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New Hampshire International Speedway
Busch 200

New Hampshire Int'l Speedway

Mid-Week Report

Heading into this season, the main objective of the Harrah's Racing Team was to improve the bottom line (better starts and better finishes) at every track we visit in 2002. I've got a year of Busch Series racing under my belt, my communication with crew chief Jon Wolfe is a lot better than it was as a rookie, and this whole team has had a year to gel.

Although we're still prone to some of the slip-ups and problems that plague young teams, we've been able to take all that we learned from last season and successfully apply that information from 2001 laps to 2002 races. We've been making progress, including a pair of top-10s at Rockingham and Talladega, but it's never been more apparent than the three-race stretch we're in now – Richmond, New Hampshire and Nazareth.

In their first years of Busch Series competition, some drivers are challenged by the high-speed racing on the speedways like Daytona, Talladega, California and Michigan – I haven't had problems there. It's the short, flat, handling tracks like Richmond and NHIS and the one we're headed for in Nazareth that have given me the most trouble.

An injury late in the year prevented me from improving on a 38th-place start and a 27th-place finish in the first race at Richmond last season – so returning two weeks ago to start and finish in the top-20 (18th / 20th) has me anxious to come back in September. New Hampshire last weekend held the same challenge; it's a tough place to get around and experience is the only thing that makes it easier. Last season, a 28th-place finish after a qualifying run of 33rd made for a long day in Loudon. So, coming back to NHIS to qualify 23rd and post another top-20 (19th) really showed the progress the Harrah's team has made in its second year.

We've been able to apply last year's lessons to this year's races to take a step up in 2002; however, it's the race in Nazareth this weekend that should really show where we are as a team. Although we were much more competitive in Richmond and Loudon, we still weren't able to get the car to handle through the corners, especially on long runs. Simply put, most anyone with a good engine can run down the backstretch; but, if you can't run through the corners, you can't run with the leaders – and that's our goal.

Last season, Nazareth was one of those tracks where we knew coming in that we'd just have to pay our dues, and we did – qualifying 28th, finishing 26th, and learning from the teams that had been there before. Before the weekend started, I even got a tour of the track from defending Busch Series Champion Jeff Green, who had great insight into how to drive the track – unfortunately, none of his advice worked for me.

Nothing can really prepare you for Nazareth – it's a track that is as close to a road course as a track that starts and finishes in the same place can get, with an actual change in elevation as you enter and literally run down the long backstretch.

The Harrah's crew has worked harder, and smarter, this week than any other time in our history. We know that we've got a good car for Nazareth – our challenge is to take the basics from last year and combine them with what we learned over the past two weeks to improve on what was a very long day in 2001. We're fortunate enough to be taking the same car to Nazareth that we ran in Richmond and Loudon, so Jon and the crew have been poring over those notes to get the car to turn better.

In Nazareth it's the corners, there are either three or five depending on who you talk to, that make the track so unique. I count three big sweeping turns, but understand where some drivers come up with five – maybe it's how your car is handling that determines the math. From the green flag, you enter Turn 1 (Corners 1 & 2) at a flat angle that dumps you out onto the long backstretch to Turn 2 (Corners 3 & 4) where you carry a lot of speed through out on to the frontstretch to the finish line in the middle of the dogleg that is Turn 3 (Corner 5). Turn 2 is where we'll find out how well we've done our homework – if we can carry all that speed from the backstretch to the frontstretch we'll run with the leaders. That's our goal.

Thanks for all your support.