Sorenson says he's focused on racing, not contract decisions

By SceneDaily Staff
Thursday, May 22, 2008
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Streeter Lecka
Getty Images

Chip Ganassi Racing's Reed Sorenson is in the final season of his NASCAR Sprint Cup Series contract, but he's not too worried about discussing his future yet. Instead, Sorenson is working on improving his performance in races.

Sorenson and his team got off to a slow start to this season, resulting in a crew chief swap with teammate Juan Pablo Montoya in which Jimmy Elledge left Sorenson to partner with Montoya and Sorenson gained Donnie Wingo. Elledge has since left the organization.

Sorenson opened the season with a fifth-place finish in the Daytona 500, but his performance dipped sharply after that. He has not scored another top-10 and has a best finish of 12th in the 10 races since that date.

He has fallen to 31st in the driver standings and, like his Ganassi teammates, is trying to gain ground in the standings. Montoya is 16th in the standings and rookie Dario Franchitti is 40th, though he has not raced since suffering a broken ankle in the Nationwide Series race at Talladega in late April.

Sorenson said that he's not focused on his contract talks right now, preferring instead to let his racing speak for itself.

"It is a contract year for me," the 22-year-old said. "Trying to do the best I can right now to try to see what we can do the next couple of months to try to get some good finishes."

Asked whether he was in talks or not, Sorenson said that he and team owner Chip Ganassi had discussed it "a little bit."

"We're working on some things and just trying to make sure we get our team better at the same time," he said. "So just wait and see what happens."

As to whether or not he's in discussions with other teams as well, Sorenson simply reiterated that he's focused on his own group's performance right now. If he can get that heading in the right direction, the rest will take care of itself.

"Up to this point all I've done is just try to make sure I can do the best I can right now," he said. "I figure if I can do really good the next couple of months, then we'll see what happens. Until that point I'm just worried about the racing ... I feel like it's so early in the season, obviously it gets earlier and earlier in the season it seems like, but it's pretty wild to start talking about next year when I feel like I'm still trying to get this season going.

"So I'm trying to make sure I concentrate on that before I get too carried away with next year yet. I figure if I can run good here for a little while, then that will take care of itself."

Mentioned Drivers: Reed Sorenson

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