Notes: McCumbee looking to continue Kansas trend

Will Chad McCumbee (No. 8 Chevrolet) become the fifth under-25 winner of Saturday's O'Reilly Auto Parts 250 at Kansas Speedway?

If the 23-year-old McCumbee's recent performances on intermediate tracks are any indication, the answer could be yes.

Fast facts

Race	O'Reilly Auto Parts 250
Green	6:23 p.m. ET Saturday
TV	SPEED, 5:30 p.m. ET
Radio	MRN (Sirius Ch. 28), 6 p.m. ET

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He nearly won this past fall in Texas before contact with Jack Sprague (No. 2 Chevrolet) knocked McCumbee from the lead on a green-white-checkered restart.

McCumbee has led two of the three most recent races on 1.5-mile tracks including last month's stop at Atlanta where the Supply, N.C., native finished a career-best fifth. He qualified on the front row at Atlanta and Texas.

"The intermediates always have been a strength of mine," said McCumbee, whose first top-10 finish in the Craftsman Truck Series came in June 2006 at 1.5-mile Texas. "They suit my driving style."

McCumbee has a sense of "feel" greater than his Craftsman Truck experience. He agrees that was key to helping crew chief Randy Dean make the aero adjustments that nearly put the team in Victory Lane at Atlanta.

"We definitely were able to find the right balance that the truck wanted," he said.

McCumbee's best finish at Kansas is 13th, but the driver has run well there in other series.

Series director on Kansas Speedway

Craftsman Truck director Wayne Auton could very well congratulate another first-time series winner at Kansas. He also could congratulate a veteran he has many times before. At Kansas, you just don't know.

"The track consistently produces new winners -- three in seven races -- and sends up-and-coming drivers as well as veterans to Victory Lane. It's anyone's guess who might end up driving a victory lap holding the checkered flag this Saturday," Auton said.

"Kansas Speedway, by virtue of the way the track was built, makes this week's O'Reilly Auto Parts 250 a wide-open affair."

Despite being one of several 1.5-mile tracks the series visits, Kansas Speedway in unique.

"What makes Kansas Speedway so interesting and unpredictable? Unlike some of the intermediate tracks where hitting the exact racing line is critical, Kansas Speedway allows a driver to select multiple grooves in order to find out where the truck works the best. That's one good reason why a newer driver can get up to speed in short order," Auton added.

"Finally, the sweeping nature of the turns, banked less than some tracks on which we compete, allows competitors to enter side-by-side, easily pick up the throttle and keep right on racing.

Althought Auton won't predict a winner, he can predict one thing.

"Based on what we saw in Atlanta, another intermediate track, reducing horsepower increased the level of competition. That has put the outcome more in the hands of the drivers and has created the kind of race, from start to finish, that our NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series fans and competitors have come to enjoy," he said.

Kansas sets table for successful season

Winning at Kansas is often a precursor to a high finish in the final standings.

The Kansas winner has gone on to log a top-10 finish in six of the seven seasons the 1.5-mile track has been a part of the Truck Series schedule.

Mike Bliss also won the 2002 championship; four other Kansas winners -- including 2006 champion Todd Bodine (No. 30 Toyota) -- finished among the final top five.

Bliss, currently a Nationwide Series competitor, is the only driver to win multiple times in Kansas. He captured the final of five races at nearby Heartland Park Topeka, a 2.1-mile road course, in 1999.

Ironically, 2007 broke the Kansas/top-10 streak. It was good news and bad for Erik Darnell (No. 99 Ford). Darnell became the track's third first-time winner, joining Ricky Hendrick and Jon Wood. Unfortunately for Darnell, the season didn't end quite so successfully. He finished 14th overall.

Germain truck chief a Kansas City-area native

Kyle Davis, truck chief on the No. 9 Toyota driven by Justin Marks, grew up in Savannah, Mo., a small town 45 minutes from Kansas Speedway.

When he moved to the southeast hoping to break into NASCAR racing by offering his services free of charge, little did Davis know he would become a key part of one of the Truck Series' top teams.

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"I laid brick to pay the bills," said the Savannah High School graduate, former go-kart racer and Savannah Speedway champion.

