* As the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series season comes to a close this weekend
at Homestead-Miami Speedway (HMS), Kasey Kahne will try to solidify his
position in the top 10 in the driver point standings.
* Kahne is currently 10th in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series driver point
standings, 65 points behind ninth-place driver Ryan Newman and 44 points
ahead of 11th-place driver Carl Edwards.
* In five starts at HMS, Kahne has one top-five and two top-10
finishes with an average finish of 18th.
* Kahne has posted four top-five starting positions at the 1.5-mile
oval and has an average starting position of sixth.
* The No. 9 Budweiser Dodge will feature a special Designate a Driver
logo on the decklid for this weekend's race in Homestead. Your
friends at Anheuser-Busch would like to remind you that the year-end
holidays from Thanksgiving through New Year's Eve provide a great
opportunity to encourage the use of designated drivers, so adults can
have fun and also get home safely.
Kahne discusses the season and racing at Homestead-Miami Speedway
Talk about racing this weekend at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
"I've always liked Homestead. That's where I won my
first Nationwide race and I've run well there in a Cup car. Every
year, we seem to qualify good there. It's a different track. The
banking...you go into Turn 1 and it is real flat and you hit the
banking and you've already started turning. It's kind of
similar in (Turn) 3 and off of (Turn) 4. It flattens out before the exit
of the corner, so it's different. Your car changes a lot. But
it's a pretty neat track and I like racing there. I like trying to
close the year out strong. We've been able to do that a couple of
times there. I made a couple of mistakes there, but hopefully we'll
close out the year strong and finish top 10 in points. That's all
that we can shoot for."
Can consistency be determined by the preparation of the racecar before it
gets to the race track? "I think so. I don't understand how
some teams get so far ahead. I do understand that when you have a car
that's right -- I've had some this year and we've
won -- it's a different ballgame. You feel like a completely
different driver. You just have to keep on working to get the cars the
best that they can be when we unload them. The teams that are winning
have them (great cars). Those drivers are doing a great job -- the
teams are doing a great job -- we need to figure out how to catch up
to them."
How would you describe your season? "I feel like we've had a
good season. I think you have to have different expectations for where
you're at in your career and where you're at with your team
and company. For where we're at, the 9 guys, our whole team,
myself included, this is probably the year that I've crashed the
least in any year that I've been in NASCAR. There are a lot of
things that we've done this year as a team that are much better
than what we've done in the past. It's just things that we
can build on and try to stick together and make progress moving into next
season."
-credit: rpm
