Dodge NASCAR Winston Cup Notes, Quotes from Thursday Daytona Test Session

BILL ELLIOTT (No. 9 Dodge Dealers/UAW Dodge Intrepid)
"Ray (Evernham) has given me a great opportunity. With Dodge coming in almost three years ago and putting together a great program and Ray backing that up with what he's put into the equation has really made it a fun effort for me and for the race team. It's been great to see Mike Ford (Team Director), I brought him on my deal in 2000, and he's really grown and shown to be a great leader. It's just like Mark (Martin) said, you encircle yourself with good people. That's what brings out the best in you. It's not every time you can put it all together and win races. If you can just do it once or a couple of times in a year's time you've done a heck of a job.

"I've always said if you come here in February and leave with a good weekend and a good run it always kind of sets the stage for the rest of the year. I still feel that way. You work all winter to come to this one event. It's the Super Bowl or World Series or whatever you want to call it, but Daytona is the place. It's where you want to come. It's where you want to win.

"It seems like in the past, just like the DEI cars have found whatever it takes to win restricted. Whether they do it with this new body change, I don't know. Restrictor plate racing is a whole different deal. I like to go run where you run. If you've got a car, you've got a car. I don't care where you go you've got to have a car under you. That's one part of the equation. Here you could have a good car and end up in the middle or the back and you're not going anywhere. At least at Pocono or Darlington or wherever, if you've got a pretty good car you can work your way back to the front and do it in a systematically type situation. Here, you just can't run up through the pack and pass a bunch of cars because you're three or four deep and you get to a point and there's a stopping point. It's just different. I don't know how to describe it. You go into these races and you know something is going to happen. You hope it's not to you, but you know there's probably going to be a big one sometime during the day because we run so close together.

"I think back then (before restrictor plates) if you were off a little bit you could back off, reassess it and go back. For example, if you were running up on a pack of cars, you could back off and have the luxury of coming back and let the cars get lined up as the race progresses and kind of pass one car at a time. Now, you've got to make big moves or you've made a big mistake. That's what has seemed to transpired over the last few years. Either you're a hero or you end up in the infield care center. There's no in between. I didn't realize it back then, but at least at that point we were running fast but you could systematically strategize where you were going to go and what you were going to do. Now, it's harder to do.


BILL ELLIOTT (No. 9 Dodge Dealers/UAW Dodge Intrepid)
"I would hope we would have been a little better to this point (in testing). The first year Mike Ford and I went to Talladega, that was the very end of '99, we had one of the worst tests I've ever had. It's a wonder Mike Ford just didn't run the other way. I don't think he had been working for me a month. They swept the floor at the shop and built new cars. We came down here and qualified third and won the 125 and finished fourth in the race. That just shows the dedication of these guys. This is a test. We'll go back, evaluate where we are. If they've got to cut these cars up and go in a different direction, I'm sure they will. That's what we're here for. We'll just take it a step at a time, and that's about all you can do when you come to these deals.

"We made several mistakes (last third of 2002). Not only situations that happen on the race track, but I guess we made some team growing mistakes. It's a young team. In Atlanta, we changed the rear gear right before the race. The one we put in had never been run. We had a problem with it. We had a real bad vibration in the race. We tried to fix it. There's just certain things you can't overcome. A few times we shot ourselves in the foot. I made some mistakes and just kind of ended up falling off the cliff before the end of the year. You get that momentum going and it's hard to keep it going. You had some teams that could do no wrong. I don't know how you explain it. I think you see it in any other sport we go to. Everybody gets momentum and they can carry it to the end of the year and sometimes we can't. Last year we learned a lot about where we need to be this year. Now we've got to apply it.

"We had a pretty good roll, but there again I still think we're a young team and that's where you make your mistakes sometimes. We had some things happen that I'd never even heard of. One of the Loudon races, we had a float hang in the carburetor and it quits running. I've never had that happen in my career, just some crazy stupid stuff, some stuff that never should have happened. It wasn't anybody's fault. It was just circumstances.

