KURT BUSCH (No. 22 Shell/Pennzoil Dodge Charger R/T) Race Winner “What an amazing win. To get to victory lane for Shell/Pennzoil is incredible. This Dodge Charger was fast and I have to thank my “teammate” Jamie McMurray so much. What an unbelievable experience – this two-car draft. I had no idea what to expect going in. I was just going to take it one lap at a time and see how it plays out. I wanted to learn as the race went on how this Shell/Pennzoil Dodge raced. (McMurray) was the man tonight. He stayed with us. He stayed true. I can’t thank him enough for doing that tonight. I hope it was the show the fans wanted to see.”
TALK ABOUT WHEN YOU DECIDED TO MAKE YOUR FINAL MOVE? “I wanted to give those guys a push hard getting into Turn 1 and I never got to them. Then my game plan changed to take whatever I could get. I knew the 11 was going to split away from the 39. I was hoping he would do it soon enough. It worked out in our favor at the end because McMurray stayed with us. For Shell/Pennzoil to believe in Penske and me, this is unbelievable to deliver them a victory in this 22 car.”
ARE WE GOING TO SEE THIS ACTION NEXT SUNDAY FOR THE 500? “Absolutely. It’s going to be those two-car tandems. No matter who you’re hooked up with, you’ve got to be able to go. It’s going to be interesting to see what NASCAR does and if they shake out the rules. I believe in what we’ve got. NASCAR’s done a tremendous job to give us this package and we’re happy to race it. Shell/Pennzoil on-board, putting Dodge back in victory lane, we’ve got AAA, Coca-Cola, a bunch of great sponsors. And I’ve got the greatest crew in the garage.”
CAN YOU TALK ABOUT WHAT IT MEANS TO WIN AT DAYTONA? “This is a special day. I’ve tried very hard over the last 11 years to break through on a restrictor-plate race. To pull into victory lane at Daytona, I knew that this was a special moment and I sucked it all in. You never know when that chance will be again. I’ve always respected this race track. I’ve always thought of the times that I’ve finished second here, not just in Cup cars, but in the Truck series and IROC. I can’t get mad. I can’t get discouraged. I know that one day it will come back for me. And with the fresh pavement and a new outlook on what this draft was going to be about, basically this is the old-school-style racing with slingshot with two cars tied up together. That’s what it reminded me of. I had flashbacks of slingshots, but you have to have the guy behind you. It’s an unbelievable experience to win here at Daytona. To win a restrictor-plate race at Daytona after years of trying – it’s not a point’s race – but it’s a very special race and heck, we knocked out the All-Star race last year in Charlotte and we got the Shootout tonight. Steve and I are doing pretty good at knocking out big events together.”
STEVE ADDINGTON (Crew Chief, No. 22 Shell/Pennzoil Dodge Charger R/T) “We felt like we couldn’t push like the other guys. We got hooked up with Mark Martin there in the beginning and Kurt said that he was going to go talk to him (during the break). We decided to add some tape to our car because we couldn’t push and felt like if we were going to be pushed all night long, we needed to add some tape to the front of it. We did that. We got separated from Mark and then he got in trouble – he and the 18 car got together – and we lost him. I thought that we were in trouble. When Juan (Pablo Montoya) got knocked out and Jamie (McMurray) was out there by himself, he committed himself to us and that helped us. They can say what they want about the pusher, but the guy driving that car leading that tandem has to know what’s going on and pay attention. Kurt did an awesome job tonight.”
TALK ABOUT WHY THE TWO-CAR DRAFT WORKED BETTER THAN THE THREE-CAR DRAFT? KURT: “Well, I think we all have been to a Saturday-night short track and seen chain races where they put a big I-beam through the cars and they don’t put anybody in the middle. There’s a guy up front with a motor and then there’s a guy in the back with the brake. This is opposite; this is where the guy in the back has the motor, the guy in the front has the brake. Two cars just hook up and it seems like the air comes off the front car and clears that second car perfectly. If you have a third car, the air comes off that front car, lands onto the third car and that third car can’t break through. That’s my philosophy on it. Having open mind tonight is similar to the approach that I had when I ran for the Chase back in 2004. Nobody knew what to expect, nobody knew how to win it, and I felt like just having an open mind and not getting frustrated with anything kept me in this. I have Jamie McMurray to thank for everything tonight. Having a guy that’s won here at Daytona is also a key ingredient because he knows how to get it done.”
YOU HELPED YOUR FORMER TEAMMATE TO A WIN HERE A FEW YEARS AGO. DID THIS TRACK OWE YOU SOMETHING? KURT: “I always think that Ryan will know that I helped him, and he’ll jump in behind me if things are getting busy out there. You have to have as many alliances as you can. And to not win at this track ever before until tonight, I still kept feeling like maybe I’ll find my day here, and tonight is my night. I’m going to absorb it, take it all in. It’s fun doing it with a new group like Shell Pennzoil. It would have been cooler to win with the Miller Lite car in the Bud Shootout, but hey, we’re with a great group with Shell, with Pennzoil, with Dodge, and maybe it was just a little bit of Lady Luck on our side tonight that gave us this win. But true credit goes to my team and to McMurray. I was just trying to hold a pretty steady wheel.”
