CONSISTENCY FOR KENSETH, EDWARDS; OTHERS MAKE THEIR MARK FOR FORD RACING

Consistency has been the key to the start of Matt Kenseth and Carl Edwards’ 2007 NASCAR season. Kenseth, the driver of the No. 17 Fusion in Cup and the Busch Series finished third in Sunday’s Nextel Cup race at Atlanta Motor Speedway. Kenseth has been the top-finishing Fusion driver for the past three Cup races; he earned his third consecutive top-five finish and led twice on Sunday for 11 laps. “We ran pretty good overall,” said Kenseth. “We had a great day in the pits. That’s really what got us where we are or else we probably would have finished sixth or seventh, but those guys did a great job and we got another good finish out of it.”

In Saturday’s Busch Series race, Kenseth finished in ninth place as the second Ford in the field and moved up five spots in the standings to 12 th. Kenseth experienced some bad tire wear towards the end of the race. “We’d wear the right rears to the cords, and 10 laps at the end of the race – the tire wear kept getting worse as the race went on, which is unusual because it usually gets better,” said Kenseth. “It was so bad that I just had to slow down at the end or it was going to come apart.”

Carl Edwards, driver of the No. 99 Fusion in the Nextel Cup Series and the No. 60 Fusion in the Busch Series is also racing steadily in both series. Edwards finished seventh in Sunday’s Nextel Cup race and fourth in Saturday’s Busch Series race. Edwards increased his lead in the Busch standings and now leads by 144 points. Similar to Kenseth, Edwards also experienced issues with his tires in Saturday’s race. “There was a little bit of trouble with the tires all day,” said Edwards. “They had a lot of grip and they fell apart, so we just had to go cautious, [but] ended up with a great finish.”

Rick Crawford, driver of the No. 14 F-150 in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series made his 250 th career start in Friday night’s race. Crawford had a strong truck and went on to finish in fourth place, the top Ford in the field. “I felt really good for the Ford F-150 to be competing for the lead, competing for a top five and running in the top five all night long,” said Crawford. “My hat’s off to Kevin Starland in the pits for making the calls to keep that truck running up front. It was quite a night for the 250 th start for the Circle Bar Racing team.”

Another F-150 driver enjoying a great finish was Joey Clanton, driver of the No. 09 F-150, who finished in ninth place and was the top rookie of the race. Getting that finish was not easy, and the track wasn’t the only thing Clanton battled as he had trouble for most of the race trying to communicate with his team. “It was a pretty long night for me,” said Clanton. “Getting ready to go and the radios went out; we worked all night long trying just to get communication back and forth. We thought we had a lug nut loose one time and had to come in, and the guys had to take the window net down just to talk to me and figure out what was going on and why we pitted.” Clanton has only raced twice this season and has earned a top-10 finish in both races.

Kelly Bires, driver of the No. 21 F-150 finished in 10 th place and moved up eight spots in the standings to 20 th. “We don’t have a mark on this truck, so it was a good top-10, our first top 10 in the truck series and a good starting point,” said Bires. “It should get us some good points. We should be better in points than where we are, but we’re coming around. We’re consistently running in the top 10 and that’s where you need to be to win championships. We’re getting better.”

Ashley Force, driver of the Castrol GTX Mustang, earned her first professional Funny Car win in Sunday’s ACDelco Gatornationals in Gainesville, Fla. after beating Jeff Arend in the first round. Arend’s car had issues during the run and went up in smoke, allowing Force to race the rest of the run easy and take care of her car. Force advanced to the second round, but lost after dropping cylinders and hitting the wall.

During qualifying for the Gatornationals, Force’s teammate, Robert Hight, posted a 4.686 second 331.94 mph run, which is the quickest and fastest Funny Car run in track history. “We’ve run 4.60s at all three racetracks we’ve been to this year and that’s exciting,” said Hight. “I’m very fortunate to have such a fast racecar.”

The NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series and the Funny Car drivers have next weekend off, but the Busch Series and Cup Series head to Bristol, where the Car of Tomorrow hits the track for the first time in Nextel Cup competition.