Carl Edwards, driver of the No. 99 Aflac Ford Fusion, is leading the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series point standings for the third straight week.  He spoke with reporters in the Darlington Raceway infield media center to discuss a variety of subjects.  

CARL EDWARDS – No. 99 Aflac Ford Fusion – YOU HAD YOUR SECOND CHILD THIS WEEK.  CONGRATULATIONS.  HOW IS IT GOING?  “It’s going great.  It was amazing.  Kate is an amazing woman.  We had a healthy young boy.  His name is Michael Edwards and he’s doing great, so it’s just a great week.  It was unreal.  We had a lot of fun.  Annie is really excited about her little brother.  I don’t think she quite understands what is going on, but we’re all doing really well, so it’s good.”   

WHERE DOES DARLINGTON RANK ON YOUR DIFFICULTY SCALE AND WHAT DOES IT MEAN THAT JEFF GORDON HAS FIVE MORE WINS HERE THAN ANY OTHER ACTIVE DRIVER?  “This place is really difficult.  I had a lot of help before my first trip here from Jeff Burton.  He’s really good here and he helped me a lot with my first run here in the trucks.  Bobby Hudson was spotting for me then and he’d watched a million races here.  I’ve never gotten a win here, but we’ve run really well.  We’ve run well in the trucks, in Nationwide and in the Cup Series.  We’ve had at least one Cup race get away that I thought we could win.  I feel like our Aflac Fusion is pretty good this weekend, but it is very difficult.  I think Jeff’s success here says a lot about him as a driver and a lot about that team.  He’s won seven races.  That’s unreal.  I ran the truck race here and we overheated the engine.  We were running really well and overheated the engine, but the first Cup race I came to here I was just watching, hanging out.  I watched the beginning of the race from turn three, in that building, watched a bunch of laps and then I decided I was gonna drive back to Charlotte.  I got back to my apartment, drove all the way home.  I had watched enough that I was ready to go home, drove all the way home, walked in and flipped on the radio and the race was still going.  They were still out there grinding it out and it was like 90 degrees outside.  It’s such a tough race.  It’s a grueling race physically, so that says a lot about Jeff to be able to win all of those.”   

IS THERE ANY UPDATE ON YOUR CONTRACT STATUS FOR NEXT YEAR?  “I don’t have any timetable, and, like I said at the beginning of the year, I don’t really like to talk about that stuff in the media.  I’ve been fortunate to be able to take care of it behind closed doors, but it’s all going well.  We’re just working on it.”   

HARVICK AND KYLE BOTH LIKE HAVING AS MANY WINS AS POSSIBLE BECAUSE THEY FEEL THEY CAN TAKE MORE CHANCES WITH SETUP S.  AS THE POINT LEADER WOULD YOU RATHER BE WHERE YOU ARE NOW OR MORE WINS THIS YEAR?  “I’d rather be where I’m at now.  The wins are very important, though.  I think just the fact that we have one win is great, two would be better.  I think both of those guys are in a great position to make the chase because they’re both gonna be in the top 20 in points.  It’s kind of interesting all the curves that go with that stuff.  I think if you can have two wins, I believe you’ll be in the chase, so that’s a relief, I’m sure, for those guys.  But having the points lead is nice, too.  I think it builds a lot of confidence within the team.  This is the longest we’ve led the points.  We’ve been able to hang onto the points lead for quite a while now, so I’m enjoying it.  If it does rain out qualifying, there’s an advantage there.  I’d like to have the points lead and a bunch of wins.  That would be the best, but we’re working on that.”   

YOU CAN SEE GRAY COMING BACK TO THE TRACK.  DOES THAT MEAN GRIP IS GOING AWAY FROM THE TRACK?  “I was pretty excited and anxious to see what it looked like.  I was telling the guys that rode with me down to the race that this track was so different before they paved it, and I’m hoping it gets back to that.  It seems like it has aged quite well, I think, over the last year.  It took a lot of rubber about three-quarters of the way through the Nationwide practice and that changed the grip level a little bit.  It seems like the tires are falling off a little bit, so I think it’s good.  I think the track is going really well, and I think that’s good for the racing.”   

CAN YOU EXPLAIN WHAT IT’S LIKE BEING A NASCAR DRIVER AWAY FROM THE TRACK?  “We run all over the place.  There’s always something going on.  I’ve been running the Nationwide Series full-time.  I think this is the seventh year running both series full-time, so, for me, days like today without the rain are really busy.  You’re in the car, it feels like for 12 or 15 hours – from 8:30 in the morning until whenever we finish the race at night, so those days are really busy.  The one thing that I’ve noticed since I’ve been doing this is my off days are like Monday and Tuesday, so I end up having days off when nobody else does, so that’s kind of odd.  But we work on the weekends essentially, and the guys in the shop are the ones that really work the hardest, the guys that work in the shop all week and then travel.  There’s more than what you see on television, I guess, is the best way to put it.  There’s a lot of work that goes into this and it seems like the more you work, the better you go so nobody lets up.”   

