Chris looked very strong, winning both his 750cc Twins event on his XR750 Harley and the Singles race aboard his 450cc KTM. When the Ford Quality Checked Team got to the slippery quarter-mile short track at Municipal Stadium, however, things weren't so rosy. Chris didn't qualify for the Wednesday main, marking the first time since 1998 that he failed to make the main - ironically also at the Daytona Short Track. On Thursday, the second night of GNC action, Carr looked competitive, but his KTM began running poorly early in the main and he was forced to circulate and go home with just three points.

With the recent cancellation of the Joliet half-mile, the next round will be another Singles race, the Springfield TT, held on May 27. In the interim the team will be testing both on half-miles and at the May 10 Springfield AMA test.

"Oglethorpe went about as good as can be expected. Oglethorpe is one of my favorite race tracks that I ride on all year long, so I went there basically looking to have a good time. I guess you can't have much more fun than winning both classes. We realized that with the new 450 rule, that we needed to do some more work with the KTMs, trying to keep up with those Hondas, and Kenny Tolbert did a great job building me a bike that was capable of winning.

"We got to the lead fairly early in that race, passing Jethro Halbert, and I was pretty much in control from that point on. He did keep me honest, but he wasn't able to make a serious pass attempt coming back at me. So, that was a good race.

"In the 750, that thing went as good as could have been expected as well. I took the lead early on from Brian Smith, and I was able to set sail. I got run down at the end by Shaun Russell, but we got to the checkered flag first in both races, so it was a great night for us."

Daytona Short Track

"We went from about as good as can be expected to about as bad as can be expected over the two nights at the short track. I got caught up in a buzz saw with little Sam Halbert. He did a great job, not only in his heat race, keeping me honest there, but in the semi too. I rode as hard as I could, and the little sucker beat me. I have no excuses, there was no problems with the motorcycle or anything, and I knew from where he finished in the main event (second) that we weren't slow, we just didn't make the main. Sometimes that happens at Daytona, and I've been fortunate over the years that it's only happened a couple of times.

"We went into Thursday night with some reasonably high expectations that we could do well, and we started off fine by winning our heat race and sitting on the front row, and I was about to move into second on the third or fourth lap when the thing quit sparking at full throttle. We don't know exactly what the problem is just yet, but I'm pretty sure it was something in the ignition or the electronics.

"It was a disappointing Daytona. I've had a lot of good ones, but this one was probably pretty far down on the disappointment list. We've got some work to do to catch up to these guys, and we'll see how the rest of the year goes."