Daytona excitement sets standard in Truck openers

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- Jack Sprague won't be the only driver looking to repeat in the Craftsman Truck Series season opener Friday night at Daytona International Speedway.

Sprague stole the win in last year's race with a strong three-wide move with less than an eighth of a mile to go in the Chevy Silverado 250. But his performance the remainder of the season was lackluster, and he left his ride with Wyler Racing for Kevin Harvick Inc. and is now a teammate to longtime friend and 2007 series champ Ron Hornaday.

Last year's race-winning team now has as its driver series iron man Terry Cook, who has 248 consecutive starts and six career wins. Cook is looking for his first win at Daytona.

Ron Hornaday

Prelude to a title?

A competitor doesn't have to win the Chevy Silverado 250 to capture the Craftsman Truck Series championship. In fact, none ever has.

Travis Kvapil (2003) and Todd Bodine (2006) came the closest finishing in the runner-up position.

A driver will tell you that a win would be nice but a solid finish and a good point total will suffice. A cliché, perhaps, but history confirms it. The champion in each of the past three seasons has finished seventh or higher.

Last year's champion, Ron Hornaday, was seventh, his first top-10 finish in four trips to the 2.5-mile superspeedway.

Mike Bliss, whose team was undecided about running the full 2002 season proved to be the exception to the rule. He suffered engine failure, finished 33rd and trailed winner Pressley by a whopping 121 points, a margin he ultimately overcame with 21 consecutive races without a DNF.

The next largest post-Daytona deficit for a past champion is the 55 points by which Bobby Hamilton trailed in 2004. Ironically, Hamilton came back to win the race the following year.

Daytona finishes

NCTS Champions

Year	Driver	Finish
2000	Greg Biffle	11
2001	Jack Sprague	12
2002	Mike Bliss	33
2003	Travis Kvapil	2
2004	Bobby Hamilton	11
2005	Ted Musgrave	5
2006	Todd Bodine	2
2007	Ron Hornaday Jr.	7

• Daytona: By the Numbers

"I've been in a position to win this race on the last lap three different times," Cook said. "I am very hungry to get that first one.

"From all of our preseason testing, I can tell this team will give me a truck that can win this race. It's all about putting yourself in that position to race for the win at the end."

Staying out of trouble may sound easy enough, but Cook and Sprague know it's always around the next turn at Daytona. Last year's race had seven cautions for 34 laps, a shade above the average for the eight Truck races at Daytona.

"You're going to want to run near the front as much as you can," Cook said. "There is much less of a chance that you'll get caught up in a wreck if you're up in the top five. But even then, you're not totally in the clear."

Sprague's strategy for the race is simple: work with his teammate and hope it comes down to a last-lap fight for the win between Hornaday and him. But before that strategy comes into play, Sprague must survive.

"I like the way they both are going to drive and so hopefully when it comes down to the end [of the race], they can race each other and keep it in the family," team owner Kevin Harvick said.

Only twice in six previous Craftsman Truck starts at Daytona has Sprague made it to the finish without being involved in an accident.

"I'm definitely going to try and draft with Hornaday," Sprague said. "I hope that we can work together to push each other across the line at the checkered flag. To be honest, I would love to be first, but if it's between us at the end it will be fun. I just want to stay out of trouble all day and be there like we were last year to contend for the win."

Every one of the previous eight races has been decided by split seconds. One -- the late Bobby Hamilton's 2005 victory -- was decided by a matter of inches. And that was the only lap the 36th-place starting Hamilton led.

The track's first series race in 2000 saw Mike Wallace overtake Andy Houston between Turns 3 and 4 of the final lap. Travis Kvapil was last year's victim of the slingshot exiting Turn 4 with the lead and finishing third to Sprague and Johnny Benson.

The Chevy Silverado 250 has produced not one but two three-wide finishes. Rick Crawford edged Kvapil in 2003 with Robert Pressley finishing third.

Cook's ninth Daytona start will be his series-leading 248th consecutive start, a streak that dates to Jan. 18, 1998, at Walt Disney World Speedway.

"I have very high expectations for our team this year," said Cook, who has won six times for four different owners.

Cook's best Daytona finish of fourth came in 2000. He counts six top-10 finishes.

More streaks

• A rival now, Todd Bodine began a run of 299 consecutive starts by Truck owned by Jack Roush that dates to his eighth-place finish on Oct. 15, 1995, at the old Mesa Marin Raceway in Bakersfield, Calif.

The streak reaches a record 300 races with the running of the Chevy Silverado 250. Along the way, now-Roush Fenway Racing drivers have amassed one championship, 48 victories and five rookie of the year crowns. One -- Kurt Busch -- won the Cup title in 2004.

"The NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series is a great series to develop a driver and get him ready for the Nationwide Series or the Sprint Cup Series," said Roush, who is looking for his third Daytona winner.

Roush Fenway is fielding three teams in 2008: No. 6 of Colin Braun, No. 09 of Joey Clanton and No. 99 Erik Darnell.

• The Chevy Silverado 250 will mark the 274th consecutive time a Circle Bar Racing Ford has competed in a Craftsman Truck race.

The team, which fields Fords for Rick Crawford (No. 14) and Brendan Gaughan (No. 10), tied Ultra Motorsports for No. 2 in consecutive starts in the 2007 finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway.

