TOYOTA NASCAR Sprint Cup Series (NSCS) Notes & Quotes – Kasey Kahne, Bobby Labonte and Joey Logano Daytona Media Day – February 10, 2011 KASEY KAHNE, No. 4 Red Bull Toyota Camry, Red Bull Racing Team

[media-credit name=”David Yeazell” align=”alignright” width=”193″][/media-credit]How fulfilling is the work you do with your foundation? “It’s been some really good stuff over the last six or seven years that we’ve been able to be a part of. We started our own foundation – the Kasey Kahne Foundation for under privileged children and their families. We’ve had some fun with events. Going to sporting events and taking the kids, raising money at races or concerts and different things. The fans have always been really involved and it’s really neat. It’s the only way that you can raise money. It’s great the following that fans have on this sport and then with the foundations and with the ways to raise money to help put a smile on kids faces.”

What will it be like to race under the lights at Texas Motor Speedway? “It’s great racing under the lights and definitely at Texas – it’s an awesome place. We finished some races under the lights there before. It’s always pretty neat, but to race a whole race there under the lights I think will be exciting. The cars will look great — it’s a fast track. There’s definitely some spots at that track where you can easily get off a little bit and screw your corner up. I look forward to it. I think Texas is one of the spots, especially the April race, that I look forward to every time we go there. It’s one of the races, it’s a big race and a tough race to win.”

How is your knee following the surgery and what type of exercises are you doing? “My knees are really good. I’m really happy I did it and took care of it. That first month was kind of a pain. I couldn’t move quick and I couldn’t really get around that well. I was not happy about it, but it was the offseason. I started biking as quickly as I could and now I’m up to running and I’m already running four or five miles a day. So they feel great and I’m really happy with where they are at compared to where they were before.”

How do you feel about your upcoming season with Red Bull Racing Team? “I can tell you that it’s not going to be any tougher than my last four years with as much adversity and ups and downs and unknowns — as much of a mess as that was over the last four years. I don’t see how going to Red Bull — a very stable, strong team with a lot of great people and then going to Hendrick Motorsports the following year, how that can be a bad thing at all. I feel like things are so easy and so simple now compared to where they’ve been. I can’t wait for the opportunity. I love Red Bull and what we’ve done so far to prepare for the season. I look forward to this whole year and I think we can run really well.”

Do you feel adversity in your past helps you this season? “I think it will help, but I think another thing that will help is everybody going into this year knows exactly what this year is about and what we’re shooting for. It’s not a long term deal, it’s kind of a short term deal and everybody’s aware of that. Everybody’s still really excited and have prepared really well over the offseason. We’ve done some testing a little bit. Things are good. We’re really prepared for what we have and everybody’s excited and has a great attitude about what’s going to happen this season. That’s the biggest thing – attitude in this sport. We have it at Red Bull.”

How are Ryan Pemberton and Kenny Francis working together? “Going into something like that, you’re a little unaware of how things will go and how everybody will get along. So far we’ve tested five days or six days total. As far as the two teams working together, it’s really good. Ryan (Pemberton, 83 crew chief) really likes Kenny (Francis, 4 crew chief) and Kenny likes Ryan. I’ve talked to both of them separately at different times just about racing and things. To me, it’s a really good connection already. The teams and stuff – I was just really surprised at the way things have happened so far. Surprising in a good way.”

Did it help you to get a head start with Red Bull at the end of last season? “Whether it was a blessing or a good thing or a bad thing or whatever happened there — I think at the end of the day it helped me and it helped Red Bull and it helped RPM (Richard Petty Motorsports). It helped all parties and I got off to a little bit of a head start for this year. That’s where it helped me. RPM needed me out of there, they were working on other things, which was good for them. It was great for Red Bull because I was able to get in there early and we were able to start working together. I just think it was good for all three parties. That’s why it happened and I’m glad it happened.”

KASEY KAHNE, No. 4 Red Bull Toyota Camry, Red Bull Racing Team (continued) How well do you and Brian Vickers get along? “We’ve always got along good. We’ve never really done a whole lot together as far as racing, but we’ve got along good. Brian’s (Vickers) a really good driver, so I feel like we can work together well. I think we can learn a lot from each other and work together as teammates to help each other and to help our company.”

Do you feel like you have something to prove this season? “I just feel like I have to prove that I can be consistent. I feel like I know I can win races, I know we can run up front, we can qualify well. I know we can race well at just about every track. There’s a couple still that I’ve got to figure out as a driver and communicating with my team to get the car where it needs to be. Really, the biggest thing is that I just need to be consistent, and consistent for a full season. We’ve been consistent for a half a year, 70 perce nt of a year or 40 percent of a year, but we’ve never done it for a full season. If I can do that as a driver that will be a good year for me.”

Do you feel that you have ever been in a situation where you’ve been consistent for a full year? “No, that’s something that I need to work on. Just straight up, all by myself, I need to work on that and make that better.”

Why did you choose to run the number 4 on your Sprint Cup car this year? “That’s my sprint car number. That’s what I run when I race a sprint car. Troy Lee, who does all our helmets and our numbers for us, so we have the 9 and the 4 and the 49 and the 91 and they all kind of go together and look similar so I’ve just been the 4. So when we started talking to Red Bull, I asked if I could bring my number becaus e it’s what I run and it has kind of a neat — it looks different than a normal 4 and has its own artistic look. I thought it was pretty cool and they were fine with it. They’ve been good about it ever since and they think it looks good.”

What is it like to drive a Toyota in NASCAR? “I think the biggest thing is working with TRD (Toyota Racing Development) with the engines and just being really comfortable with that package. They seem interested and want to work with us and also with the Michael Waltrip team. I think that’s the biggest thing. The car is going to be what we do, what Red Bull does, and they’ve worked really hard to build a top of the line car for this season.”

Were you and Brian Vickers able to work on drafting together during the Daytona testing? “We just worked a lot on how to work together well and how to do things quickly out there. I thought that was good. We were able to talk a lot about it and get better. I thought we were really good at it — we know where we’re a little bit off and where we need to make some gains coming into the (Daytona) 500, which is good. I felt like myself and (Dale Earnhardt) Junior were pretty good together and myself and (Joey) Logano. I would imagine if I was with Denny (Hamlin) or something, we would have been alright, too. We all kind of worked pretty well together and the cars were quick together. That was at a test. When we get here in the race that will all change.”

Can you win the Daytona 500? “The thing about the (Daytona) 500 is that there are probably 30 cars or 25 cars that can win the 500. There’s a few guys that are really good at putting themselves in position each year, and Kevin Harvick is definitely one of them. I don’t know how he does it, but every year at the right time, Kevin Harvick is there when we’re at Daytona and even Talladega. Definitely Daytona — it doesn’t matter which race it is. Maybe I’ll just try to stay with Kevin all day, just because he does it right. There’s certain guys that always put themselves there – probably a handful. So much happens late in the race that I bet if you’re there late in the race, there’s probably 25 guys that have a chance. That’s just the way that this race is and we’re definitely one of the 25.”

Do you feel like there are a lot of new things to digest this weekend with new rules and a new track surface? “It is what it is, but for them to reopen Daytona testing and give us three days down here, which I thought was way too much time. I left here really happy that we had three days and happy that we had all that track time to get used to the track and used to the new rules and used to the team and used to the new Toyota car. There’s so many little things that I felt like those three days and then we’ve done a little more testing with short track stuff — has really helped so I feel like going into tomorrow afternoon’s practices is like we’ve already been there. I feel good about it.”

BOBBY LABONTE, No. 47 Kroger Toyota Camry, JTG-Daugherty Racing Can you describe your experience of visiting the hospital in Charlotte earlier this week? “That was a great visit for our guys. It kind of tells us when you’re busy working on race cars a lot of times, and you get focused on that, sometimes you can forget other things that are happening. When it was mentioned the other day in a meeting at lunch about it, we were able to get with Jordan (Jemsek) and her mom and go visit — see her in the hospital and raise awareness for her cause (Acute Myeloblastic Leukemia). It just makes you feel like you did something that day that was worthwhile. Sometimes you get up and do the same thing over and over again and that was just a great time to see her and see other kids in the hospital. It kind of brings you back down — you get so focused on your day that you kind of forget. It gave us the opportunity to do something we all wanted to do and were able to make it happen with no effort at all, it didn’t seem like when it was all over with. If you can do that every day, you wish you could — that type of feeling. Hopefully, we can raise awareness for them and get her a bone marrow transplant as soon as possible.”

How much does this opportunity with JTG-Daugherty Racing renew your enthusiasm in the sport? “A lot, you said it best. This is a great opportunity with JTG-Daugherty Racing. With their affiliation with MWR (Michael Waltrip Racing), this is an opportunity and team that has prospects of making my confidence grow with the right people that I haven’t had in a long time. It definitely gets my juices flowing. It’s still a race car, its still parts and pieces, but it’s about the attitude and the people you surround yourself with as well. I think this is a great group of guys and girls that I can hopefully be able to work with and have confidence in each other and communicate to go out there and have a focus like we haven’t really been able to generate the past couple years for me. As far as knowing that the resources you have at the shop — they’re giving you everything the big teams have to go out there and compete. Not worry if you tear something up. One of the first things they said was don’t worry if you tear something up, we have plenty of them. That’s always something good to know and they’re building new ones all the time. It’s going to happen. If you tear a fender up, you can fix it. It gives me the most confidence in them and I know that it’s still a learning curve for me with these guys, but for me it’s a great opportunity. It’s one we can all view as a very legitimate front-running team.”

How difficult have the last few years been? “It was — there were definitely times of should I stay home or not if you’re not going to do what you set out to do. That was very difficult. I look back on it now and I can say there were a few races in particular where I could say there was no sense in going in my mind. But if I hadn’t, I don’t know if that would have gotten me to today, if I would have quit, stopped. So, I look back on that today and I think if I didn’t have that perseverance on it, I probably wouldn’t be here today. Hopefully, that made me a better person and a stronger person. Knowing what I went through, this is a good opportunity.”

How would you define a ‘dream season’? “I think a dream season would be being in the Chase. I think everybody’s goal is to be in the Chase at the end of the year, or win a championship. You have to get to the Chase first. I think that is the goal here. Everybody says for the first 26 races we’ve got to put ourselves in that position. I think that would be a good season for us. These guys, Tad (Geschickter, team co-owner) has been around the sport for a long time and been Cup racing only realistically a couple years. His affiliation with MWR (Michael Waltrip Racing) and their resources they have — I think it’s great. Hopefully it’s the year they break out as far as their race team goes with Martin (Truex Jr.) and David (Reutimann), hopefully I can be right there with them. Their goals are set pretty high, they want to be in the top-12 in points like 35 cars do, but only 12 of them are going to do it. I think with the resources, if we can start off strong, gain that confidence and the communication to have the focus that this team can have, then I think we can do that.”

Is there any saying or motto that makes you happy about what you’re doing? “I think a new one I heard the other day is, ‘What happens today might not matter.’ You know what I mean? Sometimes you get keyed up on the moment and whether you do it right or wrong, it might not matter in the scheme of things. There’s some sayings and stuff like that. There’s probably too many for me to jumble out one that sticks out in my mind. For our main goal this year is to make sure we put things in perspective because if you do, it’s a whole lot better than if you just say, ‘Our goal is to win two races or three races.’ Let’s put it in perspective and we’re going to give it all we can. Our focus is going to be on doing the right things.”

