Ford Notes and Quotes
Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series (MENCS)
STP 500 Advance (Martinsville Speedway; Martinsville, VA)
Friday, March 23, 2018
Paul Menard, driver of the No. 21 Motorcraft Ford Fusion, will be making his first start Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series start with the Wood Brothers this weekend. Menard, along with co-owners Len and Eddie Wood, spoke about how their season has gone to date and expectations for Sunday’s scheduled race.
PAUL MENARD, No. 21 Motorcraft Ford Fusion – HOW SPECIAL IS IT GOING TO BE TO START SUNDAY’S RACE WITH THE WOOD BROTHERS FOR THE FIRST TIME? “It’s already been pretty special, but coming to their home track essentially – Stuart is only a half-hour down the road – there’s gonna be a huge fan base and a lot of people cheering for the 21. We’re gonna try to do them proud. It’s been an up-and-down track for me. It’s a lot of fun to race on. It’s a lot of fun to drive, but it gets tough out there on old tires and you start sliding around and beating and banging. But it’s a cool track and driving the Motorcraft Ford is an honor for sure and being at Martinsville, the home track for them, is even more special.”
EDDIE WOOD, Co-Owner, No. 21 Motorcraft Ford Fusion – WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO COME HERE KNOWING YOU GUYS CAN RUN UP FRONT? “It’s always special for us to come to Martinsville because, like Paul said, we live only 30 minutes from here. Our dad came here and raced. He raced here in the fifties and it’s just a special, special place and knowing that the Ford Fusions ran really well last year here that gives you a lot of confidence. I’m sure it gives Paul a lot of confidence, but it’s just a special, special place. I love the hot dogs. I’m really jacked up to get some Jesse Jones hot dogs back. I got on Clay Campbell just now and asked him how come we didn’t have some here for lunch, but my first time here would have been in the early sixties. I probably would have been about eight years old and it was grass then and everybody parked in the infield and it was pre-tailgating, but that’s what it was. Nobody had a name for it back then, but everybody had pick-up trucks and everybody would bring food. Every team would share food with everybody. The Pettys always ate with us, so, like I said, it’s just a special place to me.”
PAUL MENARD CONTINUED — THE TEAM IS OFF TO A GOOD START. WHAT CAN YOU POINT TO AS THE REASON WHY? “Fast race cars, but good people. Greg Erwin is crew chief and we have a lot of talent on the race team, a lot of long-time Wood Brothers Racing employees. We have a lot of new guys and everybody is mixing really well and gelling really well together. The engineers and Greg and myself sit up in the hauler and talk, and we have open and honest discussions and figure out ways to make the race car go faster. I feel Atlanta and Fontana we actually had really good cars – top 10 cars – and just had some issues that took us out of contention for that, but we’ve got fast cars and a solid start for where we’re at right out of the box. None of us have really worked together before as a unit, so I’m pretty proud of that.”
LEN WOOD, Co-Owner, No. 21 Motorcraft Ford Fusion – “I think we’ve done better than we expected really. Daytona is a crapshoot and we came out of there with a sixth-place, so we were really happy about that, but Fontana and Vegas we had a really good run at Vegas and hit something with about 15 to go. That only cost us one spot, so we were fortunate on that, but we’ve been happy with the performance. The pit crew, it’s new to them with the five guys. We were wondering how that was gonna work. It’s slowed the whole group down, but our group – knock on wood – seems to be consistent so far of making good stops. We’re happy about that as well.”
AS A RACE FAN WHAT DID YOU THINK ABOUT WHAT HAPPENED LAST YEAR HERE WITH THE DRIVER CONFLICT? “I just call that NASCAR racing. It happens. It’s a short track. It’s a half-mile. You don’t do that on superspeedways. You don’t do that on intermediates, but when you come to Martinsville and come to Bristol – to some degree Richmond – the short tracks that’s when you get mad at any race track, but you can take out your frustrations a little bit easier at these smaller tracks. I really haven’t looked back to see what instigated all the pushing and shoving physically outside the car, but hurt feelings happens. It’s part of the sport.”
WHAT DID YOU THINK WHEN YOU SAW REPLAYS OF THOSE ALTERCATIONS? “Again, I grew up short track racing in Wisconsin. I got in some fights, not with 100,000 people watching, but we all got in some fights growing up and that’s just part of it.”
