Yet another opportunity to turn it all around
For Travis Kvapil, this opportunity of a lifetime could be the one that pans out. If so, it will be a long time coming for the 2003 Craftsman Truck Series champion.
Upon winning that championship, Kvapil moved to Bang Racing, one of the new teams that ushered Toyota into the truck series. At the time, it looked like the chance to get in on the ground floor with a team that seemed to have all the resources in the world.
Bang Racing, though, never lived up to its long-term expectations even as Kvapil won a pair of races, the first for Toyota in one of NASCAR's three national touring series. By the end of '04, with Bang Racing slowly heading toward its closure early the next year, the next opportunity of a lifetime seemed to be at hand, as Penske Racing South put Kvapil in a Dodge for his Cup debut that October.
Penske-Jasper Motorsports moved Kvapil to Cup full-time in '05 in the No. 77 Dodge, but the team never hit its stride. Kvapil posted just two top-10 finishes and wound up 33rd in points.
Sponsor Kodak elected to re-evaluate its program last December and the team disbanded. That sent Kvapil to PPI Motorsports, a struggling team trying to survive on a smaller budget than most teams'. The results showed as Kvapil wound up 36th in points without a top-10.
With the writing on the wall and his career seemingly at a standstill, Kvapil, 30, couldn't say "yes" fast enough when Roush Racing presented his most recent opportunity of a lifetime. Hired to drive the No. 6 Ford F-150 that had been slated for Mark Martin, Kvapil has found a stable organization.
What happens next remains to be seen, but Kvapil hopes to be set for years to come.
"More than anything, for me, it was an opportunity to get with a good group and a good race team. My last two years in Nextel Cup have been terrible and I haven't had the results," Kvapil said. "I know given the right opportunity that I can still win races and run up front. We just did it two years ago.
"When Jack came to me and then asked me to drive that truck, I thought it would just open up so many doors. No. 1, it would just get me to running up front and winning races. The way for me to get back into a competitive Nextel Cup car, I'm not going to go from where I'm at right now to jumping in a top-10 car, so I just don't think the opportunity would present itself. I'll take a step back, win some races and show people that I can still do it, and hopefully that opportunity will come again."
In 96 truck series starts, Kvapil has five wins, 40 top-5s and 64 top-10s to his credit, and never finished worse than ninth in points. In replacing Martin, he joins a team that finished second in owner points.
Martin made just 14 starts in the truck, but won six of those races and was in the top five 11 times. All told, four drivers saw time in the truck, so Kvapil thinks it's fair he be considered a championship contender in 2007.
"With [David] Ragan, with the little bit of experience that he had, and a few other guys in there, the truck always runs good, and Mark runs exceptional," Kvapil said. "I definitely think that everyone's goal going into the year is to definitely go for the championship and have a successful season. Everything that I'm told so far is that the team is sticking together and the same crew chief [Mike Beam] is going to be on board.
"It's basically just plugging in a new driver, and with my experience -- I've raced in the truck series for four years -- I feel like I'm a better driver now than I was two years ago, experiencing the Cup competition level, and how hard it is to compete and how close the competitiveness is. I just feel that I've had to step up as a driver, and I'm looking forward to going back to the truck series to have success again."
Roush has wanted a veteran in the mix of his truck program, which will also field trucks for Raybestos Rookie of the Year Erik Darnell and upcoming rookie Peter Shepherd. Once Martin elected to continue his legendary career elsewhere, that left Roush looking for a replacement.
And with PPI Motorsports unlikely to field a team next season, Kvapil was a perfect candidate.
"Travis cut his teeth up in Wisconsin like Mark did, and like Matt [Kenseth] did, and like Erik Darnell did," Roush said. "There are a lot of really good racers that have come out of that part of the Midwest. He has won a championship in the truck series. [Winning it next year is] real important to Ford Motor Co., and it's important to me."
And that's why Kvapil doesn't think twice about taking what some consider a backward step. After two years running in the back of the Cup fields, Kvapil sees this as the smartest move for his future.
"The way I look at it, the opportunities for me in Cup next year were for teams outside the top 35. That's a big deal with all of the start-up teams next year and they're all well-funded, so you'll be fighting an uphill battle, for sure, and it will be wearing on your mind all winter long to make the races," Kvapil said. "Some of these teams that are back here, you're just going to the race to make the race, that's the main goal.
"I want to go to the racetrack to win and run up front and contend for the title. I won't have that opportunity here in Cup. It's definitely a step back as far as series, but in my career, I think it's a step forward, and in the long haul, it's what I need to do."
Asked if this is a chance to get back to Cup with Roush, Kvapil said that's impossible to predict. But he figured if things go well enough next year, it could be an option both sides choose to pursue.
"If it's not with them, maybe it's with somebody else," said Kvapil, who would love to remain with Roush for the long term. "The main goal is to go out and perform next year and get back in Victory Lane and win some races and contend for the title, and then everything else will work its way out."
Mark Ashenfelter is an associate editor at NASCAR Scene magazine, which has a Web site at www.scenedaily.com.