BOBBY LABONTE, No. 47 Kroger Toyota Camry, JTG-Daugherty Racing (continued) Does it seem like 10 years have passed since NASCAR lost Dale Earnhardt? “It does seem like, in one way, like 10 years ago. I think the sport has changed a lot in 10 years, so it’s seems like it’s these 10 years have gone slower than the 10 years prior. With the way things have gone, I guess. When you come to Daytona, for the past 10 years, you think about it. People always bring it up, I wouldn’t have thought about it. Six weeks ago if nobody would have brought it up to me, that was just 10 years. Obviously, you reflect on things you do when you get to a track or you get to a town. Remember that time this or remember that time. Obviously, it was a big event, a big thing that changed our sport with what happened 10 years ago.”

What do you remember about the 2001 Daytona 500? “We were in a wreck on the back straightaway before that. (Tony) Stewart landed on my hood and windshield. I was mad and mad at the world and got in the airplane. Here you are mad at the world and fixing to get on the airplane and get to go home and you get a phone call, or actually I had my scanner with me and kind of listened to the radio. I’ll never forget my wife and I, and my kids didn’t know at the time, they were wondering why we were crying. So, here I was an hour before that, mad at the world because I got crashed, in my own airplane leaving and realized what happened. That’s something that you won’t forget how your emotions are and kind of what meant the most that day. It wasn’t the fact that I was in a crash, it was the fact that we lost a true friend more than anything else. We left and it changed us — it puts you in a different place.”

Can you reflect on any specific encounters you had with Dale Earnhardt? “There were times when he grabbed me. Fortunately I didn’t get the, ‘Boy you need to straighten up’ thing. There are a lot of things that he did for me and for the sport that a lot of people don’t know about. He had conversations with Mr. (Joe) Gibbs (former team owner) when Dale Jarrett was leaving, ‘Hey you have to get him to drive that car.’ Talking about me. I didn’t know that until later on. My on-track experiences that I’ve gone through with him had been me racing pretty hard and pretty clean. I know I made him mad probably a couple times and he made me mad a couple times, too. The respect was at a high level. I tell a story about one of the greatest moments I had with him. It wasn’t at a race track, it was at his farm. We went there for a meeting with Gibbs and some NASCAR people and we just happened to have it in his office with Theresa (Earnhardt) and afterwards he asked, ‘What are you doing?’ ‘The wife is taking me home, I got to go home.’ ‘Come here.’ He spent two hours showing me the shop, and you could see that Dale. It wasn’t the same one you saw at the race track. To me, I learned a lot more about him that day than I had ever, because when you see someone at the race track, they have their race face on. This was not the same one. As much as we’ve sat in the NASCAR trailer and argued or listened to him argue, I’ve sat with him in an airplane with Ricky Rudd and I was a rookie flying to Chicago together. I saw a picture with me and him the other day, I think it was in 1990 and a lot of guys were in it — that was some awesome stuff right there, and he was the champion and I was the Busch champion that year, maybe 1991. I can go on, those are some good times. Just knowing we finished first and second here (Daytona), he finished first and I finished second and the next weekend we took provisionals at Rockingham, he goes, ‘Ain’t this the crap. Last week we’re at the top and now we’re at the bottom.'”

Is this the safest the sport has ever been? “Yes it is. In the past 10 years, it’s just come ten-fold. I can look at race cars in my shop from 10 years ago and I can’t believe I drove that. It’s definitely come.”

Were you wearing the HANS device on that day? “No. We started the Hutchens device the next week until I finally got comfortable with the HANS a few weeks later.”

Do you think the sport would be safer if it hadn’t lost its biggest star? “No. It’s the same thing at an intersection with a caution light. Somebody has a fatality and they put up a stop light. Unfortunately things like that had to happen to make that happen. It was a bad time in our sport. We lost three other drivers. Dale Earnhardt was the most recognized between Adam (Petty) and Kenny (Irwin) and Tony Roper at Texas. That was some tough times. It was no different than my wife and I at Charleston (South Carolina) when we wanted to say it was a three day vacation and we got the phone call about Adam Petty and again we cried our eyes out then loaded up our stuff and went home right away because we couldn’t enjoy ourselves. We looked at each other and said we have to go home to be with our family. All those things had a lot of impact. Dale gets recognized because of his popularity in the sport.”

JOEY LOGANO, No. 20 Home Depot Toyota Camry, Joe Gibbs Racing How hectic is a weekend when you are running two races? “There’s weekends that I feel like I would rather run one race, but when those weekends come by that I only run one race, then I wish I was running both. When it all comes down to it — I’m a racer and I want to race. I’m lucky enough that Joe Gibbs Racing has a Nationwide team — a great Nationwide team. I just have a lot of fun with it and it’s a good time. I just like doing it. Do I get a lot out of it by running it and learning much for the Sunday race? No, but it doesn’t hurt

NASCAR SPRINT CUP SERIES

2011 NASCAR MEDIA DAY

DAYTONA INTERNATIOINAL SPEEDWAY

TEAM CHEVY DRIVER PRESS CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPT

February 10, 2011

[media-credit id=22 align=”alignright” width=”225″][/media-credit]TONY STEWART, NO. 14 OFFICE DEPOT/MOBIL 1 met with members of the media at NASCAR Media Day and discussed his racing organization, upcoming Phoenix race, multi-car teams and other topics. Full transcript:

THE MODERATOR: Questions.

TONY STEWART: Every organization is going to make gains. It’s just a matter of who gains more and have you gained enough to make the difference up from where you were the year before

.

Q. Do you feel confident in your mind your organization is capable of running with anybody out there?

TONY STEWART: Yeah, I mean, we’ve proven it two years in a row. We’ve done it. We’ve won seven races in the last two years. We’ve been able to do that.

Like I say, the hard part every year is it’s a question mark because you don’t know if what you’ve done is going to be good enough. You hope that the hard work that everybody has put through during the winter, you see those results right away.

Q. Where are you in terms of organization? Are you thinking of expansion at all at this point?

TONY STEWART: I mean, it’s always been on the back of our minds. It’s not something that we’re pushing for. It’s a hard time to try to do that right now, and it has been for two years.

The biggest thing is making sure we got the two organizations we’ve got, the two teams running well. The hard part is it takes a lot to get the right partnership with sponsors and the right drivers to put a third team together. There’s a lot of things that have to happen to make that work.

If it happens, great. If it doesn’t, we’ll keep working to make the two teams as good as they can be.

Q. What about a guy like Carl Edwards, could bring sponsorship. Would that be something you would consider?

TONY STEWART: You look at every opportunity. It doesn’t cost a dime to listen. We all look at the papers. We all look at the opportunities. You assess whether it’s the right thing for your organization. If it’s the right thing, you go forward. If it’s not, you go on to the next opportunity.

Q. How different is it being an owner?

TONY STEWART: I don’t know that it’s much different from that standpoint. It’s just a lot more work. If you have a good day, it’s a great day. If you have a bad day, it’s a miserable day. It’s like the range of emotion goes higher and lower when you have that ownership side attached to it.

The concept of what you’re doing is the same every week. I get here Thursday night and start Friday morning. I’m strictly in driver mode. I’m not in an ownership role till after the race is over Sunday, till we leave on Thursday.

Q. Do you have to act differently? For instance, the Australia thing, you apologized for that. If you were a driver…

TONY STEWART: I still would have apologized for it. We haven’t done anything different. The partners we have, that’s why they’re with us. They get that side of me. It’s not like all of a sudden they’re getting into something they don’t know who they’re getting involved with.

Q. So you’re not more prim and proper?

TONY STEWART: No (laughter). If you haven’t polished it in 39 years, it probably isn’t going to get polished.

Q. They’re totally changing the Phoenix track. That has been one of your favorite places. What do you think?

TONY STEWART: If it makes the racing better for everybody, then it’s a positive thing. I mean, I’m an old-school guy. I didn’t like it when they changed the dogleg. I hated it when they took the Goodyear bridge down, the walkover bridge over turn four. Those were things about Phoenix that made it unique and made it special. That side has already been changed.

Changes now really aren’t going to be different. It’s already lost its until original look to me. But if it makes it better and it makes it better for the fans, how can you not be excited about it?

Q. Did they ask you at all?

TONY STEWART: Not really. I mean, like I said, I’m still not happy about the original changes that were made. So I’ve always just been that old-school guy. And a lot of people in society are the same way, a lot of people don’t like change. You see places that we’ve lost. We’ve lost Rockingham, Wilkesboro, some of those places. As competitors we didn’t like those changes, but it was better for the sport.

Just because it’s different doesn’t mean it’s always going to be better or worse. We just have to wait and see. At least they’re trying to do something that they think is going to be better for the sport.

Q. How do you like the changes here now?

TONY STEWART: We’re not going to have holes in the track. That’s a pretty good improvement over last year.

You know, we always like the fact that it was a handling event and that we had to work on the handling of our cars. Anytime you pave a track, that takes it out of the equation on a track this size. But, again, it doesn’t mean it’s a bad thing. It could be the greatest thing that’s ever happened here for 20 years.

Q. Just for clarification, I asked Ryan about his contract, if he was a free agent at the end of this year. He said, Ask Tony.

TONY STEWART: I don’t know, ask Ryan. We both have copies of his contract. We’re both happy doing what we’re doing. That’s part of being a car owner that I haven’t had to worry about yet. Apparently now you guys are going to force me into thinking about it.

Q. I’m curious about after this year.

TONY STEWART: I’d have to get the contract out and look at it.

Q. He said when you take him to Burger King, he knows it will be time to talk about it.

TONY STEWART: We go to Burger King all the time and don’t talk about it. We go do things a lot of times and don’t talk about anything till you guys bring it up.

Q. He said next time when it’s a Burger King meal, he’ll know.

TONY STEWART: If I make him buy when it’s Burger King, he’ll know something is up. I don’t let him buy when we go there. I mean, that’s why I always buy. Burger King buy. You don’t get a King Card and don’t use it. That’s the best thing about having it. But I’m not giving him my King Card. I’m not negotiating that. That’s mine. My name stamped in it.

Q. Talk about a guy winning five straight titles.

TONY STEWART: The thing is now we have to talk about the potential of six. But I think there’s been too much emphasis on it not being good for the sport, people thinking that it’s bad.

I think it’s pretty exciting that an organization has been able to be that good for that long. That’s a compliment to what they’ve done. I think too much effort has been spent looking at the negative side of it, which there really isn’t, when all the guy has done is gone out there and done what he’s supposed to do. He’s gone out and done what we’re all trying to do.

I think what he’s done has been under-appreciated, in my opinion.

Q. Do you think you have another title in you?

TONY STEWART: If I don’t, you won’t see me driving a racecar anymore. I’m not going to do this unless I feel like I have a shot to win races and championships. I’m not going to hang on and ride out a career. That’s not what this is to me.

Q. Does it feel like five years since you won a title?

TONY STEWART: Yeah (laughter). You have to remember, I’m the last guy that did it other than him. It does seem like a long time. It’s got to be a good feeling to be on top that long. That’s got to be a good feeling.

Q. Does it surprise you that the media pool came out and he’s favored to win a sixth straight?

TONY STEWART: You’re kidding me. Somebody really went out on a limb to put their name in that hat (laughter).