DOES YOUR BOY LOOK OR ACT LIKE YOU, AND HOW FRUSTRATING IS THE TRACK TO LEARN AT FIRST?  “I don’t know him well enough.  He’s only been around a couple of days, but he’s healthy and that’s the biggest thing.  That’s one of the most stressful things that I hope I ever have to go through.  It’s wild to anticipate how everything is gonna go, but I’m very fortunate.  As far as this race track, it’s just wild.  To drive down into turn one, if you had a heart rate monitor it’s like as you’re approaching turn one your heart rate just gets higher and higher and you think, ‘OK, we’ve got to get this right.’  And you drive down in that corner and it just launches you into the middle of this corner and, to me, I don’t know what other guys feel like, but my brain is screaming, ‘Step on the throttle, step on the throttle,’ and for some reason my foot just won’t do it quick enough because it’s so different from most tracks.  You have to be on the throttle really, really running hard around the center of the corner and you build up all this steam and then the game is to see if you can thread that needle off of two and launch down that back straightaway, so it’s a very challenging race track.  I feel like the pace of the race, mentally at least, changes a lot throughout the race.  You get a lot more comfortable and understand how it’s working, but the first few laps out here are tough.”   

DOES THE ALL-STAR RACE HAVE A LEVEL OF INTENSITY YOU CAN FEEL AS A DRIVER?  “Yeah, it’s really fun because it’s all about the win.  It’s about winning a million dollars and getting the trophy.  It’s a neat race.  It feels like we should have more of those type of races because it is different and it truly is all or nothing.  If you’re running around there in eighth place or whatever, it doesn’t matter.  It’s about winning.  I have not been fortunate enough to run that well at that race.  It seems like we’re always really bad there.  We were watching some coverage from last year’s race before I came over here and we talked about it a little bit and they think we’re gonna be better this year, but it’s fun.  That would be an unreal race to win.  That would be cool.”   

HOW AND WHEN DID YOU FIND OUT WHAT WAS ACCEPTABLE TO SAY ON THE RADIO TO YOUR CREW?  “I think everybody is different and everybody expresses their frustration in different ways.  In the heat of the moment, at least for me, it’s easy to say things that you sometimes go, ‘Man, I shouldn’t have said that,’ but I think that’s just part of the sport and I don’t know if that will ever change.  I think at the end of the day caring enough to be upset about something is part of competition.”   

DO CREW GUYS UNDERSTAND THAT FRUSTRATION?  “I think we all do it differently.  Just like all of us do there are people that deal with things in different ways, so I don’t think it’s the same scale for every person.  I know just within my team there are guys that can say certain things to me and we can interact in a certain way that I couldn’t interact with another guy, so you just have to kind of measure that stuff based on who you’re dealing with.”   

HOW DO YOU EXPECT THE LAST 5-10 RACES TO GO WITH DRIVERS OUTSIDE THE CHASE TRYING TO GET A WIN AND GRAB A WILD CARD SPOT?  “That’s gonna be really interesting.  I think that’s something we haven’t talked a lot about, but there will obviously be guys that aren’t gonna make it in the top 10 – there might be some wild pit strategies and really, really hard racing to get a win.  It just depends on how it stacks up and what it looks like is gonna be needed.  If there are eight guys or something that are all on equal ground, but if they got a win they would be in the chase, you’re gonna see some really hardcore racing out of those guys.  I hope I’m in and I hope I don’t have to be one of those guys, but I think the fans are gonna benefit by that.” 

DID THE RAIN CREATE ANY ISSUES AS FAR AS GETTING A READ ON THINGS?  “We’re gonna look good or not here based on whether or not it stops raining because Bob and the guys forecasted right when it was gonna rain.  We got some race trim in, we got qualifying practice in, and if it continues to rain, then we might have messed up because we should have spent more time in race trim, but if we do get qualifying in, then I think we did the right thing.   It’s really difficult to decide what to do because it’s not just about whether it rains, it’s how quick does it dry off, are we gonna get more race practice.  It’s a tough call.  I’m hoping that we get qualifying in, just so we can make use of all that practice we had.”    

DO YOU THINK YOU HAVE A BETTER APPRECIATION OF WHAT YOUR CREW GUYS DO SINCE YOU USED TO WORK ON CARS, COMPARED TO GUYS WHO HAVE NEVER DONE THAT AND JUST DRIVE?  “I can tell you honestly that it’s difficult sometimes to remember how much work goes into these cars because we show up, we get in the race car, we race them really hard and if you run into something, I don’t have to fix that.  So sometimes it’s easy to forget how much work goes into these things.  I’d say it could go either way.  I know when I first came in, I probably was a little timid sometimes on the race track because I didn’t want to tear things up and I didn’t want to be too hard on the car.  I was so used to thinking, ‘OK, don’t wear out the engine.  It has to last all year.  Don’t miss a shift.  Don’t be hard on the tires’ because I didn’t want to buy new tires.  I think it took a little while to where I could get the most out of the car, but I guess  it could go the other way too and you could abuse the equipment a little bit because you don’t understand what goes into it.  I don’t know if that’s really a factor in how fast a guys is. I think it could go either way.  I don’t think the guys want you to be too easy on it, in a way.  I really respect what goes into these race cars.  The thing that’s hard to remember sometimes is that every single person is giving everything they’ve got.  Everybody is doing their best job, so when things aren’t going well it’s so frustrating because you think, ‘Why can’t they make this car any faster?’  But everybody is doing the best they can.  I think on our team we did a really good job of staying conscious of that through those 70 races we went without a win.  We were right on the verge of people starting to point fingers at each other and we didn’t do it and that was pretty cool.  I was really proud of everybody.  I never heard a cross work about me driving and I did my best not to blame anyone.  We just kept working and I think that’s really important.”    

