Newman's numbers game puts him close to Chase

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. - While many people were playing the number game, talking about the luck of the triple sevens of the date Saturday night, Ryan Newman was plagued by a different number.

The Penske Racing driver ran well for portions of the Pepsi 400 at Daytona International Speedway, but in the end he found himself the victim of a number's game that had nothing to do with the 07/07/07 date.

"We started 14th, finished 14th and fell to 14th in the standings," he said.

Still, he managed to find the good side of the equation.

"The only good result was we're only 61 points out of 12th now and we entered the race 127 out of 12th," he said. "It's going to be tough, but we really want to qualify for the Chase [For The Nextel Cup]. We had a good car tonight, but we didn't get a good finish with it. We'll try to bounce back and get them next week in Chicago."