NASCAR WCUP: Jarrett continues to persue his second championship
7 September 2000
Posted By Terry CallahanMotorsports Editor, The Auto Channel
Dale Jarrett, driver of the No. 88 Quality Care Service/Ford Credit Taurus, will go into this weekend's NASCAR Winston Cup race at Richmond trailing point leader Bobby Labonte by 111 points. Jarrett, who is also one of five drivers eligible for the Winston No Bull 5 one million dollar bonus if he wins Saturday night, has strung together 15 straight top-10 finishes as he pursues his second straight series championship. He, along with crew chief Todd Parrott, were this week's guest on the NASCAR Winston Cup Series teleconference.
TELECONFERENCE TRANSCRIPT
DALE JARRETT --88-- Quality Care Service/Ford Credit Taurus -- HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT BEING IN THE NO BULL 5 AGAIN? "It would be nice to get another few dollars in the budget. It's just a great program. I think the biggest thing about it and the neatest thing about it are the fans that have the opportunity. This is something that could really change those peoples' lives and it certainly changes our and we just like the opportunity of really trying to make someone's day."
YOU'VE DONE WELL AT RICHMOND. "Richmond's been a good place for us. We've run up front, it seems, before the night is over. A lot of times we don't seem to get there until after halfway, but Todd makes the right adjustments on the car and we just kind of let the race track come to us and we usually are there battling for a win. We've won there, we've lost races on a restart, we've had a red flag put us in a position to where we got past right at the end, so it's been an interesting race track for us. A lot of things have happened, but most of them have been good."
HOW DOES A RAIN DELAY EFFECT YOU AS A DRIVER COMPARED TO SOMETHING LIKE THE COCA-COLA 600? "A lot of that time that was spent on Sunday was just kind of down time. You were just sitting around and talking, discussing strategies and what we needed to do, so it wasn't a physical type thing. It's just that the whole day wears on you more mentally because you're thinking so much about what you need to do, and with Darlington being such a tough place, I think that it wears on you more mentally than physically."
COULD YOU EXPLAIN WHY RICHMOND, COMPARITIVELY SPEAKING, IS NOT SUCH A SCARY PLACE TO HAVE A STUCK THROTTLE AND COULD YOU GIVE US YOUR ASSESSMENT OF THE NEW HAMPSHIRE SITUATION AS IT STANDS NOW? "Anywhere is a scary place with a stuck throttle. I mean, that's no fun anywhere that it's gonna happen. You're going off in the corner fast at Richmond too. We run, when you're talking about an average of 125 (mph), you're gonna have quite a bit of speed at the end of the straightaway, but you're a lot closer to the walls there so the impact seems to be lessened somewhat -- just like Bobby's deal was at Darlington. Even though it was a hard impact, you don't have quite as far to go there. We're not concerned as much with the race track, we're concerned with that not happening to us -- that we make sure we do whatever we need to do to ensure it not happening to our race car. These are things that shouldn't be happened, so we're taking as many precautions as we possibly can with that. As far as New Hampshire, we'll go there next weekend and we're gonna race just like we always have. The Bahre's have built a great facility, they're wonderful people that have just done a whole lot for this sport. They've done a whole lot for the state of New Hampshire. The one thing that I was hoping either them or someone at NASCAR could do would be to get us some type of barrier, but it's not a necessity for us to go there and race. We raced there long before these things started happening and we're gonna continue to race, so it's not a situation where anybody's gonna look at not going or anything like that. We're just looking at all aspects of safety right now and doing whatever we possibly can."
GIVEN WHAT'S HAPPENED THERE AND WITH HUNG THROTTLES LATELY, ARE DRIVERS CONCERNED, WORRIED, SCARED? WHAT WOULD BE THE EMOTIONS OR THOUGHTS GOING IN THERE? "I think the only thought is that we want to do what is best for everyone in the name of safety. We're certainly not scared to go there. As I've said we've raced there many times before. Certainly we're gonna go back there and we're gonna think of the two young men that lost their lives there and what have we done since that time to make this safer. Obviously there are things that have been done, everyone is paying more attention to it, and obviously it also still happens so we still have a ways to go to making things totally better. So, as long as we're moving forward and in a positive direction, that's all that we're asking. We realize that things can't happen overnight and whenever something is done, it has to be something that is the right thing and sometimes that takes a little bit of time to research. You can't just snap your fingers and make these hung throttles go away and you can't just snap your fingers and have just any kind of barrier put up there -- something that may be more harmful than it would be good -- so these things take time and I'm sure, in time, that all the right things will be done. I would have thought that we could have gotten something in there by this time, but I'm also not an authority on that."
