Lakeland, Florida (November 29, 2007) - NASCAR Nextel Cup driver David Stremme is the first official entry for SpeedFest 2008 to be held at USA International Speedway in Lakeland, Florida on Friday, January 25th and Saturday, January 26th. Stremme finished 24th in 2007 NASCAR Nextel Cup points and secured an 11th place finish in the season ending Ford 400 at Homestead-Miami Speedway. Stremme, a former competitor in the CRA Super Series, also competed in this past season’s CRA Super Series sanctioned Winchester 400 at Winchester Speedway on October 14th where he got a third place finish after starting the event on the tail.
Stremme will compete in all the Super late Model events and he will bring a second car to compete in all the Crate Late Model Challenge events as well. On Friday, January 25th the Super Late Models will compete in twin 100 lap Qualifying races, one for the North drivers, one for the South drivers, with the top 10 finishers in each event transferring to Saturday’s SpeedFest 200. Additional qualifying and the last chance races will help fill out the 36-car field for the 200-lap event featuring the best Super Late Model drivers in the country and NASCAR’s David Stremme on Saturday, January 26th.
Crate Late Models will be part of the SpeedFest for the first time in 2008. The ASA Late Model Series supported Crate Late Model Challenge will consist of events on Friday and Saturday night of SpeedFest. There will be twin 25 lap Qualifying races for the North and South cars on Friday with the top ten from each event transferring to the 100 lap Crate Late Model Challenge on Saturday. Qualifying and last chance races will help fill out the field for Saturday’s 100 lap event featuring the best Crate Late Model drivers in the country battling NASCAR’s David Stremme.
SpeedFest 2008 will be under the direction of CRA’s Glenn Luckett and R.J. Scott and FASCAR’s Don Nerone. The series’ will also be co- promoting the event with the speedway. While these sanctioning bodies will direct the on-track activities, officials want to be very clear that this is an “open” event.
Advanced early entries for both events are due by January 11th, after that teams will have to pay a late fee and the Super Late Model teams will not be eligible for bonuses and will not have their numbers secured if they enter after the January 11th early entry deadline. Entry forms, rules and a schedule of activities can be found at any of the following sites: craracing.net, fascar.org. asalatemodels.com or usaspeedway.com.