As truck chief, Davis is the right arm of crew chief Jason Overstreet. "Jason decides on which chassis we will run and what he wants to do with it. I just make sure the truck setup matches up with the calls he's made."

Marks, who won pole for last year's ARCA Re/Max Series race at Kansas before finishing sixth, is tied with Phillip McGilton at the top of the rookie standings. Marks will be racing for The V Foundation this week.

"It is an honor to represent The V Foundation on our Tundra this weekend in Kansas," Marks said. "They have made an incredible impression in the fight against cancer in professional sports and we look forward to playing a small part in spreading their message. Having The V Foundation for Cancer Research on our truck this week gives us purpose beyond on-track results."

In the Loop: Skinner leads at Kansas

As the days since the race at Martinsville clicked off Mike Skinner's calendar, the race at Kansas Speedway got closer and closer. And all of a sudden, Skinner's outlook got brighter and brighter.

A former series champion, Skinner has encountered uncharacteristic troubles. After four Truck Series races, he's just 14th in the standings. Two poor finishes of 29th sandwich two strong results of eighth and third.

Skinner

But Kansas acts as an opportunity for Skinner (No. 5 Toyota) to vault back into the top 10 and get his season back on track.

In four Kansas races, Skinner's worst finish is 12th, and he's finished inside the top five in each of the past three races.

In that three-race span, Skinner has series-best numbers in Driver Rating (122.9), Average Running Position (5.5) and Laps in the Top 15 (468), and is second only to Todd Bodine in Fastest Laps Run with 65.

One other stat Skinner has going for him -- he has yet to win at Kansas. Oddly, that might help his cause. No driver has repeated at Kansas.

Another driver who has yet to visit Kansas' Victory Lane is Jack Sprague, who finished third there last season. In his past three Kansas races, Sprague has a Driver Rating of 102.7 and an Average Running Position of 13.5.

Last season, Erik Darnell was not only a first-time Kansas winner, he was a first-time winner -- period. Watch for another strong performance. Darnell has a Kansas Driver Rating of 105.0, an Average Running Position of 11.1 and 50 Fastest Laps Run.

Coming and goings

• Shane Sieg will replace Kyle Busch in Billy Ballew Motorsports' series-leading No. 51 truck at Kansas (read more). Busch is expected to return May 16 at Lowe's Motor Speedway.

• Scott Speed will drive the No. 22 Toyota for Bill Davis Racing this week at Kansas (read more). Phillip McGilton has left the organization.

• Mario Gosselin (No. 12 Chevrolet) and Michelle Theriault (No. 73 Dodge) will debut at Kansas. Gosselin is a former USAR Pro Cup champion. Theriault was 13th in NASCAR Camping World Series East competition last year.

• John Quinn has succeeded George Church at Wyler Racing as the crew chief of the No. 60 Toyota driven by Terry Cook (read more). "Let's just say John and I are both working on a Windows computer," Cook said.

• Lance Hooper, formerly with Thorsport Racing, replaces Gary Showalter at Key Motorsports as the crew chief of the No. 40 Chevrolet driven by Chad Chaffin. (read more). "We're on the same page and speaking the same language," said owner Curtis Key of the performance-related move.

Craftsman Truck Series, etc.

• Rick Crawford (No. 14 Ford) has finished second in the past two races at Kansas and in seven starts has five top-10s. "We've gotten to that point a few times, but we've just never had the perfect day that it takes to win a NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race [at Kansas]. You never say a track owes you one, but it'd sure be nice to put our Ford F-150 in Victory Lane at Kansas and erase all those memories of finishing second there."

• Mike Skinner won the Professional division of Saturday's Toyota Pro/Celebrity Race at the Long Beach (Calif.) Grand Prix. He finished .324 second behind ESPN pit reporter Jamie Little. The race featured a split start with celebrity drivers getting a 30-second handicap. "That was fun," Skinner said. "Knocked a little paint off my car and had a blast."

• Lori Hamilton, co-owner of Bobby Hamilton Racing-VA, and Yahoo Sports reporter Bob Margolis were in Atlanta on Monday as part of Head and Neck Cancer Awareness Week. They spoke with current cancer patients and conducted several media interviews with CNN and FOX. Kansas Speedway will offer free Head and Neck Cancer screenings throughout the race weekend.