UAW-DaimlerChrysler 400 - Rookie Saturday Quotes

RAYBESTOS® ROOKIE CONTENDER CREW CHIEF FEATURE FOR THE UAW-DAIMLERCHRYSLER 400 NASCAR NEXTEL CUP SERIES RACE AT LAS VEGAS MOTOR SPEEDWAY, MARCH 12, 2005.

SHANE WILSON, CREW CHIEF, No. 77 MOBIL 1/KODAK/JASPER ENGINES AND TRANSMISSIONS DODGE: “We didn’t have a very good test here but we left here with some direction and worked hard. The fab shop helped us out and we worked on our setup stuff. We learned a lot in Fontana. Coming here Monday and Tuesday [at the test session in January] and not running well we really worked extra hard in Fontana and got better. We went to Atlanta Monday and Tuesday before coming here and learned some stuff there that probably helped us a little bit here. The guys in the shop are adapting. We’re having to make changes and it’s a lot of work but everyone is really pumped up and working hard, just like everyone else is in the garage. We’re getting a lot of good support and everyone is pretty happy.” YOU STRUGGLED IN THE RACE AT CALIFORNIA SPEEDWAY TWO WEEKS AGO BUT YOU CAME BACK HERE AND QUALIFIED IN THE TOP-10. “We learned a lot at Fontana. We made some mistakes there and I guess we knew what our mistakes were. You’ve got to take your lumps and sometimes running bad makes you work harder and that’s what happened. We’re feeling pretty good. We’ve got to go out this morning and try to get the car to drive good and not worry about the overall times, just get it neutral and driving good and that will give us a good racecar for Sunday.” IS THE TRACK GOING TO BE SLICK ON SUNDAY? “Yeah, it’s going to be. It always does here. It’s a little less grip here than at some of the mile-and-a-halfs. It’s one of the older mile-and-a-halfs and hasn’t been repaved. It gets a little slippery here and you’ve got to try to get good grip but also get it balanced. I feel confident here. I’ve raced a lot and Brendan [Gaughan] was always good here. I feel pretty confident in what we learned here in a lot of west races and truck races so I feel pretty strong.” IS TIRE WEAR GOING TO BE A FACTOR HERE? “Oh, for sure. This tire here seems to fall off a little more than the Fontana tire did. It’s going to be interesting to see on Sunday or even in the Busch race today how slow the pace really gets. We haven’t raced this tire yet so it’s going to be interesting to see how it reacts. Really until you race a new tire you really don’t know. It’s hard to go out and do a full fuel run with traffic. It’s hard to simulate that anywhere. I think we’re all learning a lot and here, that’s why you have to be balanced because you could be in for a long day if your balance is off.” ARE WE GOING TO SEE FOUR TIRE CHANGES EVERY STOP? WILL SOME CREW CHIEFS ROLL THE DICE AND CHANGE ONLY TWO? “There’s a few people that did it at Fontana. We did it once. If you only have a few laps on your lefts, like seven or eight, you can do it. Here, they seem to fall off even more than Fontana so it will be interesting to see. I think you can do it but you can’t have many laps on those left sides.” HOW CRITICAL IS TRACK POSITION GOING TO BE IN THE RACE? “It’s not every easy to pass anywhere. You’ve got to use your stuff up. I think the trick is good fast four-tire stops. I’m probably going to try to put four on it all day, not have any mistakes in the pits, and have a good consistent run. The guys that ran good at Fontana, that’s what they did. There were a couple of guys that were just fast, no doubt about it. But the guys that finished fifth through 15th just had a good consistent day, always put on four tires and just muddled along there and had a pretty good race.” THIS TEAM IS NOW TWO YEARS OLD. HOW MUCH OF A FACTOR WAS THAT IN YOUR IMPROVEMENT FROM THE TEST TO QUALIFYING? “This race team is a lot better than it was last year, no doubt about it. We’re stronger in every area. We’re stronger at the crew chief position [smiles]. I’ve got a year of experience. We’ve done a lot of testing. Travis has better the beneficiary of that. Last year we were trying to build cars and that’s why our testing was a little more lax than it probably needed to be. Our whole deal from crew chief down, all our positions are better. We just moved into our new shop. We weren’t with the other two teams before so that’s definitely a help. We’re spending more time in a proactive manner getting our cars done, not just trying to figure out what everyone is doing.” HOW IMPORTANT IS IT TO QUALIFY WELL HERE? “It’s good. It gives you a good opening for a pit box, it increases your chances of having good pit stops all day and not getting boxed in. The pit boxes are average here, not as big as Fontana, and that gives us track position for the first part of the race. It just helps you get a good start plus it pumps everybody up. The guys at the shop see their work and then they see a result and that’s how you’ve got to do to keep everyone motivated.”

ALAN GUSTAFSON, CREW CHIEF, No. 5 KELLOGG’S CHEVROLET: YOU HAVE BEEN FAST HERE FROM THE START OF THE FIRST PRACTICE. “We’ve been good. We tested pretty well. We struggled a little more in qualifying trim here than we did in California testing so we made some adjustments and we’re pleased. We were good off the truck and got better and better and we were the best in qualifying.” THE WEATHER WAS A LOT DIFFERENT HERE AT THE TEST. HOW MUCH WERE YOUR ABLE TO APPLY IN QUALIFYING FROM THE TEST SESSION? “I’d say 80 percent. There were some things that kind of came up, some characteristics [in practice Friday] that we hadn’t seen but 80 percent were the same, just different magnitudes.” IS THE TRACK GOING TO BE SLICK HERE SUNDAY? “Yeah, it’s going to be fun on Sunday: hot and slick and greasy. That’s the way we’re supposed to race, you know. It’s not supposed to be grippy and cool. It’s supposed to be hot and greasy so I’m looking forward to it.” WITH THE SOFT TIRES AND SLICK TRACK, ARE WE GOING TO SEE A LOT OF PASSING IN THE RACE? “I think so, I think it’s going to be real good. The groove has been spreading out to two lanes here over the last couple of years. It’s been a good race. You can run the top a little bit now. It’s going to get hot and slick and I think some guys are going to push the envelope a little bit and be able to run good at the short run and some will be better on the long run. It seems like the top-five string out a little bit here but at the end of the race it gets tight. That’s what we hope happens.” DO YOU FEEL LIKE YOU HAVE TO CHANGE FOUR TIRES HERE EVERY STOP? “I’m going to say no, how about that [laughs]. I don’t think you do. It’s not going to be like a Darlington but I think if you can substantially increase your positions, I don’t know that you’re going to go from fifth to first and win the race but you might go from 10th to second and end up fourth or fifth and improve your position. I don’t know that that is going to be a race-winning move but it may be. I may could be wrong because when you get out in clean air, you can go. It’s still the same story. Even though the tires are soft, the track position is still big.” IS CLEAN AIR MORE IMPORTANT THAN THE FRESH TIRES? “Maybe. In the right situation I’d say that it would be. Obviously if you can be first with four tires that’s what you want but at some point in time if you’re running fourth all day or fifth or sixth, it’s worth a chance to win a race. I would be a little surprised, but I wouldn’t be surprised to see it happen.”