NHRA NEWS: Midseason Teleconference Transcript

NHRA POWERade Series Midseason Teleconference
Date: June 28, 2006
Moderator: Michael Padian 
Drivers: Melanie Troxel, Ron Capps, Greg Anderson, Angelle Sampey
 
MODERATOR:  NHRA would like to welcome the members of the media
participating in today's teleconference which will include the four POWERade
Series points leader at this midway point of the 2006 season (12 of 23
events complete).  
 
This will be the second of three scheduled teleconferences during the 2006
season in what has become a continuing effort on our behalf to make NHRA and
its drivers accessible to media not just when we are in town but throughout
the course of our 23-event season.  To that end, if there's anything we can
do to make your season-long coverage of NHRA POWERade Series easier, please
don't hesitate to call.
 
NHRA featured some incredible points races in 2005.  2006 has the makings of
an impressive encore performance.  The average lead in the four NHRA
POWERade Series categories is a mere 24 and a half points, and there are a
total of 15 drivers within 120 points or six rounds of first place.
 
 
MELANIE TROXEL 
 
THE MODERATOR: Which brings us to our first driver on the call, Top Fuel
points leader Melanie Troxel.  Melanie has a 24-point lead over Doug
Kalitta.  Melanie has led the POWERade Series standings wire to wire this
season with two wins and seven final rounds in 12 events.  Melanie also
became the first female in the 40-year history of the Driver of the Year
Foundation to win one of its quarterly or year-end awards.  This week she
was nominated for ESPY awards for Best Driver and Best Female Athlete.
 
Let's start there, Melanie.  What were your initial thoughts when you heard
about the ESPY nomination?
 
MELANIE TROXEL:  You know, it's been such an incredible season, I feel like
I've said that so many times already.  Just to come out and perform the way
we have on the racetrack is always the goal of every team out here. So
really these things have caught me completely off guard.  I hadn't even
considered getting that kind of recognition.  I'm honestly floored by it.
It's been really exciting.  (Husband and Funny Car driver) Tommy (Johnson
Jr.) and I are right now making our plans to go out there for the ESPYs and,
like I said, it's just very exciting.
 
THE MODERATOR:  Questions for Melanie.
 
Q. What do you attribute your successful year this year so far to?  Any one
thing you can point out?
 
TROXEL:  No, I don't think -- certainly not in our case -- there's not any
one thing.  It's a combination of many, many different things that goes from
Don Schumacher giving us everything we need to run the team, (crew chief)
Richard Hogan, his ability to adapt to different conditions out there, and
the guys that work on the team. It is so many different things. Everybody
playing their part to make things work as well as they can.
 
Then there's always that intangible part that even when you have all the
right people and all the right parts, you don't necessarily go out and run
as well as you would like.  We just have been very fortunate that things are
going well for us. 
 
Q. With the ESPY recognition, you really are becoming a crossover artist
where you're becoming known outside of drag racing to the general sports
public. Are you getting more of that sort of celebrity notice?  Have you had
any contact with Shirley Muldowney?  What are your impressions of her? Did
you watch her when you were growing up?
 
TROXEL:  Well, I think going back to the beginning of your question, that
sounds like a lot of pressure, being a crossover artist.  Sounds like
something you refer to musicians as.
 
But, no, I think it's great to be getting some outside recognition, not only
outside of drag racing, but outside of motorsports in general.  I mean, it's
great for our sport.  I think just in general this year, since the beginning
of the season, running as well as we have, certainly our team is getting a
lot more attention and therefore we have a bigger following, a lot more fans
stopping by our pit area.
 
I can't say that we've quite reached the level where I can't go out to eat
or anything yet.  But certainly we are getting more attention.
 
Q. Have you had any contact with Shirley?
 
TROXEL:  Yeah, I mean, I've been around Shirley for many years. In fact, I
think I raced against her in 2002 or '03, maybe it was 2003. While I don't
remember specifically as a kid watching her race, I was aware she was out
there, that there was a female out there racing.
 
Shirley and I aren't close friends or anything, but I certainly respect what
she did in the sport.
 
Q. Getting off to a start like you did, is that necessarily always a good
thing or a bad thing?  Can it also be bad to get off to a fast start, where
maybe you get overconfident, eventually things start to slip away from you
as the season goes along?
 
TROXEL:  Well, just speaking from our experience, this is the first time for
myself and I think for our entire team to be leading the points like this.
I can only speak from this one experience.
 
