Touring Series News
Said Back In Latitude 43 Car At Infineon
SONOMA, Calif. -- Vermont’s Latitude 43 Motorsports will have its best chance yet at NASCAR Sprint Cup Series success this weekend as road course specialist Boris Said returns to the seat of the Air National Guard/GlobeTrack Wireless #26 Ford at Infineon Raceway in California.
Said is a former winner of the 24 Hours of Daytona and 12 Hours of Sebring road races, and is a former NASCAR Camping World Truck Series winner at the 1.949-mile, 12-turn Infineon track. He earned four of his seven career Sprint Cup top-ten finishes at Infineon, as well as his first career Sprint Cup pole position in 2003.
“I’ve been itching to get back behind the wheel, especially at [Infineon],” Said told Vermont Motorsports Magazine on Tuesday. “I’m like a little kid at Christmas when we go there.”
Said drove in the season’s first four Sprint Cup Series events for the first-year Latitude 43 Motorsports team, finishing 25th on the lead lap at the Daytona 500. David Stremme took over driving duties at Bristol in March, and the team has shown marked improvement nearly every week since its debut in February.
Said said that although he is excited to get back on track, he is mindful of the team’s position; Latitude 43 currently ranks 37th in owner points, and is therefore outside the top-35 and not guaranteed a starting spot at Infineon.
“It could be our best chance at finishing well, but we need to stay realistic,” Said cautioned. “We’re not locked in the field, so we can’t take too many risks. The first goal is to get through [qualifying] Friday and not make any mistakes. We’ll have to stay conservative and get in the race, rather than put a wild setup in the car and try for the pole. We can’t take a chance on spinning out or dropping a wheel off the track. Once we get in the race we can reevaluate our goals.”
Said is particularly excited about returning to work with Latitude 43 crew chief Frank Stoddard. “I’ve worked with Frankie for the last six years, and he’s one of the best in the business,” Said said. “Hopefully he can get the car capable of running in the top-ten, that’s my goal. If we can get into the top-ten, then we can readjust and figure out what it would take to have a shot at winning.”
(Photo credit: Autostock/NASCAR.com)
