KANSAS CITY, KS April 27, 2008—Coming off a strong performance in Japan, Darren Manning and the ABC Supply team were primed for a good run at Kansas Speedway this weekend.
It was not to be.
The team never found its stride as they attempted to dial in a set-up for the No. 14 Dallara/Honda around the 1.5 mile high-banked superspeedway. Manning qualified the car 16th out of 27 cars.
At the drop of the green flag, he got a good run and picked up two spots but a car spun at the tail end of the field bringing out the yellow flag. When the race went green on lap eight, Manning dropped back a couple positions and as the stint wore on, the car’s handling became looser exiting the turns.
He pitted during the second caution period brought out by Will Power’s accident on lap 23. On the lap 26 stop, the crew made adjustments to the front wings and put on new tires with adjusted air pressures but Manning radioed in that the car didn’t feel much better. Three more pitstops under green with more changes didn’t fix the car and the team decided to park it after 77 laps. He was credited with 24th place.
“We have to look the car over pretty carefully to see if something broke,” said team owner A.J. Foyt afterwards. “Nothing we did made any difference so we’ll have to find out why when we get it back to the shop.”
Outside pole sitter Dan Wheldon won the race. He was followed by Tony Kanaan, Scott Dixon, Helio Castroneves and Marco Andretti.
The team heads to Indianapolis next Sunday to load in for the month of May. Practice begins on Tuesday, May 6th with qualifying set to start on Saturday, May 10th. The 92nd Running of the Indianapolis 500 is set for Sunday, May 25th and will be televised by ABC-TV, with the pre-race show starting at 12 noon.