The Wood Brothers No. 21 Little Debbie Ford Fusion is not guaranteed a spot in Sunday’s Daytona 500, so driver Bill Elliott will have to race it into the field during Thursday’s Gatorade Duel 150. Car owner Eddie Wood spoke about his team’s situation before Wednesday’s practice.
EDDIE WOOD, Co-Owner – No. 21 Little Debbie Ford Fusion – WHERE ARE YOU GUYS AT AS FAR AS CARS FOR THIS WEEK? “The car we wrecked in Shootout is back. They replaced the nose and the front horns and everything. They worked non-stop to get that done, so it’s already here in the hauler and already wrapped in Little Debbie colors, so its already for the 500, if need be. As far as our 500 car, we burned a gear up in qualifying. I’m not sure yet exactly what happened, but we practiced really, really well and were deliberate in how we scheduled our practice. We went out one time – cold – just like you do for qualifying in each practice on Saturday. Then we went out to qualify and had a problem with the gear. So now we’ve got to race in and do all the right things tomorrow and that’s just the way you’ve got to do it.”
WHAT ARE YOU EMOTIONS? “It is what it is. I’ve been down here the last couple of years and our cars really weren’t that fast, but at least we had the top 35 thing to rely on and they raced well. I guess the really aggravating thing about it is that we’ve got a fast car and we just didn’t get to use it in qualifying because something went wrong. Now whether that was our fault, it is what it is. I don’t really have an answer for what really happened to it, but a lot of times when you’re out of the top 35 and you’ve got to do everything you can do, you do more than you normally would. If we were in the top 35, we wouldn’t be standing here having this conversation. You wouldn’t have gone to extremes on friction and speed. Let’s say there are 10 things you can do to make a difference over and above a guy that’s in the top 35. If you do all 10 of them and all 10 of them work, that’s great but sometimes they’ll bite you and that’s pretty much what happened to us. It’s almost like trying to hard. But if you hadn’t gone through that and you missed the race by half-a-tenth of one-one-thousandth, then you would have been like, ‘Man, if I had only done that.’ It’s a stick of dynamite with a fuse on each end and both of them are lit and you’re the one standing there holding it. But I’m really happy with the progress we’ve made in our program. I realize we don’t have a lot to show for it this time, but from where I am I see it all and I’m really happy with all that.”
YOU DIDN’T SIT STILL MONDAY AND TUESDAY DI YOU? “No, we’re also looking ahead to the next two weeks at California and Vegas. Our entire crew flew home Sunday night after qualifying and then flew to Kentucky on Monday morning and tested all day with Bill. I think it was something like 10 degrees, but Gene Nead and the whole crew is going the extra mile to do everything we can. We had some Ford engineers go with us to help and that test went really well. Then we got back and loaded up to come down here this morning, so it’s really non-stop but when you’re struggling with the top 35, it’s everyday all day long. You can go ask anybody else in here about it. Until you live it, you can’t imagine what it’s like.”
IS THERE COMFORT IN HAVING BILL IN THE CAR TOMORROW? “Yeah, that’s good. There’s none better than Bill Elliott, so, hopefully, we can race our way in. If we don’t, we’ll see what happens after that. This is really a hard thing being where we are and we’re not alone. There are eight or 10 more of us in the same position. It’s not a good position to be in, but here we are. I’m just thankful to all my sponsors that they signed on to be with us again this year. You’ve got Little Debbie and the McKee family, the U.S. Air Force, Ford Motor Company, Motorcraft, everybody knew going in that we were out of the top 35 and they still were loyal and confident that we would get things turned around to stay with us, so I’m really proud of that. We will get it fixed and do our best.”
The qualifying procedure for the Daytona 500 may be confusing to most, but one man who knows exactly how it works is Boris Said, driver of the No. 60 7-Eleven Ford Fusion. Said has a couple of different scenarios as far as what it will take for him to make “The Great American Race” and he knows every single one of them. He shared those thoughts before Wednesday’s practice.
