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Food City 250 - Elton Sawyer Notes Elton Sawyer Notes, Quotes: Food City 250 Incredible come-from-behind charge continues at Bristol One of the hottest teams in NASCAR Busch Grand National race since the Spring, Elton Sawyer and the #98 Starter/University of Michigan Taurus team head to the high-banked, .533-mile Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway this week for Saturday night’s Food City 250. Now a close sixth in the national championship chase, Sawyer is third in championship points earned since the May 4 race at Richmond, Va. Not coincidentally, that was about the time partner Michael Kranefuss and General Manager Marty Gaunt began their full-time running of the race team, which had been owned by Brad Akins. The team was mired as far back as 17th before beginning its incredible run, which includes 10 top-11 finishes in the last 12 races. Sawyer, a native of Chesapeake, Va., has been the most successful mainstay of NASCAR’s Busch Grand National Series. He leads all active NASCAR Busch Grand National drivers in career top 10 finishes with 124 and in career top-five finishes with 49. Making his 380th career start this week, he leads all active NASCAR Busch Grand National drivers. The thoughts of Hot Tamales Taurus driver Elton Sawyer heading into Bristol: "This team is looking ahead right now. We’re looking ahead one race at a time, but we’re excited about the direction we’re headed. There are a lot of good things ahead for us. "Our goal as far as the points are concerned hasn’t changed since the beginning of the year - finish as high as we can. Where the highest can be has changed a little but our thinking along those lines hasn’t. But our number one goal is to win a race before the end of the year. Preferably we’d win two or three races but we want to get in the Winner’s Circle. "We’re not that far away from winning. We’ve run really consistently and pretty strong as of late, so winning a race now certainly isn’t out of the question. "As far as the points are concerned, Tony (Raines) was able to slide back past us just a little bit for fifth after Michigan, so that could end up being a dogfight before the year is out. Those guys have been running pretty well. But we’re looking at fifth and taking a look at fourth too. Mathematically, we still have a shot at fourth - that’s about the difference (Ricky) Rudd has to (Jeff) Gordon. He (Jeff Green) is going to have to have some bad luck and we have to continue to run as well or better than we have been running. But it’s a nice feeling that our goal right now is not so much to finish in the top 10 or even just to finish in the top five, but fourth place in the points. As long as we don’t have a bad race, maybe we can maintain a little bit of pressure on them. I know my guys aren’t going to give up on it as long as there is any mathematical chance of getting it. "Bristol should be a good place for us to continue that. Bristol has been a good place for us in the past. Our record may not look as impressive as some of the other places we’ve been, but we’ve run awfully well there. We’ve had some typical Bristol luck. I don’t know how many times I’ve been there in a good position with 20 laps to go and the fenders still on the car, and leave the track with just the roof. "You go there with just about the same mentality as you do at Daytona or Talladega. At those places you can have a great, fast car but get hung out in the draft and finish 15th. Bristol is a little bit the same way. Even if you’re not racing somebody for position, you’re racing somebody all night long. Whether it’s lapped cars or cars with four tires and no fenders or just cars you are racing for position, you are rarely by yourself on that race track. It’s completely different from what we faced at Michigan, where you have a fast car, a wide track and you can get away from people. "Bristol requires a whole different mindset than a Michigan. You have to work hard to get a good qualifying run and a good starting position. You have to pit on the front straightaway and only the fastest 21 cars are going to be there. You have to work hard to spend the least amount of time on pit road you car. "And track position is at a premium at Bristol. You are only running 250 laps total. If you run 40-50 caution laps there, you are only at 200 laps of green flag racing. Track position is everything. The strategy is to stay out if you can, to stay off pit road unless you have to go there. The old strategy of old tires vs. new tires is out the window. In the spring, Andy Santerre ran 168 laps on one set of tires. That says a lot. New tires just don’t give you that big of an advantage anymore. "We’re going into this weekend looking to do the best we can do with this Hot Tamales team. Our thinking is we’ve been running strong and consistent, and we might be due for something pretty big. We want to win and we want to keep digging as far as the points are concerned."
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