I could see theoretical situations where it might not be a good situation.
I don't think it's been bad for us.  There's a lot of attention and maybe
some additional pressure that goes along with being the points leader.
 
I really don't think -- I won't say that it hasn't had any effect on our
team whatsoever.  I mean, there may be some ways that that pressure has
affected us negatively.  But I think, in general, we've done a really good
job with dealing with that.  If anything, I think it's kind of given us an
opportunity to get accustomed to that.
 
I would much rather come out and have that additional pressure for the first
time, leading the points for the first time, early in the year, get it out
of the way, get used to it so that come late in the season, we can battle it
out for the championship and not have that pressure thrown on us late in the
season like that.  
 
I think that would have a much more negative effect than having it early in
the season.  Early in the season, there's not quite as many expectations.
It's early enough that you know a lot of things can happen.  I think, like I
said, if anything, it's given us an opportunity to actually get more
comfortable with that.
 
Q. You had a huge lead in the points early on in the season.  Kind of fallen
back a bit.  What has been the problem?  Missing the setup? What has been
the problem?  
 
TROXEL:  Well, I think we were on a roll early in the season.  We were
obviously doing a very good job and having a certain amount of luck involved
in there.  I don't think since then -- I don't think we're doing that
poorly.  We're just not having as good a season as we were early in the
year.  
 
We're working on that, trying to step our program back up.  I think right
now we just see (Mac Tools Top Fuel driver) Doug Kalitta is on a roll.  He
struggled a little bit earlier in the year.  They've figured something out.
I'm kind of looking at it that it's just kind of -- you know, that everyone
is going to have a period of time when they're running well.  I think we'll
be able to pick our program back up.  Doug has done very well.  At this
point we're still leading the points (by 24 over Kalitta and 110 over
Brandon Bernstein).
 
I don't think we've dropped that far off.  I think we've just had some
different conditions.  We've had a change in the weather where we've come
into some of the hotter tracks and maybe we're not quite as good with that
setup, but we're working on it and we're continuing to get better.
 
I think it's just something that you're going to throughout the year have
certain conditions that you run better in and other conditions you don't.
It's just something we keep working on.  But I don't think it's been a
matter of any major thing going wrong or any major change in the team.
 
Q. (Don Schumacher Racing teammate and two-time defending POWERade Series
champion) Tony (Schumacher) got his win on Sunday.  Was it a little tough or
did you feel a little uncomfortable when you were doing so well and Tony was
struggling?  
 
TROXEL:  Well, no, actually it just felt pretty good.  I won't lie to you.
They've had their fair share of success out there.  They are our teammates
and we don't want them to struggle that much, but knowing that, coming into
the beginning of the season, everybody would have to have said they were the
team to beat.  I mean, you need to get every point you can build up against
them.  
 
Certainly I think we were all surprised to see them struggle as long as they
did.  As our teammates, we wanted to help them out as much as we could,
until it comes to racing each other on Sunday.  That's kind of the way that
deal works.  
 
I think the emotion was more surprise, just really surprised they struggled
that much.  I think everybody knew they would eventually get their program
sorted out.  It certainly looks like they have.
 
Q. Going to do anything with your time off here?
 
TROXEL:  Actually, we're spending the first week or so just at home getting
caught up on things, being home bodies.  I think the plan might be to go
hang out with some friends on a houseboat down on Lake Cumberland the second
weekend.  See how that works.  It's getting pretty crowded with different
things, going to the ESPY awards.  I think we have to be out there Monday
for that.  
 
Our time off is shrinking up, as it usually does.
 
Q. You have this time off now, but you're coming into that tough western
swing of back-to-back races.  Are Denver and Infineon good for you?  Points
lead has slimmed down to 24 over Kalitta.
 
TROXEL:  I don't know personally that I have good or bad racetracks. I grew
up in Colorado, so Denver is my hometown track.  I do have a special place
for that track.  I've done well at Seattle and Infineon in the past, not in
Top Fuel, but in Alcohol Dragster.
 
They're not bad tracks for me by any means.  I think the bigger issue is
whether or not they're good tracks for Richard Hogan, whether or not he has
past data on those tracks.  That's a big part of the equation, is that if
he's run there before with similar equipment.
 
For the driver, a lot of the scenarios out there are the same.  I mean, you
either have a really good track and the car goes down the track, or if you
have a bad one, you're going to pedal it.  There aren't that many different
things we can do.  You react to it and you hope you did a good job reacting
to it.  
 
