KURT BUSCH READY FOR RETURN TO DOVER FOR DODGE DEALERS 400
Miller Lite Dodge Driver Says “Incident” In June Race Was Catalyst For Success Leading To Chase

DOVER, Del. (Sept. 18, 2007) – “I just can’t wait to get back to Dover for this weekend’s Dodge Dealers 400,” Miller Lite Dodge driver Kurt Busch said on Monday night.

That statement may sound strange coming from a driver who is still looking for his first NEXTEL Cup win and pole after 14 career starts on the track known as the “Monster Mile.” It may even be taken as extremely bizarre considering what happened to Busch during his last visit to the track.

“Our COT program just gets stronger and stronger,” said Busch, who enters Dover 12th in the point standings, trailing leaders Jimmie Johnson and Jeff Gordon by 102 points. “We had a top-five car there in the spring race before the incident took us out of the running. We’ve made such improvements since then that I’m confident we’ll have a car capable of winning this time around.”

What about the “incident” that eliminated Busch from the competition during the June 4 Autism Speaks 400 at Dover?

“I look back on that race now and I have to point to it as a major turning point for our season,” said Busch, who bounced back with an incredible nine-race stretch to make this year’s “Chase for the NEXTEL Cup Championship.” "It definitely was a tough turning point and maybe in the past it would have made the team or me crumble and not make some changes. It was a perfect example of, 'We've got to get it in gear and we've got to make this Chase.' It feels like an eternity ago that it did happen because of all the good things that have happened in between.

“As crazy as it may sound, I actually thanked Tony (Stewart) in passing while all of us Chase drivers were gathering on the stage after the Richmond race,” said Busch, who was scheduled to be a special guest on Stewart’s live radio show on Tuesday night (9/18 -- 8:00 p.m. EDT on Sirius NASCAR Radio). “I said something like, ‘Hey man, thanks for helping us jump start our season after the deal at Dover.’

“When you look back at what all has happened with our team since that race, you have to say that it has been a remarkable turn of events. It’s simply incredible as to where we are now compared to where we were when we left Dover in June. “I’ll be quick to admit that I was wrong and I know I let a lot of people down that day, but I also look back and get such tremendous pride for everyone on our Miller Lite Dodge Team for being able to bounce back like we have.

“Everything that has happened since then has made us a stronger team and has made me a smarter driver,” said Busch. “Our team has bonded so close since then. This team definitely deserves to be in the Chase and we should be looked at as a true championship threat, even after falling behind with the carburetor problem last Sunday at Loudon.”

In the June Dover race, Busch and Stewart were involved in an on-track altercation, which led to Busch deciding to discuss the situation as Stewart was pitting. Unfortunately, as Busch pulled up alongside Stewart, there were active team personnel in the area.

NASCAR officials immediately parked Busch for the day after only 271 of the 400 laps had been completed, relegating the Miller Lite Dodge driver to a 42nd-place finish. The official reason out posted by NASCAR simply said “Aggressive.”

NASCAR later penalized Busch 100 driver points and issued a fine of $100,000 and placed him on NASCAR probation until Dec. 31, 2007.

“Aggressive” certainly was an accurate description of what was to follow as a determined Busch scratched and clawed his way back from the low point of his 2007 season.

Pat Tryson joined the team as crew chief a few days later and helped Busch launch an amazing comeback to make this year’s Chase. Busch was back as far as 16th in the point standings in June and trailed Dale Earnhardt Jr. by 236 points for the 12th and final “Chase-eligible” spot entering the July 8 Pepsi 400 at Daytona.

With Tryson at the helm of the No. 2 Dodge team, Busch responded with a strong third-place finish in that race and then went on a competitive tear that produced two wins and seven top-10 finishes during the nine-race stretch to make the Chase. Busch finished no worse than 11th during that period and had a 6.2 average finish. He came back from the 236-point deficit to hold a 206-point advantage over the 13th spot after the final “Race to the Chase” event at Richmond. That was a 442-point swing in only nine races, meaning that Busch, Tryson and crew gained an amazing average of 49 points per race.

“Man, I look back now and it seems like the last Dover race was light-years ago,” said Busch. “We learned from the experience, for sure, but it’s a thrill to see just how far our team has advanced since then. I’m confident that we’ll have a really strong car there this weekend and bounce back from the disappointment we had last Sunday at New Hampshire.”

