Crunch time looming for NASCAR's little guys

  
Regan Smith: No DNFs as a rookie in 2008, quite a feat (Photo: Getty Images for NASCAR)

  

   By Mike Mulhern
   mikemulhern.net

   BROOKLYN, Mich.
   Time looks like it might be running out for some of the sport's smaller teams, facing probably even leaner times with cutbacks in Detroit support.
   So circle July Fourth. That's typically the point of the season where team owners need to have next year's deals pretty much wrapped up.
   By the time the NASCAR tour hits Indianapolis Motor Speedway for the Brickyard 400 July 26, it's usually all over but the shouting.
   The men to keep an eye on during these next few turbulent weeks:
   Regan Smith, for one.
   Smith won 2008 rookie of the year, over Sam Hornish Jr. And he beat Tony Stewart last fall at Talladega, only NASCAR took away that win with a controversial call.
   But Smith is just one of a number of drivers fighting to hang in here.
   So this is also the point of the season where odd things may happen, under the crush of the pressure to keep a ride, get a ride, land a sponsor, keep a sponsor.
   Remember last summer when Patrick Carpentier, the upbeat rookie from Montreal/Las Vegas, won the pole at New Hampshire? It didn't help him keep his ride, which he wound up losing a few weeks later. But here Carpentier is back again trying to fight his way into a Cup tour ride, and he'll be in Michael Waltrip's Toyota at Sonoma next week.
   And keep an eye on Scott Speed.  The rookie, over from Formula One, has struggled with the transition, but he's got high-powered backing from one of this sport's biggest sponsors, and he finished fifth at Talladega a few weeks ago.
   Plus, teammate Brian Vickers is on the pole for Sunday's Michigan 400….which shows the equipment is right.
   Speed, who qualified 21st, is the kind of guy who, when/if the light switch turns on, could make things happen. It will be very interesting to see just what this F1 guy can do on a technical road course like Infineon.
   "It's important we start getting some momentum," Speed says of his roller-coaster spring. "Obviously we're looking forward to Infineon next week a lot.  We're thinking we're going to have a good weekend there. 
   "Hopefully we can build some momentum starting this weekend."  
    Here? Well Speed finished 18th at Charlotte a few weeks ago, and the team appears to be improving its intermediate track program: "It's amazing how you can run anywhere you want on the track when your car is good," Speed says.
   But Jimmy Elledge, Speed's crew chief, is a little cautious, considering the rough stretch the team has been going through the past month. Keeping upbeat? "For me it's not as big a deal," Elledge says, "because I try to do a better job of managing, and forgetting about what happened the week before. 
    "I learned a long time ago the longer you carry it, the more it grows. So I try to forget about last week by Monday noon.
    "To have good things happen you've got to be focused on what you've got to do to get better, not dwelling on what hasn't happened right."
    So Elledge says top-20s are the goal. The team is barely hanging in the top-35.
    "Finish where we've qualified, that's kind of the goal," Elledge says. "To be in the top-35 when we leave here would take a top-15 to top-20 run."
   Easier said than done, even when the equipment is right. Just ask Max Papis, the F1 guy and Indy-car racer who is trying to crack into NASCAR. Papis made his Sprint Cup debut one year ago at Sonoma. Papis, driving for one of the smaller NASCAR outfits, has only run in five Cup events this season; this 400 will be his sixth.  
    "I almost had a heart attack, it's so difficult," Papis says of running one of these NASCAR stockers at this flat two-mile. "We definitely struggled with the car in practice…we were not as fast as we wanted…but the most important thing was that we put the car in the show.
   "I guess I beat one guy. I want to beat more than one guy. But the important thing is being here on Sunday. 
   "And let me tell you -- you guys don't know how difficult these things are.  My heart was pumping, it's like I lost five years on my life.
   "I've been coming here to Michigan many times, and I've had tremendous success here – I'm the lap-leader in Champ-car (Indy-cars) for years and years….and yet when I took my first lap out there I say 'Man, this is not the track.'
    "Every single track that I go is new. 
    "What makes it difficult is that every guy out there is awesome.  You're not competing against five guys, you're competing against 43 guys.
    "It is difficult because these guys are damn good."
   
   

   
Crew chief Jimmy Elledge (L) and Scott Speed (Photo: Getty Images for NASCAR)