#12 Penske South Racing driver Ryan Newman wouldn’t be surprised if the last wound up first when the 10-race “Chase for the NEXTEL Cup” ends at Homestead-Miami Speedway on November 20. “As far as the points go, we deserve to be 10th and 10th is what gets us in,” he said. “We were a 10th place team after the 26th race and we’d like to be better than that, hopefully first team after the 36th. We have a team that’s capable of being first. We’ll see if we can do that.” The 27-year-old driver opened his bid for his first series title with a test at Kentucky Speedway today. He said he is comfortable starting his second “Chase for the NEXTEL Cup” just 45 points behind series leader Tony Stewart. The South Bend, Ind., driver used today’s track time to acquire data that may help him improve on last season’s seventh-place showing in “Chase for the NEXTEL Cup.” He drove to a total of three top-three finishes during the 2004 title chase including a win in Dover, Del., a second-place finish at Phoenix International Raceway and a third-place finish in Martinsville, Va.(Kentucky Speedway PR)(9-14-2005)
