NASCAR CUP SERIES
DAYTONA INTERNATIONAL SPEEDWAY
DAYTONA 500 MEDIA DAY
TEAM CHEVY DRIVER QUOTES
FEBRUARY 12, 2025
Michael McDowell, driver of the No. 71 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet – DAYTONA 500 Media Day Quotes
HOW HAS YOUR CONFIDENCE IN THIS RACE SHIFTED FOR YOU SINCE WINNING THIS RACE IN 2021?
“Yeah, its definitely mixed because you come back with confidence for sure after you have won it. One because you know that it is possible and you know that you can do it, but you also still have that pressure. Right? You have that pressure that it’s a great opportunity, and it’s a strength of ours and it’s a strength of mine and I know that. And so you feel that extra pressure coming here because you know you will be in the mix and you will have a legitimate shot and what it means. So it’s a bit of a mix. The confidence comes with it, but the pressure comes with it too. Joey says pressure is privilege, and so I am very fortunate to feel that pressure coming here. But every year is new challenges, new obstacles, and new opportunities. That is what is exciting about kicking off a new year is that there are tremendous opportunities in front of us, and the biggest opportunity of all is being right here at the Daytona 500.”
WHAT WAS THE LOGIC IN NOT GOING OUT FOR PRACTICE THIS MORNING? IT SOUNDS LIKE THAT WAS PLANNED?
“Yeah, it was planned. I think there was a lot to it. There is not a tremendous amount that you can do to the cars, especially pre-qualifying to find more speed. You can go out there and leak check and all those things, which we probably would have liked to done. But with inspection being so close to practice, we took that extra time to run through LIS a few more times and make sure we had everything where we needed it. Minimizing risk is one small variable of it, but its not the biggest variable of it. But we have just felt like we have had a process of unloading for qualifying being our deal and knowing where those targets are. So we didn’t want to confuse it too much with race trim and draft, go back, go forth. So yeah, it was kind of a group decision that we all made and yeah, we will see how it all plays out.”
WHAT IS IT LIKE AT THIS STAGE OF YOUR CAREER TO GET USED TO A NEW TEAM AND PROCESS?
“Its nerve wracking and exciting all at the same time. It’s a brand new opportunity and there is so much in front of you that is new and it feels that way, right? You feel that optimism and you feel that energy of like wow, we are doing big things. But we haven’t done anything yet and that makes you nervous because you are like, we have to go perform now. And so that part of it has been fun and that is what I would say, its been fun. It has been fun to go through the process of how they do things, how they see things, and learn people’s names, who they are, and what they do. I was doing a FOX interview today and got there a little early and I was hanging out with my PR guy and figuring out how he got into racing. Having those conversations is fun. It’s fun to get to know people and hear people’s stories. But it takes time. You can’t walk in day one and just be clicking with everybody. The cool thing is that there are a lot of familiar faces at Spire that I have worked with over my career at some point and I have a lot of funny stories with that. Like with my very first car chief, Greg Osborne, is the shop manager at Spire. My rookie year, he was there. Peter Sospenzo was my crew chief my rookie year. I can go down the list and tell you all these guys that I have worked with. So, its cool to reconnect with people and have a shot at doing big things.”
REGARDING WINNING AT THE BRICKYARD AND THE DAYTONA 500
“The 500, there is nothing that will top that. I wish I had a better way of phrasing it, but the Brickyard was more rewarding personally and professionally. The reason that is because of what we did as a team. We dominated, we led the most laps, we executed on pit road, and it’s not a superspeedway and nobody can say it’s fluky. And I went head-to-head with Chase Elliott for 30 laps. And to me, that is like so awesome to get a win like that. Right? Where at Daytona there was a big crash with Brad and Joey, and I don’t find it controversial at all in winning the 500 because a lot of those races end like that. That is part of it, but the reward is just feeling like man, we did something special. Brickyard was one of those days.”
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