Last year’s visit to Infineon Raceway resulted in an early exit for Sterling Marlin and his Ginn Racing team. This time around he hopes his No. 14 Wiley X Chevrolet can complete all the laps of the Toyota/Save Mart 350 and cross the finish line with a strong result.
“I barely remember last year’s race because I was in it for such a short time, ” said Marlin. “What I mainly recall is (Ken) Schrader turned sideways, blocking the racetrack and me not having anywhere to go. ”
On the first lap of the 110–lap road-course race, the No. 14 crew could only watch in shock as Marlin’s car was collected in a multicar incident and credited with a 42nd-place finish.
“It was a pretty hard lick I took, ” recalled Marlin. “Luckily I came out of it in better shape than the No. 14 Chevy did. I think I’ll do what I can to stay on the track and keep my fenders on this weekend. ”
Entering Sunday’s event, Marlin is 25th in Nextel Cup driver point standings; he sat in 34th at this time last season and 30th just six races ago.
“We’ve been doing pretty well the last few weeks and have been getting things turned around, ” added Marlin. “We’d like to keep up the pace this weekend. ”
Marlin has collected four top-10s and one top-five finish in his 18 career starts at the 1.99-mile road course.
“Everyone knows that road courses aren’t number one on my list of favorite tracks, ” said Marlin. “But we’ve done some testing and I think we’re ready. If we can drive this No. 14 Wiley X Chevy to a top 15 or better finish, I’d be happy. ”
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