Q. Make your argument.

TONY STEWART: How do you bet against him right now? When a guy has done it five times, what basis would you have to bet against him? That’s the argument. Till somebody can show you there’s something else that leads to somebody else doing it, how do you bet against him? You wouldn’t do it in any other sport unless something is different that you physically can see. Nobody’s seen anything that proves that he’s not on track to do it again.

Q. (Question regarding 10 years ago.)

TONY STEWART: It hurt. That’s what I remember. I remember it hurt and it hurt for a long time. I had a headache for two days. That headache was multiplied by other feelings that were stacked on top of it.

I don’t mind not remembering a lot of what happened 10 years ago. I appreciate why it’s being brought up this year, but I’ll be the first to admit I don’t mind not talking about it, not having to relive it, so…

Q. There was a leadership loss with Dale. A lot say you’re the next one to step into that role. Do you ever see yourself coming into that leadership role?

TONY STEWART: I appreciate that compliment from those guys, but I think there’s other guys. I don’t think I’m the smartest guy out there from that side. I think there’s other guys that have a way of understanding what’s going to be good for the sport.

I like Jeff Burton. I always thought Jeff Burton was a guy, if I had to go out and pick somebody right away, that’s the guy I feel most confident in.

Q. When you look back a few years ago when you were working on this deal to come to Haas, looking back, are you surprised you were able to keep it quiet as long as you were or not? Can you talk about how the steps were you had to take to be discreet before it blew up like it did?

TONY STEWART: The problem is, it’s hard to talk about it because it’s talking against you guys. We obviously have to do our thing to keep it quiet to maintain what we’re doing with the current team we were with, Gibbs, and at the same time as soon as you explore an opportunity, somebody somehow finds out about it. Once that happens, it takes the luxury of doing your due diligence and thinking about what you’re doing to now having to be defensive about it, hiding the fact because somebody is going to get their feelings hurt or you’re going to get in trouble for it.

It would be much easier if people weren’t nosing around a lot. Obviously that’s a part of it. That’s part of your guys’ job. That’s what you have to do. It also makes us have to be guarded about what we do during that process.

Q. How has that changed over the time you’ve been involved in the sport?

TONY STEWART: It’s gotten worse.

Q. Some people say communication, you can do a lot more by texting.

TONY STEWART: You have to be very guarded about what you do still. It’s easier for us to communicate, but it’s also easier for the media to find out what we’re communicating about. The media gets smarter. I know there’s a lot of times I disagree with that, but there’s a lot of ways to get information.

Q. Is there an example maybe you can give earlier in your career where you could do something that you probably couldn’t do now because of the crowds in the garage or people in the motorhome lot?

TONY STEWART: Even the garage area, I mean, it’s become drama central. Somebody sees something… The problem is too many people now in the effort to get the scoop on something will report on something they think is going to be a factor before they take the time to do the due diligence to make sure it’s fact before they go and say something. That’s a very real problem for the people like us that are involved because it can put us in a very harmful position before those people find out whether it’s truly legitimate in the effort to make sure they get it before somebody else does. The competition in the media is just as tough as the competition for us.

Q. Has that perspective changed more as you’ve become an owner?

TONY STEWART: It’s still the same stuff. I mean, it’s what you have to be aware of at the time.

Q. There’s no doubt this sport is safer than it was 10 years ago. Do you think it took the death of someone like Dale Earnhardt to address that?

TONY STEWART: No, I don’t. The thing that’s going to upset me if people don’t remember Kenny Irwin, Adam Petty. There were a lot of people that contributed to changes. I just think it took a while to realize that we were in a time frame that people were starting to lose the edge on the safety side and it had to be revisited.

The good thing is now, because of all this, we have a group that’s dedicated to the safety aspect of our sport, and NASCAR is taking the initiative. Every year there’s a meeting about the progress, what they’ve found in new studies, what we can do with helmets, safety belts, seats, materials inside the car to make it safer for us, how we build the cars to make them safer.

It’s all been positive. But it wasn’t because of one guy. There were other guys that we had that were friends in the sport that lost their lives that also contributed to that movement of having to take a hard look at it.

One crash didn’t change our sport from the safety side. It was a lot of instances in a short amount of time that forced our sport to have to look at where we were and reevaluate the sport from that side.

Q. One of the drivers said a guy like Dale Earnhardt, how do you replace that?

TONY STEWART: You don’t.

Q. The one guy that has the personality and winning is you. Is that a compliment?

TONY STEWART: I think so. I’ll take it that way. There are a lot of guys that are colorful and are good representatives of the sport that have good personalities. It’s just now finally getting in an age again where drivers feel comfortable showing who they really are, showing they actually have emotions, are scared of it.

Q. Do you like that?

TONY STEWART: Yeah. Why should we not have been able to do that in the past?

Q. In a best-case scenario, how long do you think it could be before Danica is a factor in this sport and do you think it would be good for the sport if she were a real thing?

TONY STEWART: I honestly don’t know whether it’s good or bad for the sport. I don’t see where there’s anything negative about it. It can only be good.

There is no timeline. Literally for me there was a day that the switch kicked on and I figured it out. Same thing with Montoya. There was a day that he figured it out. There are some people that have tried that never have figured it out.

That’s never something that you can say, This is a time frame when that happens. There will be a day that she does it the right way and that she feels it’s right. She’s going to go, Aah, I got it. It could be one race. It could be a hundred races. You just don’t know. It’s different for every person.

There’s one thing that I do know, is that she’s dedicated to doing it. This isn’t just a, Hey, I’m doing this and I’m getting publicity on it. This is a person that is very dedicated and very driven to be successful and will not accept defeat. She will be successful; it’s just a matter of when.

Q. Do you think women drivers will continue to join the sport in larger numbers or does it take that first person who is successful at it?

TONY STEWART: There’s been females that have been a part of this sport for years. This isn’t something new. It’s always been accepted. It’s always been, you know, from Janet Guthrie to Patty Moise, to Shawna Robinson, there have been a lot of females that have done this and been good at it.

I don’t think anybody has ever looked at it from the standpoint that we’re waiting for that first person. I think that road was paved a long time ago.

Q. Multi-car teams, there always seems to be a hierarchy. Supposedly they’re all getting the same stuff. Because you’re a driver, do you make doubly sure that Ryan has everything the same as you do?

TONY STEWART: Yes.

Q. Does that enter your mind?

TONY STEWART: The whole purpose of having multi-car teams is to make sure you’re sharing information. If one guy doesn’t have something that the other guy has, how can you base that information on apple-to-apple comparisons? It hurts you if you don’t give that guy the same opportunity.

In multi-car organizations, it’s not that they don’t have the equipment that somebody else has. It’s the combination of that crew chief and driver, how they communicate and how well they work together and whether that crew chief makes the right calls and whether the driver makes the right decisions behind the wheel. It’s not based on differences in equipment.

There’s no organization that’s going to go out there and give one driver something in the organization that they’re not going to give the rest of the drivers. It doesn’t make sense to do that. That actually puts you in a situation where you have more to lose than to gain.

Q. Everybody is optimistic at this time of the year. Can you point to specific things that you think are going to make a difference this year?

TONY STEWART: Yeah, but it’s not stuff we can tell you guys. That’s why you work all winter, is to not give that to everybody else. You try to do things to make your program better. You do the best you can at growing your organization.

At the end of the day, it’s a matter of you don’t know till you get four or five races into the season of whether what you’ve done is good enough to be better than what they’ve done over the winter, if you’re grown as much as they’ve grown or caught up.

Q. Both as a team owner and a track owner, how would you describe the lure of Daytona?

TONY STEWART: The history. There’s nothing about the track that’s different than a lot of places we go to, it’s just the history of it. It’s the history of that trophy. It’s the history of that event. It’s knowing that this is where our sport was started. It didn’t start right where we’re sitting, it started at the beach. But to see how this sport started and how it’s evolved and when this facility was built, it was way ahead of its time. To see how, as time has gone on, technology has changed, how this place still produces some of the greatest races of the season, the fact that it’s the most important place of our season, that’s what makes this place special.

Q. Would you consider making a move like Chad Knaus made at Texas? You’re running really well, Ryan goes out of the race, you feel his pit crew is running better than yours, would you make a swap like that?

TONY STEWART: I think you have to evaluate it at that time. I think you have to see what situation you’re in.

There’s a lot of times there’s firsts. That was a first we’ve never really seen before. So now the thought process of, Would you consider that? Yeah, you have to consider it now that somebody else has done it. If it would have turned into a disaster, you’d have to think about that. I think the fact that it actually worked, they felt like it worked, that forces you to have to think outside the box and think of something that might be a different opportunity.

Q. Bigger transition: from Sprint Cup driver to NASCAR stock car driver, or Sprint Cup team owner to NASCAR team owner?

TONY STEWART: Definitely Sprint Cup team owner to NASCAR team owner. When you’re a driver, it’s you in a car that you’re trying to figure out. When you’re a team owner, World of Outlaw Sprint Cup team, you have to have three guys to work on the car versus the 163 guys that we have with two Sprint Cup teams.

Q. I would love to see you racing on the beach.

TONY STEWART: I think for the hundredth anniversary of NASCAR, that ought to be our Daytona 500.

Q. In your bathing suits.

TONY STEWART: Everybody is wearing Speedos in the cars. Can you imagine if they caught fire? Some of us are kind of hairy guys (laughter).

Note: Team Chevy press releases, high-resolution images, and media kit can be downloaded from the Team Chevy media website:

About Chevrolet: Founded in Detroit in 1911, Chevrolet celebrates its centennial as a global automotive brand with annual sales of about 4.25 million vehicles in more than 140 countries. Chevrolet provides consumers with fuel-efficient, safe and reliable vehicles that deliver high quality, expressive design, spirited performance and value. The Chevrolet portfolio includes iconic performance cars such as Corvette and Camaro; dependable, long-lasting pickups and SUVs such as Silverado and Suburban; and award-winning passenger cars and crossovers such as Spark, Cruze, Malibu, Equinox and Traverse. Chevrolet also offers “gas-friendly to gas-free” solutions including Cruze Eco and Volt. Cruze Eco offers 42 mpg highway while Volt offers 35 miles of electric, gasoline-free driving and an additional 344 miles of extended range. Most new Chevrolet models offer OnStar safety, security and convenience technologies including OnStar Hands-Free Calling, Automatic Crash Response and Stolen Vehicle Slowdown. More information regarding Chevrolet models can be found at www.chevrolet.com ce5&URL=http%3a%2f%2fwww.chevrolet.com%2f> .

FORD RACING NOTES AND QUOTES NASCAR Media Day, Page 10 February 10, 2011

Daytona International Speedway

DAVID GILLILAND – No. 38 Taco Bell Ford Fusion — WHAT KIND OF IMPROVEMENTS CAN WE EXPECT FROM YOU GUYS THIS YEAR? “I think you can expect big improvements. I think everybody at Front Row Motorsports has been working real hard over the winter. We have some new cars that we got from Richard Petty Motorsports last year with them downsizing to two cars. That has helped us a bunch. Ford has stepped up their engineering support with us and I feel like we have a better motor program. Those are three big things. I am back working with Peter Sospenzo and I think those are all key ingredients on getting our Taco Bell Ford Fusion faster.”

