Food City 250 - Travis Geisler Notes

Travis Geisler Notes, Quotes: Food City 250
Rare in NASCAR racing – driver works on car

This weekend Travis Geisler and the #36 DCT Motorsports Chevrolet team head to the high-banked, .533-mile Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway for Friday night’s Bristol 200 NASCAR Busch Series race.

DCT Motorsports’ owners John McGill and Carl Natale are the first full-time owners from Cleveland, Ohio, NASCAR’s top three divisions have ever seen. Still, their marketing and business savvy is a breath of fresh air that has captured the imagination of the sport’s business minds. McGill and Natale have developed the sport’s most cost-efficient, sponsor-friendly marketing setup. It is based on giving full value to sponsors, and utilizing the many business-to-business contacts McGill, a developer, and Natale, a major earthwork contractor, have in place.

DCT Motorsports is seeking sponsorship for next year and the remainder of this season, is in the midst of a 25-race schedule for 2004, hitting all of the major NASCAR Busch Series events and markets. One of the most comprehensive sponsorship packages in any form of motorsports, DCT offers a complete package of top racing equipment, hospitality, public relations, publicity, appearances and show cars.

The thoughts of #36 DCT Motorsports Chevrolet driver Travis Geisler heading into Bristol:

“Even though there is more beating and banging at Bristol than you might see at some other tracks, I don’t think that alone necessarily puts any added pressure on the driver. You are still doing the same thing – going out, running as hard as you can, doing whatever you can do to work to the front and leaving with the best finish.

“Even under my circumstances, there is no added pressure. Being one of the few drivers in the Busch Series who works daily in the race shop as part of the crew, anything I tear up, I have to help fix. It’s not like I can walk away after the race Friday night and hide for a week. I have to face the guys – and that race car – when we get back to the shop.

“That doesn’t affect my aggressiveness at all but it does affect my thought process. It’s a healthy thing, though, because it still boils down to bringing the race car home at the end of the race. Unless you pass under that checkered flag, you haven’t had the best possible finish. Part of racing success – a major part of racing success – is running all night long. You see guys in all forms of racing jump out to the front early, lead a few laps and then go home on a hook because they were too aggressive. I’d much rather run the David Pearson or Darrell Waltrip style – hang in there, take care of your equipment and have something to throw at them at the end of the race.

“Working on the car on a daily basis helps a lot with that. It’s a lot easier to communicate with Ricky (Pearson, crew chief) and the rest of the crew when I’ve been underneath the car and seen what is going on, and helped get it to where we want it to be. As a driver, I want the best possible understanding of what makes the car do what it does. When I do that, it makes me a better driver. And that is my goal – to be the best driver I can possibly be.

“Guys like Dale Earnhardt and Mark Martin and Rusty Wallace are incredibly talented drivers, sure. But I feel a lot of their success came from working on their own cars – even at the Cup level – and knowing the race car inside and out.

“Communication is a major part of running well. The driver has to communicate to the crew what the car is doing, and the crew has to be able to take that information and apply it. Anything that increases the back-and-forth understanding is a definite plus.

“As much as I have learned already in a short time in the Busch Series, I cannot imagine trying this any other way. How could you possibly be as good as you can be without having all the tools? And having teachers like Ricky Pearson just add to that.

“We’ve grown as a race team, and we’re moving forward. A lot of the interest we have seen from potential sponsors for next year has come from that improvement, as well as looking at what we are doing to get better each week. An improving race team on top of a really efficient and well-thought marketing program like John (McGill) and Carl (Natale) are offering should help us as we move into the 2005 season.

“This DCT Motorsports program is heading in the right direction and a lot of good things are happening. We’re all going to keep working hard – and doing everything we can do – to keep that success.”