After fourteen years with Craftsman, the NASCAR Truck Series awarded it's naming rights to Camping World. I think this new association is going to be better than we could have imagined. Look for some really cool new ideas from this energetic group.

Our Speed broadcast team is once again fired-up to cover the very best racing in all of NASCAR, and even though the NCWTS season is a little slow in the beginning, the action is sure to please again in season number 15.

It will be hard to match the championship battles we have grown accustom to seeing the past few years. I still can not believe that Johnny Benson finished just one position ahead of Ron Hornaday in Homestead and won the title by just seven points. That was truly Amazing!

So once again I have polled the SPEED NCWTS team and asked them to predict the eventual champ for 2009. (This information was gathered prior to the first event at Daytona- and Krista Voda did not get her picks to me before the Daytona race) No driver has ever won Championships back-to-back in the truck series. It certainly appears that our team thinks that statistic will continue: not one person picked Johnny Benson to defend his title.

Four of five announcers believe that Ron Hornaday will finish first or second in the run for the first Camping World trophy. Michael Waltrip, Adam Alexander, and Phil Parsons have Horn-blower winning championship number four! Rick Allen believes that Rick Crawford and the Circle Bar team will be at the top in November and I am going way out of the box and picking Johnny Sauter as the victor at season's end.Todd Bodine gets and honorable mention from three of our pundits and Mike Skinner gets my vote for second best of the season.

While it is certainly true the championship battle has been in the forefront of the past few seasons, this year's Raybestos Rookie of the Year title should be a doozie to watch develop. James Buescher will team up with Crawford, Tayler Malsam joins principal Skinner at Randy Moss Motor sports, Chase Austin is with a brand new team Trail motor sports and J.R. Fitzpatrick hopes to make a go of it at TRG. Ricky Carmichael will certainly garner a great deal of attention driving for happy Harvick, but as of now will not run all the races. I certainly do not agree with the rules for eligibility here, but somehow, Johnny Sauter is also considered a rookie in NCWTS events. Mikey Waltrip likes Buescher for ROY, while Adam and Rick both think Malsam will prevail, meanwhile, Phil and I will each wager on Sauter to grab the most points of this impressive group.

Here is a rundown of our 2009 NASCAR Camping World Truck Series Championship predictions:

Michael Waltrip: 1.Hornaday 2.Bodine 3.Benson 4.Skinner 5.Buescher
Adam Alexander: 1.Hornaday 2.Bodine 3.Crawford 4.Benson 5.Braun
Phil Parsons: 1.Hornaday 2.Bodine 3.Benson 4.Crawford 5.Braun
Rick Allen: 1.Crawford 2.Hornaday 3.Bodine 4.Skinner 5.Scott
Ray Dunlap: 1.Sauter 2.Skinner 3.Hornaday 4.Crawford 5.Starr

It will certainly be different this year not having Jack Sprague (28 wins), Dennis Setzer (18 wins) or Ted Musgrave (17 wins) competing full time with the regulars. Having Roush-Fenway enter only a single team will also be a big change. A few other questions come to mind: Will Kyle Busch win multiple races?/ Will a two-truck team help Jim Harris get his first victory?/ Will a rookie win a race?/ Will car dealer owners Wyler's and Germain's make it through the entire season?/ Can Mike Bliss win for Key motor sports?/ Will Colin Braun get win #50 for the cat in the hat?/ and finally, will it take Matt Crafton another 178 races to win again?