Auto Club 500 - Ken Schrader Notes

Ken Schrader Notes, Quotes: California 500

‘Our goal is to win. Why else race?’

Ken Schrader and the #49 BAM Dodge team head to the two-mile California Speedway this week for Sunday’s 500-mile race. The track, located in Fontana - just east of Los Angeles - is one of the fastest on the circuit.

The 47-year-old Schrader, a native of Fenton, Mo., is one of just a few active Winston Cup drivers to have won races near the speeds California Speedway projects. The busiest driver in major league motorsports, Schrader is looking for a "100-night" season this year, and will continue a winning Winston Cup career that has seen him win over $20 million.

BAM Racing is owned by Beth Ann and Tony Morgenthau of Coral Gables, Fla. The successful investors, who have fully funded the team for the complete 2003 season run, have built the BAM (Beth Ann Morgenthau’s initials) team from the ground up. Ms. Morgenthau is the only female in major league motorsports to start a team without becoming involved because of family connections.

General manager Eddie Jones is a veteran of the NASCAR Winston Cup wars, enjoying a championship career as a crew chief, mechanic and team leader. Crew chief Scott Eggleston is one of the few active crew chiefs in the business to have won a Daytona 500.

The thoughts of BAM Racing Dodge driver Ken Schrader heading into California:

"California is as close to a ‘complete package’ track as anything we run. You have to have a strong engine. You have to handle well in the turns. You have to have an aerodynamic package that is darned near perfect. And everybody has to be on their game all the time.

"If you are off just a tick, it will cost you in a big way at California. Losing a little in the turns or being down on horsepower just a bit doesn’t work too well there. Being perfect is pretty tough in this sport but if you are perfect one or two laps, you can pull away from people. The car that is closest to perfect - if everything else works out - will be the winner.

"That ‘luck thing’ can be pretty big in our sport, though. Good luck and bad luck play a pretty huge role in everything that goes on. There are a lot of people out there who say, ‘I don’t believe in luck.’ To be honest with you, I don’t either. I don’t think there is a game of fate out there or anything like that. But I do know that you can have a great car and have a caution come out at the wrong time, and go from a winner to a dud pretty quick. Then again, you can have a car you are fighting all day long and a caution come out at the right time for you - and wrong time for somebody else - and you can go from a dud to pretty good.

"Now, you aren’t going to ‘luck’ into a win. That just doesn’t happen. Some things might happen that help you out a lot but, if you are winning a race in NASCAR Winston Cup racing, there is no luck involved. You had to have a pretty good car to begin with.

"I’m never into taking a weekend off. I’m not that big on a taking a day off. I like to race. I love to race. I want to do it every day I can. I’m not sure it hurts us that much to take some time off, though. The guys have been working hard, and they deserve some time. We’ll run here for a couple more weeks, then they get another weekend off. Then there is that weekend in June, and then we finish up with 20 weeks in a row.

"I don’t think it hurts us from a momentum standpoint. We’re going to go to California and do everything we can to run as well as we can. We do that every week. It worked out pretty well in Martinsville, and we’re going into California with every intention of it working out pretty well there too. Our goal is the same every race - win the thing. While we were pleased with the way things turned out at Martinsville - and we’ve run pretty well at a lot of races this year - we still didn’t meet our goal. And that is going to be our goal every week. If it’s not, why would you even come out here?

"I’m just happy to get back racing. We’re ready to go."

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