NASCAR CUP SERIES
SUNDAY, JULY 12, 2020
CLINT BOWYER MEDIA AVAILABILITY
Clint Bowyer, driver of the No. 14 Ford Mustang in the NASCAR Cup Series for Stewart-Haas Racing met with media members across the country via Zoom prior to Sunday’s race at Kentucky Speedway.
CLINT BOWYER, No. 14 Ford Mustang — WE HAVE A QUICK TURNAROUND TO WEDNESDAY NIGHT AND THE ALL-STAR RACE: “It is the All-Star race. One million dollars! Say it with me. It is one of those things where you have been dreaming of the opportunity for a long time. By opportunity I don’t mean the COVID. I mean the opportunity to get this All-Star race to Bristol. I thought it was a perfect fit for the All-Star format and I am excited to get there and see it all go down.”
HOW DO YOU THINK THE CHOOSE RULE WILL GO? “I think just like anything, I think it comes down to having an issue of like something blowing up or some other issue that you can’t foresee ahead of time. We have had some dialogue about things. I talked to NASCAR and obviously having late models that race all around the country, as they travel all across the country they travel and run and will run into a certain track that will implement their rules a lot of times. For the locals and the track who needs them for the car count and to put the show on. I have seen it go good and seen it go bad, honestly. I don’t want that to be the focal point going into Bristol. It can’t just be about the cone rule. You hear drivers talk about it and I don’t want to oversell it. Can it make an impact? Absolutely. But if you oversell it, it will never hold up to the expectations of what people are expecting out of that. For the most part, I don’t see that it probably will make a difference past … I just don’t see people giving up two or three spots to stay on the outside. Possibly if you are on old tires or something like that, that is where an opportunity like that comes in. Just look at this weekend in Kentucky. I think it is a prime example. I called both of those Xfinity races and had it been that rule in place, some of those guys maybe starting second would have chosen the outside but it really wasn’t that second place car, that inside car, on the front row. If you go back and look at it, fifth place was the one that was certainly (indaudible). Can it work? Yes. Do I think it is oversold? A little bit.”
COMING HOME TO KANSAS, HOW DIFFERENT IS THAT GOING TO BE FOR YOU? “I think normal is shot for the most part for about everybody since this COVID anyway. Certainly going back home isn’t going to feel like home, no. I can’t go and have dinner with 20 people like I have been accustomed to and go back and have family and friends and people that have followed my career tailgating in the infield and go have a beer with them or whatever the case may be. I won’t be able to do that this time around. It is not going to be the same. It is still home. There is still a lot of pride in running and racing in the Cup Series of NASCAR at home at Kansas Speedway that means so much to you. That pride is still there but it is going to be different this time around, just like it has been everywhere else.”
ARE YOUR MOM AND DAD IN CHARLOTTE OR ARE THEY IN KANSAS? “Great question. They have been all over the place. Believe it or not, they are here in Kentucky camping with some friends that they met at Kentucky a few years back. The old man found a campground down the road by the casino and met a couple there and they have been in contact. They came to Nashville for the banquet and hung out with one another. They have been here the last couple of weeks at that same campground. That is what racing is all about, meeting people. Those relationships will take you the rest of your life. That is what you can take with you when you leave this thing. That is a prime example of what traveling and being on the road all these years does for you. It creates those opportunities and relationships that you make over the years and you cherish those in times like this. Everybody is longing for something to do in this. We were talking about it as a family after the All-Star race to try to find a campground over in the mountains somewhere and just camp in the bus for a couple days to try something new and not be quarantined at the house. You can’t find one, man. There is not a campground in sight.”
WILL YOUR FOLKS BE IN EMPORIA WHEN YOU RACE HERE OR WHERE WILL THEY BE? “That is a good question. Probably now that fans won’t be there I would say that my family won’t be there so there is no reason for them to be there. They stay pretty close to their grandkids.”
JUST TALK ABOUT YOUR SEASON SO FAR. YOU HAVE BEEN VERY CLOSE TO WINNING: “I don’t really see that as an issue. It is hard trying to learn one another in this format with no practice or anything else. Honestly, it is just weird. It feels like you should have an asterisk behind every finish. If we would have had practice we would have had a little different run or a different setup in the car and wouldn’t have encountered those problems. Those are all things that not having that chance to communicate and work with one another that we just don’t have and take for granted right now. It is the same for everybody. You have to unload well and my teammate Kevin Harvick says all the time that you can’t drive a slow car fast. We have had fast race cars and have led laps. We are kind of snakebit right now. I hate the word bad luck but I mean last weekend we were seventh place and pretty much had it locked up. With 21 to go, caution comes out. We pit, two laps later the caution comes out and the rest is history. We are a lap down and 17th on old tires. You are screwed. It is just the way it is right now. I have been racing long enough to know that it will flip and those runs will come back. We have some good tracks for us coming up. I gotta get through Kentucky here. This is going to be a struggle. Being able to call both of the Xfinity races I saw how those guys had their hands full. I am looking forward to the challenge tonight and getting a good run here and getting it set up. We need a good run. We need a confidence booster. My crew, Johnny Klausmeier, everyone does a great job and works their butts off. It is hard to showcase how hard they are working right now by just showing up and racing. You don’t get that run that you deserve sometimes. Prime example would have been last weekend at Indy.”
