NASCAR BGN: Park Returns to Charlotte - Site of His First Busch Race
4 October 2000
When Steve Park climbs into the #31 Whelen Monte Carlo this week at Charlotte he can't help but reflect on all that has transpired in his racing career, south of the Mason-Dixon line, since he climbed into a Dale Earnhardt Inc. Busch car here in 1996. That race saw him start 13th, and run with the leaders before his day ended in a second-turn crash on lap 117 relegating him to 29th spot. The fine performance enabled him to secure a fulltime Busch Series ride from DEI in 1997 when he won three races and finished third in the point standings. The next year he moved to Winston Cup where, after overcoming devastating injuries in a 1998 crash, he has earned one victory and turned in several good performances. While Park thinks about his career, his Ted Marsh Racing crew will think about what they have overcome to race in Charlotte this week. The Connecticut-based team that has enjoyed success in the Busch North and Modified Series had hoped to race here in May but a test a few weeks before the race revealed they were behind on the body of the car. Marsh Racing elected to bypass the Charlotte race. Since then crewmembers have spent countless hours in the shop working on the car's body. They hope their work will pay off in qualifying and Saturday's race. Steve Park on 1996 Busch Race At Charlotte: "The Charlotte Busch race is where my career down here all began. I remember that race as if it was yesterday. We ran really well but got in trouble and tore up the car. I remember I was pretty mad about the whole thing. It's funny how you look back on those times and laugh. It was the most important race I had ever run and I was disappointed because it ended like it did. But things turned out great. Dale offered me the Busch ride for the following year and that led to our current Winston Cup deal. Ever since that Busch race here my career has been great." Steve Park on This Weekend's Race: "You have seen what this team can do. We started dead last at Dover two weeks ago and finished ninth. We almost won New Hampshire and ran well at Richmond. If we have had problems, they have been in qualifying. Charlotte isn't going to be an easy place to qualify. They normally have a ton of cars trying to get in the race. If we can make the race I know we will run well." Marsh Racing Team Manager Brad Wheeler On Racing At Charlotte "We tested here in May and based on that test we decided we had to cut body off and rework car. We had a downforce type body that worked good at Darlington where we ran with the leaders most of the day. But when we got to Charlotte for the test it was pretty obvious all of the other cars had evolved with their bodies. They had run Texas and California races and tweaked the bodies to the point where they were just faster than we hoped we could be. We ran our car and got it to the point where Steve was comfortable but we just couldn't get speed out of it. We talked about it decided to change the body and get a lower drag configuration. Hopefully we have cut a lot of the drag out of it. We will see this weekend if it worked. "Changing the bodies like we did isn't something we were used to in the Busch North Series. We don't run any highspeed tracks over a mile there so low drag bodies aren't a specialty. Down here, they have three types of configurations for the bodies. They have high downforce, an intermediate configuration, and then just a low drag body for superspeedways. We haven't reached that level yet. But they run a lot more high speed tracks than we do. This is a challenge to us. But in racing you better pay attention to your competitors or you will get left behind." TBS will televise Saturday's race at 1:05 p.m.