YOU BOTH HAVE A LOT OF EXPERIENCE HERE AT DAYTONA. HOW MUCH DID THAT EXPERIENCE HELP? ADDINGTON: “I think we saw it coming. I mean, it was inevitable that this was going to be the way the racing was going to be. I think when NASCAR stepped in this morning and took a step with the oil cooling and tried to get the temperatures up so guys couldn’t do that, they thought they could break it up with that, but it didn’t happen. The guys are still going to do it whether it’s two laps or eight laps; everybody is going to work towards that direction to be able to do this.”
BUSCH: “We saw it coming. That’s why Brad Keselowski and myself teamed up during January testing. I have Brad to thank, as well, for the education, so to speak. We taught each other how to do this two car draft and I felt very comfortable going in tonight knowing that it could be a key factor to win. And it was. One thing I’m thinking of sitting here tonight is it was 50 degrees out tonight. It’s going to be much warmer on Sunday, and that will shake up how guys are able to push with their temperatures, their radiator and their oil coolers.”
WITH TWO-CAR TANDEMS SO IMPORTANT, WILL YOU SPEND THE NEXT WEEK TRYING TO FIGURE OUT WHO YOU CAN PARTNER WITH? BUSCH: “Yeah, I would say that that’s going to be a key player in it. There’s going to be so many elements that fall into place that you really can’t just focus on just one thing. You have to go back and review a lot. I’m going to go back and review the tape and see who are the pushers, who are the pushees. It looks like the RCR cars have some good steam under the hood to push really well, and those engines, those ECR engines, those guys are great pushers. For us, we need to have as many alliances as we can. We’re the only Dodge team out there. I can’t wait to get Keselowski out there, see how we team up. Whether we’re in the same 150 or not together, and then it comes down to these restarts at the end. You can have 450 miles of racing with somebody and it gets shuffled around. The thing that’s most important in my mind is you can’t try to hook up with your buddies too soon and then guys are trying to check up and stay together and you’re still in a big pack. Then, boom, cars are wrecking. It’s almost every restart you’re looking around, thinking who can I team up with.”
HOW DO YOU FIGURE OUT WHO TO DRAFT WITH? BUSCH: “You have to have a guy willing to stick with you and stay behind you. With the way the two cars hook up, it’s just the length from the front bumper to the rear bumper of the two cars. So it’s just taking an overall measurement, and the air comes off that first car and must land right behind the spoiler of the second car because if you hit there and try to draft a foot apart, you can never hook up. You never get that extra speed. So it’s just a distance thing. I think if we all stood in the wind tunnel, and made some measurements, we would see exactly what we’re seeing out here on the race track, but it’s very difficult to simulate wind tunnels versus what happens here on the asphalt track. A lot of it is just being able to read the car and feel the RPM and know when you’re getting bogged down versus when you actually have extra speed with the draft.”
JAMIE MCMURRAY WAS SAYING THAT THE REASON THAT HE STAYED WITH YOU IS BECAUSE YOU GUYS WERE SUCH GOOD FRIENDS? BUSCH: “It’s really just the camaraderie and the way that we’ve shared off-track experiences. Whether it’s hanging out together, whether it’s going to events together. We did flip-flop sponsors or rides in a sense. He took over at Crown Royal on that 97 car, turned into the 26, and there was a little bit of spite in the beginning with me switching over to Penske, him being part of the deal at Ganassi. But it’s just funny how things come together. There are just people that you see in life and you gravitate towards them. He and I have done that. We live fairly close to each other in the Charlotte area, and there’s times when we find each other hanging out and we don’t even know.”
WHEN DID YOU DISCOVER THIS TWO-CAR PHONOMENON OF THE TWO-CAR DRAFT? BUSCH: “Just to finish up, I consider Jamie McMurray a true friend, and it takes somebody like that to push you to a victory. It reminded me of the time when I shoved Newman to win the 500. The product of tonight’s event and how everything unfolded, it’s everything, the way the bumpers line up, the fresh asphalt, the tires, and the grip in the tires. We saw a little bit of this at Talladega and now here at Daytona with the cars hooked up; there’s virtually no tire wear and you’re just worried about staying in that two car draft because it’s four seconds faster a lap than it is if you’re out there by yourself. So just the discovery one bit at a time, here, there and everywhere. And Keselowski and I saw this coming; we teamed up and spent a great deal of time in January testing and trying to polish up on it.”
