Pit strategy foils Truex, No. 78 team late

Posted on May 9, 2015 by Nascar

Kansas run still marks Furniture Row’s 10th top-10 finish of 2015

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KANSAS CITY, Kan. — A late-race call for fuel only might have been "the worst thing you could have done there," said Martin Truex Jr., the driver who led more laps than anyone in Sunday night’s SpongeBob SquarePants 400.

Proof was on the race track, where Truex, 34, was unable to catch the folks in front of him or hold off those behind during a final six-lap shootout at Kansas Speedway.

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It was on the scoreboard, too, where the formidable No. 78 Furniture Row Racing Chevrolet finally appeared in the ninth position. Instead of battling defending series champion and points leader Kevin Harvick for what might have been his third career NASCAR Sprint Cup Series victory, Truex was left to mull over what could have been.

"We ended up being the last guy with no tires," Truex said of the call that brought him and a handful of others running low on fuel to pit road. "Everybody else behind us had two (tires) and they ate us up on the restart."

Fuel mileage was already a concern for the front-runners when Ricky Stenhouse Jr. brought out the ninth and final caution of the race on Lap 256 of the 267-lap race.

Harvick (Stewart-Haas Racing) and Truex Jr., running 1-2, were among those that hit pit road. Four others — eventual race winner Jimmie Johnson and Hendrick Motorsports teammate Dale Earnhardt Jr., Kurt Busch (SHR) and Jeff Gordon (HMS) did not and started up front.

Truex, taking fuel only, was first off pit road and restarted fifth with Harvick on his outside. With two fresh tires and fuel, Harvick charged toward the front; Truex, meanwhile, went nowhere.

"It was fun. … Bad finish, good run. What are you going to do?" Truex said on pit road.

"It was a good run for us. It was a lot of fun all night long to run like that. I’m just proud of all my guys to bring a fast car like that. It was disappointing to run like that and not be in position to win it there at the end, but on the flip side, what a great run for us. That’s a sign of things to come I think and we’ll just keep working hard."

Although winless, Truex sits second in points, 46 behind Harvick. Among the single-car teams competing each week, the FRR bunch is clearly the class of that field.

And it’s closed the gap on the bigger teams, as well.

"I’ve never come out on the right end of one of these fuel mileage deals and I hate when it comes down to that," he said. "We had a shot to win it there if that last caution didn’t come out. We were right there with Harvick, just saving a little bit of fuel and waiting until about 10 to go to really put the hammer down.

"It would have been nice to have raced him heads-up and see if we could have beaten him because I thought we had a shot at it. All in all, it was a good night, just not a great finish."

Truex led five times for 95 laps.

Crew chief Cole Pearn made the call for fuel only, but Truex wasn’t about to take his team’s leader to task for the move.

"He’s taken gambles when he needed to that paid off, he’s been smart when he needed to, he’s done everything right," Truex said. "And tonight he just — he didn’t make the right call. …

"Hindsight is 20/20. He’s done a great job this year of calling races … and I just want to make sure that he doesn’t get his confidence down, because he’s been so good at it. Live and learn. He’ll learn from tonight and get better next time around, and he’s doing a great job."

Posted on May 9, 2015 by Nascar

The 33-year-old driver to stay with team through 2020 season

SHOP: NASCAR gear | RELATED: Allmendinger inks multiyear deal with Kroger

KANSAS CITY, Kan. — NASCAR Sprint Cup Series driver AJ Allmendinger has signed a five-year extension to remain with JTG Daugherty Racing, a move that will keep him in the No. 47 Chevrolet through the 2020 season.

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Allmendinger, 33, competed in nine Sprint Cup races with the team in 2013 before taking over the driving duties fulltime for the ’14 season. A victory at Watkins Glen International was his first in the Sprint Cup Series, the first for the organization and secured a berth in last year’s Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup.

While he and the team failed to advance to past the opening Challenger Round of the Chase, his 13th-place points finish was a career best.

The team is co-owned by husband and wife Tad and Jodi Geschickter as well as former NBA star Brad Daugherty. It was recently announced that The Kroger Company had increased its funding for the single-car team, serving as primary sponsor for 17 races this season and 24 in ’16.

