Benson turns favourite car into coffee table!

MBV Motorsports Pontiac chassis number #4518 used to be one of driver Johnny Benson's favourite Superspeedway cars. However after it was wrecked beyond repair in last year's Pepsi 400, it will now become one of Benson's favourite household ornaments!!

In an age where NASCAR teams have literally dozens of chassis sitting in their workshops, each to be used specifically at certain tracks, or certain types of tracks, drivers often gain an affinity towards a particular car. Kevin Harvick, for example has 'Old Glory' while many other drivers continue to refer to cars as their 'favourite' car.

Johnny Benson's favourite car was Pontiac Grand Prix chassis number 4518; at least it was until he crushed it.

4518 was the car Benson used when he led nearly 40 laps of the 2000 Daytona 500 while driving for the unsponsored Tyler Jet Motorsports team. On the back of that performance the #10 team managed to get a part-season sponsorship deal with Aaron's, which then turned into a multi-year sponsorship/co-ownership deal with Valvoline at the end of the season.

It was a car that ran well at most Superspeedway races after that, including further top 15 performances at Talladega and Daytona later that year and several more top ten and top 15 performances over the next season and a half. But it was also the car he was racing in the top 10 at the Pepsi 400 in Daytona last year when he was wrecked on lap 8.

Benson suffered three broken ribs on his right side in that wreck and missed the Chicago and New Hampshire races, further spoiling an already injury-hit season for the likeable Michigan born driver.

The team retired the car, but Benson didn't want to let go of his favourite Superspeedway chariot.

So what do you do when you are a race car driver who has a car you really likes but it's too damaged to race again?

It's easy. You make it into a coffee table for your race shop.

Last month, Benson took the damaged Valvoline Pontiac up to a salvage yard in Statesville, North Carolina and crushed the car into a cube.

Now he's going to make it in a table to put it in his race shop.

"Hey, it was a great car," said Benson. "I didn't want to get rid of it so we put it to some good use. It's going to be the #10 Valvoline coffee table now instead of a Pontiac."

Benson is putting the finishing touches on the table and expects to be complete in a few months.

"It will look good when I get done. I guess you would call it a really heavy cube right now. It was just something to do for an afternoon."

Benson races again on July 5th in Daytona. Obviously, with a new car.

"Hopefully, this time we will get a trophy we can put on the table," he said. "I don't plan on making another table out of a race car ever again."