JEFF BURTON, DRIVER OF THE NO. 31 LENOX IMPALA SS, met with members of the media at New Hampshire Motor Speedway and discussed racing in New Hampshire this weekend, getting through to the break in July and much more.

WHAT IS YOUR OUTLOOK GOING INTO THIS WEEKEND? “We haven’t run as well here as we would like to. We’ve had a couple of good races here since I’ve been at RCR but nothing to the extent of success that we want to have. We’ve worked hard on this program, on the one-mile flat track program, Richmond, Phoenix, New Hampshire. We’ve put a lot of effort into it but we’ve yet to prove that we got what we need. We ran very well at Martinsville earlier in the year but we didn’t perform as well at Richmond and Phoenix and we would have liked to. We come here looking a little bit, searching a little bit, trying to find a way to be better and that’s what our goal is.”

IS THE FACT THAT YOUTH ARE PUSHING THEIR WAY IN, TEAMS BEING LESS PATIENT WITH DRIVERS FOR SUCCESS REASONS THAT WE ARE SEEINGNOT AS MUCH LONGEVITY WITH ONE TEAM? “I think there are a couple of factors. I think that drivers are retiring earlier than in the past. We do have a willingness to invest in youth as opposed to just before I came into this sport people were really nervous about young drivers, didn’t really give young drivers much of a chance. Today young drivers do get those chances with really good teams. If you’re going to make room for somebody then somebody has got to go and that’s just how that works. It works in our business; it works in any business especially if you’re in sports. So investing in the youth has been a factor. That’s probably been the biggest factor. You know when Kurt Busch left that was a really big deal because drivers having success somewhere really don’t leave. That’s an unusual thing. We really don’t see that a lot. So once somebody does get entrenched with their company I think it takes a lot of things going wrong for them to want to move. I think there is a lot of things that have to go wrong for the drivers for the owners to want them to move as well. I think there’s probably a lot of factors but certainly the willingness for teams and sponsors to go out and make an investment in somebody else, they’ve been much more willing to do that today as opposed to what I think it appeared to be 15 years ago.”

SO IF YOU ARE WITH A TEAM FOR SIX YEARS OR MORE THAT’S GOING TO CONSIDERED TO BE LONG-TERM? “No, if you think about it, I don’t know how it worked out like this, but most driver contracts, sponsor contracts are three year periods. Why, I don’t know but that’s kind of how it works. I think that a six-year term is going to be normal; three-year is going to be short. I believe that one thing that’s going to happen is as this sport becomes bigger and the money becomes bigger you are going to see contracts become more sturdy and have more legs and in some ways the exit clauses will be spelled out better which will allow us an easier exit in some ways and be spelled out so it allows a harder exit. That’s going to be a factor as well. It’s been an interesting dynamic in our sport, if a car owner gets tired of a driver it’s been kind of odd they’ve been able to say okay we don’t want you anymore and the driver is just kind of off and out without a whole lot of recourse. But if a driver stands up and says I want to leave they say you can’t leave you’ve got a contract. So it’s been very owner-sided contracts in the past and I think you are going to see a shift into a more equal contracts. I don’t know what kind of impact it will have but it will have an impact.”

ABOUT A MONTH AGO YOU REFERRED TO THIS MIDDLE PART OF THE SEASON AS THE GRIND AND YOU’VE ALREADY TALKED ABOUT THIS WEEKEND, CAN YOU JUST TALK TO ME ABOUT YOUR MIND-SET ABOUT GOING THROUGH THOSE LAST THREE RACES BEFORE YOU GET TO EXHALE? “That’s mentally how I do it. We have three more races to try to perform good and well in and then we get to kind of catch our breath. We’ve tested a lot, we’ve asked a lot out of our team. We’ve done that in hopes that when the summer gets here we can, not relax, but we can take a little bit of time, re-charge, re-energize, because when that little re-charge is over it’s going to get big. We’re going to hit it really hard. That’s our strategy. So for me when it starts to get hot and we race for points every week, it starts at the Daytona 500 but the reality of the situation doesn’t set in until about this time of year, you got a lot of people looking and saying oh my God I’m 15th, I’ve got to find my way to 12th. You got people who are third that say I’ve got to find a way to stay here. It’s pressure for everybody. You got a 35th place guy wanting to stay there, its pressure throughout the field. The hotter the temperatures get, the harder it is to make the cars handle. The harder it is to do what you needed to do and the pressure just builds and builds and builds so this is the hardest time of the year in my opinion.”

GIVEN WHAT YOU JUST SAID ABOUT THE TEMPERATURES BEING A FACTOR, RACING AT NIGHT IN CHICAGO, WHAT ARE YOU THOUGHTS? “It gives you a day off earlier, starts your break earlier. There is no question that the night time races are easier physically because it is cooler. There’s no question about it. I view that as a good thing. The only thing I don’t like about the night races is what do you do all day Saturday, that’s the only thing I don’t like about the night race. We all do it. I think for the fans the night races are really cool and that is why we do this. The temps do come down for the night races, no question. Of course, then we go to Indy and a lot of that will be forgotten.”

JOB ONE UNTIL RICHMOND IS TO STAY IN THE TOP 12, HOW IMPORTANT PSYCHOLOGICALLY IS THE WIN THOUGH? “I don’t think its psychology as much as it is facts. If you’re a team that hasn’t found a way to win, you’re a team that hasn’t done the things that you want to do then you are not having the success that you need to have. That has an effect on you. How do you handle that, what do you do, what direction do we go in? It is a factor, there’s no question about it. We race to win; we race to finish the best we can. When we can’t win and when you don’t feel like you’re doing that and the pressure starts, what are we going to do? How are we going to get better, what do we have to do? So the workload gets higher and it just snowballs. Then when you work harder and you don’t have success because you worked harder and that becomes harder too. The pressure just builds and builds and builds. When things go well you are able to always see that you’re making the next step. You’re always being able to improve. When you aren’t seeing that then you start questioning. What are we doing wrong or how do we do it better and that builds tension within the team as well.”