YOU GUYS DIDN’T TEST, SO WHERE ARE YOU GUYS AS FAR AS BEING PREPARED FOR THIS RACE AND SPEEDWEEKS IN GENERAL? “I think we are really prepared. With Ford support and leaning on some of the other Ford teams that did come out and test, that has helped to push us along and get us up to speed. Getting the cars from RPM happened a little bit late, so we were kind of behind. We figured that staying back and getting more prepared to come out there rather than to throw something together just to come test would be more beneficial to Front Row Motorsports.”

DO YOU FEEL LIKE YOU ARE AT A DISADVANTAGE WITH THE NEW TRACK SURFACE THIS YEAR? HAVE YOU BEEN OUT THERE AT ALL? “No, I haven’t, but I have talked to a lot of people that have been out here and they are all saying that it is quite a bit like Talladega. It is smooth but has some bumps in three and four. I watched a little of the test on TV. I think we will be fine.”

HOW LONG DOES IT TAKE YOU TO GET ACCLIMATED WITH SINGLE CAR RUNS TO BE ABLE TO KNOW WHAT YOUR CAR CAN AND CAN’T DO WHEN YOU EVENTUALLY GET INTO A BIG PACK? “You won’t know that until you get into drafting practice but everybody I have talked to has said that the cars have a lot of grip. The more grip the track has then the more you will see big packs of cars racing together. That will be fine. We have a new nose this year, which will be different. If it was a mile-and-a-half track, I would say it would be more important to come down here and test. Being that it is Daytona and we have notes from Talladega, I think set-up wise it will be similar to that, way more than it used to be. We have those notes and a week and a half down here to figure it out.”

ARE YOU ANXIOUS TO GO OUT THERE AND FINALLY SEE WHAT IT IS LIKE? “Yeah, I am looking forward to my first laps out there, believe me.”

WHAT ARE YOUR GOALS AND EXPECTATIONS THIS YEAR? “Our goal as a team is to try and get both teams in the top-25 in points. I think that is a realistic goal with our funding and our position. I think we are very capable of doing that. Our pit crews have been working really hard. Our cars hold twice as much lead as they did last year and we are going to run the FR9 engines this year. Those came on really strong last year and in talking to Doug Yates, he feels really excited about what the engines will be able to do this year. Working with Peter Sospenzo, I really enjoyed working with him last year and felt like we really clicked. I just feel we should be able to build on what we have done a little bit last year and I feel like we are ahead starting off the season this year.”

AJ ALLMENDINGER, No. 43 Best Buy Ford Fusion — DO YOU FEEL THAT YOU GREW INTO A LEADERSHIP ROLE WITH THIS ORGANIZATION BASED ON THE WAY LAST YEAR ENDED? “Well, I kind of had to because everyone else left. Everybody else on the team, driver-wise, was going their separate way. It was a tough time for everybody. More than anything, I felt that I had to step up, not for the heads of the race team, not for the Robbie Loomis and guys like that, but for my crew guys. They were the ones busting their butts everyday and it was so difficult for them because they weren’t getting told any information and I was getting told very limited information. They are the ones that worked the hardest and make the least amount of money. They needed to know what they needed to do. The group of guys I had on the 43 specifically, I loved them to death and I wanted them to stay around. It was both things, trying to take care of them and keep them here so that we could start this year out strong. It was a tough time, but we got through it. In the end, I think it will only make us stronger. I was proud of my guys that whole time for how they kept fighting. I think potentially now, we have better race cars. Doug Yates, Ford, everybody that puts the engine behind us, they are going to have more horsepower and the potential is there. We just have to live up to it now.”

THIS RACE A YEAR AGO YOU WERE REALLY GOOD. YOU WERE UPSET THOUGH BECAUSE YOU HAD A GREAT CAR THAT DAY AND DIDN’T GET THE FINISH YOU EXPECTED. “The Sprint Cup Series is so tough now that you have to start off strong. I knew we had a great race car last year and we didn’t finish the deal. I felt like that was my fault. Whether it was the pothole or not, I was the one that was controlling the steering wheel. It was a tough deal. The first 10 races last year we had 25th or worse finishes and you can’t have that. I look at this year and you have to get through Daytona. Of course you want to win it, and I think that we have a great car to go here and win it, but you have to go out there and finish strong and get a good result. You go to Phoenix from there and you have to keep that momentum going. I am excited because it is my second year working with Mike Shiplett and it is the same core group of guys that we worked with last year. Like I said, the word I hear and use a lot is potential. We are going to be better, we just have to live up to where we belong. I think that is right there, contending for wins, getting wins and contending for the Chase.”

YOU SHOWED FLASHES LAST YEAR, IS THERE ANY DOUBT WITH YOU THAT YOU CAN GET TO VICTORY LANE THIS YEAR? “There is no doubt, we just have to learn how to do it. We have to learn how to seal the deal. The only way you learn that is to run up front more consistently. You saw that at the end of last year, that we could do that, we just never finished the deal. It was our own fault at times and at other times, like at Dover, we had a 10-cent washer get in the tire and make it flat and went two laps down. Things like that are things that we just have to learn how to work with and deal with better. I am the first guy that needs to step up and do that. We are going to have the stuff to go out and win, no doubt in my mind. Mike Shiplett as a crew chief is one of the best out there. We have a great relationship. The tools are there, we can go out there and win, we just have to learn to do it and do it consistently.”

WHAT IS THE BIGGEST KEY TO GETTING CONSISTENCY? “I think the biggest thing for us last year was that most of the races, even the ones we finished well, there was a time in that race where we had a dip. For whatever reason, we would lose the handling. I just felt like the car was on a knife’s edge the whole time to making it good or making it bad. These cars are difficult; don’t get me wrong, everybody is on a knife’s edge. We have to round that a little bit more, get a consistent car and make an adjustment and know it isn’t going to turn the car to crap. That is what happened last year at times where we would be running fifth and then make an adjustment and be running 25th. Then you are back in the pack, struggling with air, and trying to get back to the front. There were times we got back and times that we didn’t. If we can make the car consistent, we are going to have a good package, and that is what we need.”

HOW DO YOU FEEL AFTER LAST YEAR’S RUN HERE? “It gives me a lot of confidence, but the race track is so different now. The way this race is going to be ran is a lot different now. Last year doesn’t really mean anything; it is going to be that different out there. At the same time, we have faster race cars and faster motors now. We had a car to beat last year, and I know we will have one of the cars here to beat this year. It is all about who you hook up with at the end of this race. Which two cars are going to get locked together bumper-to-bumper and can push each other and break away. More than anything, it is about making friends. I was trying to do that at the test, talking to Jeff (Gordon) and Kyle (Busch) and trying to sweet talk them. That is what it is going to be about, finding the right guy at the right time and staying out of the mess to do that.”

HOW DO PREPARE FOR THIS RACE? “You go step by step. With the way the rules package is, there is not a lot you can do to the car. We had three days here to test, and there is not a lot we are going to do to the car. Mike is going to get it on the race track and go through the inspection and there are some small little things we are going to try. Doug Yates and the engine shop brought a lot of stuff to the track for the test that we tried and I think we have a pretty good idea what the best engine package is. There is not much we can do from that aspect. It is more going step-by-step, getting through qualifying. If we have a chance at the pole, then great, if not then it doesn’t really mean anything. Going in Wednesday and getting in a big group of cars, which is something I haven’t done on this race track yet, because I was only here at the second test when we basically only had two-car drafting. That will be my first real attack mode chance where I can learn how to draft in a big pack on this track. Then we will go through the duals and I want to go out and win the thing. I want to be in victory lane for Best Buy and Ford and everybody at Richard Petty Motorsports. If not, I want to get out of there unscathed and keep building the week up. It is such a long time here that you can’t just come in here full bore. You have to keep ramping up and ramping up, learning each thing that happens. You have to get into Sunday and try to make the right decisions then.”

ARE YOU THE GLUE HOLDING THIS TEAM TOGETHER? “No. If I am the so-called leader then great, I am plenty happy to be the leader. I have the ability to lead this team and I feel like at the end of last year I led this team and helped keep it together, but there are a lot of great people on this race team to help keep that glue together. You have Robbie Loomis, our new CEO Lisa Brown who has been amazing. She has come in and helped steer the team in a new direction. There are a lot of people on down than can help keep this team together. Not one guy can keep a team together, that is not what it is all about. We have a great leader in The King. It is everybody working well together. That is what happened at the end of last year. Everybody wanted to be here. All the crew guys wanted to keep working hard and win races. That is what it takes. I feel like we have a great group of guys on both race teams. Guys back at the shop. For me, it is a whole total package.”

DOES THIS GROUP HAVE STABILITY NOW? “Well, it is the start of it definitely. It is not like the Medallion Group came along and all those guys came in and we thought we were saved and everything is great now. It is a stepping stone. You have to keep building. Going to the shop now, it is a small group of guys, it seemed like we had so many people from so many different race teams, whether it was just Ford in general or Roush Fenway or Yates, it seemed like you saw a new guy all the time before. Now you look at it and it is a small core group of guys that are working on two cars. Everybody seems to just be a lot calmer, and the shop has a different attitude around it. I feel good about it going into this year. We aren’t out of the woods. Everything isn’t rainbows and blue skies. You see the light at the end of the tunnel and I joke that the light used to be a train coming to hit us. Now it is a real light at the end of the tunnel and everyone seems to be happy about it. We have been through so much. Now it is time to get on the race track and see where we belong at the beginning of this year and going forward. We have new cars in the shop and a lot more tools than we had at the end of last year. The way I look at it, at the end of last year we came to the track with an attitude that we wanted to win, but even more we wanted to just survive. Now we just want to win.”

TRAVIS KVAPIL – No. 34 Long John Silver’s Ford Fusion — EXPECTATIONS GOING INTO THIS YEAR? “We definitely have higher expectations. Last year we had some struggles and I think we were definitely spread kind of thin trying to run three cars and the second and third team really kind of came together late last year. I’m thankful for Bob and everybody at Front Row. They made some big steps during the off season. We bought a bunch of cars from the RPM guys and we’re going to be running Ford’s new FR9 engine this year, which we didn’t run last year. I think that’s gonna be a big boost in our program. Consolidating down from three to two teams, I think that’s gonna help us consolidate our efforts on those two cars. We hired a competition director, a role that we didn’t have in place before. We hired Derrick Finley and I’m excited to have him. He’s gonna help strengthen that link between Front Row Motorsports and Ford and be able to use the resources Ford offers us that much better – the engineering, the technology, the wind tunnel time, seven-post time. We just didn’t have the time or personnel to do that last year, so just a lot of little steps we’re making. We’re also looking to take that next step up the ladder in the field as well to improve our performance.”

HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT THIS RACE CONSIDERING YOU DIDN’T TEST IN JANUARY? “I still feel very confident about it. We do all the things at the shop we can do just to get pure speed in the race car and spend time on the chassis dyno and pull-down rig. We have a very good idea of what we need to do to get the speed. Even though we didn’t come here and test, we all have friends in the garage. We’ve been to Talladega the last couple season, which is a very similar situation here with new pavement. The track is very smooth. The same things you did at Talladega to try and find speed, we’re gonna do those here, so having that experience at Talladega won’t make this that big of a disadvantage not coming down here to test.”