IS THERE ANYTHING THAT NASCAR CAN DO TO BREAK UP THE TWO-CAR TANDEMS? ADDINGTON: “I don’t want to see that happen. I think it’s cool that we’re running over 200 miles an hour. Kurt might not like that, but I think he likes it.” BUSCH: “It’s fun as hell.” ADDINGTON: “I don’t know. I don’t want to give my opinion, give them any ideas, so I just think that they tried to do it with a little bit this morning with the oil coolers, but we went back to the package that we tested with Kurt and Brad down here in January and felt pretty confident in it and just played it safe with opening up the tape. I don’t know what they’re planning on doing, if anything, but I don’t think that if we go to a smaller plate it’s just going to be a slower two car deal. It’s not going to separate the guys doing what they’re doing tonight. They may shorten that length of time, but I don’t think they’ll end it.”
DID YOU KNOW THAT YOU HAD WON THE RACE? BUSCH: “I’ve been in one of these .002, .003 things before. I was full throttle and I let go of the wheel to try to free up the car. I’m looking down at the 11, I’ve got him beat, no problem, and Addington said that scoring had the 11 car (winning), and I’m saying no, no, I’m the winner. I won. You can’t take this away. I’ve around been through one of these 002, 003s and came out the loser. When I got on the back straightaway, Steve said that they have the 11 scored as the leader by three thousandths of a second, and he also said that he went below the double yellow. I said, well, of course he did, of course he did. So he advanced his position below the double yellow, which was a rule that we didn’t think would come into play tonight, but it did. And it didn’t look like Newman forced him down there; it looked like the 11 took that option. It obviously was the shortest distance around. But my game plan was to stay hooked up with McMurray the whole way through, and I have him to thank. For us to come out on top with the way that the ruling went, it’s a correct ruling. I think that we can take this win on home for Dodge and for Shell Pennzoil.”
WILL YOU BE OK IS NASCAR MAKE A CHANGE THIS WEEK? ADDINGTON: “Do you think they’re going to come ask me? If they make a change, we’ve just got to deal with it. I wanted to get out to talk to Scott Currier, the engine builder over at Penske Racing Engines, just to see what he thinks on RPMs, where we’re at, where we’re running, and I’ll be on the phone with him and gathering all the information I can from him. We’ll just wait and see what the decision is on what they do. I can’t say one way or the other what they’re going to do. But if they were going to do something, I’d like for them to let us know before Wednesday morning to start practice so we can be prepared for it. They may let us know tomorrow. We’ve got all day tomorrow. We’ll be hanging around.”
DO YOU THINK THE FANS ENJOY THIS TYPE OF RACING? KURT: “I’m glad I waited for your question because after Bob’s question, I’m sitting here going what is the perspective from the outside? What did the fans view tonight? How exciting was it? NASCAR is going to eventually do that, ask the fans. From what I was told from some of the interviews I did previously, the fans were on their feet, they were jumping up and down. They just saw this whole new style of the draft. We all knew this coming in on the fresh repave, what is this going to bring. The way the cars are set up, the way the restrictor plates work, the way that the bumpers align themselves, this is fresh asphalt, this is a whole new look. And so I don’t want this win not to feel like it’s a win because we’re all writing that this is too many unknowns tonight. We do need to get the fans’ opinion to find out, and if the fans agree and there’s a general consensus that this was positive, then I hope that our win is glorified even more. Right now, I’m getting the feeling that this didn’t count because there were too many unknowns going in, and who knew that this was going to be a two car draft. But to pull into victory lane with new sponsors and a car number that nobody knew anything about, I was just hoping to fly under the radar tonight and everybody think that we were Ward Burton or Bobby Allison or Fireball Roberts running the 22 car and we’ll sneak up on them and win, and we sure as heck did.”
DO YOU THINK THAT 206 MPH IS TOO FAST? KURT: “I’m with you. I was beginning to get these shots up here, like what’s going on. I feel with the way the cars would wreck back in the day and the reason for restrictor plates came out was because the cars didn’t have enough downforce on them to keep them planted to the track. They would spin out sideways or get backwards and have the air lift them up. We saw that happen with the Truck Series the first time here with Jeffrey Bodine’s horrific accident, and I think that’s because the trucks lacked downforce the first time which was back in 2000. I think these cars have enough downforce. They’ve got the roof flaps and the safety equipment to protect the drivers, but obviously once we start getting over 200, we have to make sure that we keep these cars in the ballpark. That’s the main concern. If I had to throw something out there, I would throw on bigger spoilers and a bigger plate that we can’t go faster if we’re getting to 206. It’s an unbelievable experience to race out there in this two car tandem and to be able to feel the air around you and to have that guy behind you pushing. It is so much fun inside the car when you have things going your way. I bet the guys that lost the draft are out there just sitting there filing their nails going down the back straightaway because they’ve got nothing else to do.”