"It goes along with this Kroger deal and a lot of the companies we have," Allmendinger said of his contract extension during a press conference prior to Saturday night’s SpongeBob SquarePants 400 at Kansas Speedway (7:30 p.m. ET, FOX Sports 1, MRN, Sirius XM). "… The great thing is we’ve got a lot of sponsors; the tough thing is trying to remember them all. My suit weighs like 12 pounds now. It’s a good problem to have.

"With that said, those sponsors are here long-term; Tad and I did a new deal through 2020 which to me was just a no-brainer. Tad and Jodi have been such a big influence on my life outside the race car. Inside the race car it’s great to have a job and be here for a long time but what they mean to me outside the car is family, people I consider some of my best friends. Kind of a renewed love of the sport they’ve given me, just a different outlook. … Tad handed me the contract and I flipped to the back page and signed it and said ‘here you go.’"

Allmendinger has 237 career starts in the Sprint Cup Series. He is also a two-time winner in the XFINITY Series.

"Anybody that knows me they see my passion that I have, I always try to go out there and try to be better," he said. "It pushes me and my life every day. This race team, I really take everything to heart because I know how hard (they) work, what they give us and the effort they put into this race team. And I think sponsors see that too."

Allmendinger enters tonight’s race at Kansas Speedway 19th in points. He has two top-10 finishes in 10 starts this season.

Posted on May 8, 2015 by

Erik Jones leads 151 laps, but runs dry with five to go

KANSAS CITY, Kan. – Matt Crafton didn’t have the fastest truck in Friday night’s Toyota Tundra 250 at Kansas Speedway, but he had the best feel for fuel mileage and what his crew chief would call their lucky fuel cell. The result was Crafton’s seventh series career victory.

With truck after truck pulling to the inside of the 1.5-mile Kansas oval over the last five laps with empty fuel cells, Crafton cruised over the finish line with only a few drops of fuel left in his ThorSport Racing Toyota Tundra.

"It was not the winning truck," Crafton said after getting to Victory Lane. "We were definitely a second-place truck."

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The truck that obviously was the fastest was the No. 4 Kyle Busch Motorsports Toyota Tundra of rookie Erik Jones. It led 151 of 167 laps and was comfortably in the lead with four laps to go.

But it was also one of those trucks which ran short of fuel at the end. It wound up 11th.

"It just sucks – we had by far the best truck," Jones said after the race. "We were up to an 11-second lead at one point and it’s just so terrible for these guys when we bring that fast of a truck. We couldn’t bring the win home and I saved as much as I could most of the run. The 19 (Tyler Reddick) made us run pretty hard. Being eight laps short, I don’t know how the 88 (Crafton) made it. It’s too bad, we’ll have to bring another fast truck next weekend to Charlotte and we’ll go get a win there."

RELATED: Jones dominating run goes dry

Also running out of fuel while in contention for the victory in the final laps after Jones dropped out were Reddick and Daniel Suarez.

The victory was the second of the season for Crafton, the defending series champion, and his second in the last three NASCAR Camping World Truck Series races at Kansas. That made him the first driver to win more than once at the track located on the far west side of Kansas City.

"I heard somebody say that to me before the race," Crafton, who led a total of six laps, said of the Kansas landmark win. "I said, ‘Two times.’"

The victory allowed Crafton to pad his points lead to 17 points over Reddick as he attempts to win a third-straight series championship.

"You’ve got to be close enough to sneak one out once in a while," Crafton said. "I’ve lost some like this so every once in a while when you steal one I don’t feel too bad about it."

After the race, Crafton’s crew chief, Carl Joyner gave credit to a particular fuel cell which he said has given his trucks better fuel mileage for some reason.

Sprint Cup regular Ryan Newman, driving a truck owned by former Kansas Sprint Cup race winner Joe Nemechek and making his first truck series start since 2013, finished second.

Newman was in the seat as a favor to Nemechek, who is in the process of grooming his son John Hunter for the ride.

"Trying to teach John Hunter a little bit of what I’ve experienced on pit road, how to get everything you possibly can," Newman said. "But that wasn’t my main goal. My goal was to come here and win."