WHEN WAS YOUR SON BORN?  “He was born on Wednesday afternoon.  He was eight pounds, six ounces.  They’re doing really well.  She’s a great mom and I hope she enjoys this Mother’s Day.”

NASCAR SPRINT CUP SERIES

SHOWTIME SOUTHERN 500

DARLINGTON RACEWAY

TEAM CHEVY DRIVER PRESS CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPT

MAY 6, 2011

CLINT BOWYER, NO. 33 BB&T CHEVROLET, met with members of the media at Darlington Raceway and discussed racing at Darlington, the All Star race, testing and other topics. Full transcript:

YOU DIDN’T GET MUCH PRACTICE BEFORE THE RAIN STARTED: “We unloaded pretty good with the BB&T Chevrolet. I’m telling you, anytime you come here and unload good, that is a breath of fresh air right off the bat. This isn’t one of my best race tracks. But, nonetheless, we have to be able to overcome it and a good race car goes a long way towards that. Pretty excited about the weekend. Like I said, started off good and hopefully we can keep it that way.”

IF THE RAIN PERSISTS, WHAT IS THE RACE GOING TO LIKE? WILL BE IT AFFECTED BY SUCH LIMITED PRACTICE? “I think everybody got enough practice. We all know enough about our programs that we’ll be fine. I’m not really worried about it. We didn’t get a whole lot of practice. We actually unloaded good and switched over to a completely different package and it wasn’t as good. Then, we had to really backup and punt and we only got one lap back on the track with the old way but it was still a pretty good lap. I’m not really worried about it. Kurt (Busch, crashed during practice) had a problem there and it might be tough on him. But it is the same for everybody and everybody will be able to overcome it and everybody’s gone down this path. Benn on these bigger race tracks. It is a little bumpy off of two. Everybody’s pulling their control and things like that; kind of threw us for a loop right off the bat but we were able to put some packer in it and it was fine.”

CAN YOU FEEL THE EXCITEMENT BUILDING ABOUT THE ALL STAR EVENT? “Oh, absolutely. I mean, we live right there too. You do feel the excitement in the air. It just builds over the course of about a month’s time. A lot of hype goes into that and it’s for a million bucks you know. Everybody wants to win that race. Obviously it is a big race for our sport, but that is a huge payday.”

NINE RACES INTO THE SEASON WITH THE NEW POINTS SYSTEM AND YOU HAVE MADE SOME BIG GAINS, ANYTHING STAND OUT FOR YOU ABOUT THE SYSTEM? “You really do feel like it is about the same thing it has always been. When you look down and you look at it, you are like ‘Man, I’m only four points ahead of that guy’; or something crazy like that and you aren’t used to seeing that. It still pretty much takes the same things to be good. We’ve made a lot of ground up. We came from 24th to seventh, but we’ve ran strong. We have had five good runs in a row and that’s very difficult to do as competitive as this sport is right now; as even as everything is, it is very very tough to be able to string together a bunch of good runs. I know how fortunate we’ve been and hopefully we can continue to ride that wave.”

WITH THE NEW CHASE FORMAT, HOW DO YOU EXPECT THE LAST FIVE, 10 RACES TO GO HEADING INTO THE CHASE AS SOME DRIVERS OUTSIDE THE TOP-10 ARE GOING TO BE LOOKING FOR WINS? “I’m not a big fan of that. I don’t want to be negative about anything but I just feel like if I was running a Chase format and had 12 teams to run for a championship; I’d want my 12 best teams over the course of a year to be able to compete for that. I just don’t see how a guy running 19th in points and if he were to win on a rain-delayed race or a fuel mileage race or something like that, how he would stack up against the competition in a 10-race Chase for the Championship.”

HOW DO YOU RACE JUAN PABLO MONTOYA? “You know, I race people the way they race me. It doesn’t matter who it is, you know. I have a lot of respect for everybody. Juan has always raced me well and I give the same respect back to him. If somebody is racing you hard, you race them back hard. Like I said, that’s the way it goes. It seems like the rule of thumb the way I learned and that is the way I do things.”

HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT TESTING? GOODYEAR SEEMS TO BE DOING MORE TESTING AS THE TIRES HAVE BEEN A LITTLE BIT FINICKY? WOULD YOU STILL LIKE TO HAVE A BAN? “Two or three years ago, I would have said absolutely, we need to test. We have to test. Man, I’m telling you, the more I have learned. The more I’ve become confident in my guys, in my engineers and the guys that bring the setups to the race track, we don’t need to do any more. Things are good. We’re running well as it is and we haven’t tested all year. Really, the only way you are going to test is if Goodyear invites you to test. We just haven’t been invited yet. Some of my teammates have. We’ve been able to look at what they have learned at the tire tests and things like that and put it to good use. I feel like that through simulation; through the engineering side of our sport has come so far that can get you pretty close and get you a good baseline setup before you even get there and don’t need to be on the race track.”

