Spencer

We had an up-and-down weekend at Texas Motor Speedway. I pulled double-duty again running the Yellow Chevrolet in the Busch Series and the Target Dodge in the Winston Cup Series.

Thursday we had Busch practice and qualifying and I think we did well. The Yellow Chevrolet was good off of the truck and we qualified third for Saturday's Busch race.

On Thursday night, I went out to the Yellow truck terminal in Dallas with Yellow President James Welch, for a meet and greet with the employees. I spoke at each truck bay to the employees and shared some stories and laughs with them.

Friday we started with Busch practice and we were pretty good. The car handled really well. Then we came over to do the Cup practice and we weren't that great right off the truck. My teammate, Sterling Marlin, and myself didn't test out here so that hurt us a little bit.

Following practice, we made an announcement with my Busch team, Spencer Motor Ventures. The "Air Force and Racing: My Anti-Drug" is sponsoring Stuart Kirby in the No. 34 car for 15 races this season. This weekend at Texas was our first run with that car. Unfortunately, Stuart spun out on the first lap and he didn't get any track time in. I expect good things from him this season. It's a learning process and he's willing to learn.

After making the sponsorship announcement, we qualified the Target Dodge 21st fastest for the Winston Cup race. It's a little bothersome that we've been in the top-10 in qualifying for the last four races and now we've lost that streak. I think Sterling and I just got bad draws in a way. The track really got cool towards the end of qualifying and it helped a lot of guys pick up speed and bumped us back another six to eight spots.

The incredible thing was Sterling and I tied for the same qualifying time. Chip Ganassi has said all along that our cars are the same; I think he proved it this weekend. Sterling started 20th, one position ahead of me, due to the standings.

We went and got ready to practice Saturday morning and as soon as we got ready to pull the Target Dodge out on the track it started to rain. We tried to wait the rain out and I got together with the crew and we started talking about what we should do if we got on the track. A couple hours later, NASCAR cancelled "Happy Hour" and I just went to the motor coach and sat around with the kids and watched television.

We started the Busch race about four hours late due to the rain. The car was hard to drive at the start because it was so loose. Those handling problems and a stop-and-go penalty put our chances to win out the door. The race finished under a red flag a little over the halfway mark and we finished 28th.

Sunday we got rained-out for the Cup race. I spent most of the day talking to the crew guys and spending time with my family at the motor coach.

On Monday, the weather finally cleared and we got the race underway. The car pushed, but we weren't bad. We ran in the top-10 most of the day and made a couple of adjustments to try to get it better. At one time, we really got a push to the car. We almost lost a lap and came back. We adjusted back on it the other way, and we might have adjusted it right in the end because we came home with an eighth-place finish.

Team Target is going to have a lot of top-10s this year. We've got a good race team, and we're learning a lot. Our pit stops were awesome Sunday. Sterling and I qualified 20th and 21st with the same speed. We finished seventh and eighth. It's not where we want to be and it's not where Chip Ganassi expects us to be. The whole team expects more and we're going to get better. We want top-fives, and I know we can do that.

Jimmy Spencer is the driver of the No. 41 Target Dodge Intrepid R/T. He will be providing a regular diary to ESPN.com throughout the Winston Cup season.