WHAT ABOUT A NO BULL 5 RACE ON A SHORT TRACK? "Yeah, this is kind of something new for us to go to a place like Richmond -- a three-quarter of a mile race track -- and have a million dollars up for grabs for five of us to get. So I think things could get quite interesting if we can get down towards the end and we have the normal racing we have at Richmond. I think it's probably one of the best tracks for our racing that we go to. It always seems to come down to the end between two, three, four, five guys and there would be nothing better than to see the five that are eligible for this to have a chance and see what would take place for a million dollars on a short track. We've talked about it a lot, it would be interesting to see what happens."
DOES THE TRACK SURFACE HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH THE CARS RUNNING SO COMPETITIVELY THERE? "It's probably a combination. The configuration of the race track, the speeds are high enough that we have good racing but they're slow enough that we can race side-by-side. It's kind of the proper amount of banking for that, that allows us to go side-by-side -- two and sometimes three-wide -- and then I think they took really good care of the racing surface after they built it. It's been sealed a couple of times and it just seems that the surface allows us to race really hard and side-by-side, so, if I were gonna go build a race track somewhere I would look very hard at what the Sawyer's did there at Richmond because, to me, it provides really great racing."
DO YOU THINK YOU HAVE A GOOD SHOT AT CATCHING BOBBY LABONTE? "We still have a chance. We're improving. We ran better Sunday even though we didn't get in the front very long, but we were competitive. I thought for the majority of the race that we might gain a couple of points on Bobby, but that shows the great team that they were. They stayed after it and got themselves to the front at the right time, but we still have a chance. There's a lot of racing to go in 10 races. You talk about things could happen at Darlington, they could happen anywhere so we just have to do our job and continue to improve ourselves and make sure, again, that all of our finish are in the top 10 if not the top three."
WHEN YOU LEFT JOE GIBBS RACING DID YOU EVER EXPECT TO BE CHALLENGING THEM FOR THE TITLE? "Certainly. I knew that Joe Gibbs would build a winning organization -- one that would be winning championships. Anything that he's ever done he's been a winner at, so there was no doubt in my mind that he and Jimmy Makar would make all of that happen. I was hoping that I would get myself in a position that one day I could race them for a championship and they certainly have gotten themselves in that position. They've got a great organization and a lot of good people. Bobby Labonte is one of the most intelligent and talented drivers out there and he and Jimmy make a really good combination. This is fun and if we can't win and Ricky (Rudd) can't win, then I certainly hope that Joe and Jimmy and Bobby get that championship."
DO TIRES CONCERN YOU AT ALL GOING INTO SATURDAY'S RACE? "No, not really. I know that Goodyear has made an effort, because of the heavy braking conditions that we have at Richmond, that they've gone the extra step to try to make sure that the bead doesn't get melted by the brake heat with people that use excessive braking there. They're doing a good job. They didn't change the construction or compound of the tire or anything like that and we saw in the spring that it allows for good racing, so no concerns whatsoever."
WHAT ABOUT THE POINTS RACE AND ALL OF THESE TOP 10s EVERY WEEK? "It's a total team effort that allows us to run in the top five week-in and week-out and put ourselves in that position, especially with the competition now. You just have to try to outwork everyone. There are a lot of people willing to do whatever it takes out here, but I know that Todd Parrott and all of our people at Robert Yates Racing are willing to do whatever it's gonna take to ensure that we have a top-five car week-in and week-out, so it takes that combination of everyone working together, working hard and that Todd and I have to keep our line of communication open -- that we have to be ready and willing for change. As we've talked all year, these tires are totally different and the things we knew in '96, '97, '98 and '99 don't exactly work now. We can try those things, but we have to be ready to change. I think it's teams those teams and drivers and crew chiefs that are willing to make those changes that are gonna do well. We seem to be on our way back that we can do that and I'm very pleased with what I see going on. Things like happen Sunday, we can't control that. All we can control is what we do and we made great pit stops all day. I do think that there's something we have to look at, and when I say we in that NASCAR needs to look, is that the pace car really slows the guys right in front down. Bobby Labonte, and I won't take anything away from their pit crew -- they did a great job down there and he did a good job on pit road -- but we were down 600, 700, 800 RPMs from what our pit road speed was for a quarter of the way down because we couldn't get past the pace car and that just gives them free time -- people down on that end. So, as it turned out, Bobby and Jeff Burton -- by qualifying bad -- really got a pretty good break because of that and Jeff Burton -- it didn't help him quite as much because he was a little further down pit road. But Bobby and them really got a break by doing that because it sure made up a lot of time, so it's something that we need to address -- that the pace car needs to speed up to make sure that doesn't happen and that's something that we'll do -- but we've got a lot of racing left and the championship battles that we've been in we know that what we have to do right now is go out and try to win races and see if we can win three or four of these last 10 and get ourselves in a position to win the championship."