IS THERE ADDED PRESSURE DRIVING AT THIS TRACK NOW THAT YOU’RE WITH THE HOMETOWN TEAM? “The pressure is all what you make of it. I know a couple things – I’ve got a great team behind me. We’re gonna have a fast Ford and we’re gonna have a lot of fans cheering on the 21 car, so you can think about that every waking second you’re up here, or you can go to work and do your business. It’s obviously an honor to drive this car and to be a part of the Wood family driving the 21 at Martinsville, and I’m really gonna think about that when I put my firesuit on, but once you get the helmet on it’s all business.”
EDDIE WOOD CONTINUED – DOES THIS PLACE CHANGE FROM YEAR TO YEAR WHEN YOU COME? HOW DOES IT FEEL? “This place, to me, is still the same. The type of racing through the years is always bump the guy, move him, somebody spins somebody whether it’s on purpose or an accident. The guy that got spun is sure it was on purpose, but the facility itself, I was telling Paul, years ago there was a pond right outside the race track and I bet Mr. Earles had 5,000 ducks. You’ve got to be old to remember that one, but they were everywhere, but the race track itself, you go back and look at old pictures – somebody put a picture of my dad and myself today up somewhere and I was like four years old. I think it was in 1956, but the grandstand you can tell it’s Martinsville. The place has got more stands and all that, but the core of the place, to me, is just like it has always been. You can race here year after year, race after race and there’s no way anybody can mess this race up. This is just always a great race because it’s tight and it’s grassroots, it’s NASCAR roots. I’m looking forward to it.”
LEN WOOD CONTINUED – “It will be about saving brakes and not tearing your car up during the race, just hoping to get the good finish.”
EDDIE WOOD CONTINUED – WHAT WOULD A TAILGATE TYPE OF DAY BE LIKE BACK IN THE DAY HERE? “I would have been young, but I can remember my mom and all the wives of the people on the race team would make a particular dish. My mom made potato salad because I would look through it to make sure I found hers, and other people would make fried chicken or roast beef or whatever. Everyone had station wagons back then, so it would be like level full in the back with food and then I guess in those days the race started similar to what it does now – I think it used to start around 1:30, so around noon, after all the cars were on the grid, all the team guys would come to our station wagon and we’d eat. There are pictures, and one in particular I remember, Cale Yarborough was driving our car at the time and they’re all sitting in the back of a pick-up truck on the rails. There must have been six or eight of them and they were eating, but our family probably did the most because we were the closest. I remember the Pettys – Richard and Dale and Maurice – would always come and have lunch here with us, but there was a lot of camaraderie and everybody was kind of buddies back then until the race started and then it’s just like it is now. Everybody is against everybody when the flag drops, but then after the race you’d kind of go back being buddies again, and that’s just the way it is.”
LEN WOOD CONTINUED – “It was usually with card tables set up or something like that you would throw in the back of the car because we didn’t have easy-up tents and things back then.”
EDDIE WOOD CONTINUED – “And you’d eat the hot dogs too. I mean, they had hot dogs back then, too. At one time we came here on Thursday and started practice and qualify Friday.”
LEN WOOD CONTINUES – “It used to be Thursday so Clay could get qualifying in the Friday paper before the weekend.”
EDDIE WOOD CONTINUED – “I’m sure on a Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday deal I probably ate 18 hot dogs because they’re like potato chips, once you start you’re not gonna stop. I’ve seen people eat them in two bites (laughter).”
PAUL MENARD CONTINUED – HAVE YOU MADE ANYBODY MAD YET THAT THEY MIGHT WANT TO RETALIATE THIS WEEKEND? “Not at the moment, no. We’ve had a pretty clean year so far, but if you are gonna retaliate, I guess this is the track to do it at. Knock on wood, we’ve had pretty clean races. I try to race people with respect, but if they don’t race me that way, then I don’t race them that way. I think that’s pretty much across the board for everybody. We have a pretty good group of racers right now that all pretty much respect each other. We don’t booger each other too much, I guess.”
DO YOU WORRY ABOUT WHAT’S GOING ON BEHIND YOU? “It’s hard to see behind you. I’m always looking out front and going forward.”
DO YOU EVER DRIVE THINKING GUYS IN FRONT OF YOU ARE GETTING OUT OF CONTROL AND WONDERING WHAT YOUR MOVE IS GOING TO BE? “Yeah, sometimes I’m cheering them on (laughter). I think it was Fontana last week, I think we had to pit for a flat tire and we needed a caution or something happened and two guys were going at it. It was at Phoenix, so I was cheering for them to crash so we could get a caution, but you’re aware of the situations around you. You see people get into it a little bit or whatever, but more so about here I almost categorize Martinsville in the same category as like a Daytona and a Talladega, where two guys making a mistake or one guy making a mistake or two guys going at it can affect a lot of other cars because you’re all wadded up so tightly. Daytona and Talladega, you’re cruising around there three-wide and you see someone get a little overaggressive you might try to shift lanes or do something to take yourself out of a bad position. Here, it’s very similar. You see a couple guys doing something that might affect you, you try to put yourself in position to get out of the way.”