WITH ALL YOUR CONSISTENCY THIS YEAR INCLUDING YOUR WIN AT BRISTOL YOU HAVE KIND OF BEEN RUNNING UNDER THE RADAR A LITTLE, ARE YOU GOOD WITH THAT AND IS THERE AN ADVANTAGE IN THAT AT ALL? “I’m good with it if it yields results. At the end of the day, our goal wasn’t have an average finish of 8.9 or whatever I was just told it is. That wasn’t our goal. Our goal was to lead more laps than we did last year, to win more races than we did last year, to be solidly in the top 12 in points when Richmond started or when Richmond ended rather and when the Chase starts to be a real contender. If this process and the way that we’re doing it right now works out than I’m extremely comfortable with it. If at the end of the day we look back and say that didn’t work then I won’t be. I don’t really care how we do it. It doesn’t matter to me if we do it by winning 10 races or if we do it by winning two or winning none. The key is to win the championship. I just don’t have in my head that we’re doing it the wrong way or the right way. I know areas that we need to improve in and my team obviously knows areas that we need to improve in and that’s our focus and the results are what matters.”

IN REGARDS TO ADDING THE FOURTH CAR, HOW MUCH INPUT DO YOU HAVE WITH THE DECISION PROCESS WITH RICHARD (CHILDRESS)? “I have been not part of the decision making process from the standpoint of us doing a fourth team. That has to be Richard’s decision. We believe that it would benefit us to have a fourth team. It would put us more on equal ground with teams that have more income. We believe that we’re ready as a company to do a fourth team. Two years ago, we weren’t. It would have been a huge mistake. We’re more prepared today so a fourth team is what we believe is the next step in our evolution of what RCR needs to become to be successful not only in 2009 but more importantly in 2012 and 2018. I’m certainly not involved in the day-to-day decision making process of how we’re going to do this. I have Richard’s ear when it’s appropriate and he asks my opinion when it’s appropriate as he does with all of our drivers and all of our key people. Certainly by no means am I driving this ship for the fourth team but I’m a full supporter of it and believe it’s a next step in our evolution that can make us better. We have to as every team does, we can’t look at what we’ve done in the past as the vein that’s going to carry us into the future. We have to look at what we’re going to be doing tomorrow so that we can be competitive tomorrow. This is I believe the right step.”

HOW IMPORTANT IS IT THAT THE FOURTH DRIVER FIT THE DYNAMIC THAT YOU GUYS HAVE GIVEN THE THREE OF YOU GET ALONG SO WELL. DOES THAT MATTER AT ALL OR DOES IT JUST MATTER HIM BEING ABLE TO WIN RACES? “I think it matters. I think that we have to have a guy that we can work with and by the way he has to be able to work with us. We’re going to have to bend some. Things are going to be different. We’re going to have to work differently with another driver. It’s hard. You get two drivers running together that’s hard, you get three that’s harder, you get four that’s harder yet. We’re going have to work hard at it; it’s not just going to come naturally. Every one of our drivers supports the fourth team so therefore every one of our drivers will support the fourth team driver. That guy is going to have to come here with an open mind, a willingness to work as hard as we’re willing to work and a willingness by us to have him better with us working. It’s going to take all of us but I don’t think we’ll have a problem. I think we all understand the added bonus, benefit we’ll get from it and he’ll have 100 percent of our support.”

DALE EARNHARDT JR., NO. 88 AMP ENERGY/NATIONAL GUARD IMPALA SS met with media and discussed the Casey Mears and HMS parting ways at year-end and his Nationwide team.

HOW WAS THE CAR IN PRACTICE? “I was pretty happy with our car. We tested real good for this race and this car seems to be pretty close.”

DOES BEING GOOD AT MARTINSVILLE TRANSFER TO NEW HAMPSHIRE, OR NOT AT ALL? “Not necessarily. Those two tracks aren’t quite as similar as you might think.”

YOU MENTIONED A WHILE AGO ABOUT MAYBE MOVING YOUR NATIONWIDE JR MOTORSPORTS TEAM TO CUP. WHERE DOES THAT STAND NOW? “I ain’t got much to say about it. We’re pretty happy running in the Nationwide Series. The car is running good and I’d like to keep that the way it is.”

WHAT IS YOUR REACTION TO THE NEWS THAT CASEY MEARS WILL BE LEAVING HMS AT THE END OF THE SEASON? “Casey is a good guy. He’s a great teammate. He’s been a great teammate for me. I was real happy to be able to work with him. He’s my teammate for the rest of the year, so we’ll look forward to the rest of the season and working with him and trying to win some races together.”

IS THERE ANY TYPE OF DRIVER OR PERSONALITY THAT COMES TO MIND TO JOIN THE NO. 5 TEAM? “You just asked me who I think they’re going to hire and I don’t know. I’m just getting the news the same way you are.”

ON TAKING HIS NATIONWIDE TEAM CUP RACING “I shouldn’t have said that man because I should have just kept that to myself because I really don’t want to talk about it in the press. That’s personal to me, what I do with my business and I’m damn sure ain’t going to air my timeline out over to the media. If we feel like we want to do that, we’ll do it. And we’ll let you know and that will be that. I don’t want to answer questions about it every week because it’s really not that big of an issue. My team is doing great. I’d be foolish to make too many changes right now. It would be smart to keep things how they are while they’re working.”

YOU’VE HAD ESSENTIALLY THE SAME CREW CHIEF IN YOUR CAREER. CASEY MEARS HAS HAD FIVE DIFFERENT CREW CHIEFS, FOUR DIFFERENT TEAMS, AND FOUR DIFFERENT CARS. HOW HARD DO YOU THINK IT WOULD BE TO START OVER LIKE THAT EVERY YEAR?“It’s challenging to work with new people. Most times you want it to come off without a hitch. You want it to work right away. And we have great resources and there is a lot of talent at Hendrick. Casey would agree that it’s a great place to work. We’re both fortunate to have the opportunity to work there.”

JIMMIE JOHNSON, DRIVER OF THE NO. 48 LOWE’S IMPALA SS, met with members of the media at New Hampshire Motor Speedway and discussed Casey Mears and Hendrick Motorsports parting ways and more.

During the regular weekly top 12 press conference with Jimmie Johnson, he and his wife Chandra Johnson made an announcement regarding the Second-Annual Jimmie Johnson Foundation Golf Tournament.

ON THE ANNOUNCEMENT OF THE SECOND-ANNUAL JIMMIE JOHNSON FOUNDATION GOLF TOURNAMENT AND DINNER AUCTION. “Our golf tournament last year was a huge success, this year we’re excited to do it once again. Lowe’s has been gracious enough to be our primary sponsor once again and to also give us the signage on the race car in the Nationwide Series and in the Cup Series. We’re just really pleased and happy and thankful for all the support that Lowe’s gives us on that.”

