SKINNER AT CHICAGOLAND: Mike Skinner will be making his 195th start in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series when the green flag drops for the EnjoyIllinois.com 225 at Chicagoland Speedway Friday evening. Though this event marks the inaugural race at the 1.5-mile track, the Susanville, California, native has raced in three NASCAR Sprint Cup and one NASCAR Nationwide events at the Joliet, Ill. track. Skinner finished in the runner-up spot in the Nationwide event in 2001.
PHILLIPS' CHASSIS CHOICE: Crew Chief Eric Phillips and the No. 5 PC*MILER Navigator team will utilize chassis No. MDM-105 for Friday evening's event. This is a brand new truck and will feature PC*MILER Navigator as primary sponsor.
WHAT SKINNER SAYS: "We had the Nationwide race won there back in 2001, but a late caution came out for debris and Jimmie Johnson put four fresh tires on and we wound up second. I've run pretty well there in a Cup car, but I've had some really bad crashes with right front tires blowing there too. I think it's pretty cool that we're taking the Camping World Trucks to Chicagoland this year. Hopefully it will be a great race for the fans."
THOUGHTS FROM PHILLIPS:"Chicagoland Speedway is very similar to Kansas Speedway and Kentucky Speedway, which is good for us because we've run well at those tracks this season. Chicago has a little more banking that Kansas, but is still pretty close setup-wise, so we feel like we're going in there with a pretty good idea of what we need from our truck. We're excited about going and looking forward to racing our PC*MILER Navigator Toyota there this weekend."
THE SEASON'S STATS: The No. 5 team has posted six top-five and 10 top-10 finishes in 15 events this season, including one win, which came at Kansas Speedway in April. Skinner holds down the third spot in the NCWTS driver point standings, 94 markers behind second place and 305 points out of first.
WATCH AND LISTEN: Race coverage will be televised on SPEED and heard live on select affiliates of MRN Radio and Sirius-XM NASCAR Radio Channel 128, beginning at 8:30 p.m. (ET).
SKINNER CAREER NCWTS STATS: Mike Skinner has scored 26 victories in 194 starts in NASCAR Camping World Truck Series competition and has earned 86 top-five and 124 top-10 finishes since making his first start in Phoenix (and going on to win the event) in 1995.
POINT AND CLICK: Fans can continue to vote for their favorite driver for the Most Popular Driver Award through the end of October. The results of the online balloting will be announced at the NCWTS awards banquet at the end of the season. Visit www.nascar.com for more details and to cast your vote for Mike.
