Pennsylvania 500 - Ford Friday Quotes

There were numerous tire issues during the first Pocono race this year, so Ford Racing asked a few of its crew chiefs and engineers if they made any changes to their setups for Sunday's event.

JIMMY FENNIG, Crew Chief - No. 97 IRWIN/Sharpie Taurus - "Goodyear brought the same tire from what we had in the first race, but what they did was they fixed the curb where everybody had issues. What we did after the first race was look at the camber on our car because of what happened with that curb and our cambers. That played a part of what happened to that tire. It wasn't Goodyear's tire, it's what we induced in the tire and what that curb induced in the tire." SO YOU'VE JUST MADE A CAMBER ADJUSTMENT? "All we're gonna do is camber adjustment because they moved the ripples up on the curb to where you can't go ahead and saw that tire off. We've also adjusted more on our cambers to get some heat from the outside edge back into the inside." HAVE THERE BEEN ANY INSTRUCTIONS FROM GOODYEAR ABOUT THIS WEEKEND? "No. I'm just gonna start where I finished off the last race. I'm gonna look at Carl's notes a little bit because he didn't have a problem and his camber was backed off, too. Goodyear feels pretty comfortable about their tire. I think the problems last time were more camber-related than what it was air-pressure-related." IS IT GOOD TO HAVE PRACTICE TODAY AS OPPOSED TO SATURDAY? "It doesn't matter. As a team, we look at it every run anyway. We have guys doing tire temperatures after every run, so we pay pretty close attention to our cambers."

TODD PARROTT, Crew Chief - No. 38 M&M's Taurus - "I'm sure Goodyear addressed something with the tire. I think the track made some changes to the tunnel turn, which is a good thing because it was pretty rough down there. We were very fortunate that we didn't have any problems in that area. I know several teams had really bad problems, so, hopefully, it was a camber or air-pressure-related thing and we won't see that this weekend." HAS GOODYEAR SAID ANYTHING ABOUT THIS WEEKEND? ANY PRECAUTIONS? "Everybody is on their own. Goodyear has told us what they thought the problem was and to just try and shy away from it."

HOYT OVERBAGH, Engineer - No. 21 Motorcraft Genuine Parts Taurus - "We've made some critical changes because we feel we've figured out what the problems were all about. So we've made the changes appropriate to get rid of the problem." WAS IT JUST ONE THING OR A COMBINATION? "I think there were a lot of factors and what we ended up doing was just adjust a little on a large number of things." HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT THIS WEEKEND? "We're comfortable and don't feel like we should experience any problems."

PAT TRYSON, Crew Chief - No. 6 Viagra Taurus - "We didn't have any problems and even though we've looked at everything, we haven't made any major changes. We've made a little air-pressure adjustment, but, other than that, we didn't have any issue. We're hoping we don't the issue again, but people that were real aggressive, if they're real aggressive again, I think they'll have problems again. We weren't real aggressive and won't be this time. Hopefully, we won't have any problems." WILL THERE BE MORE ATTENTION TO THAT ISSUE IN PRACTICE TODAY? "I don't know because nobody really had issues in practice last time and then all of a sudden when the race started there were issues everywhere. It seems to be hard to judge it by practice. You can't really run long enough a lot of times to make it happen, but last time in the race there were guys having them in two or three laps. It's kind of strange. I don't know if it'll show up in practice, but we're not gonna be very aggressive. Hopefully, everything will be alright for us."

Elliott Sadler, driver of the No. 38 M&M's Taurus, was involved in an accident last weekend at New Hampshire that dropped him to ninth in the point standings. Sadler spoke about the incident and how he's looking to bounce back at Pocono.

ELLIOTT SADLER - No. 38 M&M's Taurus - "We definitely need to bounce back. We've fallen way too far back in the points. We've got too good of a race team to be ninth in points, but a lot of it has not been our doing. We had a rocket last week at New Hampshire and had some certain circumstances hurt us. We had the problem with Kasey Kahne on pit road and had to go all the way to the rear of the field and come back. And then the problem that we had with Mark. It's a shame. Mark and I have usually had great success racing each other and he's a great competitor, and I know he didn't do it on purpose, but some guys you give a little bit more room than others in case a mistake happens, and that's what Mark and I talked about Monday morning. I would give him more room than I would maybe give other people because I don't want an accident to happen around him and we really want the same in return. It's a shame. That was a brand new car that we had and we really wanted to run that car back there for the chase and now it's destroyed, so now we kind of have to start over at square one. It's been a tough couple of weeks. We want to try to bounce back. We want to run good and we need to start doing it this weekend." MARK OBVIOUSLY FELT BAD AFTER THE RACE AND HE'S PROBABLY ONE OF THE LAST GUYS YOU WOULD EXPECT TO HIT YOU. "Yeah, and that's what I explained to him. We were talking about giving more room to each other. Some people you know are gonna race you close and you don't really have to give them a lot of room because they don't respect you and you don't really respect them. But there are some guys that you want to give room to because you do respect them and Mark Martin is one of those guys. He's usually a great example of how you race people and, again, I know he didn't do it on purpose. It was a bad situation and just a racing circumstance, but, again, it cost us 100 points and kind of paints ourselves in a corner. We could still be fifth in the points right now, but we've got to let that go behind us. We've got to come here to Pocono and race hard and try to get some of those points back." YOU'VE HAD A GOOD SEASON, BUT YOU'RE ON THE BORDER LINE NOW AS FAR AS THE TOP 10. "Yeah, that's all it takes. You look at Jeff Gordon was third in points a month-and-a-half ago and now all of a sudden he's like 13th or 14th. This is a tough sport and there are only so many pieces of the pie. We have way more good race teams than we have 10 spots for the chase. You've got a lot of good teams that are trying to fight their way in and you've got a lot of us that feel like we belong in the top 10 that want to stay there. We've got seven races left to prove our point that we need to be a part of the top 10, so we'll see what happens. We need to go out there and race hard. We brought a really good car here to Pocono. We've got a really good car lined up for Indy. We're going to test Watkins Glen for two days. We're trying to prepare ourselves as much as we can for the next couple of races and make sure we'll be OK."

