Sprague, Crawford start 250th NCTS race at Atlanta

HAMPTON, Ga. -- Rick Crawford needed a challenge. Jack Sprague needed a job.

When the field takes the green flag for Friday's American Commercial Lines 200 at Atlanta Motor Speedway on Friday night, both drivers will be making their 250th Craftsman Truck Series starts.

Sprague was there at the beginning, finishing sixth in the inaugural race at Phoenix in 1995. A three-time champion, Sprague has 28 victories and 175 top-10 finishes.

By the Numbers: Atlanta

The Craftsman Truck Series has been good to three-time champion Jack Sprague. Now the driver, along with Rick Crawford, have an opportunity to reach another milestone ... both will start their 250th Truck Series race.

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"This is a great series," Sprague said. "It's a lot of fun to be involved in it. If I wasn't a racecar driver, this would be the series I'd watch on TV."

Crawford has five wins, including perhaps the most exciting finish in series history, a three-wide race to the checkered flag at Daytona in 2003. In addition, he's posted 121 top-10s since making his NCTS debut at Orlando in 1997.

"I have to agree with Jack," Crawford said. "What an exciting series to be in. I've enjoyed every minute of it."

Sprague, a Michigan native, won several Late Model short-track championships. His first foray into the Busch Series ended in disappointment, as he failed to win a race and was released from his ride near the end of the 1993 season.

For him, accepting a ride in the Trucks was a no-brainer.

"I needed a job," he said. "I needed to work at something that had a paycheck."

Crawford took more of a "wait and see" attitude at first.

"I was running in the NASCAR All-Pro Series and my boss Tom Mitchell said 'Let's give that truck series a couple of years and see if NASCAR's going to have factory backing. We might want to do that one day,' " Crawford said.

So what's the biggest change?

"It's just gotten very competitive," Sprague said. "In years past, there may have been three, four, five guys who could win these races.

"When I left the series in '01, it had gotten a little harder, but when I came back in '04 to run this series, I couldn't believe how competitive the series had become. Since then, I believe it's become 30 percent more competitive every following year since then."

Crawford mentioned three advances: the elimination of the 10-minute halfway break, improved safety specifications and the addition of Toyota. In addition, Crawford said technology is playing more of a role than ever.

"I think the engineering has played a big part in helping crew chiefs make the right decisions," Crawford said. "Drivers have had to adapt to the basic set-up of the trucks."

So what's next for the Craftsman Truck Series? Will there ever be a Truck of Tomorrow?

"If we had a Truck of Tomorrow, what would it be?" Sprague wondered. "Would we race semi rigs? I don't know."