Johnny Sauter finished third. Rounding out the top five were veteran Timothy Peters and rookie Cameron Hayley.

Jones, who won the pole earlier in the day with a lap at 179.396 mph, led the first 43 laps.

For the first 30 or so laps of those, Crafton stayed close to the young driver from Michigan. But then Jones began to pull away. On Lap 38, Jones’ lead over Crafton was four seconds.

But on Lap 41, a caution flag waved and on the ensuing stops, Crafton beat Jones out of the pits to take the lead.

On Lap 48, back came Jones to take the lead and once out in clean air again, he began to pull away. On Lap 60, his lead was 2.9 seconds. He would lose that margin – and the lead – as he was beat out of the pits after yellow flag stops that began on Lap 67 by Newman.

But on the restart, he left Newman behind. By Lap 88, Jones’ lead was six seconds. By Lap 105, it was over 10 seconds on Newman.

On Lap 109, the caution waved again and, once again, Jones’ lead was erased as he was beaten off pit road by Reddick, who was involved in a crash with his Brad Keselowski Racing teammate and started the race from the back in his backup truck.

But once again the restart, Jones moved back to the front and began to move to a seemingly comfortable lead.

But only seemingly.

"I didn’t know how short we were, but I knew the fuel window," Jones, who will make his first Sprint Cup Series start Saturday night in Kansas, said. "I knew we had to save and I couldn’t give the lead up to the 19 (Tyler Reddick) at that point. If a caution would have come out – losing track position is so big this year, if we would have lost the lead then we would have never been able to get it back. It’s just a shame. I saved as much as I could there later on and it just wasn’t enough. Eight laps short, we just couldn’t do it. We had a fast Tundra and it’s just a shame we couldn’t bring it home for these guys."

Posted on May 8, 2015 by

Team Penske takes two of top three spots in the starting grid

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KANSAS CITY, Kan. – Joey Logano strengthened his standing as the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series’ 2015 Qualifying Meister on Friday night as he won the Coors Light Pole Award for Saturday night’s SpongeBob SquarePants 400 at Kansas Speedway (7:30 p.m. ET, FOX Sports 1, MRN, SiriusXM).

The pole was the fourth in 11 attempts this year for the Team Penske driver and his second in the last three weeks.

"Definitely cool to get another pole," Logano said.

Logano, who had never won more than two poles in a season in his previous six full seasons in Cup, was asked about his sudden ability to dominate in qualifying.

"Last year it took us pretty much the whole year to get one pole," he said. "We won a lot of first and second sessions but we’d fall on our face in the third session. So it’s pretty special to be able to figure out these third sessions and still have a lot of speed in our car when we get to those rounds. You don’t get anything for winning the first and second rounds is what I figured out last year."

Logano nailed the pole with a lap at 192.397 mph and in 28.067 seconds in his Team Penske Ford. It was a lap that knocked teammate Brad Keselowski (who posted a lap at 191.857 mph/28.146 seconds) off the pole and it was a lap that kept Kasey Kahne (191.911 mph/28.138 seconds) of Hendrick Motorsports from knocking Logano off late in the third and final round of knockout qualifying.

Keselowski will start P3 on Saturday.

Next to him in the second row will be Martin Truex Jr. in his No. 78 Furniture Row Racing Chevrolet.

There were several surprises in Friday’s qualifying session.

Perhaps the biggest of those was the performance of Erik Jones. The 18-year-old Jones, who is occupying the seat of the No. 18 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota because of the injury to regular driver Kyle Busch, was making his first qualifying run in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series. Jones responded by advancing to the final round and then putting down a lap that was sixth fastest.

"I thought it was pretty good," Jones, who earlier in the day posted the fastest lap in the final Cup practice of the day, said. "It was nice to make the final round, it was good for us. Our teammates are pretty fast this weekend and I’ve been leaning on them."

Another interesting surprise was Greg Biffle. Biffle, driving the No. 16 Ford, became the first Roush Fenway Racing driver to advance to a final round of knockout qualifying. His lap at 191.015 mph was the seventh fastest of the final round.

