RED BULL RACING TEAM KANSAS SPEEDWAY 

DRIVERS: Scott Speed (No. 82) / Reed Sorenson (No. 83) EVENT: Price Chopper 400 DATES: Sunday, Oct. 3, 2010

TRACK: Kansas Speedway, Kansas City, Kan.

RESULTS: Speed (start 33, finish 19) / Sorenson (start 34, finish 30)  

HOME BEFORE SUPPER  Reut-taliation aside, the Price Chopper 400 went by without a peep.  For the 12th time this season, a Sprint Cup race fit in the three-hour window, this time in a tidy 2 hours, 54 minutes and 2 seconds. Only five caution flags waved, the fewest in the 10-year history of Kansas Speedway, which meant 243 of the 267 laps clicked off at a incredibly fast pace.   Heck, after a 400-mile race, the race after the race and a 1,000-mile flight home, our plane touched down on the Concord strip at around 7:15 p.m. in the East.  These 400-mile races do have their perks.

83 . REED SORENSON 

SLOW FROM THE GET-GO: The pace of the race kept Reed Sorenson’s No. 83 playing catch-up. He fought grip issues early and a “plowing” condition late. Add in a 42-lap green-flag run to open the race and two 100-plus stretches of green later on, and Sorenson never had the chance to gain ground. He finished two laps down in 30th.

IN REED’S WORDS: “We fought the same two issues most of the race. During each run, the car would start loose in and tight in the center, then the longer we ran, the tighter the car got in the center. As soon as you put a little load on the right rear, there would be no rear grip. I went as fast as I could without wrecking. It was strange — we had less grip on new tires than with tires with 40-plus laps on them. Toward the end of the race, the car became a 10 out of 10 tight and no adjustments were able to fix the condition, no matter what the crew threw at the car. The car was plowing up top, so I had to run a line close to the apron.”

VITAL SIGNS: The No. 83 ranks 27th in the car owner standings.

OUR INLAND EMPIRE: The season’s final trip to the West Coast should come to Sorenson’s liking. Since the February 2007 race at Auto Club Speedway — a span of seven events — the No. 83 has six finishes of 12th or better, including Brian Vickers’ 11th-place run last February.

(Team Red Bull PR Report)

Reed Battles Ill-Handling Car at Kansas

#83 Red Bull Toyota