· Matt Kenseth’s win marked the first for Ford since Kurt Busch won the night race at Bristol (Sharpie 500) in August – a winless stretch of 13 races.
· Kenseth’s last victory was at Las Vegas, which happens to be the next stop on the NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series tour. Today’s triumph snapped a 34-race winless stretch.
· Roush Racing has won 11 of the last 12 NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series races for Ford dating back to the 2002 season, including each of the last seven.
· Ford now has 545 all-time wins in the NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series, most among manufacturers.
· The win also signified the 75th series triumph for Taurus.
MATT KENSETH – No. 17 DEWALT Tools Taurus – VICTORY LANE INTERVIEW -- “I was doing everything I could. Kasey almost got me in one and two one time. I didn’t know whether to protect the bottom or the top, so I tried to protect the middle and get a good run off the corner and not overdrive the corner. The last lap, I had been loose off of four and I got up as high as I could to get a run down off the corner as good as I could and he got a good charge on me there. It was a close one.” CAN YOU FEEL HOW QUICK THE PIT STOPS ARE IN THE CAR? “Yeah. They were on top of their game today. I think they wanted to come out and win the race today and show those boys on pit road what they’re made of too. This is the second year that these guys have been together as a group and you can really feel it. They’ve got the experience and they’ve got the enthusiasm. These guys are ready to go and tear it up this year.” WHO MADE THE CALL TO CHANGE TIRES ON PIT ROAD WHEN THE CAUTION CAME OUT AND WERE YOU SURPRISED YOU STAYED ON THE LEAD LAP? “We were already changing tires. The first time (on lap 131) we didn’t have a choice and the second time (with 43 to go) I almost messed it up. They were going around and doing four and, luckily, they didn’t listen to me and did what they were trained to do. It worked out good. We knew we were ahead of the field when they froze it, but it I still didn’t know what they were gonna do when we pulled off of pit road. But I knew we were ahead of the field. We were further ahead the second time than we were the first time.” DID YOU MAKE A LOT OF CHANGES? “We made some. I probably should have made more of a change the last couple of runs. I probably should have listened to Robbie a little more to tighten it up a little more. I was just too loose off the corner the last two runs and had to do everything we could to keep our DEWALT car out front. It was a handful at the end. In the middle of the race it was just on cruise and it was awesome, but we lost the handle just a little bit at the end.”
DALE JARRETT – No. 88 UPS Taurus (Finished 40th) – “Something happened to the engine. I came off of turn two and it quit running. It’s unfortunate. We had a great race car, but things like that are gonna happen. It’s part of it. If you’re gonna be in this business, things are gonna happen like that and you just have to forget about it and move on to the next race. Mike did a really good job of giving me something I could race with. We weren’t as fast as those guys on new tires, but our car was really good on the long runs. He’s got a good outlook on things and we’ll get ready for them in a couple of weeks in Vegas.” DO YOU WORRY ABOUT DNF’S WITH THIS NEW SYSTEM? “It’s no different than it ever was. For the first 26 you race the same way. You don’t want them, but you’re gonna have them so you just have to minimize the mistakes.” THERE WERE TWO ROUSH PROBLEMS LAST WEEK. DOES THIS HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH THE ENGINE ALLIANCE? “I have no idea what it has to do with. You’d have to talk to the motor guys.” YOU JUST HAVE TO STAY POSITIVE AND MOVE ON. “Yeah, we were running well. We have very few engine problems, so this is rare. You just forget about that. We had a good race car and that’s the main thing. We know we can compete.”
KURT BUSCH – No. 97 Sharpie/IRWIN Taurus (Finished 8th) – “We had a good enough car for a top five, kind of like last week, but we just didn’t come out with the result. We got caught on pit road when that last yellow came out. Do we pit or do we not pit? That’s the thing with the new rule. When the field is frozen, what’s the penalty for pitting while the field is frozen. So we have to understand that. The 17 did a great job by making the right call, but we could have finished second today. That was just a tough call at the end. It gets so tight when you’re back eighth or ninth because with lapped cars on the inside at the end of the race, you can’t make up positions. All in all it was good day for the IRWIN Ford. We were here again, we just didn’t get the result.” HOW WAS THE RACING? “It was fun. We were sliding all around. You’re gonna have to work your butt off this year. We’re all gonna earn our paychecks.”
MARK MARTIN – No. 6 Viagra Taurus (Finished 12th) – “Everything went wrong. We lost our track position and then we got in a wreck. Then we fixed all of that and was fixing to rebound from that and then got caught on another caution.” DID NASCAR THINK YOU WERE TRYING TO BLOCK AT THE END? “I don’t know.”