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.

NASCAR SPRINT CUP SERIES

SHOWTIME SOUTHERN 500

DARLINGTON RACEWAY

TEAM CHEVY DRIVER PRESS CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPT

MAY 6, 2011

KEVIN HARVICK, NO. 29 BUDWEISER CHEVROLET, met with members of the media at Darlington Raceway and discussed taking more chances in races, what it takes to be successful at Dover, how RCR is running as a whole and more. Full transcript.

ON DARLINGTON. “It’s a fun race track and we’ve had okay results here. We’ve got a couple of different things we want to try this weekend and hopefully it will all work out.”

WITH WHERE YOU ARE IN THE POINTS AND TWO WINS, CAN YOU TAKE MORE CHANCES AND DO THINGS A LITTLE BIT DIFFERENT? “Well I think all that started last week at Richmond just trying to know where we need to be and depending upon where we are at in September. Dover and Charlotte you’ve got to know where you need to be to get back in the Chase. It’s an important week for us to put the notebooks where they need to be and have a good understanding of the things that we need to do.”

NOW THAT THE RCR CARS SEEM LIKE THEY’VE BEEN CATCHING UP, DOES THAT CHANGE THE ATTITUDE AROUND THE SHOP? “I think the best thing that happened is that Paul came out of the box and ran really well. Our cars, it hasn’t had the consistency that I would like to see it have but it’s been fast for many weeks and we’ve been able to knock off a couple of wins so that makes a big difference. It’s nice that the No. 33 car is turned around. The No. 31 car just has to get a little bit of luck. But yeah it definitely helps when everybody is running good because you have more to lean on as a driver and as a team when you have more available notes.”

DO YOU FEEL LIKE YOU ARE A LITTLE MORE RELAXED NOW AT THIS POINT WITH THOSE TWO WINS THAN A FEW YEARS AGO? “I just feel like we have difference conversations in our competition meetings about different things. It’s not just about worrying about top-fives its worrying about how you are going to win races and then its worrying about how you can better yourself to be in position to try to get the performance that you need to try to win a championship. It’s been an interesting month I guess you can say.”

WHAT DOES IT TAKE TO BE SUCCESSFUL AT DOVER? “Dover is just one of those places as a driver feels really fast. With this style of car it seems like the forward drive up off the corner is probably the most important thing but you still have to make your car turn in the center of the corner so as a driver the car has to be comfortable to be really aggressive.”

DO YOU HAVE TO APPROACH YOUR DRIVING THERE DIFFERENTLY BECAUSE OF THE CONCRETE? “Not necessarily because of the concrete but the style of the track.”

WHEN THERE’S SOMETHING GOING ON THE TRACK LIKE THERE WAS LAST WEEK WITH THE NO. 42 AND THE NO. 39, CAN YOU SEE THAT AS A DRIVER AND SAY MAYBE I BETTER STAY AWAY FROM THOSE GUYS? “Usually if there is a situation you are around and you see it you need to be on your toes or something is going to happen. I wasn’t around that situation so I really didn’t know what was happening. They were just kind of giving me play by play on the radio.”

IS THAT KIND OF A FUN POSITION TO BE IN WHEN YOU ARE HEARING ABOUT A COUPLE OF OTHER GUYS DOING IT AND YOU JUST PAYING ATTENTION TO YOUR BUSINESS? “It’s always fun. That’s why the fans come, we’re no different we like to watch it too.”

NEXT WEEK WE KNOW YOU’RE DRIVING THE TRUCK RACE, WHAT ABOUT THE GOLF TOURNAMENT? “I’m sure everybody else will have the same thoughts on this. I was actually not going to run the Truck race then decided not to run it at the last minute because we already had all the plans for the golf tournament. Hopefully they can raise a lot of money and have a lot of fun, that’s really what it’s all about.”

SO YOU’RE NOT RUNNING THE TRUCK RACE JUST TO GET OUT OF THE TOURNAMENT? “No, not really.”

BEING MOTHER’S DAY WEEKEND WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE MEMORY YOU HAVE OF YOUR MOM? “Well I think my mom has a lot of responsibility about me just being here to be honest with you because I was kind of at a cross roads in my racing career and in my life, whether I should go and try to finish college or take a chance on my racing career and she was the one who said you need to go take your chance on your racing career and see how it works out because if it doesn’t school will still be here when you get back. I guess it all worked out okay.”

WHAT HAVE YOU BEEN GRILLING THE LAST COUPLE OF NIGHTS? “We grilled steaks one night. Been trying to eat better so eating at home is a lot better for us. Lots of fish, chicken, steak, whatever?”

ARE YOU THE GRILL MASTER? “The Foreman. (laughing).”

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.

