“We wouldn’t mind adding a third team,” said Haas, whose team would be a viable situation since the organization enjoys a symbiotic relationship with Hendrick Motorsports. “It would give us a little more depth, make us more stable. We’ll see what works out in the next 30 days. Rick Hendrick will make the final decision. We’re still open and available.”
On April 14,,Hendrick insisted unequivocally that Kahne would be driving a Chevrolet next year. But with his team struggling and with Jeff Gordon, Jimmie Johnson, Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Mark Martin all under contract, his tune has changed somewhat.
“Oh, yeah,” Hendrick said when asked if Kahne would be back, then paused. “Well, I won’t say…I don’t know that. I think so, anyway.”
Hendrick acknowledges the pieces just haven’t come together.
“I’ve had a lot more options than I thought I would,” Hendrick said. “A lot of it is just waiting for the right time and the right deal…We’ve got some good options. There’s new deals coming out every day. I get unbelievable calls from people in this garage, but we’re just not ready to pull the trigger yet.”
Apparently, Hendrick reiterated the same sentiment to Kahne earlier Friday morning.
“We stay in touch every week and we didn’t even cross that path,” Kahne said. “I didn’t even ask anything about next year and he didn’t bring it up, either. We were just talking about other stuff, so I would say there is no new news.
“He said he’d take care of it. He’s been an awesome guy and a great guy to talk to. What he loves to do in this sport is win races and they’ve done it for a long time, so I just leave it up to him. He said he would and I stick behind that. I think it’ll be a pretty awesome opportunity whatever it is next year.”
Hendrick gingerly waded through rumors of partnering with James Finch to put Kahne in the No. 09 Phoenix Racing car. Hendrick has mixed business and pleasure with Finch in the past, but said he didn’t know the source of the rumor.
“James Finch is a good friend and been a good customer of our engine shop,” Hendrick said. “And I don’t know how that got started.”
Hendrick isn’t used to being in the NASCAR rumor mill. But with the Kahne situation, the speculation has run rampant. In addition to the Kahne-to-SHR possibility and last week’s Phoenix Racing rumor, a second scenario involving Finch included Mark Martin purchasing the team. Finch told FOXSports.com in April that it was his intent to put the Spartanburg, S.C.-based operation up for sale, though he added this week that he has not discussed that possibility with Martin.
Martin has insisted since the Texas race in April that he will not vacate the No. 5 Chevrolet. Martin’s name also was mentioned in conjunction with Jay Frye, GM of Red Bull Racing, with the pair partnering on a future deal. The two have been friends since Frye worked with Valvoline, which sponsored the No. 6 Ford during Martin’s Roush days and enjoyed a reunion at Ginn Racing.
Frye offered a “never say never” but added that putting a deal together for next year wasn’t likely.
CATCH THE BULL BY THE HORNS
Red Bull Racing is still looking to get its wings in 2010.
After Brian Vickers was sidelined four weeks ago suffering with blood clots, Casey Mears subbed in the No. 83 car. Two weeks into Mears’ deal, the organization swapped crew chiefs. On Tuesday, Mears was released after he triggered an altercation with teammate Scott Speed.
When Speed was asked whether he was surprised that Mears had been replaced in the No. 83 Toyota, he replied: “Did I sound surprised? This weekend (with Mattias Ekstrom) had already been put in motion before that,” Speed said. “Honestly, what has happened since then, I’ve pretty much stayed out of it.”
Red Bull planned to run Swede Mattias Ekstrom in the No. 83 Toyota prior to Mears‘ dismissal. The two-time Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters (DTM) champion had one day of testing at Virginia International Raceway prior to his debut this weekend. Ekstrom qualified 38th (91.806mph) on Friday, 1.734-seconds off Kasey Kahne’s pole speed of 93.893 mph.
“It’s always difficult to start a new format,” Ekstrom said. “I know one lap qualifying from what I’ve done previously, so, for sure, it’s a good experience. But, here there are no tire heaters, and the tires are different, and the cars are different than what we drive just before. So, you have a break, jump in, go one lap and that’s it.”
Red Bull announced that Reed Sorenson will drive the No. 83 car at New Hampshire. Sorenson has competed this season for Braun Racing in the Nationwide Series under the Toyota banner after parting ways with Richard Petty Motorsports last year.
Red Bull has struggled since the start of the season when Speed appeared to be making performance gains. In Speed’s defense, the Toyota Racing engines are rumored to be 30 horsepower less than the top power plants in the field.
Speed, who qualified 23rd for Sunday’s Toyota/Save Mart 350, was as high as 12th in the point standings after Atlanta in March, but has since dropped to 28th.
“It’s hard enough for us to push forward with the loss of Brian, with the experience that he brings to our two-car team,” Speed said.
“When you lose that, it really hurts the progression of everything. It hurts the stability of the teams. We don’t need any more problems than we already have on ourselves. I think whatever happens from here on forward is certainly something that Jay Frye and what we all consider for the best interest of the team.”
FUNKY FUEL
Hendrick Motorsports’ No. 24 team was surprised by a strange looking fuel that ended up in the car on Friday.
“I don’t know what was in our car,” crew chief Steve Letarte said. “It was something that looked -- it appeared to be other than race fuel.
It wasn’t dyed. We’re not sure if it came in our jugs or if it came in the pumps here or what happened. So NASCAR came over and tested what’s in the cells in case there’s any problems later when we do fuel samples. We pumped it out, rinsed it out the best we can.”
NASCAR confiscated the fuel and consequently took samples from other cars in the garage. Series director John Darby says the sanctioning body still doesn’t know how the fuel wound up in the Hendrick car.
“We’re still looking into where it came from,” Darby said. “They got a small quantity of fuel mixed in with their race gas. We don’t have an issue with the 24. We’ve gone through the process of helping them pump out their fuel cell, putting fresh gas in, testing and re-testing and everything is fine.
“In addition to that, we’ve sampled the whole garage because our number one concern is that there’s not a fuel problem the could create problems for anybody.”
Darby doesn’t know how the rumor started that there was ethanol in fuel. He went further to say that there was no mischief at play. Jeff Gordon, driver of the No. 24 Chevrolet, went on to qualify fifth.
NUMBERS GAME
Kasey Kahne’s pole (93,893 mph) for Sunday’s Toyota/Save Mart 350 is his 17th career pole but his first of the season and his second at Infineon Raceway. Kahne has 10 top 10 starts in 2010.
SAY WHAT?
Jeff Burton on making his 500th Sprint Cup start on Sunday: “I didn’t even know that until at some point, somebody told me that. I love what I do and I did see, or someone told me that (Ricky) Rudd was eight hundred and something and I quickly did the math in my head as to how many years I would have to race to do that and I don’t think I am going to make that. Think about that, that is like seven or eight more years of racing which I might be able to do, I don’t know."
