Raymond Key knows he shouldn't be in the garage at Daytona International Speedway.
It's not because so many people, including his brother, have told the 49-year-old commercial contractor that he's crazy to start a Sprint Cup team.
The Virginia Beach resident really shouldn't be here.
"I was born dead," Key said.
Medical personnel at Johns Hopkins resuscitated the newborn, but that was the first of several obstacles Key overcame to get to here today - where his car could make the starting lineup for Sunday's Daytona 500.
After his parents divorced, he broke away from the family, quit school in the seventh grade and became what he calls "a street kid." His father, Key said, was murdered when Key was a teen. Key was sent to a South Hill, Va., farm for boys run by a church where he remained from ages 15 to 20, learning Christian values while milking cows and plowing fields.
That experience led to his involvement in Norfolk-based ForKids, which helps homeless families, and he has pledged to donate a portion of the proceeds the team earns to the program.
Key left the farm when it closed for lack of funding. He then became a laborer, starting a journey that would lead him to owning a commercial contracting company. He survived numerous accidents, including one when he nearly bled to death. Tragedy returned. One of his brothers was killed a decade ago.
Key plans to honor his father and brother with a decal on his race car should it make the 500.
"That is going to be a surprise if we make it," Key said, sitting in the lounge of the team's trailer, which he leased from his older brother Curtis, who owns a Nationwide Series team.
Making the race won't be easy. Key's car, driven by Casey Mears, is not among those 35 guaranteed a starting spot via car owner points. Three others qualified on speed last weekend and one spot is available to past champion Bobby Labonte. That leaves four spots left in the 43-car field. Two drivers not guaranteed a starting spot will make the race from each qualifying race.
The qualifying race that Mears is in features six other drivers he must beat to make the 500 for the new team, which has existed about three months.
"It's a tough race, a scary race," Key said.
Certainly, there could be something easier for Key to do than try to join NASCAR's top ranks as a new owner. Many others have attempted this venture. Few last. Lack of sponsorship often dooms those teams. Key also needs sponsorship.
Yet, he is here in the garage.
Curtis Key, though, questions his brother's way of entering the sport, starting with Cup.
"My brother is in it for the money," Curtis said. "I'm in it to race. He hasn't raced a go-kart. He hasn't raced a Matchbox car. He sees the big money in the Cup series; he thinks he can go out and get some of it. He thinks he can get a big sponsor. He doesn't realize that he needed to get into the Nationwide Series or a Truck deal where he can learn the business... work and develop a sponsor and work and develop a driver that he can bring along with him to get there.
"He's going to be one of those guys that's here today and gone tomorrow because he won't listen to nobody because he's smarter than I am."
Raymond Key, though, is not deterred.
"It's a challenge," he said. "There was a person that told me out here I could never put a team together to race in Cup. I said, 'OK, we'll see.'
"What matters to me about this whole Cup thing is that I try, I work hard at it and everybody around me tries hard and works at it and we do the best. You never know what you come up with. You never know."