“We had a great turnout of drivers last year and expecting the same again this year. Also because of the success we had last year, we’ve decided to continue our relationship with Habitat for Humanity (San Diego). We built two homes through last year’s golf tournament and fundraising that took place so I’m pleased to announce we’re going to have two more homes going into the same area and this plot of land that we purchased and put together.”

ON THE HELMET OF HOPE. “There’s so many great charities and Chani (wife, Chandra) and I have a hard time really deciding where and what we support and who we support. At the same time, we feel this is a great opportunity for the fans and for the media to bring some recognition to charities that are important to you. In the past I’ve worn a helmet and we auctioned it off. We’re going to do that again with this helmet, but we thought it would be a good idea for six fans and for six media members if they would fill out the charity that’s important to them, each week we’ll have a bucket that we put these names into and pull the charity out and then that charity will go on the helmet. We’ll clear coat over the helmet once everything is done. I’ll wear this helmet in the race and then we’ll auction it off at our golf tournament.”

“We just thought it would be a great way to keep everybody involved and also to bring recognition to a lot of these charities that are important to the race fans to the media.”

HOW DID YOU GUYS DETERMINE YOU WANTED TO BE INVOLVED WITH HABITAT FOR HUMANITY? “For us, Chani and I we want to give back to the community we live in. To have a starting point, we need to start somewhere and we decided to give back in the Charlotte area where we live and the areas where we grew up. We hopefully will have some stuff to announce before long in the area where Chani grew up in Oklahoma. As of now, the first goal has been to get San Diego up and going in the El Cajon area where I grew up. Growing up out there with all the wild fires and all the devastation that would take place over the years, it just seemed like building a home would be the right thing to do. Habitat is a fantastic organization. I’ve actually been on home builds before this relationship started and just felt like it was the right thing to do and would really make an impact in the El Cajon area where I grew up.”

YOU’RE BLESSED WITH A BEAUTIFUL WIFE AND YOU’VE WON THE DAYTONA 500 AND CHAMPIONSHIPS, WHAT KIND OF FEELING IS IT THOUGH TO PUT A FAMILY IN A HOME? “That excitement is building and we’ll experience that for the first time here before long. To watch it come through each stage has just been extremely rewarding but at the same time we haven’t been able to see a smile on a family’s face and hand those keys over yet so I can only anticipate what that’s going to be like. It just feels so good to give back and give to the great cause and the people that are extremely deserving and we’re really excited about it and look forward to August and when we can over the first set of keys.”

WITH ALL THE MANY CHARITIES OUT THERE, DO YOU GET A LOT OF PEOPLE CONTACTING YOU AND HOW DO YOU WHO YOU ARE GOING TO SUPPORT? “It’s one of the hardest things that we do is to sift through the requests and the great charities that exist. It’s kind of led us into the idea with the helmet. We have our causes that are important to us and that we are supporting right now. We have a mission statement that is extremely broad and we’ve given to families, we’ve given to children, we’ve given to communities in need. We try to give wherever we can but there’s just not enough time or money that we can raise to pass out to all the great organizations. So we thought the helmet idea would help and would bring more and also bring new charities in that we’re not aware of. In the charity world a big part of it is just bringing in recognition to charities that are out there. There’s a lot that you can do just by spreading the word. You don’t have to give hard cash, you don’t have to support it in ways that you think you would just to help it out. We’re hopeful that the helmet can be that vehicle and help bring more awareness to other charities.”

WHEN YOU STARTED THE JIMMIE JOHNSON FOUNDATION, WHAT WAS YOUR INITIAL THOUGHT ON HOW IT WOULD GO AND DID YOU EVER IMAGINE IT WOULD GET THIS BIG? “No not a clue. In fact, we really didn’t know what to expect. I had been supporting a lot of charities, spending time helping raise money, going to fund raisers and Kyle and Pattie Petty pulled Chani and I aside and said hey look if you want to do more you can and if you start a foundation and show your fans and your sponsors what’s important to you, you’ll be surprised how much support you’ll have and how much more you can do if you want to do it. So we sat down in front of our bus in Daytona two or three years ago I guess it was and took their advice. We went back and spoke about it ourselves and off we went. Chani really pushed me forward. I needed to have it all structured and put together before we got going and she was like no let’s go. Let’s just get started, we’re doing good, we’ll find our direction and we sure did and we’ve done a lot in a short period of time. It’s hard to really have a direction because there’s so much good out there that you can do and as new relationship build and sponsorships build it kind of takes us in different directions and we’re just trying to do all that we can with every relationship and it’s been going well.”

HOW GOOD OF A CARPENTER ARE YOU? “I did work some summer jobs. Luckily that didn’t work out and racing did. I can probably smash my thumb and you know the commercial they make me look like a hero on national television but that’s not the case.”

YOUR REACTION TODAY TO THE ANNOUNCEMENT OF CASEY MEARS LEAVING HENDRICK MOTORSPORTS. “I feel really bad for Casey and for the No. 5 team. There has not been a lack of effort or commitment to get that working right. A situation has developed to where Casey is going to move on. It hurts me as a friend and teammate that this is taking place. I know it’s done the same to the company and to Rick (Hendrick) but it’s kind of the way it is and the release has been out and the decision has been made. At this point I wish Casey the best. I’m doing anything and everything I can to help he and his team out to finish this year off on a positive note. They had a great run in Sonoma last weekend and I hope he goes on a terror and wins five races and is the hottest driver out there and has everybody chasing him down for his services.”

WHERE DO YOU THINK YOUR TEAM IS STILL BEHIND THE CURVE WITH THE NEW CAR? “Any of the 1.5-mile stuff. Last year because we were focused on the championship there’s that Atlanta test, we stayed home. I think the last few months of ’07 and through the off-season of ’08 we just didn’t get on the right fence. We were working very hard. To be honest with you I’m amazed that after winning the championship we did, the hours that Chad (Knaus) spent in the office trying to get stuff right and our engineers and everybody was still working, but we just weren’t working in the right areas like we had been in the past.”