THE TRACK WAS SO BUMPY AND SLICK BEFORE, SO DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT TO EXPECT? “It’s gonna be easy to drive. It’s gonna literally be like driving down the interstate at 70 miles an hour is what it’s gonna feel like, except when you get in the pack. It’s gonna be that much more mentally challenging. Before, you were really up on the wheel and your handling was very important and sliding around and bouncing around. Now, it’s gonna be more of a chess game. The handling is gonna be a non-issue. The track is very smooth. There aren’t many bumps to deal with, but it’s just gonna be a chess game of positioning yourself right and because the track is smooth, it’s gonna be like Talladega where we’re all gonna be up on top of each other – three-wide and probably four-wide – and we’re not gonna be able to get away from each other like we did at Daytona in the past.”

WHAT ARE YOUR IMPRESSIONS OF YOUR NEW CREW CHIEF? “I’ve really enjoyed my time with Bill Henderson so far. I like that he’s straight to the point. He’s gonna do everything he can to prepare us to run well at the shop. Good enough isn’t good enough. He’s gonna try to do it the best he can, so I’m just excited to work with Bill and see how we get going here. He’s excited to be with me and with Front Row Motorsports, so I’m just excited to get this season going with him.”

DAVID RAGAN – No. 6 UPS Ford Fusion — WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS GOING INTO 2011? “It feels good. Every year everyone is optimistic. Nobody comes to Daytona thinking, ‘Oh, we don’t have fast cars. Our pit crew is slow. It’s gonna be a long year.’ Everybody is optimistic, but I really feel like the Roush Fenway team is better than we’ve been in two years. We’ve got better race cars, better engines, better bodies, better pit crews – everything is better. Now it’s just a point where we’ve all got to go and do our jobs. We’re focused on doing that. I feel like I’m a better driver than I was a year ago, I’ve just got to go out there and not make mistakes, so I’m ready. I wish the Daytona 500 was tomorrow. I wish we could line up, unload the cars and say, ‘Look boys, the first lap you’re gonna make is the first lap of the race.’ Let’s go racing. I’m ready for it.”

WHAT DID CARL’S TWO WINS LATE LAST YEAR DO FOR THE ORGANIZATION? DID IT PROVE YOU GUYS WERE GOING IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION? “Absolutely. We had top-10 cars the last five races of the year. We could have and did finish in the top five or top 10, so we had some good runs and that gives everybody motivation in our chassis shop and body shop. For two years we’d been digging ourselves out of a hole, so it’s mentally and physically tough working on Saturdays and 60-hour weeks. Those guys are putting in that effort, so it’s good to see some trophies come back home, see some top 10s and see some good runs. I think that was just kind of a breath of fresh air that allowed everybody to keep working hard through the off-season.”

DREW HAS REMAINED WITH YOU AFTER IT WAS ORIGINALLY A TRIAL BASIS. HOW WAS THAT DECISION MADE DURING THE OFF-SEASON? “It went so well that we just kind of picked up and I think our third race out we finished eighth or 10th. Drew just kind of stepped right in and went to work. I think he had been a part of those positions earlier, going into Matt’s deal and going into Carl’s Nationwide program and just stepping in and going. It’s been really good. When we got to those last couple of races and some of the questions were starting to arise on what the crew chief was going to look like I told Jack, ‘Look, I want Drew. This is what I want.’ Obviously, he said we have to talk to Carl first, so I called Carl and he was actually the one who was very cool about it. Carl is a great teammate and a great friend and it worked out the best for everyone. Mike Beam has his Nationwide deal running good, so it’s worked out well and I can’t wait for us to get on the race track again.”

WHY DID YOU GUYS SEEM TO CLICK SO WELL? “I think it’s kind of 50/50. We’re at a similar age. We want to be at the Cup level. We want to win races. We both have had some success and we’ve both had some things happen that we’ve learned from, going back and forth from the Nationwide car to the Cup car. And then another part of the 6 car running better is just Roush in general being better. I think that we were gonna run better at the end of the year no matter who our crew chief was, but Drew brought some extra fire to the team that elevated us a little bit more. He works great with all the pit crew members. He understands what’s going on over the wall and I can’t say enough good things about him. We just have to work together.”

WHAT IS THE KEY FOR YOU THIS YEAR? “We’ve got to get back to being consistent. We’ve got to be strong several weeks in a row. So many times the last couple of years we’d have a little momentum on our side and then we’d fall off for a couple of weeks. We’ve worked really hard on our short track program. I’ve turned the corner on our road course program. Our downforce and superspeedway programs are really strong, so we’ve got to win a race this year. We’ve just got to be in contention. If you’re in contention to win some races, you’re gonna win a couple. We’re at that point now and a good year for us would be top 15 in points – be in contention. If you’re in contention to win some races, you never know what’s gonna happen in the points. That’s kind of what we’re looking at.”

CARL EDWARDS – No. 99 Aflac Ford Fusion — IS THERE ONE THING THAT MAKES YOU OPTIMISTIC ABOUT THIS YEAR? “I don’t think there’s one thing. That’s what makes me optimistic is it’s not like we had one trick or one thing we did at the end of the year that was better. It’s a number of things – it’s the engine and the pit crew and the cars and the attitude around the shop. The management – Robbie Reiser – all of those things, I feel, have made us faster, so those are the things I’m excited about. I hope it works out.”

IS MOMENTUM HARDER TO RETRIEVE THAN ACHIEVE? “I don’t know. This sport is so strange. Going into the final two races of the season, I didn’t expect to win them. I hoped to win them, but to finish the season like we did – so strong. I mean, sitting on poles and winning races, winning in the Nationwide Series, it’s like all of a sudden everything went well. It could go the other way, but I’m hoping it doesn’t.”

WHERE ARE YOU IN TERMS OF YOUR CONTRACT SITUATION WITH ROUSH FENWAY? “The thing I’m going to do is to do whatever is best for me to go win the most championships I can win. That’s what I want to do and I would like to get it done as quickly and privately as we can so that we can go focus on racing because that’s the best thing. There’s no benefit to having a long, drawn out, messy process. We just need to march through it and figure out what we’re gonna do.”

IS IT MORE MESSY FOR YOU SINCE YOU HANDLE THESE THINGS BY YOURSELF? “I’m fortunate to be able to do all this stuff myself. I’ve worked with people that are easy to work with and my commitment to myself and my team is to just focus on the racing and whatever steps we have to do for contracts and stuff, I’ll do that away from the race track – literally and figuratively – I’ll make sure that I just focus on making my car as fast as it can be.”

ARE YOU FREE TO TALK TO OTHER TEAMS AT THIS POINT? “I’m free to do whatever I’d like to do. I’d rather not talk about the specifics of my contract.”

DOES GOING TO A DIFFERENT TEAM APPEAL TO YOU? “I have had a great relationship with Jack Roush and I just want to do whatever is most likely to let me go win championships. That’s what I’d like to do and the dream would be to do that at Roush in the 99 car with Aflac on board. That would be the dream, but we just have to sit down and go through everything and see where everybody is at.”

THREE YEARS AGO YOUR DEAL SET THE NEW STANDARD. DO YOU EXPECT IT TO BE DIFFERENT THIS TIME WITH THE ECONOMY THE WAY IT IS? “I don’t know. I haven’t looked at it and really analyzed it and had the in-depth conversations that I would have to have to understand exactly where everything is, but times are changing and things are changing in the world – especially our United States business world. I’m assuming that the next deal that I make will be different in a number of ways. Some of them may be really good. I have some ideas and some people around me have some ideas that could make this next sponsorship negotiation a lot of fun for me and the sponsors. We have just a lot of different ideas. We’ll have to hash them out and talk about them, but, like I said from the beginning, I have a whole year left to race here. I’m not in any rush, and I definitely don’t want to use you guys and have this out in the media. I feel like the right thing to do is to make your business deal in a normal manner and not through the media. That’s my opinion.”

ARE THE FIRST TWO OR THREE MONTHS CRITICAL ON DETERMING WHAT YOU DO? “I think it is, but I’m a little wiser than that now. I understand that this sport goes in waves. Let me give you an example, Robbie Reiser running our shop. That is a huge positive thing for Roush Fenway. I think that’s gonna be good for myself or Ricky Stenhouse or Trevor Bayne, all the guys coming up. Those are the kind of things that I’m really focused on. What are we doing to be the best team that we can be for the long term? I think Steve Newmark being on board is huge, but we haven’t really sat down and talked about it and I haven’t gone out and looked at the greater market to see what it looks like. I guess I ought to get on that pretty quick (laughing), but I really and truly am just focused on winning here. The funny thing about racing is when you win a bunch and everything is going really well, it all kind of works out. So I’m really trying to focus on that.”

DOES A DEAL NEED TO BE MADE IN A PARTNERSHIP WITH A SPONSOR? “I don’t know. All I can really officially say is I have a great relationship with everybody at Roush and my first goal would be to race that 99 car with Jack and for Aflac. That would be the dream deal, but I’ll just have to go and look, just like I did the last time, I have to look at everything and say, ‘What’s the best thing for performance?’ That’s what this boils down to because you want to perform well.”

HOW CONFIDENT ARE YOU THAT YOU CAN START 2011 LIKE YOU ENDED 2010? “I’m confident, I’m real optimistic, but I’m also realistic. In 2005 we finished the season very strongly and had a poor 2006. In 2008 we did the same thing with 2009, so I don’t want to get too far out there, but if you look at the way things have gone for us, we won three races in the chase. Greg won Kansas and we won Phoenix and Homestead. I feel like we can win at Daytona. We’ve got a team that works well together. I feel like we can win at Phoenix. I feel like we can win at Vegas. If I start going down the list of tracks, I’m very excited about it, but I don’t want to get over-confident or jinx myself of get lazy. I want to stay hungry and go out here and try to win.”

HAVE YOU LEARNED ANYTHING FROM THOSE PREVIOUS UPS AND DOWNS? “I learned a lot of things, but I didn’t really do anything differently. It’s just the way this sport works. I think our team learned that you can’t rest on anything. I wouldn’t say we were complacent or anything like that, but we might have been a little bit unrealistic about where we stood. I think that 70-race losing streak is recent enough and it’s painful enough that we haven’t lifted yet. We’re wide open. We’re going forward as if we hadn’t won those last two races, so I guess that’s the thing that we learned is to just keep digging.”

HOW HARD IS IT TO GO THROUGH A WINLESS STREAK LIKE THAT? “It’s mentally tough, it’s really tough. The thing that makes it easy is when you have team and someone like Bob Osborne and Jack Roush that, at least to me, they never wavered in their faith in me. They always said they believed in me and they knew I was doing everything for them, but it’s one of those things where everyone looks at themselves and says, ‘Hey, am I doing the best job I can do?’ It just felt so good to win at Phoenix, and then to go the next week and win at Homestead, I cannot explain how good that felt. It’s like, not only did we end our streak, but we made a statement that we’re back and we’re fast. That was good.”

WAS IT A COINCIDENCE YOU WON TWO STRAIGHT? “I don’t know. It’s kind of strange. I felt like we had been building up and getting faster, but the win at Phoenix – but let me put it to you this way. The win before Phoenix, it took 70 races to win again. To go win at Phoenix and then win seven days later win at Homestead, that’s awesome. That was a really good feeling. I didn’t want the season to end. I’m real excited about going racing.”

