Kahne: 'It should be a good Saturday night'

CONCORD, N.C. – Kasey Kahne couldn’t hand-pick a better track for the No. 5 team as he looks to make the Eliminator Round cut in the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup.

In fact, he said he would have picked it if he could.

“It would be the track if I had to choose,” Kahne said of Charlotte Motor Speedway, the site of Saturday night’s race. “It’s a place where I feel the most confident on kind of understanding and knowing what I need in the car to win Saturday night or at least come close, put it there and have a shot.

“As long as I can remember, we have been top two or three in this race throughout a lot of it and late in the race as well. I can’t remember that at too many other tracks. I would say this is the place to make up as much ground as possible. It should be good Saturday night.”

Nearly every statistical category at Charlotte ranks as a personal best for Kahne, who has competed in 21 Cup events at the 1.5-mile oval. Kahne’s four wins, 12 top-10s and nine top-five finishes are personal bests.

In addition, he has led a personal-best 1,106 laps at the track, and his 11.5 average finish there ranks as his second-best among active tracks. He is also tied for the lead among active drivers with three runner-up finishes at Charlotte.

“I just enjoy racing Charlotte,” Kahne said. “We haven’t won the Bank of America 500 in a while and would really like to. It would obviously help. There are a lot of people that want to win this one. Just doing all we can.”

Kahne currently sits ninth in the Chase standings, just eight points behind the eighth-place cutoff position for the Eliminator Round.

But he’s not looking ahead. Rather, he’s using the method that got him to this point – take it one race at a time.

“I really feel like the best thing for myself is just to look at the upcoming race,” he said. “In the last month I think it has worked pretty well. We have shown up at each track and been really competitive. In these races we have been fast each week since the Chase started. I feel that is all you can do, because depending on how you run this week is how you look at next week. There is a lot to that.”

And the goal for Saturday night is simple.

“It would be great to get a win.”