NASCAR SPRINT CUP SERIES

SHOWTIME SOUTHERN 500

DARLINGTON RACEWAY

TEAM CHEVY DRIVER PRESS CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPT

MAY 6, 2011

DALE EARNHARDT, JR., NO. 88 AMP ENERGY SUGAR FREE/NATIONAL GUARD CHEVROLET, met with members of the media at Darlington Raceway and discussed racing at Darlington, his finish at Richmond, his Mom and Grandmother and other topics. Full transcript:

CAN YOU TALK ABOUT THE DECISION TO PIT SO LATE IN THE RACE AT RICHMOND? “Well, we should have pitted with Carl (Edwards) and decided to stay out. We thought, I guess, we’d get a caution before the end of the race but we didn’t and we didn’t have enough gas to make it to the end. So, we had to come down the pit to get gas. We waited awhile to do that which cost us a little more track position. (Jeff) Burton was in the same situation. He pitted a little bit earlier than us and he finished 15th or so. But still, it’s just a missed opportunity and we looked at it and realized what we could have done and hopefully we’ll make a better call or the right call the next time. You don’t always make the right call, but hopefully, from here on out, we make mostly all the right calls.”

A COUPLE OF DRIVERS GOT VERY VERY UPSET ON THE RADIO LAST WEEKEND AND THERE HAS BEEN A LOT OF TALK ABOUT IT, DO YOU LIKE THAT YOUR RADIO TRANSMISSIONS ARE AIRED EVERYWHERE EVERY WEEKEND? “It ain’t whether I like it or not. That’s the way it is and you’ve got to keep it nice. That’s the way it is when you are upset. We don’t always do that. But, it’s just the way it is whether you like it or not.”

WHAT WAS YOUR FRUSTRATION LEVEL AFTER LAST WEEK? “It was high. We didn’t finish where we should have. It was really really high. I think that is where it should have been. I think I should have been frustrated. I know Steve (Letarte, crew chief) was frustrated and the guys were disappointed. It is just the way you are going to feel when you don’t maximize your potential and you don’t do as well as you can. We shoulda done better; we had an opportunity there; a pretty good opportunity really to do better and we didn’t”

DO YOU PERSONALLY EXPECT TO DO WELL HERE AT DARLINGTON AND IF SO, WHY? “No, not really. This place is pretty intimidating and you don’t ever take it for granted that you’re going to run well. I don’t know what my…I don’t even really know what my track record is here. I know I’ve finished ok in a couple of races, but I don’t even know what my track records stands at so we’ll just have to see. Steve said they were good last year, real good; so I am looking forward to getting in the car and practicing.”

DO YOU THINK YOUR GOOD START TO THE SEASON AND THE MOMENTUM YOU HAVE IS A GOOD OMEN COMING INTO DARLINGTON? “I’m just looking forward to getting into the car and getting some practice in and see where we stand. My confidence is up just because we’ve ran good this year. Lookin’ forward to the rest of the year. Just have to take it one race at time and see if we can follow up.”

DO YOU FEEL MORE PRESSURE THIS WEEK TO REBOUND? “Yes, potentially, yea it does. But, as soon as we got done with the race at Richmond, I was anxious to get to the race track and do something good just to get that out of our system. It was hard to get over what happened last week, it bothered me all week long and just couldn’t wait to get to the race track to do something good to turn it around and feel like we get back on the track we were on. We’re on such a good track there throughout the first part of the year here and that kinda of a deal there just really gets to you. You just want to get to the track and do something to get it back like it was.”

IF IT CAME DOWN AGAIN TO THE SAME SITUATION, WOULD YOU RATHER JUST TAKE THE POINTS TO KEEP UP YOUR CONSISTENT ROLL RATHER THAN GAMBLE FOR WIN ON THE FUEL MILEAGE? “It depends upon the circumstances. There was a couple of cars there that I don’t think anybody was going to out-run. We really had an opportunity to be up around the front. I mean, we’d stayed out and got track positions; stuff like that. We were out of sequence and when you come into your pit window, common sense says come in and get fuel to finish the race. But that’s what we’ll do. That’s what you should do every time and that’s what we’ll do. You can’t gamble on NASCAR throwing a caution at end of all the races like you normally see. They didn’t do it last week, so we had to…you know, you can’t get yourself out there pitting like that. I mean, that’s….we just didn’t think it would go green all the way to the end. The cautions were starting to come out. The race was starting to pick up more cautions and you expect the intensity to start picking up and the caution to be there for you at the end of the race. They just weren’t.”

DID YOU EXPRESS THAT TO STEVE? “I think he knew it already. I mean, I think he was pretty sharp on picking up what went down. We just talked it out. That was a good conversation we had. I figured we had it and settled it between us before we left the race track which I liked. That was good. We didn’t have any…I was upset how we finished. He was. He took a lot of the responsibility. But, we’re a team and we race together and I believe in his decision at the time we made it and I would do the same thing again if he told me to stay out. I might have a different opinion about it after the fact, but, we work together and we believe in each other. It shouldn’t hold us back as far as that all went down. That shouldn’t be a problem.”

WHAT ARE YOU DOING FOR YOUR MOM ON MOTHER’S DAY? “I got her some gifts last week when we were at Richmond. We’re just going to hang out together out by the pool and drink a couple beers I guess.”