DOES THE NOSE CHANGE HAVE AN EFFECT ON THE GAINS YOU MADE LAST YEAR? “I don’t think the nose will do anything but give us more grip. That’s a good thing. Right now, we’re on top of our simulation stuff and our wind tunnel stuff well enough that any changes we’ll be in a good spot to make the most of it.”

FOX IS GOING TO PUT MORE EMPHASIS ON THE DAREDEVIL ASPECT OF DRIVING. HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT THAT? “Racing is what it is. We go out and race and things happen. Whatever Fox has got to do is what they have to do. I don’t really have an opinion on it.”

HOW MUCH IS DANGER A PART OF THE FAN APPEAL? “One of the neat things about racing to me is that there is an element of risk and danger. That’s what made it exciting to go to the race track. As a fan when I used to go and watch, that’s what separated me from the guy driving. I don’t know if I was prepared to take that risk. There is a lot of excitement because of that, but I think the educated fan and the true race fan understands that’s part of it. That’s not why they’re watching it, but they understand that’s part of the sport and that’s what makes the hair stand up on the back of your neck when you see something really wild happen. I think as long as it’s done tastefully – showing that side of the sport and putting an emphasis on it is OK as long as it’s not exploited.”

WHEN DID YOU NOT KNOW YOU COULD BE THAT GUY? “When I was going to the races with my dad as a little kid. I was like, ‘That’s really, really neat, but that looks really, really scary too.’ So the first time I drove a race car it surprised me. The speed, the power and the noise – that first time I drove it took me a little while after that to think about it and go out there and really race. It was about a six-month gap between the first time I stepped in a race car to when I really started racing. During that time, I thought a lot about that feeling of, ‘Holy smokes. This is pretty serious.’ That’s fun. I think that’s part of what we’re all trying to do is master that – that little bit of anxiety or fear. That’s a neat part of the sport.”

WOULD YOU TRADE BEING IN THE CHASE FOR WINNING THE DAYTONA 500 AND BRICKYARD LIKE JAMIE DID LAST YEAR? “I see Jamie as a guy who is really confident in himself. He’s been through a lot and he’s shown everyone that he’s a true racer and a guy that can win. I think whatever he tells you is the truth. For me, personally, I want to win a championship more than anything. That is my mission. I know what it feels like to win races. I don’t know what it’s like to win the Daytona 500 or the Brickyard 400, but I want to go win championships. If I had to choose right now between the Daytona 500 or making the chase, it’s definitely making the chase. But if I knew I wasn’t gonna win the championship, then, hell yes, I’d take the Daytona 500. I’d take the Daytona 500 over second-place in the championship. I’ll do that. For sure. I’ve finished second. That’s wonderful. You get to go sit down and watch Jimmie Johnson talk some more (laughing). The 500 would be big.”

MATT KENSETH, No. 17 Crown Royal Ford Fusion – CAN YOU TOUCH ON DAYTONA AND WHAT IT MEANS TO HAVE WON THIS RACE? “Yeah, it is our biggest race of the year obviously, so when you can win that race it is one of the things you like to collect. You want to win every week, but if you can pick one, this would be one of them. It was great to win it.”

WAS THERE A LOT OF TIME TO ENJOY IT AND WHEN DID YOU FIRST REALIZE THAT WINNING IT WAS A LIFE CHANGING EXPERIENCE? “I don’t know if it is life changing. I mean I guess professionally it is somewhat. It is cool to have. To be in that group of drivers that has won one is cool. Really, this sport is more about what have you done for me lately. You have to go back and do it the next week and the week after that. I didn’t spend a lot of time thinking about it. We had that week after and that was a lot of fun, but then we were off to California.”

WHERE DID YOU WATCH THE SUPER BOWL AND HOW DID YOU CELEBRATE? “I watched it at home in my basement in my lucky chair. I sat in the same chair after they won the last three or four games or whatever. I had a few friends come over and put themselves through that. To watch a Packers game with me, I don’t know if it is fun or not, but I am sure it is entertaining because I yell a lot. I just watched at home. I had a good time. I really wish Katie and I could have gone to the game. I didn’t get to go last time because back then I just honestly couldn’t afford it. After I got doing better and making some money I told myself that if they ever get back, not matter what the circumstances I was going to go. I did want to go with Katie, but she couldn’t travel. Hopefully they make it back soon and we can go next time.”

YOU ARE A PRETTY CALM DRIVER, ARE YOU A CALM FAN? “No, you know it is really the only thing that I get in to besides racing. The only other sport I get in to really. I am a big Packers fan and I enjoy watching the NFL. I enjoy watching a lot of NFL games and playing fantasy football. I just really enjoy that. I am a pretty loud passionate fan.”

YOUR RESERVED PERSONA DOESN’T HOLD FOR A FOOTBALL GAME? “No. I am the guy that is standing up, cheering and yelling. I get into it.”

CAN YOU TALK ABOUT HOW MUCH THE TRACK HAS CHANGED COMPARED TO LAST YEAR? “It is night and day. I think you can do anything now. The new surface has so much grip that you will be able to change lanes at the drop of the hat and put the car wherever you wanted to put it. You couldn’t do that before because the pavement was so worn out and we had such big restrictor plates. We had a lot of speed when we got to the corner which made the cars a handful through the corner. I think it will be a totally different race and approach than ever before.”

HOW DOES IT CHANGE FROM A DRIVING ABILITY STANDPOINT? “You won’t have to wrestle the car through the corners like you used to have to do, but I think the racing is going to be very intense because everybody’s car does handle and you can put it wherever you want.”

IS THERE SOMETHING IN THE WATER AT ROUSH FENWAY WITH ALL THE BABIES COMING? “Well, I don’t think it is just Roush Fenway. I think ever since NASCAR stopped the off-season and in-season testing. I guess we have all been at home too much (laughter). It is fun, there is a baby boom in NASCAR and I think it is cool that there will be a bunch of kids about the same age that can grow up together and hopefully be friends. It used to be like that. Everything works in cycles. When I showed up in this circuit, there were still a lot of kids around, but they were older. A lot of them were around the teens. All those kids got older and some of the drivers retired and then there were no kids around for the last four or five years really. Now it seems like all the guys that have been married for awhile and are getting to the point where they want to have kids.”

HOW DO YOU THINK THE NEW PIT RULES WITH THE SIX MEN OVER WILL IMPACT STRATEGY IN RACES? “I think it depends on the track. You still need so much fuel to get to the end of the race. You are still going to have to pit. At a track like this it will be way more about fuel than tires. I don’t foresee any tire wear or problems here. I think you could run the whole race on a set of tires with this pavement. Tires will be more important than fuel, but fuel will be important. Our fuel mileage is going to be a little worse with the FR9 and it takes a little longer to fuel the cars.”

IT USED TO BE YOU COULD PICK UP SOME SPOTS ON PIT ROAD, WILL THAT STILL BE THE CASE DO YOU THINK? “I think that it is just going to be different. The fuel guy is going to be more important. How fast he can get to the car, get it plugged in quickly and not leaking. How fast he can switch from the first to second can without disrupting the rest of the stop. We used to fuel the car to stay out of the way of the tire changers because we could fuel the car much faster than they could change the tires. Right now, and this might change as we go along, you can change tires a couple seconds faster than you can put fuel in the car. I am sure everyone will work on getting fuel in the car as quick as they can and that will be the difference, more than the tire changers — at least for a little while.”

IS IT GOING TO BE TOUGHER TO MAKE THE CHASE NOW WITH THE NEW FORMAT? “I think it will be a little different. I think, I don’t know, but I think that with this points system, if you drop out of some races and get those one, two, four and six points from being in the back, that is going to be really hard to make up points. I think the win thing is a good idea. I think that 10 is enough for the Chase anyway, but to have 11 and 12, as long as you are in the top-20 in points it helps those guys that maybe had an engine break or had a wreck at Daytona or Talladega or whatever and lost so many points that they couldn’t overcome that, now they have a chance to get in by wins. I think that is a neat twist that they put in there that makes it interesting.”

MARK MARTIN SAID EARLIER THAT BEFORE, HE THOUGHT IT WAS THE CAR BEFORE IT WAS THE DRIVER OF THE NO. 48 THAT WAS THE REASON FOR THE SUCCESS. HE NOW SAYS HIS TUNE HAS CHANGED. DO YOU FEEL LIKE JIMMIE HAS EARNED HIS STRIPES? “Has he earned his stripes? He has won five championships in a row. It is a team effort. When Mark first showed up at Hendrick and won the most races in a season than he has ever won in his career. Obviously they have good equipment and Jimmie is a great driver. There are four really great drivers over there and he has won the last five of them. It is like anything else, it is a team effort. You have to have everyone doing their job at the highest level to win championships. Certainly it would be hard for anybody to say that Jimmie is not the best out there, if not the best ever. Nobody has won five in a row and I think only one other guy has won three in a row. It is really incredible this day in age with this competition level and this amount of rules. It is an incredible accomplishment.”

DO YOU WELCOME THE NEW POINTS SYSTEM? “Sure, why not. It will be alright. I hope it will be alright for us. I look forward to seeing how it goes.”

ARE YOU HOPING THERE ARE ANY IMPROVEMENTS TO YOUR ENGINE FOR THIS YEAR? “You always hope they improve it, whether they change the rules or the parts or not. I think they are. Doug Yates, in my opinion, is the best in the business and he is always trying to give us as much power as he can and still be reliable.”

NASCAR HAS TWEAKED WITH THE CHASE FORMAT AND THE POINTS OVER THE YEARS. IS THERE ANY PART OF YOU THAT WISHES THAT THERE WAS CONSISTENCY WITH THINGS? “To me it doesn’t matter that much as long as it is the same for everyone. I think you always have to look to make things better, I am all about that. I also think that at some point along the line you need consistency so everyone can understand things. When you watch football, you understand how the people make the playoffs, how the wild card works, what you have to do to get in the Super Bowl. I think this points system is probably a step toward that, but we have to get it to the point where all the fans understand what is going on eventually too and get some consistency and keep things the same. That is what I think, but I don’t know.”

HOW BUSY ARE THESE COUPLE OF WEEKENDS FOR YOU ON THE TRACK? “It really is not that bad. I was talking to Katie the other day about it and I remember when we used to come down here how incredibly busy it was for me. Now it is honestly not that busy. When we were running better and had won the championship and all that, we had about 20 Nationwide races, the I-ROC series was still in business, so you would get your Busch car ready to go, your I-ROC car ready to go and you would run that race and practice and the Cup race and practice. This week, I don’t think there will be as much practice because everybody’s car is going to handle. I think we will go out and draft once or twice and everybody will be okay. There are so many rules and so much grip; I don’t really know what you are going to work on that much. I could be wrong, and Jimmy could have a plan to run every lap of every practice. Not running Nationwide and I-ROC has made it not so busy.”

