Jeff Burton
No. 31 Cingular Wireless Chevrolet
Event Preview Fact Sheet
Event/Date: Neighborhood Excellence 400 – June 4, 2006
Venue: Dover (Del.) International Speedway
NOTES:
This Week’s Race Car at Dover International Speedway … Jeff Burton will race chassis No. 164 from the Richard Childress Racing (RCR) stable. Built new for 2006, Burton raced it at California (started sixth, finished fifth), Las Vegas (started eighth, finished seventh) Atlanta (started third, finished 32nd) Texas (started 21st, finished sixth) and Darlington (started 20th, finished ninth).
Stat Facts … In 24 starts at Dover, Burton has posted five top-fives and eight top-10 finishes
Double Duty … In addition to his driving duties with the No. 31 Cingular Chevrolet at Dover, Burton, a 21-time race winner in the NASCAR Busch Series, will race RCR’s No. 29 Holiday Inn Chevrolet in the StonebridgeRacing.com 200 Saturday, June 3. The race will air live on FX beginning at 3 p.m. Eastern Standard Time (EST).
Streakin’ … Burton and Team Cingular have five top-10 finishes in their last six starts. Burton has climbed from 21st in points following Martinsville to eighth entering Dover. In addition, they have a total of seven top-10 finishes this season, already bettering their total of six for the entire 2005 season.
RCR at Dover … RCR Team owner Richard Childress has earned three wins at Dover, all of them coming with Dale Earnhardt. Earnhardt won both events at the "Monster Mile" in 1989. The seven-time champion also won the spring race at Dover in 1993. Additionally, RCR has earned one pole, 17 top-five and 30 top-10 finishes at the high-banked concrete oval. Childress, a former driver in NASCAR's top division contributed three of those top 10s from 1976-1980.
Satellite Media Tour … On behalf of associate sponsor Prilosec OTC, Burton will be participate in a Satellite Media Tour on Tuesday, June 6 from 7-9 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time (EDT). If you are interested in joining the tour, please contact Lisa Cox at lcox@rcrracing.com to arrange a time slot.
Up to Speed … The Neighborhood Excellence 400 from Dover International Speedway will take the green flag Sunday, June 4 at 1:30 p.m. EDT and will be telecast live on FX. The event will also be broadcast live on MRN and XM Satellite Radio. Qualifying will be televised on a same-day-delayed basis on SPEED Friday, June 2 beginning at 5:30 p.m. EDT. MRN and XM Satellite Radio will provide live qualifying updates beginning at 3 p.m. EDT.
JEFF BURTON QUOTES:
Both Dover and Bristol have concrete surfaces. Is that where the similarities stop?
“Dover is similar to Bristol but nothing compares to Bristol. Dover is concrete, it is high-banked and I guess it is kind of like a big Bristol. The great thing about Dover is you can run different grooves; you don’t just have to get stuck on the bottom. Where Bristol is just a one-groove race track. There are some similarities, mainly the fact they are both concrete and very fast.
What is mindset going to Dover?
“Dover is an exceptionally fast race track. For a mile-long race track, it generates a lot of speed. You’re in the throttle a lot of the time, there’s a lot of banking and you really have to work hard to get your car to turn well. That’s what I go to Dover thinking; you have to make it turn well and keep it where you can run on the bottom. You don’t want to lock in so you can only run on the bottom. You want to be able to run different grooves. If you can do those things, you can run really well there.”
Does there need to be a lot of give and take at Dover?
“It plays a lot at Dover. The corners are exceptionally wide and the straightaways are exceptionally narrow. These are some of the widest corners that we have, usable corner space, but it narrows up a great deal getting off the corner and it’s narrow getting into the corner. You can be three-wide in the corner, but you aren’t going to be three-wide coming onto the straightaway; you’ve got to get sorted out. You really have to give and take a lot.”
How concerned are you about long green runs in what is a very long race?
“It is a long race. The green-flag runs at Dover are really what you want to see. It’s a lot like Bristol in that when you have green-flag runs, you knock a lot of laps off really quickly. When you have a lot of cautions, it takes forever. The green-flag runs are what you want to see from a driver’s standpoint.”