CAN YOU TALK ABOUT THE STRENGTH OF YOUR GRANDMOTHER MARTHA IN THE FAMILY? “Any wife, girlfriend…this business is pretty hard on them, makes them pretty tough. You stick it out. You’ll be pretty tough by the end of it. My Ma-Maw (grandmother), she’s got a lot of knowledge about the sport and what it takes to be involved to be involved in the sport; what she went through. You just have to respect somebody like that. You have a ton of respect for somebody like that. To see and done everything she’s done; witnessed everything she has witnessed from her husband Ralph and her son, all of her sons. I’m sure they all put her through equal amounts of trouble and stress. She enjoying the fruits of all that now with all the grandkids and everybody, hopefully for many years to come.”

HOW DO YOU THINK WINS IS GOING TO INFLUENCE THINGS ON TRACK AS THE SEASON GOES ON, ESPECIALLY FOR THOSE OUT OF THE TOP-10? WILL DRIVERS BE GOING OUT THERE FOR WINS WHEN BEFORE THEY MIGHT HAVE SETTLED FOR FIFTH? “It won’t make a difference. We go out here every week and we race as hard as we can and finish as good as we can. We’ve done that for years and that is the way it will be. That’s not how we did it before; we never settled for fifth. You ran fifth because you couldn’t run fourth. You are going to start making me cuss. I almost cussed right there. Everybody thinks we are out there saying ‘Oh, this is good; I’ll take this’. That’s not what we were doing. Everybody is running as hard as they could run, man. Been doing that for years. That bugs the hell out of me when everybody thinks you go out there to run; you get out there and you get into to fifth or whatever….second or third and you take it. You ain’t going to take it man, you just got your ass beat was all it was; by four or five other guys.”

WHAT IS THE FRUSTRATION FOR YOU WHEN YOU GAMBLE ON THINGS WHEN YOU HAVE NOTHING TO LOSE WHERE AS IF YOU ARE IN THE POINTS CHASE AND YOU CAN’T AFFORD TO LOSE ANY? “Yeah. I mean, when it comes down to it now…in the last five races leading up to the Chase, you might see some questionable gambles, you know, guys staying out, taking two tires, whatever to get the points that they got to have, you know, that they got to have. I don’t think you will see those kinds of gambles until then.”

YOU REALLY DRINK BEER WITH YOUR MOM? “She’s like that. Well, she drinks wine basically but she’ll drink a beer. She’s cool, man.”

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.

Friday, May 6, 2011

Darlington Raceway Dodge Motorsports PR

SHOWTIME Southern 500

NASCAR Sprint Cup Series

http://twitter.com/teamdodge

www.media.chrysler.com

Keys for Success: SHOWTIME Southern 500

DARLINGTON, S.C. (May 6, 2011) – Each race weekend, selected Dodge Motorsports engineers, Penske Racing crew chiefs, drivers or engine specialists give their insight on the ‘Keys for Success’ for the upcoming race.  This week, the green flag drops on the SHOWTIME Southern 500 at Darlington Raceway.

Track: Darlington Raceway (Race 10 of 36 in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series)

Race: SHOWTIME Southern 500 (367 laps/501.322 miles)

Trivia Question: Harold Brasington set out in the fall of 1949 to construct a 1.25-mile speedway on 70 acres of land purchased from Sherman Ramsey that had once produced peanuts and cotton.  His plans called for a true oval, but what emerged was a distinctive egg-shaped design.  Why? (Answer Below)

HOWARD COMSTOCK (Dodge Motorsports Engineering)

Two or Four:  “It might be a whole new tire game this weekend.  Last year, we saw that two-tire stops were the right call, especially late in the race.  I think it’s going to be two days of looking at tire wear and gauging how much (tire) fall-off there is and how long the left-sides will go.  You can always change two tires on a fuel stop with the new fueling system, but it may be unnecessary to put four on, especially late in the race.”

Old vs. New: “The “new” Darlington is not exactly like the “old” Darlington.  Yes, it’s still tough.  Yes, the corners are still similar.  Yes, you still have to understand the track and you have to race the track.  But, we’ve proven over the last two years that with the new track, surface you have to race the other competitors as well.  Pit strategy is important.  When you pit for tires versus the competitors is important.  While this track surface still has a lot of grip, you’re going to have to race the competitors as much as you race the track.  It’s not so much just racing ‘The Lady in Black’ as it use to be.”

Answer to trivia question: The egg-shaped design was necessary because Harold Brasington, a retired racer, promised Sherman Ramsey the track wouldn’t disturb his minnow pond on the west side of the property.

10

NASCAR SPRINT CUP SERIES

SHOWTIME SOUTHERN 500

DARLINGTON RACEWAY

TEAM CHEVY DRIVER PRESS CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPT

MAY 6, 2011

JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 LOWE’S/KOBALT TOOLS CHEVROLET met with media and discussed last week’s frustrating race at RIR, the upcoming Dover race and the All-Star race at Charlotte, tempers on the race track, and more. Full Transcript:

KERRY THARP: Next up is our five-time NASCAR Sprint Cup Series champion, Jimmie Johnson. He’s got two wins here at Darlington. Average finish is 9.3.