IN REGARD TO THE NEW POINT SYSTEM, IT WAS ALREADY TRUE THAT BAD THINGS HURT MORE THAN GOOD THINGS HELPED, BUT IT SEEMS MORE-SO NOW AND IN THE CHASE IT IS REALLY GOING TO BE A CRUSHER IF YOU HAVE A 38TH PLACE FINISH. WHAT CAN YOU DO ABOUT THAT OR DO YOU JUST GO FULL STEAM AHEAD? “It is the same for everybody. The higher you finish the more point you get. So obviously if you can win every race you are going to win the championship, as dumb as that sounds. I have not taken a calculator to it like it sounds like you have, but it does seem like if you have one or two real bad races, worse than 35th, then you are going to be in big trouble. In the Chase, it used to be that you could have a bad race, like the year we finished second to Jimmie, we finished second in points and he had a couple real bad weeks and was behind, but then he stared finishing top-five for a couple weeks and we were running 11th every week and you get so many more points to be in the top-five and you could gain points that way. I think it will be tougher to do that now. I remember when they first came with the Chase, everybody was saying with only 10 races you couldn’t have one problem and still win the championship, but we have proved that was not true. You can have a couple problems if you are a great team and still overcome it. It is what it is. It is the same for everybody. We just have to watch it, see how it plays out and go from there. The first year of the Chase, Kurt was going to wrap it up a week early, blew up in Atlanta and finished last and won the thing by just a couple points at Homestead with a wheel falling off and everything. He was going to wrap it up early easily in Atlanta, but he had a problem and it got everybody caught up. He was still able to win the championship though.”

DO YOU THINK WHAT WE SAY WITH THE PIT-CREW SWAP LAST YEAR WITH THE 48 AND 24 COULD EVER HAPPEN AT ROUSH OR IS THAT OFF THE TABLE? “I think it could happen. It would be dumb not to happen if you had a guy that was running for the championship and didn’t have the fastest, best over the wall crew, and one of your other three cars dropped out of the race, now it is one thing robbing them in the middle of the race, but if you own four teams and you have one drop out of the race and instead of six crew members you have 12 standing there and you know that those six are better than the other six, why wouldn’t you put them in?”

YOU DON’T THINK THAT AFFECTS THE CHEMESTRY OF THE TEAM? “It didn’t seem like it did. The team is bigger than one person. It is bigger than the driver or crew chief or six people over the wall. It is bigger than that. It takes everybody to make that thing work. You have to put your best foot forward and use your best stuff every week. If you are one of the guys getting pulled out, obviously nobody likes that, but at the end of the day it was smart. It probably helped them win a championship.”

EVERYBODY IS OPTIMISTIC THIS TIME OF THE YEAR. WHAT DO YOU FEEL MIGHT BE DIFFERENT ABOUT YOUR TEAM THIS YEAR THAN OTHER YEARS? “Well, Jimmy Fennig has been here and we finished strong at the end of last year. I felt more confident at the end of last year than the 10 weeks before that. It seems like we are going in the right direction. We have had some change over the wall that hopefully will pick our over the wall guys up a little bit. We have had several changes and have to see how it goes. This year, I feel like maybe Jimmy will feel like it is more his own team. Chip has stepped up to engineering, and now Jimmy has built the team that is there now. It is different than it was a few years ago. I think he probably feels a little more comfortable with his own group and that will help.”

MARCOS AMBROSE – No. 9 Stanley Ford Fusion – HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT THIS YEAR? “I’m one of 43 drivers who think they’re gonna in the Daytona 500 and think they’re gonna win the championship. What makes us different? I think, for me, 2011 was all about change. I wanted a fresh start. I wanted to work with a new group of people and shake things up and try to get the most out of myself and we’ve done that. I’m looking forward to driving for Richard Petty Motorsports. We’ve got great sponsorships with Stanley and DeWalt to partner up with in 2011, so we’re fully funded. We’ve got a great technical partnership with Roush Yates and the engine program over there, so we’ve got a lot of really good stuff going on. Todd Parrott, he’s a championship crew chief and he’s won the Daytona 500, so I feel really good about the situation just hope I can make the most of it.”

WHAT ARE THE KEYS TO YOUR SUCCESS? “I’ve got a lot of determination and I’m very stubborn as well and I think that’s helped me persevere through the tough times. Not every day is a good day. I did a lot more winning before I came to NASCAR than since I’ve been here because the competition is so fierce and it’s an incredible form of racing. It’s something I’ll take with me forever. It’s a dream job and a dream chance to be here and compete and I think just my passion for racing and my dedication to my chosen sport and field has held me in good stead, and I’ve had a lot of luck. It takes a lot of luck to get to where I am.”

DO YOU HAVE ANY FAVORITE SAYINGS? “I’m a man of action. I love to do things. I’m not a guy who sits around on a computer. I’m not a guy who sits around the house. I’ve got to be doing something and, for me, racing is all about that. We’re living life in the fast lane and we’re mixing it up and it’s passion and aggression and commitment and somewhat skill to get around these tracks, and it’s just great to be part of this sport.”

HOW HAVE YOU ADJUSTED TO THIS TEAM? “A lot better than other teams because I’ve obviously I’m racing against other people, but we’ve got some communication issues. I like to talk Australian and my crew chief talks North Carolinian (laughing). It’s a little bit different, so we’ve got some issues there to deal with, but I’m getting along well with my guys. It’s taking its time to get to learn each other and it’s a work in progress, but Richard Petty Motorsports went through a lot of change at the end of last year. I feel like our team is a great small team that is really gonna bounce back well. I’m excited for it. I feel a lot of responsibility to deliver for the sponsors, for my team, for members who stayed committed to the program and to the King. I’m driving for the King and that comes with a unique responsibility as well.”

DO YOU HAVE A PLAN FOR THIS YEAR AS FAR AS A COURSE OF ACTION? “Not really. At this point you get paid to race cars. You’re meant to know what to do. They’re not gonna tell me what to do. I know what I need to do out there. I can tell you straight up we’re gonna try to win the Daytona 500 and we’re gonna get a good points base to get through the fifth race and build up a championship run if we can. We’ve got to be consistent. We’re gonna take our chances when they come, but not be crazy out there. For me, it’s a solid start. Obviously, the Daytona 500 is a unique deal where we’re not considering the Daytona 500 a championship race just because you want to win it so bad. We’ll see how it all goes and just get through the first part of the season smart and then get to know each other and build up a base.”

WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT THIS WEEK IN GENERAL? “It’s good that I’m here talking about it. That’s a good thing. I’m here to be part of the sport and to see NASCAR reinvigorate itself into a new year. It’s always refreshing and nice to be a part of it. It’s exciting. There’s such media attention. I heard today that there are more sponsors today back in the sport than last year and there’s more commitment. That’s always a good thing. We’re here to talk about the good things in NASCAR and a new season is upon us. Hopefully, we can stop Jimmie Johnson.”

WHAT WERE YOUR THOUGHTS ABOUT DALE EARNHARDT SR. WHEN HE WAS RACING? “I remember the day here that ended his life and I knew the man he was – an incredible person and he’ll be a legend that stays in the sport for generations to come. I was lucky enough to see him race live. I was lucky enough to be a part of it and see what he was all about. I never got a chance to race against him, which is a shame, but it was just great to have witnessed it and Richard Petty is the same. He’s a living legend. I get a chance to rub shoulders with him and to learn about the past and that’s pretty cool.”

WHAT WOULD YOU BE DOING IF YOU WEREN’T RACING? “I’d be a builder of some kind. I left school and kind of stumbled into a job as a builder’s assistant. I enjoy the outside. I enjoy building things and it’s good job satisfaction and good physical work.”

WHAT ARE YOUR CHANCES OF WINNING HERE? “My first race here with this team, it’s gonna be tough but we’ve got as good a chance as any of the other 42 drivers out there. It’s a race where you only get one shot at it each year. This is my third chance and my best chance yet, so I feel my odds are better than last year and the year before that.”

ANY FUNNY STORIES WITH YOUR ACCENT AND COMMUNICATING WITH TODD? “He can’t understand a word I say. He might be miming or lip-reading, I guess. I’m not sure what he’s doing, but I’ve got to learn to slow my speech down. I’ve got to learn to be clearer on the radio and on the telephone too. I talk a little fast and my accent can throw guys off a little bit.”

NASCAR SPRINT CUP SERIES

2011 NASCAR MEDIA DAY

DAYTONA INTERNATIOINAL SPEEDWAY

TEAM CHEVY DRIVER PRESS CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPT

February 10, 2011

KEVIN HARVICK, NO. 29 BUDWEISER CHEVROLET, met with members of the media at NASCAR Daytona Media day and discussed the 10-year anniversary of KHI, the new points system, the Budweiser Shootout and much more. Full transcript:

WITH IT BEING THE 10TH ANNIVERSARY OF KEVIN HARVICK, INC. CAN YOU TALK ABOUT THE BEGINNINGS AND HOW MUCH SUCCESS YOU’VE HAD? “We’ve been fortunate to have the company evolve. It really wasn’t ever intended to be anything other than just to go out and have fun and try to win a truck race. When (Tony) Stewart came along and wanted to run the Nationwide race it really evolved into what it is today. So it’s probably mostly his fault that it evolved into what it is today. Its fun and I really enjoy the part of trying to put the people together and the sponsorship and everything that goes with that to make it all go around. So it’s become kind of its own animal I guess you can say as it evolves into what it is today. We try to do everything we can do. We don’t do it to make money or anything like that, we just do it to be a part of the sport and learn what we need to do so that one day when I’m done we’ll have the option of having hopefully a company that’s fully paid for and competitive if we want to stay in the sport.”

CAN YOU TALK ABOUT DELANA’S INVOLVEMENT? “Yeah, it’s a full-time job for her just for the fact along with the competition side expanding obviously, the hospitality and the pr and everything that comes with the sponsorship stuff has to be taken care of. So, we both work hard at it and she has to work at it year around. I get to winter and then I come back from being a driver. But its fun and we enjoy it. It gives us both a good sense of things that we need to do better. Better as people and if we were going to be successful as a company things that you need to adjust as far as a constant adjustment, no matter how well you think you have things figured out and whether you are on top or on the bottom it’s a constant adjustment to keep up with it.”

WHAT DO YOU THINK OF RICHARD’S COMMENT ABOUT WHEN HE SAID THE CHAMPIONSHIP WILL BE WON BY AN RCR CAR? “Richard’s comment wasn’t a championship would be won by RCR, Richard’s comment was somebody needed to knock Jimmie Johnson off and it might as well be us. Richard is excited about this season and comfortable with where we are. From my standpoint I’m just gonna go out and race. But that’s how he should be.”

YOU TALKED ABOUT ALWAYS HAVING TO MAKE ADJUSTMENTS, WITH THE SHORT OFF-SEASON AND NOT MUCH TESTING HOW DO YOU JUDGE WHETHER YOU GUYS HAVE DONE WHAT’S NEEDED TO DO TO CONTINUE TO PERFORM AT THE LEVEL YOU WERE, IS THERE ANYTHING OTHER THAN GETTING IN THE CAR AND SEEING THE RESULTS? “That’s the best way to do it but I think for us the things that we had missed before we can always catch up and not keep pushing ahead. I think that was where the biggest adjustment we made last year was bringing Scott Miller in to make sure, Kent Day in the engineering department and the simulation and the aero department, all those things kept moving forward and being leaders and not just figuring out what everybody else is doing, catching up and not pushing ahead again and waiting until you get behind and then pushing to find out what everybody else did and then you build it and you catch up for a little bit then you are behind. I tell this to Richard a lot. I say the best example that we have is our engine shop. Our engine shop used to be not that great and now it’s probably the best engine shop in the whole sport. Whether it’s the truck, Nationwide or Cup level, they are the leader in what we do and that’s a lot of the same philosophies and styles of management that have been installed with the race shop itself.”