"I can't imagine what he's going through. To live it every day, at least looking back on what I did from '95-2000, probably my saving grace was getting in Ray's car and racing because I could forget about the other stuff. There again, the problem is you never could get away from it. I see what he's trying to build and what he's trying to do and it's a tough task in today's world. I don't know if a single guy can do it. I'll give him a lot of credit. He's come a long way. Where it leads him, I don't know. The problem I see is where's this sport going to go. From what I started with my own deal in '95 versus where it's at in 2003 and where's it going to be in 2005 or 2006 and trying to keep the type sponsorship and the level you've got to have and the monster you've grown to this point and keep all that going and prospering in the right direction. That's what I see as the most 


BILL ELLIOTT (No. 9 Dodge Dealers/UAW Dodge Intrepid)
difficult challenge. It's all about people and keeping those people together and keeping those people happy. From what I've seen of these race teams, if you don't have sponsorship and you don't have people, you don't have anything. It's 10 cents on the dollar at the end of the day.

"That's pretty much what's left right now. That's it. That's what you've got. You look what dominated this past year, and that's it. I guess the Roush cars won the most races last year. It's there. That's what this evolution is going to be (multi-car teams).

"We ended up Homestead on a good note. We didn't win, but we ran well all afternoon. We didn't have any problems. I think we addressed a lot of the issues we had in the latter part of the year. We made some people changes, some people moved around. I hated to see Kenny (Francis) go over. I guess he's crew chief  for the 19 car now. That was a tough loss for us, but Mike Ford and Derek (Jones, Evernham Motorsports Senior Engineer) and all the guys, we've still got a lot of stability there. Ray knows what he's doing.

"I think Kenny will bring a lot to that (19 team). I think that will help Jeremy and we can both worth together for a common goal. That's the way it's got to be. You've not only got to use the resources within your team, but if you've got multi teams, you've got to use all the resources. That's what I keep seeing about more teams. That's what's going to dictate this sport down the road.

"From what I understand with all the aero numbers, everybody is about the same. I don't know what you're going to change. (Smaller fuel cell) kind of achieved its purpose at Talladega, eventually, right down at the end of the race. The problem at Talladega was there was so much inconsistency in fuel mileage. We were getting terrible and the GM guys were getting good at that time. Some of the guys were good, but we just couldn't get very good mileage that day and we had to end up making an extra stop. Some of the guys could make it to the end, and that kind of got everything out of whack there. Until you can be equal, where you can run the same laps and do the same thing... I think that's going to be the strategy of the 500, fuel mileage and how well you can run. There again, you're banking on the race going green the whole way, which is highly unlikely."



STERLING MARLIN (No.  40 Coors Light Dodge Intrepid)
NOTE: Marlin posted the third fastest time in Thursday morning's test session with a lap of 183.434 mph. Kyle Petty in the No. 45 Georgia Pacific Dodge Intrepid was the fastest at 183.733 mph.

"I think we'll be in pretty good shape. We've got the same car we ran in all the speedway races since 2001, and it's been a real good car for us. It's led every race we've been in. We won a qualifying race with it and we came close in a couple of (Daytona) 500s, so I think we're going to be in pretty good shape. We've got another car we need to pick up a couple of tenths to be competitive with, but right now we're right pleased.

"Chip and Felix have a great team put together. The guys at the shop put in a lot of hard work. We've got a lot of good people. They're building cars left and right. We've got a lot of stuff left to try. We're going to try to get back to Talladega in a week or so to run some stuff in. It pays a lot to win this thing. There's a lot of prestige, so we don't want to leave anything laying on the table.

"That's about the 1000th and tenth time (I've been asked about my neck). It's OK. I'm been doing a little stuff. I got some stuff from UT, weights to build you back up. I did it last year and it seems to be the same amount of weights with the same number of repetitions. It never really got weak. The neck really never hurt the whole time. It felt like I needed to pop it. After Richmond is when it was really sore.

"They say it's supposed to be stronger. When a bone breaks it's supposed to callous over and builds up more calcium on it. It's stronger now than it was.

"The technology now has gotten so far. Back then (without restrictor plates) we were on bias ply tires. I guess Elliott's got the record at 210 mph here. It just kind of went where you aimed it. We didn't have any rules on the spoilers. We'd just lay the spoilers straight back. It was a pretty wild ride. The race wasn't bad, but qualifying would take your breath.

"After Richmond, it was really sore. We went to Kansas and was just about over it and did the same thing again. My neck never hurt. It took three weeks after Kansas to get my chest or ribs or whatever I messed up...You got up in the morning and it didn't hurt. If you'd wake up in the morning every now and then and stretch you could kinda feel like it needed to pop. We went back the first of December and got X-rayed and everything is fine.




