Jeff Burton
No. 31 Cingular Wireless Chevrolet
Event Preview Fact Sheet
Event/Date: Ford 400 – November 19, 2006
Venue: Homestead-Miami Speedway – Homestead, Fla.
NOTES:
This Week’s Race Car Homestead-Miami Speedway … Jeff Burton will race Chassis No. 173 from the Richard Childress Racing (RCR) stable. Built new for 2006, this is the same Cingular Chevrolet Burton drove to a sixth-place finish in the Coca-Cola 600 at Lowe’s Motor Speedway, ninth-place finishes in both races at Pocono and a runner-up effort at Chicagoland Speedway. Burton sat on the pole at Michigan with this car in August before a blown engine resulted in a 42nd-place finish. This car finished 16th at California Speedway in September, notched a third-place last month at Lowe’s Motor Speedway and most recently finished 13th at Atlanta Motor Speedway.
Stat Facts … In seven starts at Homestead-Miami Speedway, Jeff Burton boasts three top-five and three top-10 finishes and no DNFs to go along with his Busch Series victory in 1998 at the South Florida track.
Top 10 marker … With Burton’s 10th-place finish at Phoenix his season total for top-10s grew to 20, second only behind current points leader Jimmie Johnson. The last time Burton topped the 20-time marker for top-10 finishes was 2000 when he finished third in points.
Testing, testing … Burton and Team Cingular tested at Homestead-Miami Speedway October 16-17 in preparation for the Nov. 19 season finale.
State of NASCAR … Team Cingular driver Jeff Burton will join fellow competitors Mark Martin and Greg Biffle on ‘The State of NASCAR’, a special edition of Wind Tunnel with host Dave Despain from Homestead-Miami Speedway. The one hour show will feature roundtable discussions on NASCAR with journalists, drivers and owners and will air prior to the season finale Ford 400 on SPEED Sunday, Nov. 19 from 10-11 a.m. EST
Make it Four, for RCR … RCR’s newest driver Scott Wimmer will attempt to qualify the No. 33 Holiday Inn Chevrolet for the Ford 400, making it four entries for RCR. Wimmer, a five-time winner in NASCAR’s Busch Series, will split driving duties with Jeff Burton in the No. 29 Holiday Inn Chevrolet for the 2007 NASCAR Busch Series campaign.
Meet the Driver … Burton is scheduled to meet fans and sign autographs Thursday, November 16 from 5-7 p.m. at the Cingular Wireless store located at 825 N. Homestead Blvd., Homestead, Fla.
Up to Speed … The NASCAR Cup Series season finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway will be televised live Sunday, November 19 beginning at 2 p.m. Eastern Standard Time (EST) on NBC and broadcast live on the Motor Racing Network (MRN) and XM Satellite Radio. Qualifying for the final event on the 2006 NASCAR Cup Series schedule will take the green flag at 3:30 p.m. EST Friday, November 17 and will be broadcast live on SPEED, MRN and XM Satellite Radio.
JEFF BURTON QUOTES:
The track configuration at Homestead has changed quite a bit over the seven years NASCAR has raced at the track. Do you like the current configuration?
“It’s now a very oddly built race track. It has a really fast exit to the corners but one of the slowest entries to the corners on the circuit. You have to drive Homestead differently than any other track we go to. You have to go in there and be careful to not have to tight of a box with your set up. The mind set of a driver has to be open to try things. So you have to go be careful going to Homestead not to go in with too tight of a box on your set up or in your mind set as a driver needs to be open to different option because it is such a different race track.”
Is it hard to find a good line around the track with the progressive banking?
“I think you definitely have to hunt for the best line. As a driver you have to be open to trying the different lines to find which works best for your car. The problem is when you are trying to get your car set up in practice, what line do you run? It’s really easy to set your car up for one line then move somewhere else and it doesn’t work as well. You really have to get committed to where you want to be and stay there.”
