David Gilliland

March 26, 2008 - David Gilliland, driver of the No. 38 freecreditreport.com Ford Fusion, is coming off his first top-10 finish of the season with a ninth-place run at Bristol last week. Gilliland recently spoke about going to Martinsville for Sunday’s NASCAR Sprint Cup Series event.

DAVID GILLILAND – No. 38 freecreditreport.com Ford Fusion -- HOW DO YOU FEEL HAVING BACK-TO-BACK SHORT TRACK RACES? “We run so many mile-and-a-half tracks that the short tracks being back-to-back is a good thing for the teams because everybody’s mindset is on short-track racing. It’s a little bit easier on the teams and drivers going back-to-back, but Martinsville is a great place. I’ve really enjoyed racing there. It’s short-track racing. That’s where I came from and where I cut my teeth and that’s where I grew up loving what I do.”

BRISTOL AND MARTINSVILLE ARE SO DIFFERENT PHYSICALLY. WHAT’S IT FEEL LIKE BEHIND THE WHEEL? “It’s definitely different. It feels like you’re going about a quarter as fast at Martinsville. Bristol is just so fast with the banking. I was trying to explain it to my dad. I said, ‘You get out there and you feel like that airplane on the end of the string that you’re just whipping around and just going.’ It’s a lot of fun, though. It’s a challenging track and Martinsville is equally as challenging but just in a different way. It’s a flat track and it seems like everybody is a little bit closer at Martinsville. It’s just a little bit tighter quarters, but they’re both a lot of fun. They’re both very, very important to Yates Racing and it will be important to have a solid finish at Martinsville.”

THE BUMPERS ON THESE NEW CARS LINE UP SO WELL. IS THAT THE BIGGEST DIFFERENCE IN THE STYLE OF RACING WE SEE ON SHORT TRACKS? THE BUMP-AND-RUN IS A BIT TOUGHER TO EXECUTE. “Yeah, I think so. I think the way the bumpers line up is much better at short tracks because you are gonna bump a little bit. The way the bumpers were before, it would just pick your rear wheels off the ground if you were the guy in front and odds are you were gonna wreck, so that’s not a good deal. Now you can get around and you can really bump somebody and move them up out of the way. With the way the bumpers are aligned now, it’s much better, especially at a short track.”