Ryan Joseph Newman was the first born child of Greg and Diane Newman. He was born on 8^th December 1977 in their home town of South Bend, Indiana. He has a younger sister called Jamie. Ryan attended Purdue University whilst pursuing a full time career in motor racing and graduated in 2001 with a B.Sc. in vehicle structure engineering making him the only active member of NASCAR to have a degree. With his engineering background Ryan understands what a car is designed to do, particularly on the racetrack. The combination of being a first class driver and his engineering background is what makes him a respected and successful driver in modern motor sports.

Ryan Newman in 2007 at Bristol Motor Speedway (courtesy of Wiki Commons)

Ryan’s love of the sport started when he was just four years old when he was given his first racing machine, a go-cart. From this age he went from strength to strength, winning 75 races and two championships in various Quarter Midget classes by the age of ten. At eleven years of age Ryan won the US Quarter-Midget National Championship and the All-American Midget Series championship at fifteen. In 1999 he was "Rookie of the Year" after winning the USAC Coors Light Silver Bullet championship, made his sprint debut in 2000and ran the Arca, Busch Cup programme and achieved his first career Sprint Cup pole.

Ryan and his wife, Krissie, operate the Ryan Newman Foundation. This foundation a has three line mission, firstly to educate and encourage people to spay/neuter their animals and to adopt their dogs and cats from animal shelters, the second line is to educate children and adults about the importance of conservation so the beauty of the great outdoors can be appreciated by future generations and thirdly to provide college scholarship funding through the Rich Vogler Scholarship programme to students interested in auto racing careers. Ryan, himself, received this funding. The Foundation published a charity book "Pit Road Pets: NASCAR Stars and Their Pets" which included more than forty faces of NASCAR drivers and their pets together with first person stories. 100% of the net proceeds of sales were given to humane efforts. In March of 2010 a second book was published - Pit Road Pets: NASCAR Stars and Their Pets, The Second Lap. The Newman family have five dogs that they have rescued and care for. Ryan helped with funding the North Carolina Humane Society shelter in Catawba County, the county where he once lived.

Ryan is an avid car enthusiast with a collection of fourteen cars, his favourite being a 1948 Buick Roadmaster convertible bought for him by his wife as a birthday present. He loves to work on and to drive vintage cars especially 1950’s Chryslers.

Ryan has raced in an incredible 266 races since making his debut in 2000, winning 13 with 44 poles, 68 top five and121 top ten to his credit. In 2003 he finished the season with a series-high of eight wins and eleven poles and because of the high number of poles he gained in this series he became known as "Rocket Man".

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Ryan Newman - Nascar.com
Ryan Newman Website
Ryan Newman - Wikipedia

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