Jimmie, talk about racing here at Darlington. You have that one win under your belt. You’ve moved up obviously in the points, up to second. Been up there a couple weeks. Talk about racing here at Darlington.

JIMMIE JOHNSON: I think every driver, veteran or rookie, coming in is really excited to come to this racetrack and compete. With only running here once a year, I think there’s more of a focus on trying to take a trophy out of here. It means so much to our series, to the drivers, competitors, the history of our sport, that we’re all very excited to come here and compete.

Things change a lot. This track, I’m eager to get onto it. There’s been so much grip since they repaved it. There’s been a tire test. Heard some mixed report. We’re not sure what to expect until we get out there. One of my favorite tracks, along with a handful of other drivers, I’d say a lot of other drivers. We’ll just get out there and let it rip here in practice today.

KERRY THARP: We’ll take questions for Jimmie Johnson.

Q. I wanted to ask you about last week. You were pretty miserable for a long stretch of that race; still were able to salvage it. How difficult is it to stay focused like that? Last week there were a few certain drivers who couldn’t do that and they became unraveled and so went their day. How were you able to do that, pull that out?

JIMMIE JOHNSON: Man, I was coming unraveled. I guess we’re all wired differently and have higher thresholds. My fun meter was pegged. It was not a good night.

We never lost our heads completely, and that’s what led to the good finish. So proud of that. Just not a night we expected to have, especially leaving Happy Hour strong as we were. Then to start the race, we go in the wrong direction was frustrating.

I’ve always had that ability to keep my cool longer than others. But I still snap. I started to in the car late in the race.

Q. You’ve won here a couple times. Last year you probably had as miserable a night as you had all year, wrecking two or three times. Does that speak to the nature of this place, how it can be so Jekyll and Hyde? Every night is different at this place.

JIMMIE JOHNSON: Yeah, it is. The speeds we run around here, it’s really mind-boggling. There’s some tracks we go to where you don’t feel you’re running 210, like at Michigan or California, going into a corner, there’s so much room, it’s so wide. But at this track, the sensation of speed is probably the highest of anywhere we go. If you look at the average lap time, I think Greg Biffle at a tire test was like 206 into turn three which is crazy to think of at a mile-and-a-third track.

That leads to my point, which the speeds are high, narrow, narrow racetrack. And last year there were a few things that went on around me, guys crashing. I slid into the 56 down here in three and four. A lot of other things went on. I think there was a wreck in the front of us. I got into the back of the 14. I didn’t get stopped in time. A.J. had his brake issue going down the back straightaway. I never saw him. It was like a missile coming out of the infield that hit me.

So, yes, it was a miserable night. I think we would have been decent. We ran well up until then. It’s always been this track, too. When things start working against you, or the lady starts working against you, it’s over.

Q. Jimmie, you follow other sports as well as racing. In your mind, other than the million dollars to win first prize, what differentiates the All-Star event in NASCAR races from All-Star events in other sports?

JIMMIE JOHNSON: I’d have to say the mindset of our All-Star event is a lot different than others when you look at the Pro Bowl, you look at the baseball All-Star Game, basketball’s All-Star stuff.

No one in our sport is really concerned about saving something or getting hurt, playing at 80%, whatever it may be. You hear that stuff all the time. You watch the Pro Bowl. The guys aren’t hitting like they normally do. Our series, the hits are actually probably worse, harder, stronger. The intensity and commitment for our All-Star event seems to be a lot higher than others. So that mindset is the difference to me.

Not to take anything away from those athletes. I should then say we’re surrounded by a steel cage so it’s easier for us to dish some stuff out and take some hits.

Q. Looking ahead from one tough oval to another, next week Dover, you had a lot of success there. Can you talk about the track? Been described as a rollercoaster that’s also self-cleaning.

JIMMIE JOHNSON: Yeah, it’s a fun racetrack. I think it’s a track that really suits my style, and the stats show that. There’s a certain rhythm there. You have to be comfortable with typically the racecar at least into the corner, then you have to figure out somehow to make it turn the center, fight forward grip up off the corner to run a good lap there.

The rubber, I understand we’re going back to the same tire as we had there in the fall. That tire laid a lot of rubber down and caused a lot of handling issues for teams. We did a good job of working around that. So I’m excited going back. I think it will be a strong race for the Lowe’s team.

Q. You and Chad have won five championships together. You obviously work well. You don’t always see eye-to-eye. On a week like last week when you were starting to have a meltdown in the car, he kind of pushes your buttons sometimes. How much does it help you come back from the brink when he does that?

JIMMIE JOHNSON: Yeah, it just depends. That environment, we forget that everyone is scanning and listening sometimes, act like idiots, grade school kids at times. So it’s always embarrassing, especially walking in the bus, to see my wife post-race. Then friends at times will mention stuff. Then come back to the media center to be reminded about stuff I forget about or wasn’t informed of. It’s tough. That is the cool think about our sport. Everyone can listen and hear what’s taking place, what’s going on.

You know, a driver/crew chief relationship is one that is unique. It’s a lot like a marriage in some ways, which we’ve all joked about and talked about. You know how to push your wife’s buttons. We all know how to push our spouse’s buttons. So when it comes time in a race, in a driver/crew chief relationship, you can do the same. Then there’s also buttons you can push to whip someone into shape. All of that takes place.