SO I GUESS YOU AND CASEY TALKED WEEKS AGO ABOUT THIS, DID HE COME AND SAY SOMETHING TO YOU OR DID YOU KNOW ABOUT IT AND COME TO HIM? “The performance has been tough and I know there’s been a lot of frustration between the teams and everything that’s been going on. So I kind of sensed it and when Casey mentioned it to me a while back my heart went out to him. The guy is one of my closest friends and I felt terrible for him. They’ve all been working hard but they’ve had some bad luck and crazy things going on. I know Casey and that team are much better than where they are running right now. Now that this pressure is off I’m hopeful that everything hits right and they start running good. I’d like to see them win a race or two before the season is over and really show what he’s capable of and what that No. 5 team is capable of.”

EVEN THOUGH HENDRICK IS FAIR, DO YOU THINK CASEY GOING TO A TEAM WHERE HE’S THE LEADER THAT HE MIGHT HAVE MORE OF A CHANCE VERSES BEING ON A TEAM WITH A (JEFF) GORDON, JOHNSON AND AN EARNHARDT? “Maybe. The thing with Casey what makes him such a good teammate is he doesn’t have to be the No. 1 guy. His heart is as competitive as anyone. He wants the success and wants to win but the guy can adapt to any situation, any teammate and really fit in well and pull in the same direction. He’s a great, great teammate so I don’t think it would hurt him being a top guy at another team but I really wished it could have worked with us at Hendrick because he’s everything that you would want in a teammate. He’s loyal, dedicated, bites his tongue when he probably shouldn’t or doesn’t need to. He just really is focused on the overall performance of the team instead of himself. He’s a special guy for that.”

JEFF GORDON, DRIVER OF THE NO. 24 DUPONT IMPALA SS, met with members of the media at New Hampshire Motor Speedway and discussed his outlook for the weekend, Casey Mears and Hendrick Motorsports parting ways at the end of the season, racing in Daytona next week and more.

WHAT’S YOUR OUTLOOK THIS WEEKEND? “We’re pretty excited about this weekend. The last two times we were here we were runner up so we want to be one better this time around. New Hampshire has been really good to us over the years. It’s great to come out of Sonoma with a good day, with a third-place finish and get us sixth in the points and we just want to try to gain some momentum and I think this is a track that we can do that with.”

TALK A LITTLE ABOUT THE RACE YOU HAD LAST YEAR HERE WITH DENNY (HAMLIN) AND HOW CLOSE YOU CAME, NOW THAT THE RACE IS AN EXTRA LAP DO YOU FEEL LIKE YOU’LL HAVE THAT EXTRA LAP TO TRY TO CATCH SOMEONE IF YOU’RE IN THE SAME POSITION THIS YEAR? “One more lap would have done it last year definitely. I think that those guys made a great call and track position we’ve seen over the years has just continued to get more and more important. This is one of those tracks that two tires can really, really pay off for you especially if you get out front in the clean air. We came out of that last pit stop I think we were third or fourth or something like that, had to fight really hard with Martin Truex before we could get to Denny and that fight right there just kind of didn’t allow me to get to Denny soon enough and it was just kind of a last-lap bonzai effort and Denny was in his mirror kind of looking to see where I was and it slowed him down a little bit. It was a great battle. We looked at all the strategy from the past and what wins and what doesn’t. Steve Letarte does a great job with gathering all that information to try to see if we can make a call like that and win the race for ourselves.”

IT WAS ANNOUNCED THIS MORNING THAT CASEY (MEARS) WILL BE LEAVING THE TEAM AFTER THIS YEAR, WHAT WAS YOUR REACTION TO THAT? “Well it’s disappointing. Casey is a good friend of mine. He has been for a long time before he came to Hendrick. He is a great race car driver, it’s just things haven’t clicked over there. I think you go back to last year and I still believe we made all the right calls and decisions and if we had to do it over again I think we’d do the same thing. You can’t always make these things come together the way you want them to. They got to happen naturally and on their own and for whatever reason it just hasn’t happened. I know it was a very, very difficult decision for Rick (Hendrick) because of the way personally we feel about Casey, but this is a big business and I think Casey understands that, Rick understands that and the decision was made.”

THINGS BECAUSE OF THE BAR THAT HE AND JIMMIE JOHNSON HAVE SET. “I do think that coming to Hendrick Motorsports with what Jimmie and I have, the bar that has been raised makes it very difficult for anybody to come in but Junior (Dale Earnhardt, Jr.) has come in and done a great job so it’s not impossible. It’s hard to get four teams all clicking at the same time, it really is. I’ve been in it long enough when we had three teams, now with four teams. Sometimes you look at it and you go I don’t understand how these guys are doing so well and then other times you look and you go I don’t understand why they’re not doing well. It’s just people and timing and there’s a lot of things that factor into what makes it work and what doesn’t make it work. Unfortunately you give it time and then decisions have to be made and usually somebody gets that short end of the deal.”

DO YOU FEEL LIKE THIS TRACK IS THE PERFECT PLACE FOR YOU TO GET THAT FIRST WIN WITH YOU FINISHING SECOND HERE IN BOTH RACES LAST YEAR AND WITH THE MOMENTUM YOU HAVE? “This is a good track for us. It has been for many, many years. I feel confident we can usually come in here and not be on our A game and have a top-five car. I’m hoping that’s the case this weekend. We haven’t had a lot of top-five cars this year including last week at Sonoma. (Kevin) Harvick gave us a gift and we’ll take it. It was a great fight and we still did get ourselves back up solidly in the top 10 last week after that first run that was pretty dismal and that’s all I can ask out of this team is to continue to give that kind of fight. It’s been a long time since I’ve been home. We’re testing, we’re working as hard as we can and we just hope the results will start to show here pretty soon because we will start running out of time here pretty soon if we’re going to be a factor for the championship.”

LOOKING AHEAD TO DAYTONA, YOU HAVE A HISTORY OF RUINING COCA-COLA PROMOTIONS AT THAT TRACK WITH THE PEPSI CAR, ARE YOU GOING TO BE IN THE PEPSI CAR? “We’re not going to be in a Pepsi car. Unlike Coca-Cola, Pepsi doesn’t get in to the types of marketing that they’ve done in the past. That’s why I love them so much. They’re a class act with a great product and company. We’ll have our day at the Pepsi 500 out in California. But we will with our DuPont Chevrolet and our Pepsi associate sponsorship still try to ruin that day and take Pepsi into Victory Lane.”