Richard has the job of trying to work with the new tire and anything new
they've put on the car and different track conditions.  We came on board
with Don Schumacher Racing at Denver last year. We should have some data,
but we do have a new chassis and some different parts on the car and stuff.
I think that's going to be the big factor, is whether or not Richard feels
comfortable with the information he has to draw from.
 
THE MODERATOR:  Melanie, was Seattle significant for you for Top Alcohol?
Did you get a first win there?
 
TROXEL:  Yeah, Seattle was my First National event win in Alcohol Dragster.
I believe I've won divisional events there as well.  I've always enjoyed
that track. I'm looking forward to going back there.
 
 
RON CAPPS 
 
THE MODERATOR:  We'll go ahead with funny car points leader Ron Capps now,
who has already won a career-high five events in 2006.  Ron has a 44-point
lead over John Force.  He's the points leader now for 11 consecutive weeks.
Ron has finished second three times in his career, but is still looking for
his first POWERade Series championship.
 
Ron, I know you've tried to sort of steer clear of the talk of points and
championships.  Do you think that's going to be more difficult as we move
into the second half of the season now?
 
RON CAPPS:  No, I don't mind talking about the points.  I've been here
before.  You just don't want to start concentrating too much on them.  We
know they're there.  We know that's the topic of conversation.  That's why
I'm on here.  That's what's going to make the fans come to the racetrack
because there's going to be a battle.  We know it's Force and I out front.
Any one of these other guys can catch fire.
 
It's funny, we went to Chicago, kind of lost a little bit.  People said,
ŒOh, maybe this could be it.¹  We went to Englishtown, won, put it back up
over a hundred points.  We struggled last weekend, back down to a little
over two rounds.  I'm really looking forward. I'm enjoying this more now
than I did at the end of last year when it came down to the end.  I was so
engrossed in it.  
 
This year I'm having a better time enjoying it. I'm really looking forward
to battling Force down to the end.  We've already shown we can run with him
and beat him and his whole team for that matter.  There's so many other good
cars you got to watch for, especially coming into some of the races we're
going to.  
 
THE MODERATOR:  We'll take questions for Ron.
 
Q. How much different of a driver are you?  How much did you learn from
going through that epic points battle last year?  Are you approaching things
different than last year?
 
CAPPS:  Yeah, you always learn something from it.  Throughout my career,
even when I was a crew member, ironically when I became a driver, the first
person I went to to ask questions was Ed (³Ace²) McCullough.  It was in
Seattle I remember the first year I got my Top Fuel license.
 
I've always tried to take a piece of everything I could, whether it's
hanging around Dick LaHaie, Dale Armstrong, Don Prudhomme, working with Ace,
the guys I've gotten to work with, just kind of take things here and there
that you can use.  I think any athlete will tell you that.  You can't think
that you know everything.  Somebody can always, especially with experience,
offer something to you.
 
I think Don Schumacher, there's just a lot of people around, a good support
group that I can always feed off of.  Last year, like (the moderator) said,
I've been in the championship (chase) ­ I¹ve been the runner-up three times
in the championship. (So I¹ve) kind of been there.  Last year I was really
close to winning it.  I took a lot from that.  I was getting sick on Sunday
mornings.  In fact, it made me drive better.  I never faltered when it came
to the starting line.
 
Yeah, I did learn a lot from it.  Ironically, you know, I got asked about it
yesterday and this morning, so the word is out, Ace, they found some cancer
in him again.  As we speak, he's under the knife in surgery right now in
Indianapolis. They just found a little bit more on the other side, so
they're hoping to go in and get it out.  But it's kind of de'ja vu.  It was
this time last year that he had the cancer in the first place.
 
To answer your question, what I learned last year, there were so many other
things going on, especially with his cancer, still going to the track,
getting chemo in between the races, it really pushed everything aside.  It
really made it a strange trip down to the end.
 
The racing, here we are about to win a championship possibly, and the racing
was really secondary.  I can't really attribute a lot to what happened to
the end of the year to what we're going through now.
 
Q. You mentioned Ed, what he's gone through.  How much more inspiration or
something would that be to win this championship for Ed?  Does it inspire
you to try harder for him?
 
CAPPS:  It's everything for him.  I mean, obviously it's for Don Schumacher
as well.  Don and I talked.  I've known about them finding the cancer since
before -- right around Bristol. Of course, Ace didn't want anybody to know.
We kept it quiet.  Don didn't find out until Englishtown.  We didn't want it
around to fog up any mission we had.
 
