Robbie Gordon joins Dodge for 2011 NASCAR season

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Chrysler’s official blog RedLetterDodge announced yesterday that Robbie Gordon Racing have partnered with Dodge Motorsports to run 2011 Dodge Charger stock cars for the 2011 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series.

Late last year, the new nose shape of the 2011 Dodge Charger stock car debuted and with the announcement that Robbie Gordon will be piloting this new Dodge Charger for the 2011 NASCAR season, we have our first good look at the new Charger “nose” with full race livery. As you can see in the image on the left, Gordon’s 2011 Charger will wear the #7, sponsored by Speed Energy Drinks. Gordon’s #7 Charger was introduced with two paint schemes – the bright orange shown above which is very similar to the Speed Energy livery seen on Gordon’s #77 Chevrolet Colorado Trophy Truck and a reverse scheme with an all-black Charger with orange trim. (Shown in the gallery below)

Gordon, who is known best for the fact that he races pretty much every type of vehicle in venues all over the world, has spent a few years running NASCAR with varying success. Dodge hopes to add more teams after the loss of Richard Petty Motorsports to Ford, believing that success as a brand requires a stronger group of factory-backed drivers. The one area where Gordon stands to help Dodge Motorsports the most is highly technical road courses but with those track comprising only a very small portion of the season, it will be interesting to see how Gordon does in the new 2011 Dodge Charger stock car.

As for the new 2011 Dodge Charger stock car front end, the folks at Dodge Motorsports did a great job of integrating the muscular new front end design of the 2011 Dodge Charger to the sleek stock car form. While the angle of the front end is obviously very different when comparing the 2011 Charger street car and stock car, the prominent crosshair grille that has become the main styling similarity across the brand is perfectly depicted. The headlights of the new Charger stock car offer the same scowling look at the street car and along the lower fascia the race car version even includes faux foglights, foglight openings and lower fascia trim that mimics the look of the production Charger sedan.

The 2011 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series kicks off on February 20th with the storied Daytona 500 with preliminary races for the big race starting on February 12th. Check out the gallery below for a closer look at the Robbie Gordon Dodge Charger, along with the 2011 Dodge Charger test car and click here for more on the Dodge brand at RedLetterDodge.com.

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