BORIS SAID – No. 60 7-Eleven Ford Fusion – DO YOU UNDERSTAND THE SCENARIOS OF WHAT YOU NEED TO DO TOMORROW TO MAKE THE 500? “Completely, and I think I’m the only one. I’ve been watching TV and they’ve been getting it all wrong and people in the garage have been getting it all wrong. Basically, if I spin out in the first race, I get in if Joe Nemechek qualifies in the top two. If he doesn’t, then in the second race my last chance is David Reutimann has to finish in the top two, then I transfer. But then there are a lot of other little things like, if Kurt Busch doesn’t transfer in the first race, then he takes a championship provisional and then I’m sure David Reutimann will have team orders to pull over and let the 44 car go through. My hopes are that if I don’t transfer and Joe Nemechek doesn’t transfer is at least Kurt Busch transfers. But I also think that the two 150’s are stacked pretty heavily where the faster guys are in the first race. For me, it would have been a little bit better if I was in the second one, but we’ve just got to go as hard as we can.”
SO IT’S A NO HOLDS BARRED MENTALITY FOR YOU? “Yeah. The only worry we have is now, hopefully, it looks like we’ll get practice in, but I haven’t done one lap of drafting in these cars yet. We’ve worked on nothing but qualifying. The rain scared me last night, but it looks like now we’re going to get it in.”
HAS IT BEEN HARD SLEEPING THE LAST COUPLE OF NIGHTS? “Yes. You want to make this race so bad. You lie down in bed and just keep thinking about all these different scenarios, so I’ll be glad when it’s all over on Thursday. Hopefully, it’s on the good side.”
Travis Kvapil, driver of the No. 28 K&N Filters Ford Fusion, was the fastest qualifying Ford in Sunday’s Daytona 500 qualifying session (seventh). Kvapil, who is in his first year with Yates Racing, will be making his race debut with the new car in tomorrow’s Gatorade Duel event.
TRAVIS KVAPIL – No. 28 K&N Filters Ford Fusion – WHAT IS YOUR PRIORITY FOR TOMORROW? “Our main priority is to get through the race unscathed. I feel like we’ve got a really fast Ford Fusion and we don’t want to mess it up. We don’t have a lot of laps in the draft yet, just testing so far, so it’s gonna be a big learning experience to figure out for myself positions that I can and cannot put the car in. We’ve seen the guys in the Shootout and Shootout practice talk about that quite a bit. They’ve learned quite a bit in how this car reacts differently than the old car, so, for me, I’m gonna try to figure that out and work through that and get an understanding of that. I think our car will be fast enough to where we can keep it towards the front and that’s a goal. We want to stay up in the front of the pack and don’t want to get mixed up in the middle or get caught up in something. There are a lot of different agendas tomorrow and we just need to kind of steer clear of it and come through it unscathed.”
DO YOU FEEL LIKE A ROOKIE ALL OVER AGAIN? THIS IS YOUR FIRST RACE IN THE NEW CAR? “Yeah, but I think a lot of other people do, too. I’m excited about it. I know this vehicle drives a lot differently than a truck and aerodynamically it’s a lot different than a truck, but it’s closer to a truck than the old Cup car, I think. So I’m hoping I can take a lot of the information and knowledge I had from the Truck Series days and apply it to this new car. If we do that and pick up the nuances on this new car, I think we’ll be a contender and we’ll be towards the front of the pack all day and that’s what we’re looking for.”
IT WOULD BE GREAT TO WIN, I’M SURE. “Definitely. With the situation we’re in, it’s really important for us to just complete all the miles on Sunday and have a solid finish and, really, throughout the first handful of races that’s important to us – establish our team in the points. Then I think we can really go after it, but most importantly – early in the year – it’s about establishing ourselves in the top 35 and build a good foundation these first handful of races. But if the opportunity comes up and we’re in position to win tomorrow, we’re gonna go for it.”
