#82-Scott Speed has driven a Sprint Cup car at all tracks on the schedule except one Kansas Speedway. And he hopes to cross Kansas off his to-race list this weekend. If everythings right with the car, he said, itll be all good. Or, it wont be. But I dont expect its going to be too much harder to learn. Its another mile-and-a-half track. Its certainly going to be a track thats easier to learn than, say, Darlington, which is extremely difficult. But Speeds no stranger to the 1.5-mile track that joined the NASCAR circuit eight years ago. On a Saturday afternoon in April 2008, Speed pulled double duty there, competing in the ARCA RE/MAX and Camping World Truck series. He started second and went on to win his first of four ARCA races that season. Hours later, he started and finished eighth in the truck race. All totaled, he drove 267 laps that day, which just so happens to be the same distance as Sundays Price Chopper 400. Youre certainly going to have to learn the lines and learn about where to run. I guess its kind of like a Chicago track with less banking, Speed said. I won an ARCA race there, but still, if you ask me to think about where I was running or what the track looked like that early on in my career I couldnt tell you. Im going to have to learn where to run and what groove is going to work the best for our stuff. In Sundays race at Dover, Speed slipped and slid around the concrete track most of the afternoon. No series of adjustments could cure the No. 82 Red Bull Toyotas loose condition, and Speed ended up 25th at the checkered flag. We were really great for about 10 laps every single run, but we couldnt keep any speed in the car. We kept slowing down, Speed said. We went a lap down and once youre a lap down at a place like that it seems like you go a lot of laps down right away. The #82 ranks 36th in the car owner standings 124 points out of the top 35 with eight races remaining.(TBR)(9-30-2009)
