Jeff Burton
No. 31 Cingular Wireless Chevrolet
Event Preview Fact Sheet
Event/Date: Dickies 500 – November 5, 2006
Venue: Texas Motor Speedway – Ft. Worth, Texas
NOTES:
This Week’s Race Car Texas Motor Speedway … Jeff Burton will pilot chassis No. 172 from the Richard Childress Racing (RCR) stable. Built new for the 2006 season, Burton sat on the pole at Indianapolis with this car then went on to finish 15th. Most recently this car finished fifth at Kansas.
Stat Facts … In 11 starts at TMS, Jeff Burton boasts one win, two top-five and four top-10 finishes.
Inaugural Winner … Jeff Burton won the inaugural NASCAR Cup Series race held at Texas Motor Speedway on April 6, 1997, crossing the finish line four seconds ahead of Dale Jarrett.
Double Duty … In addition to his driving duties with the No. 31 Cingular Chevrolet, Burton, a 21-time race winner in the NASCAR Busch Series, will drive RCR’s No. 29 Holiday Inn Chevrolet in the O’Reilly Challenge Saturday, November 4. Burton’s final Busch Series race of the 2006 season will air live on TNT beginning at 2 p.m. Eastern Standard Time (EST).
Chat with Burton: Cingular is offering fans a chance to chat with Jeff Burton: On Wednesday, November 1st at 6p.m. EST, Cingular Wireless is offering their customers the opportunity to chat with Burton directly from their wireless phone. To pre-enroll in the chat session, text the word "JEFF" to 25655 from your Cingular Wireless handset.
Outside the Lines … Team Cingular driver Jeff Burton is scheduled to be a guest on ESPN’s ‘Outside the Lines’ Sunday, November 5 from Texas Motor Speedway. The Emmy Award winning series will air live at 9:30 a.m. EST.
Dear Diary … Throughout the Dickies 500 race weekend at Texas Motor Speedway, Burton will once again become a guest columnist for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. The inaugural winner at TMS will discuss the Chase for the Championship, along with his day-to-day activities from the track as he competes in both the Busch and Cup Series events. His column can be read in the motorsports section at www.startelegram.com.
Up to Speed … The Dickies 500 at Texas Motor Speedway will be televised live Sunday, November 5 beginning at 2:30 p.m. EST on NBC and broadcast live on the Performance Racing Network (PRN) and XM Satellite Radio. Qualifying for the 34th of 36 NASCAR Cup Series events will take the green flag at 4:30 p.m. EST Friday, Nov. 3 and will be broadcast live on SPEED, PRN and XM Satellite Radio.
JEFF BURTON QUOTES:
Team Cingular is sitting fifth in the points heading into Texas. You’re 84 points behind leader Matt Kenseth. How will you approach the last three races of the season?
“I think we still approach the remaining races the same way we have all season. Team Cingular will give our best effort this weekend at Texas just as we did in each of the first 33 races. To put it in football terms, since it’s football season, I am looking at this like we have six minutes remaining in the fourth quarter, we’re down by seven and it’s fourth down. We need to decide to punt or to go for it. Right now, we’re still going to punt. We’ll rely on our defense and our entire team to play together as a team to win this game. Now, if we go into next week’s race at Phoenix sitting 90 points back from the leader we’ll need to change up our strategy a bit and go for it on fourth down. “
How tough is Texas Motor Speedway?
“Texas is an interesting race track. As the track has gotten older the groove has changed and as they have made changes to the track obviously, the groove has changed. Now some people run the high groove and some run on the bottom. It’s a very fast race track. Texas is a very physically demanding track as well, drivers are exposed to a lot of G-forces. Texas is a high-speed race track but more narrow than some of the other 1.5-mile tracks. It’s easy to get caught up in a wreck at Texas and easy to slip up just a little and get into the wall. It’s a really fun race track but it is difficult.”