"We just got a little better speed in our car and this race track has been pretty good for us," Biffle, a former winner at Kansas, said. "We barely made the first round and barely made the second and then I just drove it – over drove it. I just said I was going to go for it. I didn’t care what happened. I was 11th so I kind of had nothing to lose and that is a hell of an improvement and a great accomplishment. The fact is though that we have to find that speed for the race now and we are celebrating a seventh and three years ago we would be mad right now. I am excited we are seventh and not 27th but at the same time we will keep our head down and keep improving on it."

Carl Edwards, who during a press conference earlier on Friday beat himself up pretty badly for getting off to a slow start in his first year with Joe Gibbs Racing, advanced to the final round of qualifying and will start fifth.

"We’ve really tried to focus all of our efforts," Edwards said after qualifying. "We’ve had bad luck and some problems and it’s time to really get going here. Everybody has really stepped up and our Stanley Toyota is great. If we can just have a good, solid race tomorrow and perform the way we know we can, then it’s going to be great. And Erik Jones has helped a ton today too so everybody is coming together and hopefully it yields a good result."

Edwards led the first round of qualifying as he went out early in the 20-minute session, posted a lap at 192.342 mph. Second fastest was Logano of with a lap at 191.904 mph.

In the second, 24-driver round, Truex Jr. went out to take his lap with just over five minutes left in the 10-minute round and responded with a session-best lap at 191.986 mph. It was a lap that kept Edwards from topping both sessions.

Failing to make the third round were such notables as six-time champion Jimmie Johnson of Hendrick Motorsports, teammate Dale Earnhardt Jr., and former series champions Tony Stewart and Matt Kenseth.

The only driver to miss the race was Brendan Gaughan, who was driving the No. 62 of Premium Motorsports.

Posted on May 8, 2015 by

Find out what legends Earnhardt Jr. would put up there

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KANSAS CITY, Kan. – One of the best ways to determine a sport’s all-time legends is to simply pose the question: "If someone built a Mount Rushmore for ‘Sport X,’ who would be on it?"

So that’s exactly the question we posed … to Dale Earnhardt Jr.

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So, Dale, whose faces would you carve in the side of a South Dakota mountain?

"My mind goes back to the 70’s and stuff … Richard (Petty) would have to be there," Earnhardt said Friday at Kansas Speedway. "It would be so tough. I would probably walk out of here and think of four more, but the guys that stand out to me are Richard and my father (Dale Earnhardt), David Pearson."

Okay, we’re with you so far – that’s 381 Sprint Cup Series victories and 17 championships spread out between the three NASCAR Hall of Famers.

But whose face gets etched in stone as the fourth?

"The fourth is a toss-up between guys like (Cale) Yarborough and Bobby Allison and Darrell Waltrip, obviously.

"Jeff Gordon, Jimmie (Johnson) (have) got to be in that conversation."

Pretty high praise for his Hendrick Motorsports teammates, considering they’re still padding their respective resumes as active drivers in the series.

Then again, Gordon and Johnson aren’t your typical surefire Hall of Famers. The duo serve as two of the strongest faces of NASCAR and each individually dominated the sport for extended periods of time.

Look no further than Johnson’s record five straight Cup titles. He won a sixth in 2013.

"(Johnson) could even probably be the third guy. I would imagine definitely Jimmie would be on there," Earnhardt said. "But the fourth could just be about a handful of guys. You would get a different opinion from probably everybody in the room maybe."

Posted on May 8, 2015 by

Full-time rookie pleased with 2015 Truck Series performance

KANSAS CITY, Kan. — Take a look at the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series standings.

At the top, you see familiar names — two-time defending champion Matt Crafton, Brad Keselowski Racing product Tyler Reddick, 18-year-old phenom Erik Jones, 2012 series champion James Buescher …

But there’s also another, lesser-known name — Ray Black Jr.

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With just 11 NASCAR national series starts under his belt — all of which have come in the Truck Series over the past two seasons — many fans aren’t familiar with the SS Green Light Racing driver.

"I’d say we’re doing a really good job with the team we have," Black said Thursday at Kansas Speedway. "We’re growing a lot. This is our first full season with them and they’re really respected in the series, and they’ve been around for a long while. (Team owner) Bobby Dotter is a good guy and he’s taken us under his wing and showed us the ropes and I’m glad to be able to give him a good season so far."