JEFF BURTON – No. 99 SKF Taurus (Finished 37th) – “They all got bottled up and I didn’t even see what happened. You can’t see through these cars and I couldn’t see around anybody. We’re leaving and the 97 had to check up because something happened in front of him and I ran into the back of him. I couldn’t see through the 97’s car, so I have no idea what happened. His rear bumper brace went right through the middle of the radiator and from then on we were just trying to make laps. And then the oil pump belt came off of it and broke the motor, so I feel like right now we just can’t do anything right. The tide will turn though and when it does, they’ll know we were here. We had a good car. We started 28th and Matt and I drove up to 13th or 14th and we had a good car. Unfortunately, it is what it is.”
GREG BIFFLE – No. 16 National Guard/Subway Taurus (Finished 23rd) – “It was just one of those days. Me and my teammate ran into each other on pit road and that bent something in the front end. It was a long day after that. Burton bounced off of me and then I got out of the way, but I’m not sure what happened there. That’s just the way it goes.”
RICKY RUDD – No. 21 Motorcraft Taurus (Finished 19th) – “We pitted early and that caution got us another time. We long-pitted, but we didn’t long-pit long enough and the caution got us. We came in and then the caution came out two laps later. We were a 20th-place car and that’s about where we finished.”
ANDY HILLENBURG – No. 80 – Commercial Truck & Trailer Taurus (Finished 34th) – A LOT WAS MADE ABOUT THE SO-CALLED FIELD FILLERS THIS WEEK, BUT YOU RAN THE WHOLE RACE AND WERE COMPETITIVE. “We’re trying. Were we the best car today? No, not even close, but we tried our hardest. I don’t think anybody tried any harder, so now we have a starting place. We actually had a couple of flat tires under green and that made it look even worse than it was, but I felt like we were out there and hopefully the guys can see that we’re trying. They were all back here at one point or another, so hopefully a few guys will give us a hand and give us a few ideas.” THE END RESULT IS A 34TH-PLACE FINISH. “Wow, alright I’ll take it. I didn’t know it was that, but all I can say is we’re trying our hardest. Stan has one employee and the rest were volunteers. Hopefully now for Vegas we can get two or three employees.”
Mark Martin, driver of the No. 6 Viagra Taurus, went to the NASCAR hauler after the race. He spoke about the final restart.
MARK MARTIN – No. 6 Viagra Taurus – “When you double-file restart these things and you put the lap-down cars on the inside for the sake of a show, things like that happen. I was on the lead lap all day and I restarted 15th but 30th on the race track. I wrestled the last-lap cars all day. The 24, the 19 and the 6 were all racing. If the caution would have come out, one of those three would have gotten a lap back and would have been back in the race.” ARE YOU FRUSTRATED? “I’m just disappointed because I think that the people in this sport know that I have a lot of integrity. I watched it on the tape and I didn’t see anything. I’m a big fan of these guys. I’m a big fan of Jamie McMurray. I don’t care who wins that race. I wanted to win the race. I was racing and I wasn’t in anybody’s way. I never got in anybody’s way.” MORE ON THE RESTART. “I couldn’t help it that the 9 and the 42 got side by side. That wasn’t of my doing. I never held the 9 up. I left him the outside when he was there and when he wasn’t there I used the race track.” THIS DOESN’T HAPPEN TO YOU OFTEN – BEING CALLED TO THE TRAILER. “This is rare. I couldn’t believe it when they said that, but they’re taking that real serious. I hate it, but, like I said before, I didn’t cause those guys to get side by side. Once they got side by side I was gonna be in somebody’s way, but I never held the outside lane up – ever, ever, ever. I wouldn’t do that.”
MATT KENSETH RACE-WINNING PRESS CONFERENCE – WHEN DID YOU REALIZE YOU WERE GOING TO HAVE TO REACT COMING OFF OF FOUR? “Before the middle of the corner you’re already wide open anyway. I got a little loose up off of four. I knew he was a little bit lower, but I didn’t really pay that much attention. I figured as long as I can get into three in front of him, there’s no way he was gonna beat me off four down the straightaway. So I was surprised he had that big of a run. I was probably halfway from turn four to the finish line before I looked down and saw his nose was up by the door. I was like, ‘Man, he’s gaining momentum on me.’ So I probably did the wrong thing, I turned right. The line is a little bit of an angle, but I actually turned right to get away from his car so he couldn’t pull the air off my door and fill my wheel wells there and slow me down, so I tried to get away from him as much as I could and just hold it wide open. I was surprised because I didn’t expect that. I expected him to make a last-ditch effort, but I didn’t expect it to be there. I didn’t expect him to get that good of a run, so it was kind of a surprise and I was glad we made it back there.”
