(VPS Motorimages Photo)

Diary by veteran NASCAR driver Johnny Benson. Benson is chasing the 2008 NASCAR Camping World Truck Series Championship in the No. 23 Bill Davis Racing Toyota Tundra.

Although my No. 23 Bill Davis Racing Toyota team lost the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series points lead to Ron Hornaday last weekend at Talladega Superspeedway and now trails by 39 points, we're not complaining too loudly. 

Talladega is just Talladega and there is only so much you can do about it.  It's one of those races where a lot can go wrong that is none of your doing.  You rely on others, to a degree, for a good finish, and that always presents its own unique challenges.

We knew going into Talladega that the race and its pitfalls could work 100-percent for us or 100-percent against us.  Approaching a race, our team's mindset needs to be such that we try not to open ourselves up to a situation that will ultimately hurt us. 

That said, during a race, especially at Talladega, you sometimes just need to get out of the hornet's nest you're in, whether it means dropping to the rear or losing 10 spots, and finding where you feel comfortable with the drivers around you.  It is important to remember that during practice and in preparation for the race. 

Practice itself involves trying to get the feel of the truck and what you're going to feel comfortable with throughout the race on Saturday. Once you've accomplished that, then you start racing around other people and finding out 'Okay, I'm good behind this truck. I'm bad behind this truck. I can work with this guy. I can't work with that guy.' We went through that scenario Thursday at Talladega and evaluated everything.

Friday night before the race, I thought about the drivers I'd feel comfortable racing with and how my truck was handling.  Of course, every plan doesn't always work out as expected, but at least the process gives me a starting point.  We were able at times to make that happen at Talladega but it also was the opposite story quite often.  As the race unfolded, we got in some goods spots and we got in some bad spots. At the end, we thought we were in a really favorable place but got shuffled out to finish 11th.  That wasn't really what we were looking for, but as the saying goes, 'If you come out of that race not upside down, you're in good shape.'

We'll take 11th and go on to Martinsville in two weeks.

Our game plan for the final five races is no different than it's been the whole season … go out there, be extremely competitive and try to win a race. There's no sense in changing our plan to win the championship because it got us where we are today. I don't feel like we need to points race now that we're 39 points back and I didn't feel that way when we were 119 ahead. Our goal is to win a race, run as well as we can and not do anything stupid. Don't change your plans because when you do, you get hit with a lot of things you weren't prepared for.  So, our goal is no different going into Martinsville than it was three or 10 races ago. 

Vegas was a good example.  We were doing everything we normally do on a weekly basis and were leading the race when we had our problem. Unfortunately, our normal game plan didn't work out for us that day. You have to put yourself in a position to win and we were doing nothing we haven't done all year. There may be more races where it doesn't work out for us but we'll stick to our plan and we'll start with Martinsville.

The opinions reflected herein are solely those of the above commentator and are not necessarily those of SPEEDtv.com, FOX, NewsCorp, TruckSeries.com or Speed Channel

SOURCE: Bill Davis Racing/Edited by Megan Englehart and Steve Keller

Diary by veteran NASCAR driver Johnny Benson. Benson is chasing the 2008 NASCAR Camping World Truck Series Championship in the No. 23 Bill Davis Racing Toyota Tundra.