Jeff Burton
No. 31 Cingular Wireless Chevrolet
Event Preview Fact Sheet
Event/Date: Crown Royal 400 – May 6, 2006
Venue: Richmond (Va.) International Raceway
NOTES:
This Week’s Race Car Richmond International Raceway (RIR) … Jeff Burton will pilot chassis No. 149 from the Richard Childress Racing (RCR) stable, which recently finished ninth at Phoenix and was also run at the test session at RIR. Burton raced No. 149 five times last season. (Homestead, Atlanta, Texas, Indianapolis and Lowe’s Motor Speedway) Best start – 16th (Homestead) Best Finish – eighth (Atlanta)
Stat Facts … In 23 Cup starts at RIR, Burton boasts one pole, one win, seven top-five and 11 top-10 finishes.
Double Duty … In addition to his driving duties with the No. 31 Cingular Chevrolet at RIR, Burton, a 21-time race winner in the NASCAR Busch Series, will make his 250th career start in the series, debuting RCR’s No. 29 Holiday Inn Chevrolet in the Circuit City 250 Friday, May 5. The race will air live on FX beginning at 8 p.m. Eastern Standard Time (EST).
Media Alert … Richard Childress Racing has scheduled a press conference Friday, May 5 at 2:45 p.m. EST in the media center at Richmond International Raceway.
Testing One, Two, Three, Testing … Burton and the No. 31 team tested at Richmond International Raceway April 11-12 in preparation for the Crown Royal 400. Following the race weekend at Talladega Superspeedway, Team Cingular also tested at Lowe’s Motor Speedway May 1-2 in preparation for the upcoming Coca-Cola 600. The tests were the third and fourth of the six allowed under NASCAR’s 2006 testing policy. The remaining tests available to teams in NASCAR’s top division will be conducted at Indianapolis Motor Speedway (July 10-12) and Homestead-Miami Speedway (Oct. 16-18).
Meet the Driver … Burton will participate in a question and answer session hosted by Riki Rachtman on the Chevy stage at Richmond International Speedway Saturday, May 6 at 3 p.m.
Meet the Driver, part two … Burton will sign autographs at the Cingular souvenir trailer at RIR on Saturday, May 6 from 2 – 2:45 p.m. A limited number of tickets are available and can be obtained at the souvenir trailer.
Live on stage … Burton will return to the desk of NASCAR Live! again this week as a host of the popular race program on SPEED. The driver of the Cingular Chevy will take to the stage Saturday, May 6 at 12 p.m. EDT for the show, which can seen live on SPEED.
Up to Speed … The Crown Royal 400 at RIR will be televised live Saturday, May 6 beginning at 7 p.m. Eastern Standard Time (EST) on FX and broadcast live on the Motor Racing Network (MRN) and XM Satellite Radio. Qualifying for the 10th of 36 NASCAR Cup Series events will take the green flag at 6 p.m. EST Friday, May 5 and will be telecast live on SPEED.
JEFF BURTON QUOTES:
Richmond is a flat short track, the type of track which has been historically strong for you and Team Cingular. Has that changed this season?
“I hope not. We didn’t run very well at Phoenix. Certainly we’ve been really good on the big tracks and Phoenix didn’t go quite as good as we wanted it to. If you would have asked me after the first day of testing at Richmond if we would have been strong, the answer would have been yes, without a doubt. But by the time we got done testing on the second day we were scratching our heads. So, I don’t know what to think. We have some work cut out for us. We obviously weren’t as good at Phoenix as we would have hoped and thought we were going to run. We need to improve on that and I feel really confident that we can.”
Richmond is one of your favorite tracks. Why?
“I just think for the teams, for the fans and for everybody that it takes to make this sport work, it’s the best all-around track. Richmond has good racing action. It’s big enough where it’s not wreck after wreck, but small enough where it’s close side-by-side action since you have multiple grooves. To me, it’s a really hard racetrack to beat competition-wise.”
Team Cingular tested at Richmond as part of the new NASCAR testing package. How does that new testing rule affect how teams approach testing?
“It forces you to test where every other team does as opposed to setting some sort of strategy. Last season we tested at places we thought we would be good and then also tested at places where we thought we weren’t very good. This year we go where NASCAR tells us. The great thing about that is we can compare ourselves much easier since all the other teams are there. The tough thing is you don’t have the freedom to test where you want. It’s good and bad. My opinion has always been as long as it’s the same for everybody, then it’s who makes the best of it.”
How has the testing policy changed how teams approach the season, as far as building new cars and not being able to take them testing?
“It certainly has had an impact. It makes starting the season off strong very important. It also makes the teams who have good testing programs away from the race track a lot stronger. Who has the best wind tunnel program? Who has the best engineering program? There are a lot of things that can be tested away from the race track. The companies that are doing a good job of that will benefit from this testing policy.”
Were the preparations RCR started last season and continued into the off-season that much more important since you don’t have the at-track testing to rely on?
“I think that strengthening all of our programs helps with that a tremendous amount. I think we still have to be stronger. Team Cingular in particular is really strong. We have really good people but we have to make sure that we have the best hardware we can to work on. That part comes from better engineering and better testing. You can’t rely on just testing at racetracks to do that. You have to be able to test at wind tunnels and engineering and those kinds of things. If you can’t, you won’t be competing at a high level consistently.”