I even said last year, all my guys on the crew, we all wanted to win it for
Ace.  To be honest, I thought he won a championship, at least one or two.  I
was kind of dumbfounded when they told me he never won one.  I kind of
prided myself in knowing the history of drag racing.  I thought he already
won a championship.  He won just about everything in sight.  I was
surprised.  Then it was kind of a mission to win it for him.
 
I hope I got a lot of years left in me, but right now we're really
concentrating on this is our best chance to get him a championship ring.
 
Q. Ron, is Ace the biggest difference between being with Snake and being
with Schumacher?  
 
CAPPS:  Biggest difference?
 
Q. Biggest plus, just the way your career has really blossomed.  Is he the
big factor?  
 
CAPPS:  Yeah, I think so Š It was neat for me because at Snake's (former
team owner Don Prudhomme), when Ace got let go, it crushed me.  I mean, I
was in my room the night of Sonoma when he got let go.  I sat in my room and
cried because he had been such an influence on me.  Every time I went to the
starting line, I wanted to do everything perfect for him. When it didn't
work out, I was crushed.
 
When he was announced as the crew chief on the Brut deal (to begin the 2004
season), I really looked at it as this is my chance to work with Ace again.
He's been a huge influence.  We've really -- the relationship has really
grown a lot between him and I on the track and off the track, but especially
on the track.  Going to battle him on Sunday morning, as you know, he's a
gamer.  I really am thriving on learning how to race from the guy.
 
Q. Did he hold off on the surgery for the start of the summer break?
 
CAPPS:  Yeah.  We kind of knew about Ace's deal prior to Bristol.  He of
course doesn't want anybody to know.  He was trying to get through and do
the same thing last year, get the surgery done right after St. Louis.  We
had the break.  He's so driven, he had it all planned out.  He's so
meticulous about everything.  He had a plan, get the surgery done, have time
to heal, go on the plane, go to Denver.
 
We had the car -- brand-new car we were going to run in Denver. It's a car
we've been running to be front-halved after St. Louis.  That was another one
of his plans.  Almost like he had all these planned out.  Get the car
front-halved, have a brand-new car for Denver, I'll get my surgery done,
everything will go perfect, we'll have a couple weeks off.  So, yeah, he
definitely had a plan.  Anybody that knows him knows how he plans everything
to a Œtee¹.  
 
CAPPS:  I called him last night.  I'm scared right now. I'm really scared.
He's in surgery now.  I'm just hoping everything goes all right.
 
Q. What kind of cancer does Ed have?
 
CAPPS:  Colon cancer they found last year.  He went in for his checkup.
They found a little polyp I believe on the other side of his body there.
Just a tiny bit.  Precautionary, they want to go in and definitely take care
of that, just make sure everything else is good.
 
We don't know what they're going to do, if they're going to do chemo again
afterward or he'll be fine with what they get out.  We're waiting to hear.
He's in surgery as we speak in Indy.  We'll probably know Friday when he
goes home, go from there. We're not sure yet.
 
Q. Down the road, coming to Sonoma, what are your thoughts about that track?
Is it a track you look forward to coming to?  Is it a challenge?
 
CAPPS:  Infineon has always been -- it was kind of a home track.  I lived in
the Bay Area, going to school.  I lived up there, met my wife up there.  I
lived up there about eight or nine years. That was a home track.
 
Besides the fact that when I was growing up, my dad, when he raced, we went
to Fremont and Sonoma all the time, Sacramento for that matter as a kid.
The Bay Area has always been kind of a home track for me.
 
Seattle I've won I think twice, Funny Car once, Top Fuel.  That's always
been a great place for me.  Denver, we've done so-so.  Like Melanie said,
you never know if it's you or the crew chief.  Sometimes a driver goes to
the track and he just does well.  Sometimes a crew chief goes and he does
well.  
 
The Western Swing has always been a good place in my heart.  We're camping
right now in central California at a lake for a couple weeks, then I take
the family on that Western Swing.  That has another add-on to why I love the
Western Swing.  Especially with Bruton Smith, what he's done with the track
at Infineon, it's turned into one of the most favorite tracks we all go to.
 