Carl Edwards, driver of the No. 99 Office Depot Taurus, will practice at Pocono today before traveling to Pikes Peak for the Busch Series race. Bobby Gerhart, and not Frank Kimmel, will qualify the Cup car tomorrow, so Edwards will be forced to start from the rear of the field on Sunday. Edwards spoke about his cross-country trip and hopes for the weekend.

CARL EDWARDS - No. 99 Office Depot Taurus - THOUGHTS ON BOTH RACES THIS WEEKEND. "This whole week has been awesome just leading up to coming to Pocono. Obviously, I love racing here. That was just great how we ran here at June, and running our Charter Ford at Pikes Peak. I've had the chance to race a couple of Silver Crown races there and I love that place. We are gonna start at the back of both of them. We're gonna miss qualifying in both series and, heck man, it's 500 miles here. I don't see why we couldn't run just as well, but it's gonna be tough." WHAT IS YOUR STRATEGY FOR COMING THROUGH THE FIELD? "My strategy for the remaining races before the chase in the Cup car is just to go easy - don't damage the car, prepare for the end of the race. I have this habit of driving like a maniac as soon as the green flag drops and it's great sometimes, but it's either hit or miss. You can't take too many chances, so what I'm gonna try to do is just be there. I know our car is good enough to win the race. If we're there at the end, we can do it." WHAT'S BEEN THE BIGGEST PROBLEM SINCE YOU WON HERE? THINGS HAVE KIND OF SLIPPED A BIT. "We've just had bad luck. The Sonoma wreck was something that literally I could not avoid that one. We had a tire failure at Chicago with what I thought was the fastest race car at the place. We were the first tire to go bad in the race, so I just didn't see that coming. And then the Daytona wreck was just bad luck, so at least I don't have the same mistake repeatedly. It seems like every time we wreck or something happens it's something new, and I feel like that's what this season is for. This is my first full season of Cup racing. The expectations changed from me and from the press and from everyone else when we started winning races. It appears from the outside like we should not make any mistakes, but every week I'm learning. I'm just glad to be back here at Pocono. In a way, I'm grateful for all of these things that are happening. Even though they're bad, I don't think I'll make the same mistakes twice. I think for the rest of my career we're only gonna get better and better. I'm pretty excited." IS IT THE SAME CAR YOU WON WITH THIS WEEKEND? "Yeah, it's the same car. I don't know if we've changed a nut or bolt or anything on it. We plan on running pretty well here. I think we're gonna be pretty good."

Mark Martin, driver of the No. 6 Viagra Taurus, is seventh in the point standings going into Sunday's Pennsylvania 500, but the main topic of conversation continues to be his status for 2006. He spoke about his plans for 2006 and how he hopes the situation with Jamie McMurray is resolved.

MARK MARTIN - No. 6 Viagra Taurus - DOES IT DISTRACT YOU MUCH KNOWING YOU MIGHT BE BACK HERE NEXT YEAR IN A CUP CAR? "There's a lot of distractions right now with that only being one of them." FELIX SABATES SAID HE WAS GOING TO PICK UP JAMIE'S OPTION FOR NEXT YEAR. YOUR THOUGHTS? "That's what I'd do if I was them." THAT WOULD PROBABLY PUT YOU BACK IN THE CAR NEXT YEAR. "Well, I think we have to wait and see what happens. That's what I think." HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT BEING ASKED TO MAYBE STICK AROUND ANOTHER YEAR? "I committed to do it, so I guess that's what everybody is wanting to know." WHAT WOULD YOUR IDEAL PICTURE FOR NEXT YEAR BE? "Jamie McMurray in the 6 in '06. Jamie is, in my opinion which doesn't mean much, probably the most sought after driver in the Cup garage, and we're fortunate enough to have him signed up for '07. That's where we're at. We'll see what happens. If it's '07, then it's '07 and I'll drive the car." DOES THE SALUTE TO YOU TOUR CONTINUE INTO NEXT YEAR? "We're gonna continue doing exactly what we're doing. It could be opening day at Daytona that I step out of the seat in February. You don't know. Nobody knows. All I know is it's easier for me to do this for the team, who has really been responsible, and for Jack Roush, who has stood by my side when I built my NASCAR career. He and I did it together. We made the 6 car together and I'll hand it over to Jamie McMurray." THERE WERE A RASH OF TIRE PROBLEMS IN JUNE HERE. HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE THAT DAY? "Left fronts went flat. We had the same problem at Indy last year, but people didn't notice as much. We had the same problem back at Indy in '04." WHY DO YOU THINK IT HAPPENED? "It's harder to tell on left fronts. On right fronts you can see it coming with temperature and with air-pressure - you can see it coming. You don't see it coming on left fronts, but, obviously, it's from being aggressive with your tires." ARE YOU CONCERNED IT WILL HAPPEN THIS WEEKEND? "We didn't have any trouble, so maybe I should be concerned but I'm not."