With an average finish of 23.0 in seven starts scattered throughout last season behind the wheels of the Nos. 07 and 08 Chevrolets, Black struggled to find the stability necessary to make much noise. Shuffling through three different crew chiefs (Doug Weddle, Keith Wolfe and Jason Miller) will do that.

Now that he’s secured a full season with the team and seems to have found a fit with Miller, the results are already showing.

Black came out of the gate firing with a fifth-place finish at Daytona and hasn’t looked back.

"I like the bigger tracks because I like to go fast. (Daytona) played out very well," Black said "It’s just all luck there. You just kind of ride and stay on the bottom and stay out of trouble, but I don’t know. We got really lucky there with two big wrecks and somehow stayed out of both of them. I don’t know how we did, but somebody was looking out for us.

"We ran good at Atlanta, we were in the top 15 and … had some problems with the truck and couldn’t finish the race, which limited us to 25th place. Things like that, that’s 10 spots right there and 10 points. We’d be doing a lot better if it wasn’t for those circumstances, I’d say."

Ten extra points would’ve had him in sixth heading into Friday’s Toyota Tundra 250, ahead of John Wes Townley and one point behind Buescher.

After Black recovered with a 13th-place finish at Martinsville, the series had more than a month of downtime before getting back on track. The driver — who moonlights as a certified scuba instructor, once leaving racing for two years to focus on that — spent that time diving in his private spring, surfing and road-tripping, but also thinking about how he’d approach Kansas.

A blown engine on Lap 110 sent Black to a 21st-place finish in the Toyota Tundra 250. That puts him ninth in the standings heading to Charlotte.

Black has developed a close, mentoring relationship with his spotter, Stevie Reeves, who also spots for Paul Menard in the Sprint Cup Series. The advice he’s gotten from Reeves has proven invaluable thus far.

"(Stevie’s) really helpful and he tells me what I’m doing wrong or if I need to change something or try something or whatever it is," Black said. "That’s usually who I look to, to help me out. Just because they can tell you all day (what to do), but it’s when you’re out there on the track that I really see it and feel it the most.

"(The best advice he’s given me) is just give and take. You’ve got to respect other drivers. They’re long races. I’ve come up running 25-lappers and there’s no give-and-take at those kind of things. These races are 200 laps-plus, so you’ve got to make sure you know who you’re racing with because some of these drivers are different and some are more aggressive than others. Some are good to follow and some aren’t. He’s really smart on that edge and he looks out for me so I have to give him props."

Posted on May 8, 2015 by

Get caught up for the SpongeBob SquarePants 400 (Sat., 7:30 p.m. ET, FS1)

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What: 5th Annual SpongeBob SquarePants 400
When: Saturday, May 9, 2015
Where: Kansas Speedway, Kansas City, Kansas
TV/Radio: FOX Sports 1, MRN/SiriusXM
Distance: 267 laps (400.5 miles)
Time: 7:30 p.m. ET
Pit Road Speed: 45 mph
Caution Car Speed: 55 mph
Competition Caution: Lap 25

On The Front Row | Full starting lineup | See all 43 cars
1. Joey Logano, Team Penske No. 22 Ford (192.397 mph)
2. Kasey Kahne, Hendrick Motorsports No. 5 Chevrolet (191.911 mph)

Failed To Qualify
Brendan Gaughan, Premium Motorsports No. 62 Chevrolet

Fastest In Practice
First Practice: Kevin Harvick, Stewart-Haas Racing No. 4 Chevrolet (190.772 mph) | Results
Final Practice: Erik Jones, Joe Gibbs Racing No. 18 Toyota (191.306 mph) | Results

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Driver Rating
Best driver rating average at Kansas based on past 14 races:
Jimmie Johnson, Hendrick Motorsports No. 48 Chevrolet (112.1)
Matt Kenseth, Joe Gibbs Racing No. 20 Toyota (105.6)
Kyle Larson, Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates No. 42 Chevrolet (103.9)
Greg Biffle, Roush Fenway Racing No. 16 Ford (102.8)
Jeff Gordon, Hendrick Motorsports No. 24 Chevrolet (100.5)

Defending SpongeBob SquarePants 400 Champion
Jeff Gordon, Hendrick Motorsports No. 24 Chevrolet

Former Kansas Winners In Field
Jeff Gordon (3); Greg Biffle, Jimmie Johnson, Matt Kenseth, Tony Stewart (2), Denny Hamlin, Kevin Harvick, Brad Keselowski, Joey Logano, Ryan Newman (1)

Happy and Sad
Former Kansas winner Kevin Harvick had an interesting Friday at Kansas Speedway, topping the first practice session with a speed of 190.722 mph, then inexplicably placed 35th in the final session at 185.471 mph.