Q. Where about are you camping?
 
CAPPS:  We're at Lake  San Antonio.  I grew up in San Luis Obispo. Used to
come here as a kid.  Last four or five years, we come up here.  In fact, I
just ran into some Doug Herbert Snap-On distributors parked next to us with
some boats.  It's cool.  A way to get away.  At the same time we run into
some fans.  We're going to hang out here for a couple weeks with the kids,
ride skidoos and boats and stuff.
 
Q. If you compared golf majors to drag racing points championships, are you
the Phil Mickelson of your sport?  Do you feel if you can get one out of the
way, it could be the start of something really cool?
 
CAPPS:  You're always coming up with these bitchin¹, intellectual questions.
You crack me up.  Yeah, I guess.  Hey, to be compared with Phil would be
awesome.  Just to be a contender. If I had to quit right now with what I've
done, I'd be more than happy with the career I've had.  But definitely we'd
like a championship.  To always be a contender, that's all you can ask.
 
Last year hurt.  That eight points, losing it.  In the big picture, the
Oakley team winning it, they were a big part of this team as well.
Everything was perfect.  I don't want to go another year as another
runner-up.  If I have to,  it beats third or fourth.  I can only do so much
as a driver.  The team, a lot of young guys.  I'm hoping to keep the team
together for a long time.  If we can win a championship, it would be
unbelievable.  
 
Q. Five for five in finals this year.  How do you explain that?
 
CAPPS:  Ace and the guys.  Believe me, staging the car.  A couple of those,
I was thinking, man, I don't know if we got it today for this run right
here.  Ace would pull it out.  We've been winning as a team and losing as a
team.  I've made some mistakes.  The first guy to pat me on the butt was Ace
and the crew guys.  They help keep my spirits up.  Vice versa.  I'm able to
win a few on holeshots, which is always good for a driver.
 
Those finals, beating Force when we've beaten him, as Melanie talked about,
the points, down to (44), but those are points we put in our pocket for a
reason.  If we didn't do well at the beginning of the year, we'd be behind
right now.  You try to just show up at each race and get as many points as
you can.  That's all we can do.
 
Q. Why do you think that no No.1 qualifier in either Top Fuel or Funny Car
has won yet in 2006?
 
CAPPS:  You know, I've said it time and again, you really have to look at
our qualifying.  We've won from 14th, 15th.  I think it's just coincidence,
to be honest with you.  Those are good teams qualifying No. 1.  You know,
I'm looking and hoping that NHRA will change something with our Friday night
qualifying.  Maybe there's a way to lock in the top four for Friday night,
have the other two runs.  It's too much dependent on all the Nitro and Pro
Stock classes on the Friday night run.  I really believe that. If you have
one bad run, Dell (Worsham) in Topeka, you can go on a big team that
struggled, have something go wrong on a Friday night run, you're up the
creek.  Very rarely is the weather going to be any better on a Saturday.  If
you don't get that run in, that's usually where the field is going to end
up.  We don't see those conditions ever again during the weekend.
 
Those teams that have been No. 1 are the teams that really go for it on
Friday night.  That's where it ends up.  That's just kind of I think how
it's ended up where those teams maybe don't run as well when it does heat up
on Sunday. 
 
Q. Now with the Western Swing coming up, is this more difficult than the
ones you went through?
 
CAPPS:  Yeah, a little bit, only because Denver is so hard on parts.  It's a
difficult place to go.  It's pretty close.  The Chicago, Englishtown, St.
Louis thing was pretty brutal with conditions changing, hard on teams.  This
one will be as well.
 
I think they're pretty close with the exception of Denver and having to
really lean on your parts because you're a mile high.  You know, I think for
a lot of the teams it's a little more relaxing.  They're closer together.
This last one was very hard.  You have to remember these guys jumping in
these trucks, having to drive race to race.  I think that's probably the
most difficult difference of the two.
 
Q. You're 4-1 against Force this year.  At least one of them was on a
holeshot.  To know you beat him off the line, to you, is that almost as
impressive leading the points?
 
CAPPS:  Standing back, if that was somebody else's record, I would be
impressed.  
 
I just get up for the guy.  I try to get up for everybody.  That just tells
you how big a deal he still is in the sport.  I've said it before.  If you
can beat him to the hotel in a rental car, qualifying, final round, whatever
it is, it's going to be a big deal.
 
Anyhow, yeah, I'm impressed with it.  I'm impressed with my team, what
they've done.  I just try to do the same thing every time.  I get up for the
guy like you can't believe.  We just had a great car every time.  You know,
as soon as you get out of the car, I'm shaking my head sometime in disbelief
of how good we've done. You expect to be able to do that.  When it happens,
keep reeling those wins off, I'm impressed myself.
 
