NASCAR buzzing about Toyota improvement

After a difficult — some may even call it disastrous — inaugural season at NASCAR's top level where NASCAR probably asked Toyota to lay low while its Xenophobic fan base became accustomed to a Japanese manufacturer, Toyota has made marked improvements in its Sprint Cup program. The two weeks of preseason testing at Daytona International Speedway showed that the 11 Camrys are fast and ready to challenge for wins.

“If I told you how many times I have won testing in 40 years!'' said Lee White, senior vice president of Toyota Racing Development. “It's just testing, and it's really hard for me to get all jazzed up over testing because you don't know what people are doing. And there's a month left before we race. That's a lot of time for people to tune up their programs.''

It is difficult to accurately gauge just where the Toyotas rank after one testing session on the 2 1/2 -mile superspeedway. NASCAR splits the session equally among single-lap runs and drafting, and nobody is certain what each team is even working on. Some may be looking for qualifying speed, while others may be fine-tuning race setups.

“This is the biggest game of chess,'' Sprint Cup director John Darby said. “All these teams are toying with each other, and no one wants to show their full hand. Yes, the Toyotas have been very impressive. But it's hard to say for sure where they stack up against the competition.''