If Jeff Burton is indeed back in championship form, there is no better place for him to prove it than New Hampshire International Speedway, the Loudon racetrack where the Ford driver has excelled.

Burton has won four Winston Cup races in New Hampshire, most of any driver at that track; owns the track record; and once won there by leading every lap.

But these, like Burton's many other accolades, are from years passed. During the past two years, he has struggled everywhere, including at this venue. This year, Burton got off to another slow start, but with several new team members, all-new race cars and a fresh confidence brimming at the shop, he's posted back-to-back top-six finishes and heads north intending to dominate Loudon once more.

"(We're) coming off two good finishes and we are certainly hoping to build on that at New Hampshire," Burton said. "This team has had success there in the past but our last several times there we have not run well.

"To me, it's one of the more enjoyable tracks we go to. I've always enjoyed the track. From the first day that we ran there, I liked it. And, of course, I still do. The last few races there we haven't run very well. We got behind it a little bit, the latest technology."

For several years, Burton and his old crew chief Frank Stoddard continued to run setups that had worked for them in the past -- while other competitors listened to the warnings spat at them by their many computers. That's what helped put Burton and Co. behind the competition, technologically speaking.

Once they lagged, frustration set in and, at times, the team tried radical changes to try to regain its edge. Most of the strategies failed, and Burton -- coming off points finishes of fourth, fifth, fifth and third -- finished 10th and 12th in the past two years.

"It started in 2001 and it carried into 2002, and we're recovering from it today," Burton said. "I can't put my finger on what happened. I can't put my finger on any one thing that headed us down the wrong path, other than to say that when we got behind, we had a real hard time figuring out how to catch back up. And we're still catching back up; we still haven't figured it out.

"So, I don't know what to tell you, other than we've worked really hard through that whole time."

	Burton has five top-10 finishes this season.

The team reached a low point last season and felt drastic measures were necessary. Stoddard was replaced by crew chief Paul Andrews, many other new crew members were hired and during this past offseason, team owner Jack Roush and Burton decided it was time to build a brand-new No. 99 Ford Taurus chassis.

All of this has Burton, a veteran of more than nine Winston Cup seasons, racing for what sometimes feels like a rookie operation.

"It was my determination and Jack's determination that we needed to rebuild and start over," Burton said. "And that's what we're in the process of doing. This is a brand new team this year, and there's times we look like a brand new team and there's times we show a tremendous amount of promise."

Immediately the team saw the promise -- jumping to fourth in the championship race through three events. After that, though, came a rough spot. Back-to-back finishes outside the top 30 dropped Burton from fourth to 22nd in two weeks. From then on, it's been a slow climb back up to the current position of 13th.

But confidence is at a high because of a second-place finish at Daytona and a sixth-place run last weekend at Chicago. Also at a high are expectations.

The team is happy with the finishes, but Burton said fortune allowed for those good results. More work needs to go into the cars and into the setups to make sure the car is a top-five car finishing in the top five; not a top-15 car catching a break and landing in the top five.

"People on this team are intelligent," he said. "We don't have a bunch of guys on this team that when we run 10th we all think we could've won. And, there's a lot of teams out there that are like that -- that even if you've got a glimmer of running well, you know, everybody thinks that you could've won the race. This team is really good about understanding what we let go and what we grab a hold of.

"At Daytona, we didn't have a second-place car. We did have a top-12 car, which was an improvement on our speedway program. But through great strategy and through the understanding of what we needed to do, we got a good finish out of it, and that's a good thing.

"The race before we had a great car and I stuck it in the fence. ... So, Daytona was important. But like I said, this is an intelligent team, and we know we have some improving we got to get done."

Andrews believes the car heading to New Hampshire is an improvement over cars they've run there the last two years. He's hoping the fact that Burton will be racing Saturday as well as Sunday will give him some extra glimpses at the track and an edge over drivers who will only race once this weekend.

"They repaved up there and that should provide some extra grip which, of course, will make the cars handle better through the corners," Andrews said. "We tested in Milwaukee last week for this race and had pretty good results. Car No. 50 is a new car and I'm expecting good things out of it. Jeff will also be running the Busch car Saturday and that's always good because it gives the driver that much more seat time on the track and helps to refresh him for the race Sunday."

Sunday won't determine the 2003 Winston Cup champion; there's an entire second half of racing to go. But Sunday is an important step for this re-emerging race team -- a team that knows it will lose its sponsor after the year is up and is hoping to post good finishes to attract new financial backing.

"We are continually evaluating our program, and we will get there," Burton promised. "There's no question in my mind that Paul Andrews can crew chief a championship team. There's no question in my mind that I can drive for a championship team, drive the car at championship caliber. We just got to get it done."

Rupen Fofaria is a beat writer for The Raleigh News & Observer and a regular contributor to ESPN.com. He can be reached at rfofaria@espnspecial.com.