DO YOU CARRY OVER ALL THE WORK FROM TESTING FOR THE 500 AND THE RACE INTO THE JULY RACE? “Absolutely. That’s all we have to go off of is the laps that we had in the race at Daytona which we were very strong. We were handling good and we were fast and then we had our failure and so we’re going to make sure we don’t have that same problem. I feel confident in that. That’s our base set up. We know it’s going to be slicker and hot and conditions are going to be different. We’ll work off of that once we get there.”

WITH 10 RACES LEFT UNTIL THE CHASE HOW MUCH DOES THIS RACE SET THE TONE FOR YOU AND OTHER DRIVERS TO MAKE A RUN IN THE SECOND HALF HERE? “The way I look at this race is this is not the type of race track that we’ve struggled on this year and I hope we don’t struggle this weekend because it would be disappointing. I feel confident that this is a good track for us. I think that this is a track that’s important because this is the first race in the Chase. This is not a track that we’re thinking and worrying too much about because we need to be better on the 1.5-mile tracks and some of the other tracks that we’ve gone to this year. I hope that we can put a solid run in here this weekend and make us feel good about if we get in the Chase that we can start the Chase off right like we did last year.”

CLINT BOWYER, NO. 07 JACK DANIELS IMPALA SS met with media and discussed last year’s win at Loudon, making up points in the standings, what his team needs to do to make the Chase, the importance of consistency, and more.

ARE YOU HAPPY TO BE BACK AT LOUDON? “Oh, absolutely. Last year t was good to me, but that’s not to say that it will be this year. A lot of things have changed. A lot of people have had time to work out the little kinks and quirks of this car. So hopefully the Jack Daniels Chevrolet will live up to what it did last year or at least half as much. It was so dominant. You can only ask for so much. I’m just looking forward to it. I like this race track.”

IS THERE MORE PRESSURE COMING BACK AS THE DEFENDING RACE WINNER? “That’s funny that you say that (laughs) because I told somebody on a radio show last night that yeah, it is. You’ve got to live up to what you did last time and there is a little bit more pressure. But it is what it is.”

ON THE RUMORS THAT HE MIGHT MOVE TO ANOTHER TEAM “I’ve signed up with RCR for three more years.”

ON THE NATIONWIDE SERIES, WHY HAVE YOU BEEN SO FRUSTRATED THE PAST COUPLE OF WEEKS? “We’re not running up to our potential. Those guys are a championship team and I just want to make sure that we do everything that we possibly can to make sure that we win that championship. I think we’ve got close to a 200-point lead, but by no means is that enough. One bad race and they can be right back in the hunt. So we’ve got to stay polished and got to stay doing the things we’re doing, but we’ve got to pick our program up and need to be racing for wins and leading laps.”

WOULD YOU BE SATISFIED IF YOU WENT THROUGH THE REST OF THE SEASON WITHOUT A WIN? “As long as I’ve got that one trophy at the end of the year, yes. But like I said, I’m afraid that we might not be able to do that if we don’t get some wins and start at least running a little bit farther up front.”

CHICAGO IS COMING UP IN A COUPLE OF WEEKS AND THEY’VE PUT UP LIGHTS, DO YOU EXPECT THAT RACE TO BE ANY DIFFERENT? “I’m looking forward to it. Chicago is kind of a sister track to our home track in Kansas and the way I look at Chicago is that if I can run good at Chicago, chances are I’ll run well back home at Kansas. So that’s an important race track for me.”

LAST FALL, YOU SAID YOU WERE GOING TO SEND RICHARD CHILDRESS ON A HUNTING TRIP AGAIN “Yeah (laughs) maybe the fall trip; it’s pretty early for him to go hunting yet.”

SEEMS LIKE EVERY TIME HE GOES HUNTING, YOU GUYS WIN HERE “Absolutely. Well don’t get me wrong, we want him here. He’s a racer and he leads the pack you know. But every now and then it might be good for a vacation.”

DO YOU GUYS FEEL LIKE YOU’RE MAKING UP ANY GROUND ON TOYOTA, IN BOTH SERIES? “I don’t think so. In that Nationwide deal, all we can work on is our cars and try to beat them on the long run. You’re not going to overcome the horsepower difference. But we’re doing everything we can do and they’ve set their program up. I’m not going to say it’s all horsepower, they are getting through the corner better than we are and their cars are working better than ours right now. We’ve just got to work harder, and pick our program up.”

FROM A DRIVER’S VIEWPOINT, IS IT PRETTY COOL TO BE ABLE TO RACE AT INDY WITH ALL THE HISTORY THERE? “Oh yeah, with the history and tradition behind that place. Above and beyond that, it’s such an awesome race track. It’s got a golf course in the infield for crying out loud. It’s an awesome, awesome race track and the fan turnout and everything that surrounds that race, it’s really cool to be a part of it.”

OBVIOUSLY YOU WANT TO BE HIGHER IN THE POINTS RIGHT NOW, BUT IS THAT UNNERVING A LITTLE BIT? “So far, so good. We just had four bad races. We went into Richmond on seven top-10’s in a row, won Richmond, and then right after that the bottom fell out. We’re just trying to get things turned around. Last week at Sonoma, having a top five there was a breath of fresh air and hopefully a step in the right direction.”

DO YOU USE THIS AS A TEST FOR THE NEXT LOUDON RACE WHEN IT’S MORE IMPORTANT STARTING THE CHASE, OR DOES IT REALLY MATTER? “Every race, it seems like, in this series anymore is equally important. Obviously inside the Chase you’re racing, hopefully, for a championship. But it takes races like this one and running well to put you inside that Chase to have a chance at the championship. So every race is equally important.”

DO YOU WALK IN HERE FEELING A LITTLE BIT DIFFERENT SINCE YOU WON LAST TIME? “Yeah (laughs), but not really. There’s a little bit more pressure. You want to be able to back up at least half of what you did last year. That’s just the case.”

ARE YOU FEELING THE SAME CRUNCH EVERYBODY ELSE IS WITH THE GAS PRICES? “Heck yeah. It costs me just as much as it costs you to fill up. It’s the same for everybody. It’s just an unfortunate situation we’re all having to live through right now. It’s a strain on everybody. You’re seeing scooters and everything else going down the road. I haven’t bought a scooter yet, but I sure saw one and thought it was a good idea the other day.”

