In this paper, we consider the equation $u_t = u_{xx} + h(b(x)) (1-u)u, x \in \mathbb{R}$, where $\gamma \mapsto h(\gamma)$ is a nonnegative continuous function and $b(x)$ is a periodic function. In some sense, $b(x)$ represents a controllable parameter and the function $\gamma \mapsto h(\gamma)$ describes how the intrinsic growth rate of $u$ depends on the parameter $b$. It is known that there exists a nonnegative number $c^{*}(h(b))$ such that the traveling wave with average speed $c$ exists if and only if $c \geq c^{*}(h(b))$. We study minimizing problems and maximizing problems of the minimal speed $c^{*}(h(b))$ by varying $b(x)$ under the constraint $\frac{1}{L} \int_{0}^{L} b(x) dx = \alpha$, where $\alpha$ is a given positive constant. We prove the existence of minimizers and maximizers of the minimal speed, but it turns out that the minimizers for certain choices of $h$ do not exist in the class of functions but do exist in the space of Young measures. This means that the minimizing sequence exhi...