Q. You consider Infineon your home track and your teammate Gary Scelzi also
considers it his home track.  Are you going to take him in the Funny Car?
 
CAPPS:  Well, we were in the final round together last year. I've been in
several of them there.  I've won there before.  Gary is from Fresno. That's
pretty close.  I lived up there for a while.  Gary and I are great friends.
We do the go-kart thing to raise money for Speedway Charities, have a fun
time with that.  It's always been a fun track for me and I know Gary as
well.  If we can both get in the final again, that would be unbelievable.  I
love that place, everybody at that track, what they do.  They welcome you.
Just everything.  You can ask any team, that's a great place to go.
 
I've had great success.  I don't want to jinx myself.  I always think when I
go to a good track, I don't want to talk too much about it.  It's always
been great to me.  I'm hoping I can just repeat.
 
Q. You said you lived up there.  You lived in Cupertino.
 
CAPPS:  Yes.  My wife, I met her, she lived there.  I lived in Mountain
View, Palo Alto, a couple different spots when I lived up there.
 
THE MODERATOR:  Ron, thanks for your time.  You are all set.
 
RON CAPPS:  All right, man, thanks.
 
 
GREG ANDERSON 
 
THE MODERATOR:  Greg Anderson, winner of the last three Pro Stock World
Championships.  He's back in first place again.  He's in first place by two
points as we reach the halfway in the season over teammate Jason Line.
 
You won the first event this year.  You've led the series wire to wire.  Can
you talk about Pro Stock this year. It's been crazy.  Eight different
winners to start the season.  You have six drivers right now within six
rounds of first place.  Seems like you throw a dart every week.  Can you
shed some light on that class, why it's been so close this year?
 
GREG ANDERSON:  It is pretty incredible.  The best way I can describe it,
there's been a lot of teams really, really step up their program in the last
year.  It's funny.  We as racers, usually we can get a feel by the time we
get to Sunday morning who has the best chance of winning the race.  We can't
do it any more.  There's so many good cars right now.  You don't know who is
going to qualify No. 1.  It's a crapshoot who makes the best run of the
dozen cars that are capable of it.  The same thing on race day.  If you
qualify on race day, you absolutely have got a great shot of winning.  There
are so many great cars right now.
 
It's kind of been tough on us.  Everybody is so even, we don't have the
advantage we had over the last couple years. We're pressing harder, trying
to make that perfect run every time, which we didn't necessarily have to do
before.  Usually when you do that, you make a few mistakes.  Everybody is
pressing hard in this class right now. Everybody is running well, but at the
same time making mistakes along the way because the competition is so tough.
You're pressed to make that perfect run every time out there or you're going
to get beat.  
 
It's really, really interesting right now for the fans, for the media.  It's
also creative for us as drivers and as a team, and especially me coming up
the last couple three years where we had kind of a cushion on the field.  We
don't have that cushion any more.  Now it's down to we have to execute
perfectly.  Bottom line is we haven't executed perfectly since Pomona. We're
lucky to still have that point lead to be honest with you.  Too many first-
and second-round losses where either I didn't do a good job driving or the
car didn't perform like it should have.  Any time you're going to make a
mistake in this class right now, you're going to get beat.  It would be easy
to say everybody is screwing up and nobody wants to take the points lead.
It's not necessarily that.  Really a lot of guys are doing a great job, so
many guys doing a great job, everybody is able to beat anybody any more.
It's just wild right now.  I guess that's what everybody wanted.  They want
parity.  We have parity in this class right now.  It should be very exciting
for everybody, except for us the drivers.
 
THE MODERATOR:  Greg, talk about the Western Swing.  Very favorable to you
in the past.  Talk about your mindset going into these next three events.
 
ANDERSON:  It's been very good to me.  Really, we've passed the halfway
point in the season. Got 12 races down, 11 to go.  Before you realize it,
you're past halfway.  You come into the Western Swing which is very, very
tough on everybody.  Three really very different racetracks.  Denver, which
is completely a one-off deal. By the way, I'm up here in Denver right now
testing.  I think there's about a dozen Pro Stock cars up here right now.
We're all testing for the race here because it's so different, it's so
tricky to figure this place out.  Through the western swing, you have three
completely different races.  You come here, it's a one-off deal.  Then you
go back to sea level at Seattle, cool temperatures.  Then you go to Sonoma
where you have sea level conditions, a lot of times 90 degrees.  Just
completely different scenario every time.
 