YOU HAVE MORE ROOM AT DAYTONA AND TALLADEGA. HOW DO YOU FIND THAT ROOM HERE? “It’s really tough. There’s a little patch of grass on the inside of the corner with a big curb that leads to it, so it’s tough to do.”
HOW DO YOU DEAL WITH SOMETHING BAD THAT MIGHT HAPPEN AT LAP 25 SO YOU’RE STILL AROUND ON LAP 425 TO CONTEND FOR THE WIN? “I guess you have to lean on your professionalism and the job that you have to do at the end. Obviously, emotions get the better of people at any given time, so you just have to be a professional and realize it’s not all about you, it’s about these guys sitting next to me, the guys up on the pit box, the guys that work on the race cars and be smart about it.”
A LOT OF TALK LATELY ABOUT GRASSROOTS RACING. WHAT IS IT ABOUT MARTINSVILLE THAT CAN MAKE EVEN A CUP RACE FEEL LIKE A SATURDAY NIGHT SHOWDOWN? “It’s getting back to grassroots. Over half the guys, probably more than that, started racing at short tracks with late models somewhere. We were running 25 laps back then versus 500 now, but the stage racing is kind of like a couple of heat races before the A Main, so you try to get your points when you can and be smart about things when you can and let it rip when you can.”
DO YOU HAVE A FAVORITE MOMENT HERE AT MARTINSVILLE? “The first time I ever came here in 2003, I think it was, Andy Petree was driving a truck. I was up on the pit box watching him race and he ran into everything on the race track, so that was a highlight then. He had three or four guys come down and try to kill him afterwards, so that was a highlight, but as far as driving the track every race is a little bit different. The same situations kind of pan out during the race, so nothing really crazy there, but I’ll never forget the Andy Petree one.”
IS IT DIFFERENT DRIVING FOR THE WOOD BROTHERS? “At the end of the day it’s still a race team. You’re still producing race cars to go race, but the personal aspect of it I’ve never experienced before. Last November, probably around Thanksgiving time, I got a handwritten letter from their mom mailed to my house welcoming me to the family. Kim Hall sending a box of t-shirts for me, my wife, but also my baby, my daughter and my son. So stuff like that that most race teams don’t do. The personal aspect is much more tighter over here.”
EDDIE WOOD CONTINUED – HOW HAS IT BEEN BRINGING PAUL INTO THE FAMILY? “Like Paul said, we’ve got the first part of the season behind us. Daytona, like Len said, if you’ve got a fast car down there and you don’t have any problems – it used to be you get to 10 to go you’ve got a shot. Now you’ve got to get to one to go, but Paul did a great job down there to get through all that mess that was going on, and then we go to Atlanta and, like he said, we had a really good car there and got caught with some cautions or something, but so far this season has been great. He’s around all the time. He’s up in the hauler all the time with the engineers and Greg and it’s just a good atmosphere. I’m really enjoying it.”
LEN WOOD CONTINUED – HOW HAS PAUL FIT IN? “He’s fit good so far. This deal came up last year and we never really met Paul until pretty close to the time we announced the deal. I think we hit it off really good. He likes to wear blue jeans. We like to wear blue jeans, t-shirts, so I think we’ve got a lot of similarities. We met his dad last year. We met his mom at Vegas, so this is like a family for us.”
PAUL MENARD CONTINUED – HOW DO YOU GRADE THE FIRST FEW RACES? “I haven’t really even thought about it. I’m happy that we are where we are. Obviously, we have work to do. We want to get better. I got a nice note from somebody saying, ‘Good job in Las Vegas,’ but we didn’t win so there’s still work to do. I didn’t really know coming into the season how everything was gonna shake out with having a new manufacturer, new race team, the way that they talk about the race cars is different than what I’ve been used to, so it’s kind of learning the details, but that’s all gone really smoothly and we’ve got speed in our race cars. We’ve just got to iron out some details that’s all.”
THE WOOD BROTHERS HAVE 99 WINS. WHAT WOULD IT MEAN TO GET WIN 100 FOR THEM ON SUNDAY? “It would be huge. I’ll take it anywhere. We started at Daytona and didn’t get it there, and we’ll keep working until we get it. Martinsville would be a huge one for us, obviously, and if we do that, we’ll have another one for the museum down the road.”
