NASCAR SPRINT CUP SERIES
SAVE MART 350
INFINEON RACEWAY
TEAM CHEVY DRIVER PRESS CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPT
JUNE 24, 2011
CLINT BOWYER, NO. 33 CHEERIOS/HAMBERGER HELPER CHEVROLET, met with members of the media at Infineon Raceway and discussed his walk across the Golden Gate Bridge, strategy coming into the road course race this weekend, going back to Daytona next week and much more. Full transcript.
TELL US A LITTLE BIT ABOUT YOUR WALK ON WEDNESDAY. “The walk was good. It was a lot of fun. Just very appreciative to have great sponsors like Cheerios, Hamburger Helper and General Mills brands. They always create good environments to interact with fans. Certainly a walk across the Golden Gate Bridge is something that I probably would never partake in. It gave me an opportunity to get to meet a lot of my fans and let them get to meet me. It was a lot of fun, it really was.”
TALK A LITTLE BIT ABOUT YOUR STRATEGY WITH ROAD COURSES AND THIS WEEKEND’S EVENT. “It seems like forward bite, rear grip is a big issue. I was looking at that Top Fuel Dragster over there, it’s kind of what you feel like coming off of turn seven over there. That’ pretty much right there. You know we’re working on things for tomorrow. It’s a different deal. Nobody has their coaches out here so you don’t have anything to do but sit there and bicker and gripe to your guys about how to be better, what things you can work on. We’ve been working a lot just trying to get better on the bigger race track. We really had a good handle on things what a month or so ago. Things were running really good and the last two or three weeks we have just been off. Our speed has been off and we’ve been working really hard trying to figure out the reason why.”
HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE YOURSELF AS FAR AS ROAD RACING, ARE YOU A GOOD ROAD RACER OR ARE YOU STILL LEARNING? “I’m not as good as that guy. I don’t know if I will have that hat on my head at the end of the day by any means, but I think hopefully we can be, I think we had the speed to be somewhere in the top 10 and that’s really a good goal for us right now as far as starting position. I really do believe forward bite, grip is going to be a big issue on into the race on Sunday. Just starting up front where you don’t have to worry about passing and then being overly aggressive with your tires and things like that, things you have to do to pass somebody is going to be beneficial. Other than that you’re going to have to race the race track. Focus on making sure you’ve got better grip than the rest.”
THE RED BULL THING WENT DOWN AND ALL OF A SUDDEN YOUR NAME POPPED UP AS YOU WERE REALLY CLOSE TO SIGNING. “I was actually on a golf course for a sponsor of ours and my phone started blowing up. I was like what the hell is this all about? You guys are pretty creative. You are really pretty good at creating stories and stuff like that. Any time any sport loses anybody it’s a huge setback for everybody. I hope they do keep that team going. They had a lot of strong runs and was a big part of this sport. The biggest thing is hopefully they can keep those cars in this sport and we can continue to move on having a full field and things like that. As far as myself goes, I’ve said from day one I want to stay at RCR and we’re actively pursuing that. It’s this time of the year, you’ve got to see what’s out there, you’ve got to see your options and things like that and other than knowing what the goal is the goal’s never changed. I want to be able to stay driving where I’m at and hopefully keep the same colors on our car and everything. As far as I’m concerned, sign us up for three more years.”
WHERE DO YOU THINK THAT CAME FROM? “Hell, I don’t know. Where do you think it come from?”
IT PROBABLY CAME FROM THEM CALLING YOU. “No, seriously it’s amazing how rumors and things, like I said there’s a lot of people call and ask questions. Not necessarily call, you just run into people in the garage and hey what are you doing next year. Well, I don’t know. Well, okay we might be interested. Something like that and all of a sudden the next thing you know you are standing on a golf course and you hear everybody saying, oh now what are you going to do. Your plan just blew up. And you’re like what? So it is what it is. Its part of coming in here to the media center and answering questions.”
SO WHAT IS STANDING IN THE WAY OF YOU GETTING A THREE-YEAR DEAL DONE AT RCR? “Money, sponsorship that’s the biggest thing just making sure you lock in everything. It takes time to get all that done. Like I said I would be happy exactly with the sponsors, the partners we have are great. General Mills has been an awesome sponsor to work with. BB&T has always been our go to sponsor and it’s always been good. We’ve won the Nationwide championship, we won my first Cup race with them, been a great sponsor and is right there in our own backyard. It’s been a proven product that has worked. I think we’ll get it all put together and certainly that’s the goal. It just takes time to get everything put together and if that doesn’t happen then you’ve got to explore options and see what’s out there. It’s the same thing that everybody goes through. It’s not much fun but its part of it.”
GOING BACK TO DAYTONA DO YOU HAVE ANY REASON AT ALL TO BELIEVE ANYTHING MIGHT BE DIFFERENT AND DO YOU GUYS EXPECT TO BE MORE ADVANCED WITH THIS TWO- CAR DRAFTING NOW? “I think my radio box is a little more advanced. It’s a little more easier to navigate. I can find my teammates. I think it even has a really cool light on it that lights up whose numbers they are so they’ve worked on it really hard. Other than that, just making sure you bring the fastest bullet to the race track. That’s all you can do. We were good there obviously in the 500, we were good at Talladega, I mean missed it by inches. This is a great opportunity for us to capitalize hopefully and get our first win of the season. It’s time. We need to do that. Obviously for the Chase and everything that happens with these crazy wildcard for the last two I’m telling you there are 15 teams that are plenty capable and have been in the Chase. That’s the thing, if you look at the top-15 teams they’ve all been in there and should be in there. But you’re just going to have to do a better job than the rest and beat them out of it.”
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