YOU HAD SUCH A DOMINANT PERFORMANCE LAST YEAR AND JEFF BURTON LED FLAG TO FLAG ONE TIME. HAS HE GIVEN YOU ANY ADVICE? “No, I think his was a little bit different circumstances with that restrictor plate and everything that they tried that year. But it was just coming down to a great race car. It was a great race car all weekend long. Gil and all the guys on the Jack Daniels Chevrolet just hit it. You only get that car every so often and hopefully maybe it’s that time again (laughs).”

CAN YOU BRING WHAT YOU HAD LAST TIME TO THIS RACE? “I think things are going well. We’re back a little bit farther than what we should be in the points. But there are two or three cars there in front of us that I think that we can outrun into the Chase. I think that’s the biggest thing is that we’ve just got to stay honed in and focused on the task at hand and being consistent and that’s what we’re good at.”

HOW COMPETITIVE IS IT RIGHT NOW FROM 1 – 43? IS THIS THE PEAK FOR NASCAR? “I think it’s as competitive as anything I’ve ever raced in and maybe as ever in NASCAR. I mean you’ve got a lot of teams that are capable of winning races and a championship and you’re given a puzzle and it’s all about how you put the pieces of the puzzle together. Right now RCR is doing a really good job of that.”

IF YOU COULD CHANGE THE SPEEDWAY HERE, WHAT WOULD YOU DO? “I like it. We won here last year. I like mile race tracks like this. I think it races well. I think it puts on a good race for the fans, which is what this sport is all about. And if it’s fun for the people in the stand to watch, it’s fun for us in the car as well.”

TO BE ABLE TO WIN THE CHAMPIONSHIP, DOES THE DRIVER NEED TO BE ABLE TO RUN WELL ON ANY TYPE OF TRACK, ROAD RACING TO SHORT TRACKS? “I definitely think so, especially inside the Chase. They throw a little bit of everything at you inside the Chase. To win the championship, you’re going to have to run well on all of those. As competitive as this sport is and as deep as the talent is, you don’t make mistakes anymore. The guys who win the championship don’t. And to be able to beat them for a championship, you’re going to have to be good everywhere.”

HOW BIG OF A DAY WAS THAT FOR YOUR TEAM TO GET A TOP FIVE AT SONOMA LAST WEEK? “It was awesome. For whatever reason, we’ve run well at Sonoma. You wouldn’t think of going to a road course looking for a little bit of a breath of fresh air to get things started back off on the right foot. It’s not secret that the last four races before that were terrible. They were disastrous for us. It was partly due to part failure one race, and I crashed another race and that’s two 38th place finishes or worse and it set us way back in the points. But Sonoma, for whatever reason, I felt comfortable. I was confident going into that race that we could get things turned around. That’s not always the case at a road course so it was kind of funny that I was looking forward to Sonoma. Any track like that, in my opinion, you can’t look go into it worried. You’ve got to go into it looking for a way to get things turned around and that’s certainly the way I look at road courses; and any race like that where they can make or break you so much. I think it’s a situation where you stand to lose a lot of points and if you run well you can gain a lot of points.”

WHAT’S THE BIGGEST CHALLENGE OF THESE 10 RACES LEADING UP TO THE START OF THE CHASE? “You’ve got to be there week in and week out. Consistency is always going to pay off in championships and that’s the case with these next 10 races. You’ve got to be there. You’ve got to run up front; that’s a hard thing. But you’ve got to be consistent if you’re not going to win the race, you’ve got to finish inside the top 10. Right now, if you can rattle off ten top-10’s, you’re be in it.

“I don’t think we’re off anything big. We’ve just got to do a little bit more of the same like we’re doing and maybe a little bit better calls. The biggest thing is qualifying. The last handful of races our draw has been 10th or better going out and we’ve got to qualify better and have got to start up front and have better pit selection, which leads to better racing.”

HAVING MOVED UP IN THE POINTS AND NOW COMING TO LOUDON, THIS IS HOW YOU WANT TO START THOSE NEXT 10 RACES, ISN’T IT? “Absolutely. Coming off a good run at Sonoma and coming to a place like this gives you a little bit more confidence boost that hopefully you’ll run well here and start moving forward up through the points. You want to make that gap of cars in between you the 12th place as big as you can. A little bit of confidence there is knowing that a couple of the cars in front of us we’ve run better than this season and over the course of the long haul, I think we can. And there are a few of them behind us that I think we can run better than. So there’s a little bit of confidence there. But anything can happen in this sport, as we all know. And you’ve just got to make sure you stay honed in and focused on making sure that those bad things don’t happen.”

CASEY MEARS, NO. 5 KELLOGG’S / CARQUEST IMPALA SS met with media and discussed today’s announcement that he and Hendrick Motorsports will part ways at the end of the 2008 season.

ON HIS TOP 5 FINISH AT INFINEON RACEWAY LAST WEEKEND “Yeah, that was definitely something the team needed. We had good strategy, obviously, and I think we had a good car. Fortunately there at the end a couple guys took themselves out there and so it was a good, solid day for us. It was something we really needed. It’s been a long year so far. It’s been a short first part of the season, but definitely a long season. It was something team needed and I needed and the whole program needed.”

IT HAS BEEN ANNOUNCED THAT YOU ARE LEAVING THE No. 5 TEAM. WHAT IS YOUR REACTION TO THIS AND HOW LONG HAVE YOU KNOWN? “I’ve known now for a couple of weeks. Rick (Hendrick) and I sat down and had a talk. Right now, we didn’t know exactly how things were going to play out so we haven’t really jumped around to make any conclusions right away. But it’s disappointing. I’d love to be there, obviously. Hendrick Motorsports is a great organization. We’ve definitely had a rough year for probably several reasons. But everybody has worked hard. Alan (Gustafson) and Rick and everybody has worked hard to try to do what we can to help improve the program, and we just haven’t had the luck. We had some bad luck at the beginning of the year and then had some bad runs to back it up. It’s frustrating that we’ve had the start to the season that we’ve had. Unfortunately, it’s kind of weird because we still have the second half of the year. Everything has happened so early. But the big thing is obviously we have a lot of potential still. I don’t feel a whole lot differently about the team or the organization or the guys than I did at the beginning of the year. I feel like every week we have the opportunity to capitalize on a good finish and for some reason, we’ve just really, really struggled. The team as a whole and then we seemed to struggle a little bit more the latter part of the first half of the season and it’s unfortunate that things have come out the way that they have, but at the same time, things happen for a reason. We’re just going to try to finish off the rest of this year as strong as we possibly can. There are really no hard feelings toward anybody right now. Everybody is just going to be working hard and trying to get good finishes because at this point, it doesn’t do anybody any good to worry about what’s going on and not focus on the remainder of the season. We’re just going to continue to work hard on that and see what happens for next season.”

