NASCAR WCUP: Dallenbach: 'I really don't care if they think we're athletes or not'
30 August 2000
Posted By Terry
Callahan
Motorsports Editor, The Auto Channel
Cartoon Network Ford driver Wally Dallenbach has hunted wild game
in some of the toughest environments imaginable. He admits Darlington
Raceway, site of Sunday's Southern 500, is one of the most demanding
tracks
on the NASCAR Winston Cup circuit. Dallenbach talks about this
toughest-ever
hunt and the track known as "Too Tough to Tame."WALLY DALLENBACH (No. 75 Cartoon Network Ford Taurus): "Probably the Zambezi Valley in Zimbabwe, Africa, was my toughest hunt. We were hunting buffalo mostly. The problem was that the country we were in we could usually drive to where the game was. But it had rained so much we could not drive in to where we were hunting. It was in the mountains. So we had to walk into the country where we usually would drive in order to hunt. We basically had a four-to-five hour walk in just before you started hunting. It was just a lot of walking, a lot of hiking. It was real hot, real humid. Physically, that was one of the toughest hunts I've ever done. The sheep hunt I just did up in the Northwest Territories (Canada) comes a close second. That hunt in Africa was the toughest, because not only was it hot, but it was rough country. The Zambezi Valley looks just like Colorado. It reminded me very much of Colorado. It was real steep, real rocky, lots of trees, lots of big, deep valleys. It was like hunting in the mountains of Colorado."
WHAT MAKES DARLINGTON SO TOUGH? IS IT ONE OF THE TOUGHER TRACKS THE CIRCUIT GOES TO? "It's one of the tougher places we go to, but there are a lot of tough race tracks we run on now. We just got done with one. Bristol is tough. There are lots of places that are tough, but I like racing at Darlington. I like the track. It's a slippery race track, so you have to stand in your seat every lap. It's a driver's race track. It's tough too because it's hot down there this time of year. At Darlington you have to be careful because you can definitely get into trouble there. We all need to have respect for one another and you've got to give a guy a lot of room and they'll give you a lot of room. It's a tough race track because it's so slippery. It's real abusive on the tires and you don't have much rubber left after a few laps. You just slide a lot. That makes the track seem a lot narrower. You're just always on that straight edge. The tension becomes a strain sometimes. You can have moments of much more peace of mind at other tracks. It's a challenge mentally."
THE GALAXY MOTORSPORTS PIT CREW CRANKED OFF FOUR PIT STOPS AT BRISTOL IN LESS THAN 15.5 SECONDS. TALK ABOUT WHAT THAT MEANS TO YOU. "The pit stops were great. If we can crank those pit stops out at Darlington when it means something in regards to track position, then at the end of the day we'll have something to show for it. The pit stop thing is always important, at Darlington, even more so. It was good to see we had good stops. Hopefully now we can just put the pit stop thing behind us. Maybe now we'll automatically have good pit stops every time we come in. I guess I expect good pit stops because I know we have good guys. It's just when you get the bad pit stops that it works on you mentally. These guys are so hard to pass on the race track that if you lose seven or eight spots in the pits, you use your stuff up getting by those seven guys that you lost to in the pits. It's good when you get great pit stops like we've been getting lately. You're proud of the team and proud of the guys. You don't think about it much until you have a bad pit stop."
FOOTBALL SEASON BEGINS THIS WEEKEND. HERE'S THE OLD QUESTION: ARE DRIVERS ATHLETES? "All I have to say to anyone that thinks to drive one of these cars it doesn't take good physical condition is that I'll give them a two-second cushion and all they have to run is 18-second laps at Bristol and let them run 50 laps straight and lets see what they look like after 50 laps. I really don't care if they think we're athletes or not. Until you sit in one of these cars and do it yourself, then you can answer for yourself whether we're athletes or not. I don't get wrapped up in that. I don't really care if people think we're athletes or not. Let them do what we do. I think anybody that's gone through the Richard Petty Driving School or any of those driving schools has a little bit better appreciation for what a race driver goes through in four hours in a stock car. When it's hot, I've lost up to six pounds in a car. One time I lost eight pounds, but I wasn't preparing myself as well back then. You've got to drink a lot of fluids. I use a product called 'AquOforce' (bottled water with 40 times more oxygen than normal water) that's made a big difference for me ever since I started using it. That's kept me in better shape in the race car and also it has kept me hydrated better. If you find something that works, that's what you use."
Text provided by Brian Hoagland
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