(THOMPSON, CONN. - MAY 22, 2004) - Bill Penfold hopes to go from missing the setup in last week's Pepsi Racing 150, the second NASCAR Grand National Division, Busch North Series race of the 2004 season, to contending for the win in next weekend's Busch North Series 200K at Lime Rock Park. While Penfold had to settle for finishing thirteenth at Thompson International Speedway's race last Saturday, a successful test session at the Lime Rock Park road course left him optimistic for next Saturday's race.

The day at Thompson began with Penfold posting only decent times in pre-race practice, but stepping up to qualify twelfth, picking up time while most other drivers' times fell off.

"We were struggling in practice with a car that's been real tight all day," he said before the race. "Everybody was running in the 20.3s and 20.4s, but they all lost a bunch of time in qualifying and we picked up some time. We've been pretty consistent, and we're looking for a good race. The track's going to be slippery with this weather, so we made just one small adjustment on the car for the race, raised the Panhard bar a quarter of an inch, and that's it. It's basically just how I qualified it. We're looking for a good race, I've got a good starting spot."

The car's tight condition continued through the race, even after Penfold changed tires under caution on lap 23. He fell off the lead lap near the halfway point, but continued fighting as, near the end of the race, there were only ten cars on the lead lap. Despite getting caught up in a minor accident near the end of the race and cutting a tire, Penfold soldiered on to finish thirteenth.

"We survived," he said. "The car didn't handle all day, we just pushed and we couldn't get the car loosened up enough. We just had to take what we had and make the best of it. It's one of those days where we just missed the setup so we had to play with the cards that were dealt to us. That's what we did, we did the best we could and we came out of it nineteenth. We actually were up to ninth but we had a flat tire and had to pit. We'll take thirteenth, we're thirteenth in points right now, and we've got Lime Rock coming up."

The mere mention of Lime Rock makes Penfold's eyes light up.

"You better look for me up front," he said. "Dale Quarterley and Brad Leighton and some other guys will be tough, though. We have to show those guys a lot of respect on the track because it doesn't take much to get anybody in trouble on that track. It's just a fun race track, the fans are great. I've even got some of my Watkins Glen fans coming to Lime Rock to watch me race, hopefully we can get some of my Lime Rock fans to go to Watkins Glen later in the year to cheer me on. I hope to put on a good show for everybody. I'm looking forward to going back to Lime Rock for the first time in a couple years, I missed it like hell last year.

"We're bringing the oldest VIP Charter Coach Monte Carlo that we've got, and we haven't even put any paint on it in the last three years," Penfold continued. "But it still runs great, and we might do something different with the paint job for Watkins Glen, do something special for the people out there. We're going to have some fun this weekend."

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