OVER THE YEARS, WHAT WAS THE NO. 25 TEAM AT HENDRICK AND NOW IS THE NO. 5, FOR WHATEVER REASON THERE HAVE NEVER BEEN CONSISTENCY AND GOOD FINISHES. IS THERE ANYTHING, ORGANIZATIONALLY, THAT YOU CAN POINT TO THAT SETS THAT CAR APART FROM THE OTHER THREE IN TERMS OF PERFORMANCE? “The biggest thing is that’s probably one of the most difficult things for all of us. There is no real one place you can point the finger and say hey, this is bad. It’s funny. I think if you did this with a lot of teams, if you analyze really how their whole season played out, you could look at four races right now that we wrecked out or just got in an issue that really wasn’t our fault, we’d be sitting in about 12th or 15th in the points right now and we probably wouldn’t be having this conversation. We’ve struggled a little bit as a whole this year, with the new car. It seemed like (Dale Earnhardt) Junior and Jimmie (Johnson) kind of grabbed a hold of it a little bit better as far as those teams performing on a weekly basis. And if you look at all of us, we’ve struggled at times. The races that we had good races going, unfortunately we had an issue and it’s made us look worse than we are this year. It’s frustrating because of that reason. I don’t think that there is a hoax or a problem with the No. 5 team or anything like that, that transferred over from the No. 25. It’s just really some hard luck at the beginning of the year and we backed it up with some bad runs. Fortunately we had a good run at Sonoma. The team has a lot of potential. We’re there. If you look at Darlington, we had one of the fastest cars on the race track. We made one decision on the set-up and fell back to 21st. We went back on that change in a pit stop and were driving right back up to the top five and we had a header blow off, of all things, and blowout the left front tire and we’ve never seen that happen. We just have had some stuff like that happen this season. At the end of the day, this is a performance-based sport. My uncle has always said you’ve got to put the numbers on the board and that’s how you keep your job and keep your ride. And unfortunately for a few different reasons we just haven’t been able to do that this season. It’s kind of funny because I say that now and we still have the whole second half of the year to work on. So I think we can have some good performances here before the year is out. The best thing that I want to do is get this No. 5 car back up as high as we can in the points and get some good finishes for myself and hopefully get a good opportunity for next season.”

CAN YOU TALK ABOUT THE MARKET FOR A CASEY MEARS RIGHT NOW? AGENTS YOU’VE HIRED? THINGS YOU’RE LOOKING AT? “There actually are some good opportunities out there right now. I’m pleasantly surprised. You know you don’t really think about it a whole lot. I wasn’t thinking about it a whole lot going into this next year. This wasn’t in that mindset. But I’m definitely talking to different people. There are some good opportunities out there and I’m looking forward to having more discussions to see how that’s going to play out. But as of right now, I don’t have enough details to really discuss it. But I am pleasantly surprised with the opportunities that are out there.”

IS IT MORE DIFFICULT SINCE YOU ARE WITH A STRONG TEAM WITH GOOD TEAMMATE AND THAT THE OTHER DRIVERS ARE ALSO CLOSE FRIENDS OF YOURS? IS IT HARD TO SEPARATE BUSINESS FROM PERSONAL? “It is and it isn’t. I think because I’ve got such good friends over at Hendrick Motorsports, I understand more than ever that it’s business and you can separate that. At the end of the day, obviously Rick is trying to run the best possible business he can and do the best things he can for his company. At the same time we’re all really good friends still. I think the fact that I do have such good relationships over there makes these conversations a little bit easier in some respects. And in some respects, a little bit harder because you’re leaving some good friends. But at the same time, we race around each other every single weekend regardless of what team you’re with. When I was with Ganassi, (Chip Ganassi Racing) still some of the guys at Hendrick were some of my best friends. So I don’t think that will change by any means. But at the same time, it makes maybe some of these conversations a little bit easier to go through. Obviously it’s disappointing. It’s not exciting to be going through this again, you know. It’s been year in and year out that we’ve been making changes, or I’ve been making changes. I’m really looking forward to finishing off the rest of this season strong. I know we can do that. Everybody has a pretty positive attitude. It almost seems like now that people know kind of what’s going on, it’s has almost relaxed things even more and it almost seems like it’s going to go better (laughs) from here on out, just because the tension isn’t there wondering what’s going to happen. I see us having a strong second half of this year and hopefully from here on out, get with the program where I can build a couple of good seasons in a row and build something to go from there.”

YOU WON A RACE LAST YEAR IN THE NO. 25 CAR, MOVE TO THE NO. 5 CAR, AND NOW HALFWAY THROUGH THE SEASON ARE GIVEN THIS ANNOUNCEMENT. DO YOU FEEL LIKE YOU’VE BEEN GIVEN ENOUGH TIME? HAVE YOU BEEN TREATED FAIRLY IN THIS SITUATION? “I don’t a lot of the details of what’s going on behind the scenes. Obviously I think that because we have good relationships there at Hendrick Motorsports, Rick, out of everybody wanted to see a multiple year deal and see me get some consistency. So, people have made decisions because they’ve had to make decisions. I don’t know why everything has gone down. That would be a better question for Rick and some of the guys with the team. But he understands my situation more than anybody and that getting some stability would be good. But decisions are made for certain reasons and like I said, it’s frustrating but at the same time I can’t control a lot of those things. So, hopefully in my future, somewhere before I’m about 45 (years old), I can get a couple of years in a row (smiles). That would be good.”

ARE YOU GOING TO STAY IN THIS SERIES, OR IS OPEN-WHEEL A POSSIBILITY? “No, no, no. I want to be here. This is the best series in the world. Right now it’s the strongest, most competitive place and really, if you want to be a race car driver and prove that you can be the best, you need to be over here and that’s where I want to be.”

