NASCAR WCUP: Sadler looking forward to first race at Kansas
Posted By Terry Callahan
Motorsports Editor, The Auto Channel
September 26, 2001NASCAR will hold its first-ever event at Kansas Speedway this weekend. Elliott Sadler, driver of the No. 21 Motorcraft Racing Taurus, tested for Goodyear at the new speedway, along with Bill Elliott, earlier this season. Below are his impressions of Kansas Speedway and how he compares it to the other new track the series visited this year, Chicago.
"Kansas City is a great race track. It is smooth. The guys did a great job with the asphalt. As far as the shape of it, it's shaped like Vegas or it's shaped just like Kentucky, so it's really a mile-and-a-half D-shaped oval. It has a little more banking than what we're used to in Vegas so when you enter turn one you stay up as close to the wall as you can. When we tested you could drop down in the corner. Bill (Elliott) and I both were right down on the white line. When you come off turn two it is a lot narrower than a lot of the race tracks that we are used to so you really have to be on the bottom or the car tries to push up towards the wall. The backstretch is kind of short. When you go into turn three it is a sweeping turn so it is a high speed part of the track and you can run through three and four almost wide open, not much lifting there, and you've got a little bit more room coming off turn four. I think on the long runs, the guys will start moving up some in the middle of each corner. I know we were while we were testing. But as smooth as it is, and the way that groove was coming in higher and higher the longer we ran I think it will be good side-by-side racing when we get there.
"We really enjoy going to new race tracks. It's kind of equal opportunity. Nobody's got any past notes; nobody's a 15-time track winner or anything like that like some of the other places we go to, so we like it. It's unbelievable; it's a great race track. It's smooth, it reminds me a lot of Chicago, but I think there will be more side-by-side racing. There's a little bit less banking and it has a different grade of asphalt, which makes the track a little bit slicker which means you can move up off the bottom. So, I think you're going to see a lot more side-by-side racing there than you saw in Chicago. It is laid out just like it. When we first got there we couldn't really tell the difference until we actually ran on it. We were running a little bit off the bottom when we tested there, so I think the guys did a great job.
"They've done a great job on the facility, the whole NASCAR bunch. The roads going in and out are unbelievable. They are nice and wide and they just really paid attention to that part which is good for the fans and the teams. As far as the inside of the track, the surface, you can't ask for a better surface. They did a great job of paving it. It reminds me a lot of how smooth Vegas is and California. It's probably one of the smoothest tracks out there so they did a great job on it. Pit lane is nice and wide. They've got good cement pit boxes and that gives us a lot more grip, which is safer for everybody. They've done a great job with the garages as far as room. We're not stacked in there like sardines. They've got a lot of room between each garage stall. The victory lane is beautiful. We went and looked at that while we were there hoping and wishing that we might get into that thing. But they've done a great job on the inside. It will be one of the top-notch tracks we race at. The grandstands, and all, the designs of them and the suites, they're all pretty neat. The grass on the front-stretch, it seems like they paid attention to every little part of the racetrack so it will be a place fans love to come to watch a race at."
"I'm looking forward to going back."
Text provided by Marti Rompf
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