---

NASCAR WCUP: 'We've had more than enough motor' says Wally Dallenbach

17 August 2000

Posted By Terry Callahan
Motorsports Editor, The Auto Channel

TBS Superstation Dinner & A Movie/Imodium AD Ford driver Wally Dallenbach is coming off his best finish of the season after a ninth-place run at Watkins Glen. Now he heads to Michigan Speedway for Sunday's GoRacing.com 500. Michigan is a horsepower track and Dallenbach feels the Galaxy Motorsports team can be a force at the two-mile superspeedway thanks to their Robert Yates engines.

Dallenbach will run the same Taurus he ran at Indianapolis two weeks ago. The car has excellent aerodynamic numbers and is considered the strongest car in the Galaxy Motorsports stable. At Indy, Dallenbach had one of the fastest cars on the track and cracked the top-20 before a pit road accident caused him to go a lap down early in the race.

CONSIDERING THE STRENGTHS OF THIS CAR, DOES THAT GIVE YOU MORE OPTIMISM FOR A STRONG RUN AT MICHIGAN?

"I would be real surprised if we didn't run 100 percent better this time around than we did last time. The last time, not only was our aero off, but our chassis was off. That car was inferior to the one we have this time around. I'd be surprised if we don't run well at Michigan, I really would. This is the car we ran at Indy and it was very fast. I feel like it will adapt to Michigan really well. I look for a really good run at Michigan."

TALK ABOUT THE TEAM ATTEMPTING TO SUSTAIN ITS MOMENTUM FOLLOWING ITS FIRST TOP-10 RUN OF THE SEASON.

"Hopefully, we'll do just that. It's just been frustrating to not get the results we really deserve. At Watkins Glen we worked awfully hard for a ninth-place finish. Considering where we started (35th) and the number of laps we got (12) on the race track before the race, we did an excellent job. We made a lot of changes before the race and just went with them. Ninth-place was a good finish for us considering how poor we were on Saturday. No mistakes were made in the pits and that makes a big difference. You have to get in and out of the pits cleanly and you've got to make the right calls and all that was done. When that's done every week, I feel like we have a shot at a top-10 or top-15 every weekend. At Watkins Glen, nothing went wrong. Maybe we've got the monkey off our back and we can start getting the results we should be getting."

WHAT'S THE KEY TO A GOOD RUN AT MICHIGAN?

"It's a horsepower track. Every race track is a handling race track. Every track is a handling race track and every track is a horsepower race track. You've got to have everything. You can't just have one thing. It's just like everywhere else we go. You've got to have a good race car, good motor, and everything has got to be great in order to have a good finish. If you're off in one area you're not going to have a good finish."

YOU CAN'T BE TOO WORRIED ABOUT HORSEPOWER WITH YOUR ROBERT YATES ENGINES.

"Most definitely. I'm real happy with the help and support we've gotten from Yates. At Watkins Glen we put a lot of gear in the car and I was cranking on that thing. I was turning on it really hard during the race and it lasted and we didn't have any problems with it. That's the kind of stuff you need. You can't be conservative. I think a lot of guys would have been afraid to turn the motor the way we were turning it. We did it, we got away with it and that makes you feel good going to a place like Michigan. We know we're going to have a lot of motor. If we can just catch up with our race cars to match the motors that we have, we'll be a tough race team. We're getting close to that point."

DO THE YATES MOTORS GIVE YOU MORE PEACE OF MIND? IS IT A PART OF THE EQUATION YOU DON'T HAVE TO WORRY ABOUT?

"We know the motors we plug in are going to be good. There have been times where we've had more motor than race car. They could have probably cranked some more timing into it and probably added a few more horsepower and I couldn't handle it. We've had more than enough motor."

NEWT MOORE, crew chief (No. 75 TBS Superstation Dinner & A Movie/Imodium AD Ford Taurus): "The Watkins Glen race helped pull us together more. At Indy, we had a top-10, top-15 car and we had trouble in the pits. We put pretty good race cars together. These guys have been working hard on the pit stops. Our pit stops at Indy hurt us, but at Watkins Glen they helped us. Wally is a winning driver. He's probably the best driver that hasn't won a race yet. We want to get that first win for him. But a ninth-place finish is good for us. I've told the team that's not going to be our best finish of the year. We're going to work from here. We've just had so much bad luck. I've told my wife, 'It's not our time to shine.' At Watkins Glen, we started to shine a little bit. Maybe it's our time now."

Text provided by Brian Hoagland

Editors Note: To view hundreds of hot racing photos and art, visit The Racing Photo Museum and the Visions of Speed Art Gallery.