DO YOU EXPECT TO TALK WITH KYLE BUSCH SINCE YOU ARE THE LATEST AUTHOR OF THE DIARY OF THE LAME DUCK DRIVERS AT HMS? “I don’t imagine so. I think I’ve got more experience than Kyle in changing teams. The lame duck thing is one thing that I don’t agree with completely. That’s probably, typically, the next thing I’m going to be answering for the next months until we figure out exactly what’s going on with my career for next season. I’ve been through this enough to know that it doesn’t do anybody any good to run poorly. I think it’s important now more than ever to run good. I’m going to be working very hard. The team is going to be working very hard to put themselves in a position for next season to be the best they can in points to start the year. The transitions are never fun. But at the same time now that it’s out, everybody can take a deep breath and just focus on the remainder of the season and that’s what we’re going to do.”

SPEAKING OF THE LAME DUCK STATUS, THAT RELATIONSHIP DECLINED AS THE YEAR WENT ON AND HE WAS NOT ALLOWED TO ATTEND TEAM MEETINGS. DO YOU EXPECT IT TO BE DIFFERENT OR SIMILAR IN YOUR CASE? “I don’t know. If it was the case, I wouldn’t be surprised. It wouldn’t be disappointing. I think that from a certain perspective that was the case. A team has got to protect what they’re doing as well and in those meetings things are shared that they may not want me to see for next season. Hopefully I do get to attend them because it is a benefit for sure, going through the remainder of the year. I haven’t heard of anything like that. Do I know that anything like that is going to happen? I don’t know. I didn’t really see that with Kyle, obviously, and I don’t expect that to happen. But if it did, it wouldn’t surprise me, nor would I be upset with it other than the fact that I’d be losing some information here and there on each race track that the other drivers have to provide.”

THE NO. 24 AND THE NO. 48 ARE IN THE SAME SHOP AS ARE THE NO. 88 AND THE NO. 5. DALE JUNIOR IS THIRD IN THE POINTS. ARE YOU GETTING THE SAME LEVEL OF EQUIPMENT THAT HE IS? ”I do, really. It’s funny to say this now, but more than ever Hendrick Motorsports has got the parity that it needs. What you’re finding with these cars is we’ve got some different stuff throughout the shop, but everybody has the advantage of grabbing a hold of all that. The biggest thing I’ve noticed this year is just how sensitive these cars are. Earlier in the year, the biggest mistake we made was thinking that man, you can change everything on these cars and it doesn’t do anything. It’s the same. And at times, it is. You’ll change about 10 million different things on these cars and nothing responds, but then you go out and you pull about an eighth-inch of camber and all of a sudden you’re one of the fastest cars on the track. I think finding that sweet spot in these cars has been difficult and I think the No. 88 found it early in some ways in some things that worked for Junior. And they’ve sort of just stayed in that window. Where earlier this year, we were bouncing around a lot just going from one set-up to another and really trying to find where our path was.

“We’ve sat down and talked and realized that (with) making some small changes and getting some direction, we’ve really started to narrow down more of what we like. So I don’t think with our performance and the way that things have gone this year, is because they’ve been giving me poor equipment. We’ve had great race cars in a lot of ways. Alan and I had trouble getting our communication down early. Now we’re starting to get a little bit more on the same page and we’re starting to see a little bit of progress and starting to develop some trends. Unfortunately, after last year we had gained some momentum and won a race and Darian (Grubb) and I were starting to get on the same page. Now you move into the No. 5 car and you’ve got to learn a new crew chief, new driver scenario and on top of that, learning a new car. So that just kind of threw us for a loop at the beginning of this year and obviously that some of the reason when we didn’t have the performance. But that’s also why I’ve got a lot of confidence that we can perform the rest of the season because I know it’s there. We’ve just got to wrap our arms around it and make the right decisions and move forward.”

DO YOU JUST TRY TO REMAIN UPBEAT AND HOPE THAT YOU HAVE THE KIND OF YEAR THAT KYLE BUSCH IS HAVING NOW? “Yeah, I don’t see why we can’t, to be honest. It’s frustrating to go through these scenarios but beyond this right here, we’re still at the race track, do you know what I mean? We’re trying to make the best race car we possibly can. That team’s got a lot of pride. They want to run well. I want to run well. We’re just going to continue to work hard. There are no hard feelings anywhere, I mean really. It’s a scenario that developed from reasons that I really know why it actually ended up happening, but it happened for a reason and now we’ve just got to focus and buckle down and do our jobs like we know how.”

GIVEN THIS ANNOUNCEMENT AT THIS TIME OF THE SEASON, WHAT’S THE LEVEL OF COMMITMENT THAT RICK AND THE REST OF THIS TEAM IS GOING TO GIVE YOU? ARE YOU PLANNING FINISHING OUT THE YEAR IN THIS RIDE, OR IF YOU FIND SOMETHING WILL YOU MOVE ON BEFORE THE END OF THE YEAR? “I think that Hendrick Motorsports is as committed as ever to making sure they’ve got a fast race car, if not, maybe more. Obviously now that we know we’ve struggled a little bit, they really want to find exactly why that has been. For myself, I want to do the same. I’m committed to finishing out the remainder of the season with Hendrick Motorsports. I haven’t even thought beyond any of that. I’m going to have discussions about next season with other teams. If something develops toward the end of the year where it makes sense for everybody, given the scenario, I don’t know exactly what the future holds. But right now my plan is to finish off the rest of the year with Hendrick Motorsports. When it gets down to the end of the year, you start seeing things happen that you wouldn’t have thought would happen at this point in the season. We’ll see how that plays out as time goes on. But right now, I think that Hendrick Motorsports is very committed and in seeing the No. 5 car do well and I’m the same.”

YOUR NAME IS ALREADY BEING CONNECTED WITH A FOURTH CAR OVER AT RCR. ARE YOU INTERESTED IN THAT? HAVE YOU TALKED TO THEM? “They are a great organization, obviously. If that was an opportunity, it would be great. As of right now, I’m just getting my feelers out to everybody and trying to see what exactly is out there and what the opportunities are. So far, I’ve seen some really good opportunities and if something like that is to develop, it would be a great opportunity. Right now there are a lot of things out there, surprisingly. I wasn’t even thinking about it. I wasn’t thinking about next season. I was thinking oh my God, when I heard the news; I’m thinking there’s not going to be anything going on. But the more you dig into it; there are a lot of things that are happening for next season. There are a lot of teams that are continuing to grow and add new teams and making changes for next season. So I am pleasantly surprised with the opportunities and hopefully will have some good conversations. I’d like to get something tied up as soon as possible just so we can all just take a deep breath and relax and focus on the remainder of this year.”