It really comes down to crunch time now.  It's too late to wait any longer
to make your run.  It's the time to make your run.  If the guy can come out
of the Western Swing with a points lead, if you look at stats from years
past, he's probably going to be the guy with the best chance of winning the
championship.  
 
Two years ago we swept the Swing.  I think we won only one of the three
races last year.  Still we started running good on the Swing last year and
really that was what propelled us to perform well the rest of the year.
Very, very important.  That's why we're at Denver right now testing.  I
think the swing will make or break a lot of people's seasons.
 
THE MODERATOR:  We'll take questions.
 
Q. You went from a dominant (three) year (stretch) to looking over your
shoulder.  Did all these guys catch up or have you slowed down?  What do you
attribute the parity to this year?
 
ANDERSON:  In reality I guess if I look at it, we've been trying to figure
that out all year, too. Basically the rest of them have caught up.  It's so
tough in this class to keep your technology to yourself.  We probably broke
through to a few things that other people hadn't in the last couple years.
We were able to hang on to those secrets, those breakthroughs for a while.
 
It just seems like you can't keep it to yourself forever.  Things leak out.
The more things leak out, I lost a key engine shop guy, my head engine
builder I lost in the middle of last season, went across town to (Erica
Enders¹) Victor Cagnazzi team; he brought a lot of technology, secrets with
him that we had.  Now you have those things to another team.  Things leak
from that team to other teams. That's how things happen.  You just have to
be able -- if you look at Pro Stock cars, people laugh at why we always
cover things up.  We cover our engines up all the time.  We cover the backs
of our cars up, our suspensions up all the time.  We have covers over our
intake manifolds.  People think, ŒWhat are you crazy, why do you have to do
that?¹  It's so tough and so dog-eat-dog, you have to be careful with all
your stuff.  Any breakthrough you make, any secret you find, you have to
hang on as long as you can before it filtrates through the class. Really
we've had a lot of that filtration in the last six months and it shows.
Everybody stepped up to basically the same level performance-wise,
power-wise, and now it comes down to executing on the racetrack.  They've
also raised their game.  They've paid a lot of attention to our team, how
our team operates.  I think I have a very professional team with a lot of
great guys working on it, a couple of great crew chiefs.  People can kind of
sit back and watch the formula and see how it works out, a lot of them have
copied that formula.  A lot of people have bolstered their teams with key
people, they have learned how to work together as teams.  That's kind of
what we showed them.  I guess we created our own worst enemy.  We showed
everybody how to do it, now they're doing it.  It's really up to us to find
a way to make that breakthrough again and get back ahead of the pack.  Right
now we're a little bit stagnant it seems.  They've caught us.  It's up to us
to find another way to put some ground on them.
 
Q. What areas are you working in now that you feel can give you the
advantage that you had last season?
 
ANDERSON:  Well, obviously our generation three engine, we're still working
on that.  We still haven't debuted that.  We still have high hopes for that.
Haven't been able to spend enough time on it because of the way the season
has gone.  We haven't been able to abandon the current engines we have and
just pay attention to the new ones because we're in such a tough points
battle.  We have to keep chiseling at that.  If we get that up to speed, I
think we can make some gains again.  We're probably going to debut another
new car when we come out here to Denver.  I debuted a new car here last year
at Denver. That's when things kind of took off for me last year.  Hopefully
we can make that jump in the next month or so, maybe even on this western
swing, and never look back.
 
Q. As tight as it is, there's not much room for experimentation.
 
ANDERSON:  There's not. That's the tough part.  You can't abandon the things
you've got that have gotten you this far.  You can't slip up at all.  You
get in kind of safe mode, think we're going to have to execute better, do a
better job of driving.  We haven't done that so far.  We have to change
that, make better car runs with our race car, got to do a better job of
driving, both (teammate) Jason (Line) and myself, chip away at that new
engine. Hopefully in another month or so we'll have an edge back.
 
THE MODERATOR:  I'll let you get back to testing.  Sounds like you need
every minute you can have out there.
 
ANDERSON:  Pretty interesting.  About a dozen of us up here.  Like every
national event, every doggone team is within 3/100ths.
 
THE MODERATOR:  Good luck.  We'll see you in Denver.
 
GREG ANDERSON:  Thanks.
 