BUDWEISER IS DOING A ROAST FOR YOU ON TUESDAY, WHO ARE YOU MOST WORRIED ABOUT SPEAKING AND WHY? “I’m pretty much going into it with the fact knowing I’m pretty much going to get slammed. But the thing they all got to remember is I get the last work and so as many good stories them all have on me, I have on most of them. And I know better than to completely demolish my wife. She’s probably going to get away with a lot more than the rest of them. Mike Dillon I have no worries about whatsoever because I have the ultimate story on him. I think Hornaday is probably the one that worries me the most to be honest with you.”

WELL YOU’RE HIS BOSS. “Yeah, but in those in particular environments nobody cares about who your boss is and who you are. I think Hornaday, he’s probably got . . .”

POLAROIDS? “(Laughter). He’s got stories, pictures and the ones that he and I can’t remember I’m sure Lindy does.”

TO KNOCK OFF JIMMIE JOHNSON DO YOU JUST HAVE TO REPEAT WHAT YOU DID LAST YEAR? “I don’t think you can count on him stumbling. I think that was a lot of the talk last year, they were stumbling and then here you go, you get into the Chase and there they are. I think for us it’s doing a lot of the same things that we did last year. Our main focus was rebuilding the pit crew. We completely rebuilt the pit crew and I think this year brings a lot of new challenges. Obviously the noses are all different so reacting to how the cars are reacting we’re heading in the wrong direction or doing something we shouldn’t have, but just fine tuning everything and not letting down on the areas that we were strong last year, continuing to focus on those areas. Obviously they all talk about wanting to qualify better and if we do we do, that’s fine. But I think the main thing besides the pit crew is just trying to win a couple more races.”

SPEAKING OF THE PIT CREW, YOU GUYS HIRED A FEW GUYS FROM HENDRICK AND ALSO RPM, WERE ANY OF THOSE HENDRICK CREW MEMBERS FROM THE NO. 48 TEAM? “No.”

EARLIER YOU TALKED ABOU THE NO. 48 TEAM BEING VULMERABLE AT THE END OF THE YEAR, WAS THAT SOMETHING THAT WAS ORGANIZATIONAL GIVEN THE CHANGES THEY MADE AT THE END OF THE SEASON? “Well I think when you look at the No. 48, I think that the biggest thing that sticks out to me was the performance of the other three cars so it’s not just us that they beat. They continually beat the same teams they have in the same shop. So that to me tells me it’s a chemistry thing. I think those are the things that I felt like we did a very good job at with our team last year, was just figuring out how to stay calmer than what we had in the past and figure out how to take a 20th-place car and finish seventh or eighth with it and those are the things they have always been good at is when they are junk in practice or they are junk in the race they figure out how to make something out of that particular day. But they do a better job at it than the other three cars sitting in their own shop. It’s not a we need to go out and we to buy this or buy that, it’s just about making sure we do the things and use the tools we have as a race team to figure out how to get out of those holes.”

IT SEEMS LIKE YOU GUYS CAME INTO THE CHASE WITH A DIFFERENT APPROACH. “Well we wanted to have fun with the whole year last year. Obviously there was a lot more questions than there were answers when we started the year last year. But we went in with the approach of just having fun and not being mad and down. If things aren’t going right we’ll brush it off when we get on the airplane and go home and come back the next week with a fresh attitude. Gil (Martin, crew chief) does a very good job with that. He’s very good with the guys and if you have a bad day or I say something wrong it doesn’t become a bigger deal than it needs to be. They understand that I’m emotional and they don’t want me to not speak my mind or hold it in, they want me to get it out and get it over with and move on in the race and that’s it. It’s a good chemistry and a good balance between everybody.”

HOW MUCH DID YOU ENJOY NEEDLING DENNY (HAMLIN) THERE IN THAT LAST PRESS CONFERENCE? “I just sat back and watched. I didn’t really mean to get involved. Jimmie was taking control. I just sat back.”

DOES JIMMIE GET ENOUGH CREDIT AS A RACE CAR DRIVER? “That is a tough question. I think as you look at what they’ve accomplished, I think you have to respect what they’ve done as a race team. You look in sports history in general, you have to understand what they’ve done and as competitors we do. I think the hard part for them is they have a lot of fans but the fans haven’t embraced what he’s done as a race car driver and what that team has done as a team in general. So when the fans don’t embrace that you don’t get as much credit as you should.”

YOU SAID YOU GET EMOTIONAL DURING A RACE, OVER THE COURSE OF THE SEASON, THIS MORNING KESELOWSKI SAID HE DOESN’T LET GRUDGES OR FEELINGS OF OTHER DRIVERS GO OVER IN THE OFF-SEASON, WHAT IS YOUR TAKE ABOUT THAT? “In my opinion I just go start and kind of do my own thing. You race as hard as you can, you are going to have some dust ups with some people and you try to handle them and you do the best that you can from inside the car and do what you think is right and sometimes that requires to do things that other people don’t like. If you carry too much over at this point of the season all it does is take away from the performance of your own team. This is too big of a deal. You will gradually create those ruffled feathers and things as you go through this season so it’s hard to carry over last year’s unless you really pay attention to it.”

WITH THE WAY THE TRACK IS NOW ARE WE MORE LIKELY TO SEE A FINISH LIKE YOU HAD IN ’07, OR ARE YOU GOING TO SEE IT FAN OUT? “I don’t think you are going to see any fanning out.”

I MEANT THE WIDTH NOT THE LENGTH. “That’s the difference between this place and Talladega there’s only so much room. You can squeeze four-wide but it’s going to be door-to-door-to-door and one’s going to be on the apron and one’s going to be next to the wall. The biggest thing that I notice from testing is if you touch that apron just a slight bit you are in deep trouble because it grabs the car and hangs a left and wants to instantly spin you out. That’s different. There’s not that transition of banking there used to be or where you can get away with something like that. So three-wide is pretty much it. If they’re three-wide you’re not going to see that two-car breakaway that you had coming from the middle or the back of the pack. There’s not going to be anywhere to go. I think you’re going to want to be towards the front and try to time that two-car breakaway towards the front of the pack because I don’t believe there is going to be anywhere to go for those breakaways anywhere else.”

WHAT’S YOUR TAKE ON THE NEW POINTS? “I don’t think they did anything to address the first 26 weeks, which is something that probably still needs to be addressed. Everybody spends a lot of money and a lot of time to get to that particular point. That is probably the only thing that got left out. I’m really happy with kind of the wildcards that get into the Chase. Taking the top-10 from the points and obviously everybody likes the winning part of it. To have the bonus points as you lead up to it and I think the smaller point totals are a lot easier for us dumb guys to add up. I think it’s very simple when you look at the way the points are spread out. So I like the simplicity of it. I just hope that we stick to it so that everybody can understand it.”

AS A FORMER WINNER OF THIS RACE, YOU GOT TO ENJOY ALL THE SPOILS THAT CAME WITH IT, HOW BADLY DO YOU FEEL FOR A GUY LIKE MICHAEL WALTRIP WHO WON THIS RACE BUT ON A DAY THAT WAS ONE OF THE DARKEST IN THE SPORT AND NEVER REALLY GOT A CHANCE TO SAVOR THAT MOMENT? “This is obviously the biggest race you can win in our sport and there is nothing that even comes close to the magnitude or the excitement or anything that goes with it to be honest with you so obviously you hate for somebody not to be able to experience that and then carry that with you for years. You don’t ever wish anything like that on anybody. It’s the biggest race you can win and you want to enjoy while you have the opportunity to.”

NOW THAT YOU’RE WEARING RED AND BLACK, WHAT DOES THE BUDWEISER SHOOTOUT MEAN AND TALK A LITTLE ABOUT WHAT WE MIGHT SEE IN THE BUDWEISER SHOOTOUT THIS YEAR IN PARTICULAR. “The Bud Shootout this year, I think everybody is anticipating it just for the fact you have the all new fueling system. I think there’s questions there how fast he fuel goes in and what you do for strategy and things like that, but obviously we’re not going to approach the Bud Shootout just because Budweiser is our sponsor any different than what we did in the past. We’re gonna come here and try to win the race and know that there’s no points on the line and do everything we can to win. Nothing has changed there.”

YOU TALKED AT HOMESTEAD ABOUT HOW SOME OF THE OLD EARNHARDT FANS ARE FINALLY COMING ON BOARD WITH YOU GUYS AND HOW YOU FINALLY EMBRACE THEIR CONNECTION, IS THAT SOMETHING YOU SEE CONTINUING TO GROW? “Yeah, I think as we went through the year that was neat just to see that all come full circle and with everything that has happened. This is obviously the 10-year anniversary of everything that happened so there is a lot of focus on that and the fans are all aware of that. So it’s great to see them back involved with the sport and that’s the most important thing.”

WHY DID IT TAKE YOU SO LONG TO EMBRACE THAT CONNECTION? “I just didn’t like it. I didn’t like everybody expecting you to be somebody else. Somebody else did this and somebody else did that. It just wore on me after a while and it was like the easiest thing to do was be defensive about it and not talk about it. Now that we’ve been able to establish ourselves as what we’ve done and establish a solid footing in the sport you realize when you step back a lot of things they are talking about are compliments to what you’ve been able to accomplish on the race track. So that’s important. The other thing is it’s just one of those things where RCR was built by Richard and a huge part of that was built by Dale and that’s always going to be my car, and that’s always going to be his car so the Heritage that Earnhardt not only carries in our sport but to our particular company is very important. I think once I was able to sit back and realize that it is very important to the people that work there and very important to the fans, you also learn how to make it important to yourself. So I think everybody understands that and we embrace the fact that we need to take responsibility and carry that forward.”

BECAUSE YOU DIDN’T WIN THE CHAMPIONSHIP ARE YOU GLAD THAT JIMMIE DID SO YOU MAY BE THE ONE TO KNOCK HIM OFF? “I think you always want to beat the best and right now they are the best in our sport and so yeah. I never really thought about it that way but that’s a great way to put it. The one to knock him off is finally going to be that guy. Like Richard said it would be great if it was us and we’re going to do everything we can to try to do that just as we have done in the past. They’ve had some great accomplishments in this sport and somebody is going to beat them at some point. I know everybody keeps saying that but at some point hopefully it will finally happen.”

THERE WAS A LITTLE TALK AT THE RCR LUNCH THAT WHEN YOU GOT UP AND SPOKE YOU GOT EMOTIONAL AND MAYBE EVEN A LITTLE TEARY EYED, WHAT STRUCK YOU SO? “I think that as you look back at everything that happened 10 years ago there’s a lot of people that had a huge part in playing up until that point that had been around Dale and Richard. For me it’s more about the company and Richard and I just wanted to make sure everybody understood how important these weeks were and making sure that you are able to understand the magnitude of this weekend and how much it all means to hundreds of us at that company to come down here and be successful and how important it would be to race for a championship and try to win it on this particular year. It’s just there are a lot of us that are around it and obviously I didn’t have a great close personal relationship with Dale so it’s more about knowing how emotional a lot of the guys in the company and Richard were and you saw how down they were and how tore up they were. When you think back about all that stuff everybody went through a lot. It’s important for everyone to understand the magnitude of this weekend.”

IS THAT WHAT YOU PLANNED OR DID THAT JUST KIND OF COME OUT? “I carry a lot of my emotion on my sleeve. It means a lot to me and a lot of people there.”

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