Mark Martin Advance
Atlanta Motor Speedway
October 28th-30th Nextel Cup Series
Bass Pro Shops/MBNA 500 Sunday 1:00PM
Mark Martin
Team: No. 6 Viagra® Ford Taurus
Crew Chief: Pat Tryson
Chassis: RK-315 (won at Kansas)
Martin on racing at Atlanta Motor Speedway:
“After the weekend we had at Martinsville, it's going to be nice to get back to Atlanta. Atlanta is a really cool race track. It’s a big, fast race track. The pavement has gotten a little older and it has finally given up and made it a really fun place to race. From top-to-bottom, it’s one of the best places that we go to race. It usually makes for a great show and a great race. We had a good run there in the spring and we probably had the best car in last fall's race, so we are excited about get back down there and doing some good racing.
"Martinsville was just a bad weekend all around for this team, but the one thing I will say is that these guys on this Viagra Team never gave up. They hung in there and kept fighting and I'm honored to drive there race car. We are just going to have to go out and really go after the next four and see what happens.”
Crew Chief Pat Tryson on racing at Atlanta Motor Speedway:
“We had a good test at Atlanta a couple of weeks ago and the team we'll be happy to put Martinsville behind us and move on. We are taking the same car that we used to win the Kansas race two weeks ago, so hopefully we'll go in there and find similar results.”
Fast Facts
After one of the toughest weekends of the season at Martinsville, Mark Martin and the No. 6 team will look to regroup at Atlanta where Martin has posted back-to-back top-five finishes in his last two starts. Martin dominated the Atlanta race last fall, leading 227 of the 325 laps.
Martin dropped to seventh in the points’ race, four points behind sixth place and 21 points outside of fifth. With four races remaining in the "Chase" for the Nextel Cup, Martin trails first by 170 points.
Martin has started a total of 72 races at the remaining five tracks that will make up the Chase for the Nextel Cup. He has posted 4 wins, 25 top-five and 39 top-10 finishes at those tracks. Martin has a 13.5 average finish at Chase tracks and he has led a total of 1,496 laps, including 881 at Martinsville.
This will be Martin's 40th-career Cup start at Atlanta, where the veteran has posted 19 top-10 finishes, 11 top fives and two wins.
