Sitting in his cozy new motorcoach at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway three weeks ago, Roger Brogdon was smiling, despite some minor grumbling. It must have been one of those sly types of grins.

The Pro Stock Showdown at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway was quickly turning into a veritable waste of time and resources. Or at least it was the picture Brogdon was painting.

“Nothing impressive,” said Brogdon of his first two days of testing and qualifying in Vegas. “We had to abort two out of four runs, we chipped a tire so bad. Track's not that good, matter of fact it's terrible. They sprayed it one time this morning and haven't done nothing to it all day long. The two runs we did make it down, my car spins from the time I go to third gear to the finish line. So it's nothing to write home about.”

Sitting in his cozy new motorcoach at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway three weeks ago, Roger Brogdon was smiling, despite some minor grumbling. It must have been one of those sly types of grins.

The Pro Stock Showdown at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway was quickly turning into a veritable waste of time and resources. Or at least it was the picture Brogdon was painting.

“Nothing impressive,” said Brogdon of his first two days of testing and qualifying in Vegas. “We had to abort two out of four runs, we chipped a tire so bad. Track's not that good, matter of fact it's terrible. They sprayed it one time this morning and haven't done nothing to it all day long. The two runs we did make it down, my car spins from the time I go to third gear to the finish line. So it's nothing to write home about.”

After some complaining about the track surface, which all of the teams did, Brogdon admitted the test wasn't a complete waste of time.

“We learned a lot,” admitted Brogdon, who then put the knowledge to use at the NHRA Winternationals in Pomona one week later. “We're working on 60-foot times and 330 times. The last run wasn't too bad and by far is the worst the track's been all weekend.”

Whatever Brogdon and his team learned at Las Vegas apparently paid off in at Pomona. After two rounds of qualifying Brogdon was fourth with a first run pass of 6.603 seconds at 209.23 miles per hour. Saturday's passes placed Brogdon fifth in Sunday's eliminations, which ended in the second round with a red light effort against Allen Johnson.

Those results are easily within the target Brogdon has set for the team in 2010.

“A realistic target?” Brogdon queried back. “Well I think we'll be totally disappointed if we don't make the countdown. Towards the end of last year we were starting to run real good at the last three or four races, and we really expect to win a couple of races this year too. So yeah, if we can get in the Countdown and make a good show, that'd be good. But not to the point to run for a championship yet. I honestly think we can get in the top five; that might be a realistic goal.

“We're out here trying to win like anybody, but you've got to be realistic. I think if I could have a three or four on my car next year, I think it'd be pretty damn good.”

In addition to his Pro Stock racing efforts, Brogdon has at least two other important irons in the fire – Attitude Apparel and Racer's Edge. He purchased both companies last year – one to make his wife happy and the other because he truly believes in the product.

“Well Bart (Price) approached me about the Attitude Apparel deal; I think it was right after … Seattle or somewhere. And you know his wife was not doing real well and he wanted to get rid of it. To be honest with you, my wife loved that little piston guy since the day she's seen it. I went home one day and said 'hey guess what, bought a company today and told her which one it was, I told her well you like that little piston guy.' She told me she's never gonna tell me she likes anything again. So Steve (Kent) and I ended up buying that.”

Apparel company in hand, Brogdon couldn't resist his next purchase, a company with claims their product would reduce pain with stick on patches. This time his wife tried the product and gave her approval to the deal.

“Racer's Edge, that's a spin-off of another deal we have, and Jerry Coley actually hooked us up with the guys who had this whole thing. “I was the biggest skeptic like anyone else is. My wife actually tried it first, she had a bad tennis elbow and it fixed that, and I have a bad knee which I think everybody knows about now, supposed to have surgery on it last July. And I didn't, just for the simple fact because I got hooked up with these chips and it cured the whole problem. It's incredible. I went from taking five or six Advil or Motrin a day, or whatever you might want to take over the counter, to taking none. So I said well this is something that's good, it's not a gimmick, it really, really works and I think everybody needs to know about it and hopefully we can make some money off of it at the same time.”

Brogdon has taken the product to different markets including to NASCAR team shops.

“Well, we actually had a meeting with … Jack Roush, and I think it was Hendrick … so those guys, they got some and they like them, too.”

T-shirts, pain patches or performance on the track, Brogdon is stepping up the program in search of increased success.