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Autolite Platinum 250 - Elton Sawyer Notes Elton Sawyer Notes, Quotes: Richmond 200 ‘We’re not out of this thing yet’ One of the hottest teams in NASCAR Busch Grand National race since the Spring, Elton Sawyer and the #98 Starter/Hot Tamales Taurus team head to the tough .750-mile Richmond (Va.) International Raceway this week for Friday night’s Richmond 200. Sawyer and the MK Racing team head into Richmond coming off a very strong second-place finish at Darlington, S.C., one of the toughest speedways in motorsports. Now fifth 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 11 top-11 finishes in the last 13 races. While running strong this season, the team is also beginning to look towards next year, and a probable run for the national championship. The team is also speaking with several corporations regarding a potential co-primary sponsorship for next season as well. Racing observers consider the team one of the most cost-efficient sponsorships in Busch Grand National racing. 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 125 and in career top-five finishes with 50. Making his 381st career start this week, he leads all active NASCAR Busch Grand National drivers. The thoughts of Starter/Hot Tamales Taurus driver Elton Sawyer heading into Richmond: "We’re thinking about winning races and we’re thinking about the points standings. If we do the winning races part, then we don’t have to worry about the points thing. "You look at it and you think, ‘Hey, those guys are way behind, why don’t they just keep looking over their shoulder and be happy to finish fifth?’ If you think like that, you’re right that we still have a way to go from fifth to fourth (fourth place Jeff Green leads fifth-place Sawyer by 325 points, 3452-3127). But we have a legitimate shot at getting there too. "Eight races to go and we’re coming off a second-place finish at Darlington, where we picked up 32 points on the fourth-place guy . . . 52 points on the third-place guy (Greg Biffle) . . . and 20 points on the second-place guy (Jason Keller). If we can keep going like that in the last eight races, you know what? We finish third in the points. If we can keep going like that in the last eight races and the second-place guy has a problem or two, maybe we finish the year in second place. Not bad for a team that was 17th in the points and nobody had on their radar screen the last time we were at Richmond. "The only spot I might give you is the top spot. We’d have to pick up 90 points a race the rest of the year, and that would be pretty tough. Still, until we’re absolutely and totally mathematically eliminated from it, we’re going to run as hard as we can. If nothing else, I don’t want the guys on that car leading the points sleeping real well until the season ends. "We can’t afford mistakes and we can’t afford problems. We can’t afford bad luck. Everything is important to us. Whether we can control it or not, things can affect us. Where we’ve been smart is we’ve worked as hard as we can work on the things we can control and haven’t worried too much about the things we can’t. "Now, all of that said, Richmond hasn’t always been a great track for us in the past. I always like going there. I love the race track but we haven’t always had a great deal of success there. "The Spring race there we qualified sixth, felt like we had a really good race car and were running very competitively until we lost an engine 60 laps into it. We have the same car we’re taking back there. We’ve massaged a little on the chassis and think we have something pretty good. The Cosworth people have worked really hard on the engines for us, horsepower and reliability, and we think we can make a run for it. "We’re thinking about what we can do the rest of this season and, obviously, we want to win some races and we want to finish as high in the points standings as we can. But we’re doing a lot to prepare for next season too. "As far as we’ve come this year, especially since the Richmond race in May, we feel like we’re putting ourselves in a position to make a real run for the championship next year. This is a team that could win it all next year, and we are putting ourselves in a position to do just that. We want to win races and we want to win championships. "Our immediate goal is to make a run for fourth in the standings. If we do that, well, he is pretty close to third (Biffle leads Green by just 19 points) and that’s not that far from second (Keller leads Biffle by 62 points). We’re not going to give up on any of those until we sit down with a calculator and see that it is impossible. "Our long-term goal is to get into a position for a championship run in 2002. We think we’re close to being right there, and the last eight races of this season will put us right there. "For Starter and Hot Tamales, we have some pretty big plans."
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