Kvapil beat Ron Hornaday, Jr. by 2.403 seconds for his third win in six races and enabled the 2003 series champion to preserve his chances for a second title.

Series leader Mike Skinner , who led the first 102 laps, was third with David Starr and Todd Bodine rounding out the top five.

"We started the race and the truck was a little bit too tight but I think that was because I was in traffic," Kvapil said. "I told (crew chief) Mike Beam what the truck was doing and he made some air pressure adjustments that brought the truck to life."

Kvapil advanced from fourth to third in the standings and is 236 points behind Skinner.

"It will still take Mike and Ron some bad races for us to close the gap but there are 10 races left and a lot can happen," Kvapil said.

Kvapil took the lead when Skinner encountered traffic near the end of a 63-lap green flag run, but Skinner said that Kvapil would have made the pass eventually.

"Travis had us anyway," Skinner said. "The balance was not consistent on our second set of tires and Travis' truck was extremely strong. We have to learn to fix our truck on pit road. That has been our problem all year."

But Kvapil wasn't so confident.

"I wasn't sure we could catch Skinner," he said. "The track was pretty tough. People were sliding around and there was not a lot of grip and you had to be really disciplined.

"Once I found my rhythm and got the truck adjusted, we nailed some really good lap times. I could tell the truck was where we needed to be."

Mistakes scuttled the chances of two other contenders who were running in the top five. Johnny Benson , last year's race winner, was forced to exit after brushing against a wall, and a pit stop penalty shuffled Ted Musgrave from second to the tail end of the lead lap on a restart.

Musgrave briefly took the lead on the 111th lap, before Kvapil regained it for good.

Kvapil, who has completed all but one lap this season, became the seventh winner in as many series races at Nashville Superspeedway.

In the waning moments, he said his thoughts turned to late NASCAR driver Bobby Hamilton of nearby Lebanon who died earlier this year of cancer. Hamilton won the 2004 trucks race at Nashville.

"I was thinking last 10-15 laps about Bobby Hamilton and to come here to his home turf and win is pretty special."

The series will remain in Tennessee for its next outing on Aug. 22 at Bristol Motor Speedway. AP NEWS

The Associated Press News Service

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Source: [url=http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/sports/5047086.html]Houston Chronicle[/url]