Down with Dover: Sorenson has four starts at “The Monster Mile” – three in Busch Series competition and one in NEXTEL Cup. His Busch stats included a runner-up finish, a fourth-place effort and 10th in the spring of this year. His only NEXTEL Cup start at the track resulted in a 19th-place finish.
Making a Pass: Based on NASCAR’s NEXTEL Cup Series loop statistics, Reed Sorenson ranks fourth in the total number of passes (2124) made under green flag conditions through 27 races. His strong points seem to be in the turns where he ranks first in all turns combined with 1207 passes, most of which have come in Turns 2 (275) and Turns 4 (313), categories he leads as well.
CoT Test: Reed Sorenson and his Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates teammate Casey Mears tested the Car of Tomorrow on Tuesday at Nashville Superspeedway.
Chassis: Crew Chief Jimmy Elledge and the No. 41 Target Team have selected chassis #206 for this weekend’s NEXTEL Cup event at Dover. Thus far in ’06 the team has used the car at the first California race (21st-place finish), Las Vegas (40th), the NEXTEL Open (14th), first Pocono (36th) and Indianapolis (30th). In 2005 the Target team ran this car a total of 11 races with driver Casey Mears. The team recorded six top-10 finishes and two top-five finishes, including a sixth-place effort at Indianapolis and two near victories in the final events of the season at Texas Motor Speedway (fourth) and Homestead-Miami Speedway (fifth).
NEXTEL Cup Points Report: Sorenson and the No. 41 team maintained 22nd in the overall standings after their 17th-place finish in the last event at New Hampshire. With a total of 2722 points, the team is 67 points out of 20th and 193 out of the top 15.
Rookie Round Up: Sorenson is currently third in the Raybestos Rookie of the Year standings with 189 points. He trails leader Denny Hamlin by 71 points and second place Clint Bowyer by 19. Sorenson has captured rookie of the race honors in five of the 27 races run thus far in ’06 (Atlanta – 10th, Martinsville – 12th, Michigan – fifth, Chicagoland – seventh, Michigan 2 - eighth).
Busch Series Update: The Busch Series returns to action this weekend at Dover after a one-week hiatus. Sorenson currently sits 10th in the overall Busch Series driver standings and he is only 67 points out of ninth place.
Reed Sorenson on Dover…
“Dover has been a good track for us. We’ve had really good runs in the Busch car and we had a solid effort in the Cup car there in the spring. Both teams have been performing well the last few weeks, so I expect us to be competitive this weekend. Even though we don’t have the best finishes to show for it, there seems to be a lot of momentum building for our programs and I believe a win is in our future for one if not both teams.”
“Dover reminds me of a bigger Bristol. It’s concrete, high-banked and extremely fast. It’s one of those self-cleaning type of tracks, so if something happens in front of you it typically washes to the bottom of the track before you get there. The track is pretty fun to race on, if your car is handling well. If it’s off, especially loose on corner exit, then it can be a handful.