Chad and I have done a good job over the years of not having complete meltdowns. We certainly have our moments. We get right to the edge and then realize, Hey, this isn’t good for the team, we’re going to give up a good finish, we shouldn’t do any more damage than we’ve already done, let’s get our heads on straight and go from there.

Q. Jimmie, you’re good buddies with Brian Vickers. This is the last race he ran last year before he had his medical issues. Just talk about the year, what he’s been through. That kind of wake up everybody in the sport? You can be doing anything and all of a sudden having something like that happen.

JIMMIE JOHNSON: I know it did me being around Brian, looking at someone that was, to the eye, certainly young but healthy and in shape, having those issues. It was spooky for a while. In the beginning, there was some hope and we’ll find out what the problem is, why the clots are taking place. There was a dark period where they didn’t know why. All the tests came back negative from a hereditary standpoint, all these other issues. That’s when it really hit him, which would have been probably midway through his year off or three-quarters through his year off. Didn’t really have a solution.

That’s when I really saw Brian looking hard in the mirror, trying to figure out what he was going to do. All of us drivers, racing is us. That’s what we’re defined by, what we’ve always done. Then Brian is sitting there at a point wondering if he’s going to be on thinners the rest of his life and if he’s going to go back to the sport that defined him as a man.

I know he went through some really tough times. Glad to see him back. He’s shown some great runs this here. Hopefully those guys can get some luck going their year and get some good finishes.

Q. Last weekend wasn’t the first time you made chicken salad. You’ve had bad nights. Charlotte last year you spun in the opening laps, finished second or third. Atlanta race a couple years where you finished second at the very end. You guys have the ability to work through really serious and bad problems, and other teams don’t. How come you guys can do it? Is it you? Is it Chad? The combination of being together? Is that the defining competitive advantage you guys have that you can work through this where maybe other teams can’t?

JIMMIE JOHNSON: Yeah, I mean, we didn’t really know this about ourselves. If that race was a hundred laps shorter, we were right in the middle of our meltdown and wouldn’t have had time to rally back. We’ve always found that longer races suit us, just work better for our team from an opportunity to win a race or even from an opportunity to take a 30th-place car to the top 10. It’s within us somewhere. It’s kind of in our makeup, in our DNA.

I feel that you don’t see me in a lot of issues on track, and it’s so easy to get caught up in that stuff when you’re angry and mad. A lot of times you watch guys take care of themselves. They’re frustrated, mad, start running into another one. That energy just breeds more of it. Before you know it, you turn around, cars wreck. There’s that part inside the car.

If you give Chad long enough on pit road making adjustments, he’ll find out what it needs, so it’s a combination of those two.

Q. The one thing I’ve noticed most about you is the sheer self-control. You seem to have more self-control when stuff like that happens than 99% of the people out there, including your crew chief. Has this been a characteristic of yours or have you had to work at maintaining that kind of composure when it starts to hit the fan?

JIMMIE JOHNSON: I think it’s a characteristic. I mean, I felt like I was completely out of control last weekend. Maybe I wasn’t in comparison to other drivers and the way they act. But as I said earlier, my fun meter was pegged. I was so mad inside the car that anything would send me into a tailspin.

I’m happy to hear that; that I am in control.

Q. Do you have to work at it?

JIMMIE JOHNSON: No, it’s just always been there. To me there’s something going out starting off racing bikes, then into off-road, on and on. When you act like a fool on the track, there has always been something when you come off the track that hits me and I feel guilty about acting that way. I can remember some instances early when I was a kid racing dirt bikes. There’s one kid that I was racing for the local track championship. He fell in the corner in front of me. I followed him into the berm and I went down. So now as I’m going to pick up my bike, he’s shoving me so I can’t get to my bike so he can get to his bike.

We end up in the wrestling match out there. We’re like 11, 12 years old. We end up in this wrestling match out there. We both get on our bikes. I get up before him. I shove him down. Got off the track. When he got off the track, I launched my bike over towards the pit area and knocked him off his bike.

At that moment, when I turned around and saw my parents, my dad’s shocked face and my mom’s shocked face that I acted that way, I think there’s something from that moment that kind of stuck with me.

In most cases, I feel bad or guilty after acting like that. It’s been that way through school and racing and all kinds of other things.

But there’s just something in that moment when I was 10, 11 years old, I realized I didn’t like how I felt after that. I was kind of embarrassed of it.

Q. I didn’t know you were a hooligan when you were little.

JIMMIE JOHNSON: We’re all brats sometimes.

Q. Should we expect more of acting the fool tomorrow night? Is it that part of the season when tempers snap?

JIMMIE JOHNSON: It is. And this track is going to breed that. As narrow as it is, track position being so important. If you look at tracks where it’s tough to pass, I think you can set up some sort of temper scale, and it will parallel it. Michigan, tons of room, easy to get by people, it’s not a problem. Here, Richmond, other tracks where it’s really tough to pass, that’s when tempers fly

KERRY THARP: Jimmie, thanks a lot. Good luck this weekend.

FastScripts by ASAP Sports

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.