 
ANGELLE SAMPEY 
 
THE MODERATOR:  Angelle Sampey, you currently have a 28-point lead over
Andrew Hines, who is the current and defending series champion, obviously
coming off of a critical victory over Andrew last week in St. Louis.  Some
notes on Angelle. She has won three of seven events this season.  Angelle
has won 40 career events, that's first among females in NHRA POWERade Series
history, tied for eighth among all drivers in NHRA POWERade Series history.
Angelle is currently second and five wins shy of catching Dave Schultz for
Pro Stock wins in NHRA POWERade Series history.  She's also won
championships in 2001, Œ02 and Œ03.
 
Angelle, that's my question for you right there. How far do you allow
yourself to look ahead this season?  When will you start thinking about
adding a fourth POWERade Series world championship?
 
ANGELLE SAMPEY:  We came into the season thinking about that.  It's been
like the past couple of years, I wanted to get my fourth championship. But
this is the first season that we actually start the season off the way we
need to, to finish it off No. 1.
 
The last few years we've had a rough beginning, caught up somewhere in the
middle, did really well at the end.  By that time, it was just too late to
get the points.  I mean, we've lost the championship in the last couple of
years by just a couple of rounds each time.  We're trying really hard not to
let that happen this time.  Anything can happen.  Lots can change from the
middle to the end of the year.  But at least being in the lead, you do have
the advantage going into the second half of the season.  We're hoping to
hold on to it.  
 
THE MODERATOR:  Eight events left in Pro Stock Motorcycle Series.  Where are
we going to see the differences?  What are kind of the things you should
look for that are going to separate yourself from Andrew or Chip Ellis in
the second half of the season?
 
SAMPEY:  Well, first of all, in Denver, it's going to be really tough for
us.  That's just like Greg was saying, it's a tough tuner's race, even more
so for our Suzukis.  We still aren't running the fuel injection like we wish
we would have been by this time of the year.  We're not ready for it.  That
high altitude -- it's a lot easier for the Harleys with their fuel
injections to get what they need to get done to win the race.
 
We're going to be struggling at that race, hopefully not as bad as we're
expecting to be struggling.  I'm sure we will be a little bit.  We're going
to try to race better like we have in the past couple of years.  That's how
we've won races, by racing better instead of having more performance or more
of a horsepower advantage.
 
I think when we get to Sonoma, it's going to get back -- being back a little
bit to a better of a level playing field for us.  Our Suzukis should run
really fast there.  If the weather conditions are right, you should see
quite a few sixes, both with the Harley and also the Suzukis. After that, it
should be pretty cool, pretty normal for all of us.  Reading, Pa., we always
do well.  That happens to be the best racetrack for me for some reason.  I
think I've won like six or seven out of the 10 years I've been there.
 
It's mainly just staying consistent, trying not to hurt any engines.  It's
really hard when you do break something, our crew chiefs have worked on them
for so long, try to get them right.  If we break something, have to start
all over again.  That's been important to us, not push too really hard, so
we don't break anything, we can keep running for the rest of the year, just
racing well.  Of course, as you know, battling these red lights, trying to
keep it green is going to be a good key in who is going to win this
championship as well.
 
THE MODERATOR:  Getting off to the fast start this year, three wins in seven
events, what do you attribute that to?  What has been the biggest reason for
the turnaround this season?
 
SAMPEY:  I think we actually came into the season a little bit more prepared
than we have the last few years.  That has a lot to do with my crew guys.
They worked really hard this off-season getting the bikes ready.  What they
actually did was took both motorcycles and completely stripped them down to
the bare frame and started all over again like they were building brand-new
motorcycles.  They came up with lots of wonderful ideas of how to avoid
little stupid accidents, wiring problems, mechanical problems that are some
little piece that breaks.  They redesign lots of things, just put all new
stuff on the bike, came up with ideas to make things easier for us to fix
during a race if we're having a problem.
 
I think them going back to the basics is really what made the difference.
Everybody's looking for that extra one horsepower every day.  I don't think
a lot of people go back and just -- back to the basics and rebuild.
 
We had lots of wiring problems last year that caused us to lose races.
Little, bitty actually funny wiring problems.  We went back and we saw that
the body was pinching one of the wires, caused a short.  We lost two races
because of it.  It was something so stupid and so minute.  We never took the
time to go back and look at all those little things that you don't think
might be a factor in winning or losing.  So we did that.
 
I'm riding an older motorcycle, but it's like a brand-new bike because of
what they did to it.