New engine for Ford

Elliott Sadler debuted the new configuration at Richmond last Saturday night, where he finished 12th.Yates said a full fleet won't be available until July at either Chicago, Loudon or Pocono.

"We raced it last week in the 38 [Sadler] car, and the plan for this weekend is to have it in five cars based on our first five guys in points," explained Doug Yates, head engine builder for Roush-Yates engines. "So the 17 [Matt Kenseth], 97 [Kurt Busch], 38 [Sadler], 88 [Dale Jarrett] and the 6 [Mark Martin] will have it this weekend, and then from there we'll evaluate it and start getting it ready to go full-time in the second half of the year.

"Being that it's a non-points event gives us a chance to get our feet wet with it. We just got the engine Elliott ran on Saturday night and we're evaluating it, so it's a little early to say if everything is perfect; but early indications are that everything went well. The engine performed pretty well and even though we've got some things to work on, we're pretty happy with it. Prior to that, we tested it a couple of times and it seems like it's definitely a step in the right direction."