WHAT ABOUT THE TALK REGARDING LOWERING ENGINE SIZE? "Everybody has their own opinion on it, but Robert Yates has always been one of the people that, I think, has tried to look ahead in the sport all these years. It seems the last four or five years that's been something on his mind as we talk about slowing the cars down, to make for better racing, to make things better at Daytona and Talladega. That's always been the one constant thing that Robert has brought up and I think there are enough people listening now that they kind of agree that all of these other things that we may be trying are gonna be difficult to do. So, the next thing is to cut the engine size -- the cubic inches -- and I think that would be a very, very good direction. I think it could help solve a lot of the problems that we seem to talk about having without hurting the competition."
WOULD IT MEAN YOU COULD FORGET THE RESTRICTOR PLATE AND USE THE SAME CONFIGURATION EVERYWHERE? "I'm not an engine guy, but I think if you're gonna drop and you could get it to where we'd lose 125 to 150 horsepower, then I think you're looking at not having to use the restrictor plates."
TODD PARROTT, Crew Chief --88-- Quality Care Service/Ford Credit Taurus -- DID YOU TEST AT RICHMOND THIS YEAR? "We tested last week actually and it went pretty good. We took a brand new car up there and a car that's been successful and won a couple races for us up there, and I think we've talked to Dale and the guys and the new car seems to be the way to go, so we're throwing everything we can at it to at least get two of these things so far this year (No Bull 5 wins)."
WHAT ARE SOME OF THE THINGS A TEAM AND CREW CHIEF DO TO GET THE CAR IN QUALIFYING CONDITION? "It starts Monday morning after the previous Winston Cup race. We get going on that car and it takes a week's worth of work preparing the car and you're pretty much, basically, preparing the car for qualifying for either a one-lap run or a two-lap run. So when it comes time to get the car ready for race trim, you've spent a week getting it ready to qualify and then you get to spend two hours getting ready for the race, so there's a lot of time spent."
WHAT DO YOU DO TO GET THE CAR RACE READY? "A lot of spring changes, swaybars, shocks, truck arms in top or bottom holes, widening the front fenders out, the tape configuration on the grilles, front-end settings where you obviously run less camber for race conditions because of long green flag runs. There is a lot of stuff to be done after qualifying. They came up with a new rule this weekend at Darlington that the garage will close one hour after qualifying, so you've got one hour and whatever time you come in the garage that next morning to get your cars ready, so, like I said, you spend a week getting ready for qualifying and then you get to spend maybe two hours getting ready for the race."
WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS ABOUT DROPPING THE ENGINE SIZE AND HOW MUCH LEAD TIME WOULD YOU NEED TO GET THAT IN PLACE? "On the engine side of it, like Dale said, Robert's worked close with NASCAR for many years and being the type of engine builder that he is -- he's very smart on those kind of things -- and he's expressed his opinion to them and that's the area Robert feels like that the cars need to be slowed down would be with the cubic inches and then you could open the restrictor plates up to have more throttle response, instead of messing with the aero part of it. I'm all for making races better. The races that I've seen at Talladega in the past have been pretty incredible the last couple of years, so making it any better I don't know if you could do that, but as far as making the cars have more throttle response -- where if a guy has to get out of the gas and has 30 or 40 guys trying to run over him because it takes him two laps to get back up to speed, I'm all in favor of that. I think Robert, with the idea of the cubic inches, is definitely an area to look at if the aero or drag package don't work."
HOW MUCH TROUBLE WOULD IT BE TO MAKE THE CONVERSION? "I'm gonna tell you, they don't allow me over in the engine room."
HOW DO YOU FEEL BEING 111 POINTS OUT AT THIS POINT IN THE SEASON? "With 10 races left, 111 points is not very many, but when you're racing Bobby Labonte and Jimmy Makar and the Joe Gibbs team for the championship, I guess you could probably tack on 100 to that because that's what it feels like. Those guys were so consistent last year, we had to beat them for it last year and we know how consistent and strong they ran the second part of the season. But we all know that anything can happen. Bobby's had a great year this year, a lot of luck. You have to have a lot of luck, we proved that last year. Last year we had a year where we had a lot of good things happen to us, a lot of lucky breaks that it takes to win a championship and Bobby's kind of had those breaks this year. So, we'll just keep racing and keep spitting out good race cars and trying to run up front -- try to lead some more laps. We've got to lead laps now. We can't sit back there and wait to try to finish in the top five, we've gotta lead laps and run hard from the time the green flag falls if we're gonna win it. We'll see what happens."
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