The Mentee Teaches
Carl Edwards has a new teammate this weekend in 18-year-old Erik Jones, filling in for the injured Kyle Busch in the No. 18 Toyota. Jones just happened to top final practice — heading into what will be his first Sprint Cup Series start.

"I haven’t talked with Erik (Jones) much. I talked to him a little bit today. As fast as he is … the advice will be going the other direction it seems like. He’s very good and it’s really exciting to see someone that fast.

A Racetrack Under the Sea?
Saturday’s forecast calls for heavy rain, putting the status of throwing the green flag into question. Thankfully, SpongeBob SquarePants – whom the race is named after – is, you know, a sponge, so hopefully he can aid the Air Titans in drying the track if it’s necessary.

Coming From the Back
Brad Keselowski holds the distinction of winning after qualifying deepest in the field, winding up in Victory Lane after starting 25th in 2011. The race has been won from the pole four times (Joe Nemechek, 2004; Johnson, 2008; Kenseth, 2013; Harvick 2013).

Home Sweet Home?
Three Sprint Cup Series drivers consider Kansas/Missouri home, but not all three consider Kansas Speedway their home track. Here’s what Clint Bowyer (Emporia, Kansas), Carl Edwards (Columbia, Missouri) and Jamie McMurray (Joplin, Missouri) said what a win would mean for them.

Bowyer: "It would be awesome to win here. We’re going to need a hospital if we win here. … If we win, there could be a flamethrower in Victory Lane."

Edwards: "The thought of winning here, winning that (Camping World Truck Series) race here, I could hear the crowd over the engine – I’d never heard that before. I never had anything like that happen. There’s so many people from my hometown and so many people that I’ve raced with that are going to be here, to run well here would be special."

McMurray: "This isn’t a home track because we’ve all raced here the same amount of times. It’s not like we grew up racing here. It would be special to win here, but it would be special to win anywhere."

Posted on May 8, 2015 by

Defending race winner eyes another Kansas victory

SHOP: Gordon gear | POLL: Who will win at Kansas?

KANSAS CITY, Kan. – A year ago this time, a winless Jeff Gordon pulled into Kansas Speedway coming off a disappointing, 39th-place finish at Talladega Superspeedway.

The four-time champion sat down at the press room podium on Friday in a similar position – winless, coming off a 31st-place ‘Dega finish in a race he started on the pole.

Only difference?

He arrived at the 1.5-mile speedway as the points leader through 10 races last season, while he stands mired in 13th ahead of Saturday night’s SpongeBob SquarePants 400 (Saturday, 7:30 p.m. ET, FOX Sports 1, MRN, SiriusXM).

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Gordon, of course, wound up winning last season’s spring Kansas race, helping propel him to one of his best seasons in years. While the No. 24 Chevrolet squad’s intermediate program hasn’t exactly been where Gordon would hope in 2015, his comfort level and past history – he won the first two races here – at Kansas set him among the favorites for Saturday.

WATCH: See how Gordon won the first race at Kansas

"I do like this track and I think our chances are always good when we come to Kansas," Gordon said Friday. "But I’m the first one to admit that our mile-and-a-half program is not up to par with a couple of other teams that seem to be beating us every weekend on these types of tracks.

"No one’s working harder than (crew chief) Alan Gustafson and our group to find that extra speed and get ourselves in position to win races more consistently. There’s a lot of ways to win, so it’s not always guaranteed that you have to have the fastest car. But we pride ourselves on having the fastest car and we’re not going to settle for anything other than that."

