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“I’m leaning on Colin now and he’s a guy that I’ve gone to just lately and he’s agreed to help me out with my road course racing. I just think he’s unbelievable,” Edwards said. “Our deal is, I can lean on him for road courses stuff and he’s going to lean on me for the oval stuff. But I haven’t seen him race too much on an oval. He might not need any help.”

Braun has plenty of experience as a road course racer, and he excelled Saturday at Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez. But he is making only his third Nationwide start. He downplayed his abilities as a teacher.

“I really don’t think I’ve helped Carl too much,” Braun said. “We went and tested at (Virginia International Raceway) about a month ago. Carl helped me out quite a bit. Both Carl and Boris Said were there and those guys taught me a lot about road course racing and really helped get me up to speed in these cars.

“I know, obviously, a little bit about road course racing, but certainly not like those guys do in these stock cars.”

Optimistic

Marcos Ambrose is without a top-10 finish on the Nationwide circuit this year after earning six as a rookie in 2007. He’ll have a chance to improve this weekend after finishing fourth in qualifying.

“I was hoping for a top five qualifying run there and I’m pretty pleased with it,” Ambrose said. “It’s a nice gain for us. I feel like we’ve really improved our road course program.”

Ambrose, who is from Australia, is strong on road courses. He finished eighth in Mexico City last year.

The undercard

Scott Pruett’s chance at a weekend double went by the wayside when he and Memo Rojas finished second in Saturday’s Grand-Am Rolex Sports Car Series event. Marc Goossens and Jim Matthews won it.

Rojas is from Mexico City. He and Pruett had been 2-for-2 in 2008, and they still lead the point standings.

“It was just one of those situations — I got jammed in traffic,” Pruett said. “Marc got a good run on me. I knew he was coming. I was trying to protect the outside, and he did a nice move. We are focused on a championship.”

Pruett, who finished second in Nationwide qualifying earlier in the day, said he’s enjoying his stay in Mexico.

“This is a fun track, and Memo — he’s been my taxi driver,” Pruett said. “If I drove his car, I would be lost. I would still be looking for the track right now. It was nice. The people here are very gracious and very excited about the racing.”

Robin Liddell and Andrew Davis were the winners in the GT class.

Homero Richards topped all qualifiers for the NASCAR Corona Series event that will take place Sunday before the Corona Mexico 200.