Busch’s Dover career NEXTEL Cup record boasts two top-five finishes and four top-10s in 14 races. He posted his career-best Dover finish, a fourth, in last September’s race. He started 10th in that event and was a fixture among the top-five drivers during the entire race. “It was a good solid run for us; just what we’re looking for this time around,” recalled Busch.

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Busch and his Pat Tryson-led Penske Racing Team will be racing their PSC-518 Miller Lite Dodge this weekend at Dover. The team last raced the car at Watkins Glen on August 12. The car has since undergone a process of “transitioning” in order to be utilized this weekend at Dover.

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This weekend’s schedule at Dover begins on Friday with practice from 11:00 a.m. till 12:30 p.m. Friday’s 3:15 p.m. single round of qualifying will set Sunday’s 43-car starting field. Saturday’s schedule offers practice sessions from 11:00 a.m. till 11:50 a.m. and from 1:50 p.m. till 2:50 p.m. Sunday’s Dodge Dealers 400 (400 Laps, 400 miles) has a scheduled 1:30 p.m. EDT starting time and features live coverage by ABC-TV and MRN Radio.

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Notes of interest:

--Kurt Busch and his Pat Tryson-led Penske Racing Team will be racing their PSC-518 Miller Lite Dodge Avenger this weekend in the Dodge Dealers 400 at Dover. This chassis debuted on 6/24 at Infineon and was last used at Watkins Glen on 8/12. “We had originally looked at running our (PSC-) 516 car (Darlington car) this weekend, but we needed it for the Talladega test. I guess you could say that this is a good example of the new car being very versatile in that it raced on a road course and now it is going to a high-banked oval. We know that is something that NASCAR is pleased to hear. Since we raced it last, the 518 has been ‘transitioned’ over to match the demands of Dover. We reworked the front end geometry and have us a great Miller Lite Dodge Avenger ready for Kurt this weekend.”

--Have you seen Kurt’s new “This Is SportsCenter Promo Spot? “It’s pretty cool and I’m getting all kinds of positive response from the fans and the sponsors,” Kurt said on Tuesday morning. The spot, entitled “Sponsor,” began airing yesterday (Monday, 9/17) and features SportsCenter anchor John Anderson attempting to buy a good sponsor location on Kurt’s Miller Lite Dodge. The “This Is SportsCenter” campaign debuted in 1994 and was selected by TV Guide as one of the greatest TV campaigns of all time. To view Kurt’s new spot, go here:
http://sports.espn.go.com/espntv/espnShow?showID=SRDA --Kurt is scheduled to be a special guest on tonight’s (Tuesday, 9/18) edition of Tony Stewart Live – (8:00 p.m. EDT on Sirius NASCAR Radio). Kurt and Tony will be discussing this weekend’s return to Dover International Speedway, Kurt’s upcoming “Ride With Kurt for the Kids” program and several other topics. He’ll also stick around for a few rounds of “Stump the Champ.” Should be a great show. Kurt expected to call in at 8:30 p.m. EDT.

--Pat will be appearing on Wednesday night’s (9/19) special two-hour “NASCAR Performance Live” radio show originating in front of a live audience at the NASCAR Technical Institute (NTI) in Mooresville, N.C., from 7:00-9:00 p.m. EDT. The two-hour radio special will be hosted by MRN Pit Road Reporter Steve Post and former crew chief and current color analyst for NASCAR on FOX, Larry McReynolds. The first hour will feature NASCAR NEXTEL Cup crew chiefs ranked seven thru 12 in the point standings, while the second hour will showcase those ranked one thru six. The broadcast will air nationally on NASCAR Sirius Radio and the Motor Racing Network (MRN).

--Pat on the carburetor malfunction that hampered the Miller Lite Dodge Team’s effort last Sunday at New Hampshire, resulting in a 25th-place finish: “Without getting into all the technical details of what went wrong, the best way to describe it is that a shaft broke and because of that, Kurt was operating with more or less a two-barrel carburetor, while the other guys were out there armed with four-barrel carburetors. That’s the best way to describe the handicap we faced during much of the race. You’ll always be faced with potential part failures in our sport, but rest assured that everyone here at Penske Racing is working as hard as possible to keep that from happening.”

--Kurt making a special appearance this Friday for Miller Lite at Bubba’s, located at 865 N. Dupont Highway in Dover. Kurt scheduled to do a Q & A with the fans at 8:20 p.m., followed by an autograph session from 8:45 p.m. till 9:30 p.m. For additional information, please call (302) 730-8445.