The "other teams" that Gordon alluded to – with a wry smile, naturally – are almost certainly the No. 4 Stewart-Haas Racing Chevrolet (of Kevin Harvick, with whom Hendrick Motorsports has a technical alliance) No. 48 HMS Chevy (of teammate Jimmie Johnson) and No. 22 Team Penske Ford (of Joey Logano). Kurt Busch‘s No. 41 SHR Chevy could also be thrown in there, given how fast it’s been overall, though the 2004 champ missed the season’s first two intermediate races.

Consider that group among the few that have figured out the speedway since its repave at the end of 2012, and the few – Gordon included – that have a serious shot at holding a giant, yellow trophy with SpongeBob’s face on it Saturday night.

"With the repave, I’m always concerned with how competitive we’re going to be on a track where we’ve been so competitive when things change. But I think we proved last year that we can still be very competitive here," Gordon said. "We had a great race. Kevin (Harvick) was extremely strong but we were right there with him. Under the green-flag stop, we were able to get the lead and complete it. So this year we’re certainly optimistic about coming back here with how well we ran here last year that we can repeat that performance. We’re certainly excited about the weekend."

Gordon said that while he’s had so much success throughout his expansive NASCAR career at numerous tracks – and that many rank among his favorites – Kansas is easily a "top-five" for him.

"I’m certainly very comfortable and enjoy this track. But you’re talking about going against tracks like Indianapolis, which certainly goes to the top of my list, or Bristol or Michigan are ones that stand out. I like a lot of tracks, so it’s hard to grade them in any way. But Kansas is certainly way up there."

As for hometown favorite and fellow competitor Clint Bowyer?

"Clint Bowyer on the other hand," Gordon said, jokingly, as the jovial Michael Waltrip Racing driver walked into the interview room as Gordon was wrapping up. "He’s somewhere in my top 15 or 20 drivers of all-time."

Posted on May 8, 2015 by Staff Report

See where your favorite driver will pit Saturday night (7:30 p.m. ET, FS1)

SHOP: Logano gear | RELATED: See all 43 cars at Kansas | Full starting lineup

Joey Logano won the Coors Light Pole for Saturday’s SpongeBob SquarePants 400 (7:30 p.m. ET, FOX Sports 1, MRN, SiriusXM), and the No. 22 Team Penske Ford will pit in the No. 1 stall at the exit of pit road.

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For the second consecutive race, Kasey Kahne qualified on the front row, and he chose the No. 38 stall for his No. 5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet toward the entrance to pit road with an opening in front of him.

Logano’s Team Penske teammate, Brad Keselowski, qualified third and will pit in the 18th stall, four boxes off of the start-finish line toward Turn 1. Martin Truex Jr. was fourth-fastest in qualifying, and he will pit in the No. 7 stall with his No. 78 Furniture Row Chevrolet with an opening behind him.

Carl Edwards qualified fifth and will start across the opening from Truex in the eighth stall with his No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota. Kevin Harvick will start sixth, and he’ll pit his No. 4 Stewart-Haas Racing Chevrolet in the fifth stall.

Greg Biffle was seventh in qualifying, and he will pit his No. 16 Roush Fenway Ford in the second stall next to pole-sitter Logano.

Posted on May 8, 2015 by Staff Report

See where your favorite driver will pit on Friday night (8:30 p.m. ET, FS1)

RELATED: Full race lineup

The pit stall assignments are out for Friday night’s Toyota Tundra 250 (8:30 p.m. ET, FOX Sports 1, MRN, SiriusXM) and 21 Means 21 Pole Award winner Erik Jones had his pick of stalls on pit road.

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Jones will have the pit stall closest to the pit road exit and will have no one in front of him when he goes to exit his stall.

Two-time defending NASCAR Camping World Truck Series champion Matt Crafton will have an opening in front of him on pit road as well. The ThorSport Racing driver will start on the front row next to Jones.

Brandon Jones (starting third), Johnny Sauter (starting seventh), Cameron Hayley (starting ninth), Spencer Gallagher (starting 14th) and Ray Black Jr. (starting 16th) have openings in front of them on pit road.

Tyler Young (starting 17th) has the first pit stall closest to the entrance of pit road.

The Toyota Tundra 250 is the fourth of 23 races in the 2015 Camping World Truck Series season.