The streak began Jan. 19, 1997.

"There's no other team in the series that can say they've had one driver, one owner and one sponsor for that long and we take pride in that as an organization," said Crawford, who has driven the 14 Circle Bar Ford in 246 of the team's 247 races. He failed to start one race due to injury in 2005.

The rookies

At least seven drivers from a number of different motorsports disciplines will compete for the 2008 rookie of the year crown.

The class is solid -- perhaps more so than in a number of years.

A rookie has not won a Craftsman Truck Series race since 2003 when that season's rookie of the year (and now Sprint Cup Series star) Carl Edwards posted three victories.

That drought well may end this year given the caliber of candidates and the equipment in which each will be competing.

Handicapping the class, it would seem unrealistic to pick a favorite but history falls squarely on the side of Colin Braun, a 19-year-old road-racing graduate.

Braun will drive the No. 6 Ford. The Roush Fenway Racing entry went to Victory Lane four times in 2007 with Travis Kvapil at the wheel. Crew chief Mike Beam, a 10-time series winner, again will oversee the operation..

TRG Motorsports, a powerhouse Grand American Series team, will field two candidates in its first full season. Andy Lally (No. 7 Toyota), a three-time Grand Am champion, will be paired with 2007 NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour champion Donny Lia (No. 71 Chevrolet).

Also members of this year's class are Justin Marks (No. 9 Toyota), Phillip McGilton (No. 22 Toyota), Marc Mitchell (No. 15 Chevrolet) and Brian Scott (No. 16 Chevrolet).

The class ranges in age from 19 (Braun) to Lally, who celebrated his 33rd birthday the Monday of this week.

The veterans

Five Craftsman Truck Series drivers who battled for last year's championship return to renew rivalries in 2008.

The five -- Todd Bodine, Ron Hornaday Jr., Ted Musgrave, Jack Sprague and Mike Skinner -- have rung up eight championships, 114 victories and more than $24 million in winnings.

As good as they are overall, only Sprague has won at Daytona International Speedway.

Skinner, last year's championship runner-up, returns to the No. 5 Toyota in which he led an unprecedented 24 of 25 races.

Bodine will begin his fourth full season with Germain Racing where he's won 12 races and finished third, first and fourth in series points.

Musgrave, seventh a year ago, moves to the No. 59 Toyota. The 2005 champion snapped a lengthy winless streak this past fall at Texas Motor Speedway.

Musgrave will make his 501st start in NASCAR's three national series at Daytona.

"It shows that, as a driver, I've been around the sport for a long time. It's a great milestone to hit," he said.

Skinner, a Californian who has lived in the Daytona Beach area for seven years, is excited about getting the new season started.

"I think the race is going to be just as interesting as it was last year" when the 50-year-old competitor finished fourth.

In the Loop

One of the most go-to terms in all of sports is "due," usually attached to any athlete or team who consistently steps to the brink of glory only to fall short.

That's Todd Bodine at Daytona International Speedway in the Craftsman Truck Series.

He has an incredible Daytona resume, but has yet to visit Victory Lane in any of his three races at the historic track.

Bodine has raced in each of the past three NCTS races with results of third, second and fifth. He has led laps in all three. He has an Average Running Position of 5.4, a Driver Rating of 116.2 (best among drivers with two or more starts), nine Fastest Laps Run (which is second only to Dennis Setzer's 11) and has spent 281 Laps in the Top 15 -- which, at 93 percent of the laps run, is best of any driver.

In other words, Bodine is due.

One of Bodine's key obstacles to victory is last year's winner, Jack Sprague, who has remarkable stats at Daytona: a 101.6 Driver Rating, an Average Running Position of 9.0 and 241 Laps in the Top 15.

One driver who has had surprising struggles at DIS is defending series champion Ron Hornaday Jr. In four races, Hornaday has only one top-10, an Average Running Position of 14.3 and a Driver Rating of 83.7.

NCTS, etc.

• Daytona's race is sponsored by Chevrolet, however, a Silverado truck has yet to win on the 2.5-mile superspeedway. Ford has been the dominant brand winning four -- 50 percent -- of the races held. Dodge has three wins while Toyota, the 2006-07 series manufacturers' champion, won last year's race.

• The 22-gallon fuel cell is history. The Chevy Silverado 250 is the first Craftsman Truck Series race to utilize a 17.75-gallon cell that's now standard in all three of NASCAR's national series. It is anticipated the change will result in shorter fuel windows and more pit stops.

• As in 2007, a one-inch tapered spacer (1-11/16th inch to 1-1/16th inch) between carburetor and intake manifold is required.

• Keystone Light beer is the series' pole sponsor in 2008 posting a $1,900 award to the driver with the fastest qualifying time eligible to participate in the program. Pole winners have won the Chevy Silverado 250 three times including the past two events.

• Only one previous winner, Carl Edwards, 26, has failed to celebrate his 40th birthday before winning the Chevy Silverado 250. Joe Ruttman was age 56 years three months when he won the race in 2001.

• While no driver has won at Daytona more than once, one team -- Bobby Hamilton Racing -- has three victories, the most by any one team. Current drivers Dennis Setzer (No. 18 Dodge) and Stacy Compton (No. 4 Dodge) hope to convert best finishes of sixth and 17th into win No. 4.

The Sporting News Wire Service contributed to this report.