--Kurt’s visit to his souvenir trailer at Dover International Speedway this Sunday will mark the 237th time in the last 240 races that he has been out on race day mornings to meet his fans and sign autographs. His continuing tradition began during his first full year on the Cup circuit back in 2001. Kurt is tentatively scheduled to be at his souvenir trailer from 9:00 a.m. till 9:30 a.m. on Sunday. Please verify that time by visiting the trailer in advance and picking up the free tickets for the autograph line.

--Kurt may still be looking for his first NEXTEL Cup win and pole at Dover International Speedway, but the track certainly holds quite a bit of historical significance for the Miller Lite Dodge driver.

Kurt made his NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series debut during the September 2000 Dover racing weekend, a double-header adventure for the Las Vegas native that saw him post a remarkable winning performance in his only truck series start on the “Monster Mile.”

“That was a pretty cool weekend for a 22-year-old kid there at Dover in 2000,” Kurt recalled. “I was running for the Truck Series Rookie-of-the-Year and was third in the overall points when I got the call to drive the 97 car.

“My career was moving so fast back then,” Kurt continued. “Only 11 months before that, I was just a successful young short-tracker living in Las Vegas and still holding down a job with the water department. We’d won the championship in the NASCAR Southwest Series in ’99 and I was the youngest driver to ever win the title. We got the call to drive the No. 99 truck and I had run only 20 races or so (21) when I was put in the 97 Cup ride.

“I can remember reading a headline back then that said, ‘Busch’s Career Skyrocketing Into the Stratosphere,’” said Kurt. “That pretty much said it all. I’d gone from being a big fish in a little pond on the short tracks to a Truck Series race winner and leading rookie in only a matter of a few months. Then I was straight into the Cup ride, without ever even running a single Busch Series race.

“That was a special weekend at Dover, for sure,” Kurt said. “We won the pole for the Truck Series race, but wrecked during the final practice. We had to pull the backup out and start from the rear of the field without turning a single lap of practice in it. I remember just taking it easy for the first few laps to make sure everything was cool. Then we just set sail. We’d raced up into the top five after only 50 laps. We kept up the pace and at the end it came down to a big battle between Mike Wallace and me. He was leading with only a couple of laps to go and we were right on his bumper. I made the move to pass him on the outside and he tried to block me and wound up spinning himself out. So we wound up coming from last to first and won that race in our backup truck.

“We’d already had the Cup car there testing it a week earlier and had turned in some really fast laps,” recalled Kurt. “That Friday, before we won the Truck Series race, we qualified the Cup car in the 10th spot.

“I remember really looking forward to the Saturday morning practice, but it never happened because a storm came through the area. We got an extra hour of practice that afternoon after the Grand National race was over and got her dialed in the best we could. At least we thought we did. It had been overcast all during Saturday’s practice and was still that way when Sunday’s race started. The car started out really loose, and we adjusted to tighten it up. Then the sun broke through the clouds and we had a super tight racecar. We ran the last 125 laps under the green and I really had my hands full. We held on, kept her out of the wall and finished 18th. We accomplished all our goals there that weekend.”

And who was the crew chief for Kurt’s debut in Cup racing? None other than former crew chief-turned Fox Sports broadcaster Jeff Hammond.

--“Ride With Kurt for the Kids” events coming up on October 18 at Lowes Motor Speedway and on November 6 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. These high-speed, white-knuckle rides with Kurt behind the wheel will be in a special NASCAR Nextel Cup-style stock car provided by event sponsor – the Richard Petty Driving Experience. For complete event information and to purchase one of these exciting experiences, please visit www.kurtbusch.com, send an email to ridewithkurt@kurtbusch.com, or call 704-799-2428.

All proceeds will go toward the completion of the Kurt Busch Superdome at the Victory Junction Gang Camp. The new 28,000-square foot facility will allow camp-goers to play sports in a climate-controlled atmosphere, which some of the children require due to their medical conditions.

--“But it’s still a coach’s game -- make no mistake about that. You start at the top. If you don’t have a good one at the top, you don’t have a cut dog’s chance. If you do, the rest falls into place. You have to have good assistants and a lot of things, but first you have to have a great chairman of the board.” –Coach Paul William “Bear” Bryant (Sept. 11, 1913-Jan. 26, 1983)