OTHER PROFESSIONAL SPORTS LEAGUES ARE TESTING THEIR PARTICIPANTS EVERY WEEK WHEN THEY COME TO THE VENUE. WOULD YOU LIKE TO SEE NASCAR START TESTING ITS DRIVERS AND CREW MEMBERS EVERY WEEK BEFORE THEY COME INTO THE TRACK? “I think we do a good job of that and I certainly feel safe. I feel like narrowing down the amount of people that come into this garage area. The teams and everybody, we are a family. We have said it time and time again. If any organization or sanction was to be ready for a challenge like this, I knew it would be NASCAR. We are a group that travels together and takes care of each other and looks after one another. Everybody knows everybody and in a time like this when you really have to hunker down and watch each other’s backs we do a good job of that and I think it shows. How many races are we in now? We have had several races where other sanctioning bodies have maybe had one or two. We have had only one instance where Jimmie was out and that was confusion. I don’t see the problem. I think we are doing a good job. I feel safe at the racetrack and I know my peers do as well. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. I feel like that is a good example of what we have going on. I think we are doing a good job with it.”
CAN YOU TALK ABOUT THIS SEASON BEING IN THE BOOTH FOR FOX? YOU STARTED OFF CALLING THE IRACING AND CAP IT WITH XFINITY, WHAT WAS THIS CRAZY SEASON LIKE AS A BROADCASTER? “You know, I don’t really know about the rave reviews but I am just having a lot of fun. I enjoy it. I enjoy this sport. I love this sport. I am proud of this sport and proud to be a part of this sport. It has always been fun for me over the years to sell this sport to the fans or whatever the case may be. Having that access to be able to reach a fan in a different way, over the years I have just gone out to the infield and interacted with fans and got to know them and tell our story. Having Fox Sports reach out and ask that we do that has been a breath of fresh air for me. The iRacing thing was a great opportunity to do two things. I have had for a long time a partnership with iRacing and I appreciate them and being able to rise to the occasion. What a wonderful thing that landed in a world of NASCAR and motorsports’ lap. It is almost like it was built and prepared for this pandemic. Without it, I don’t honestly know that NASCAR survives and are able to turn the switch back on after we did. Bridging that gap and keeping our sponsors in the limelight under ratings that are competitive with any sport was phenomenal for all of us in the world of motorsports and in particular NASCAR. Then Fox for taking that risk. Eric Shanks called us, Jeff and I, and asked if we would be a part of it and it was a no-brainer and goes without saying absolutely. Them taking that chance and doing this for us was ultimately, honestly in my opinion, the reason we were able to come back the way we are. Furthermore, the way we called these races. There are so many layers to it. What they learned with the iRacing was being able to call those races from the studio safely, with social distancing, so many things. You can’t have one missing link in the chain. It all has to be together. You can’t have somebody show up sick. It will ruin the whole thing. The format in which we called those races is exactly how we are calling and they are calling these races now, Xfinity, Cup or Trucks for that matter. Tremendous amount was learned with, call it a mishap, but I call it an opportunity. A lot of things you are seeing right now — the All-Star race, things that we have wanted to do with our sport for a long time. Opportunities that we wouldn’t have been able to take because of courage or business or a lot of reasons that we wouldn’t have been able to go to those measures that we were able to because of COVID.”
THERE WAS A MEMO SENT OUT TO NASCAR TEAMS REMINDING THEM OF THE COVID GUIDELINES. DO YOU FEEL THERE HAS BEEN A LOOSENING OF THAT OR HOW TEAMS HAVE HANDLED THAT OR IS IT GETTING HARDER TO FOLLOW THEM? “I don’t think it is getting harder to follow. I think everybody needs a reminder whether you are at the race track or home. It is just life to get lax with things. You always need reminders. Certainly them coming out with a memo was nothing more than an opportunity. Again, I feel 100-percent safe in here. We are a family that travels together and have for a long time. We look out for each other and I think that our track record is proving itself. We are the only ones that have been doing this for 10-plus races. There are some other sanctions that are trying to start back up and make no mistake, they are starting back up following the lead of NASCAR and the job we have done. Has there been instances where we have to learn and bob and weave, absolutely. But show me anywhere in this COVID deal. There is no handbook that comes with it. You have to creat it and you have to learn from your mistakes quickly and put them to use and certainly we have done that with NASCAR.”
WHAT IS THE TEAM STRATEGY RIGHT NOW? ARE YOU GOING FOR STAGE POINTS, RACE WINS? WHAT IS THE PLAN WITH 10 REGULAR SEASON RACES LEFT? “Aside from the obvious of winning the race each and every week. Right now it is about getting back into the damn 12th place. Gosh it has been tough. Since Talladega. We were in 12th. Would have been just fine. Look at my teammate Aric Almirola and myself. He was 13th and I was 12th at Talladega. I got wrecked on the last lap. He finished third and I was like, “no big deal, we will race it out’. We were within striking distance of others too. He sat on pole the next week and won two stages and put 50 points on me in three races where we have been starting 21st, 22nd or worse and struggling and started digging ourselves out of a hole. Just that difference in that one spot and one particular race that is a wildcard race at Talladega. No excuses or anything else but it is just a prime example of how quickly things can change in this world. That shoe can be on the other foot and it will be. The biggest thing is we need to get back in the top-12 if we are going to continue to go down this drawing position because those guys, since then they have been on fire. I don’t know who is drawing for them but they have been top-five each week and we are around 13th or whatever it is. We gotta get back into that top-12. That is the item number one here at Kentucky. We do that, we start knocking down solid finishes and settle into those single digit finishes and the rest will take care of itself.”