STERLING MARLIN (No.  40 Coors Light Dodge Intrepid)
"After Richmond, we went to Dover and tested that week at Kentucky. I was going to Dover and we had to get the trainer to meet us at the airport. I had to do some therapy on my ribs they hurt so bad. Finally, I got over it and then we wrecked at Kansas and they say that's what broke my neck. I think the Richmond deal cracked it or something because Richmond hurt a whole lot more than Kansas did.

"You look at 2001, we were third in points and no one gave us much of a chance when the season started. We came back last year and had the same team, the same everybody and led points. We felt like when we went into last year we had a pretty good chance to win the championship from the previous year with the fall we put together. We've got the same everything now, so I think we can come back and be as strong this year. Hopefully we won't get hurt.

"There was nothing I could do about it. Once they saw the X-rays and I saw 'em, I knew I couldn't drive. It's frustrating. We worked hard all year to get in a position to try to win the championship and then have that happen. Worst things have happened. We're glad to be back this year and we're looking forward to getting it done this year.

"Last year we wore the Hutchens and Hans. We're going to wear the Hans this year. If I'd had it on last year, it might not have cracked my neck, I don't know. Given what we saw, the Hans deal looks a little safer than the Hutchens deal. NASCAR is always doing things to make it safer.

"I guess everybody saw it. It's a deal where I'd been racing cars a long time and I knew going around the track the fender was on the tire hard. What were they going to do? Put you in jail? We knew we were going to have to pit anyway and go to the rear. We thought we'd just try to call their bluff and get out there and try to pull it off and get back in the car. It didn't quite work. I didn't know he (inspector) was behind me. He scared me when he touched me on the shoulder. The hardest part was getting the window net hooked back. I didn't think I was ever going to get it hooked. I finally got it hooked. If I'd known that I wouldn't have tried to hook it. I would have just come in the pits. It almost killed me.

"You never know what's going to happen (in Daytona 500). In 2001 we led a lot of laps, and I think last year we led the most laps. The thing that was aggravating last year was we came back and raced Ward for the finish. Then they stopped the race. That killed us.

STERLING MARLIN (No.  40 Coors Light Dodge Intrepid)
"A guy came to the shop every day. A lot of guys put the foam like stuff that forms to you, kinda like the Indy car guys run. He fitted it up and it felt real good, so we're going to try to run it.

"I saw it (space shuttle) coming off turn two. The guy says the space shuttle is taking off, so I was looking out. It was going real fast.

"I remember when Alan Kulwicki won it it was really tight between five guys. Last year we led a long time. It was like it was meant to be. We'd fall out of a race and the other guys behind us have trouble. I remember the road course race at Sonoma, I thought we'd fall to fourth or fifth. When we walked out of the garage I think all the top four cars had trouble. It was just a weird deal. Hopefully we can come back and compete and try to win the thing this year.

"At certain tracks you get at you hit the right combination and you don't have any trouble. The tracks I see that have a lot of trouble are tracks like Kansas, Chicago, tracks that are semi-banked and everybody is real close and you get the aero push a lot. They tested big greenhouse cars at Charlotte with softer tires and I don't think they really saw anything there. The cars are so slick now, so dependant on aero. I saw a picture the other day from '95. We were leading at Charlotte and I was in front of Gordon and Earnhardt. The left front valence was a mile off the ground. We didn't think anything about an aero push. If it was like that now, you'd run 40th. It's just the evolution.

"The car is running good. Two years we left after testing down here and we were 30th. They guys had to go back and work and cut the cars apart. The hard work paid off. We came back down here and almost won the 500. We came down here last year and had a pretty good test. This year it looks like we're even better than we were last year. We are better. We're just trying to get the other car up to speed.

"I still haven't figured out what Casey (Mears) is carrying around in his backpack. Every time I see him, he's got a backpack on. I haven't asked him yet. He's probably got a Gameboy or some cookies or something. I don't know what's in there. I've got to ask him. I wouldn't have a backpack. I've got everything I need in my pocket.

"We're having a good time. That's what I did last year. If you can't have a good time, you might as well stay home. I feel real good. The guys have a lot of good cars built up. We're going to do some more testing before we go back to Las Vegas and try to win at Vegas again. We need to get off to a quick start. We've done that the past two years, so we hope we can do it again this year."