DID YOU HAVE A VIEW OF MARK’S RESTART? “I didn’t see any of it, so I can’t really comment on it too much. I will say that all day we were getting really good restarts. Every time we got a restart when we were in the lead I cleared the lap-down car every single time getting into turn one. By the end of the backstretch I had a 10 or 15 car length lead and the lapped car was in between me and the second-place car every single time. So I don’t think it was something different. I know Mark pretty well and even if it’s me, he isn’t gonna do something that’s gonna hurt his reputation. You know how he drives. I don’t really think he did that (block), but I didn’t see it so I don’t really know. There was one restart where Robby Gordon was in between me and the second-place guy for 35 laps. They’re doing what they can to stay the first car a lap down and get that lucky dog thing, so I’m sure he was trying to stay in that position. But the short answer is, no, I didn’t see it.”
DID YOU HAVE A SENSE OF SECURITY TODAY? “That’s exactly what happened with not making adjustments. We were so good in the middle of the race that I didn’t want to do something to the car that would be hard to reverse – like pulling a spring rubber or going too far on something and getting behind. We were so good in the middle of the race. There wasn’t anybody that I felt like that could run with us the first 300 laps. I should have adjusted on it more. The car was giving me every sign that I needed to get better traction up off the corner and I just couldn’t figure out how to do that without hurting the middle of the corner. I thought we were gonna be OK for a short run, but we weren’t. We were too loose and I almost gave that race away because we didn’t adjust on the car the way we should have. It would have been really hard for me to face me crew that had those perfect pit stops and kept me up front all day if I would have lost that thing in the last hundred yards.”
IS IT A RELIEF TO WIN AGAIN? “Yeah, it feels great to come here and be able to win right out of the box and lead all those laps. That didn’t look like us. Usually we don’t lead all those laps. Even if we win, we usually sneak up kind of at the end and we had such a strong car, so it feels good to do that because, obviously, some people wrote or some people have said that we can’t lead laps and win races, and we just finish seventh every week. So it was great to go dominate the race the way we did. Even though we didn’t dominate at the end, it was really fun for me to dominate the middle of the race, and also because we had so much stuff go on over the winter. We got the same pit crew together. We didn’t lose any people and they’ve been practicing really hard. They showed what they were made of down there today and never lost a spot. They kept me in the lead and gained me spots when we were behind all day. The new body that Ford has and the engine program and all the stuff we’ve got going, I’ve been so excited to get to the track. I thought we were capable of this, so it feels good to me to come here and be able to do this so early in the year.”
THOUGHTS ON POSSIBLY LOSING THIS TRACK? “I don’t like change a lot. I like things the way they are. I like historic places and the roots of it. I understand the need to market the sport to more people and to go to other cities and have a bigger TV number. I understand all of what they’re trying to do, but just as a plain racer, it’s sad for me because I love racing here. Even if we ran bad here, I’d still love coming here because it’s such a different track. There are only two of them left on the schedule where the tires wear out as much as they do and the cars slide as much as they do. It’s like you’re driving on ice at the end of the run and you really have to have a good chassis setup. The aerodynamics don’t really mean everything and the engine doesn’t really mean everything. You have to have a good mechanical setup that has grip in the car and keep it balanced. There’s so many different things you can do from a driver’s standpoint and from a setup standpoint and that’s really a challenge more so than what we have at a lot of the new types of tracks they’re building. It’s sad that there’s only one race here. I’m glad we won the one race they had this year and hopefully we’ll be able to get the attendance here to be able to keep racing here.”
WERE YOU CONCERNED YOU WEREN’T ON THE LEAD LAP ON THE LAST PIT STOP? “I was concerned a little bit because I’m a worry-wart and I worry about everything. I was maybe 60 percent concerned because of the situation that happened earlier. I was actually farther ahead of the leader this time and the same situation happened earlier in the race, so I felt good about where we were when the caution came out – that we were farther ahead of the leader than we were the first time when we were still on the lead lap. I felt good about all those things. I thought it would have been hard to present a case to show me that it was right the first time and wrong the second time. I’ve got to applaud NASCAR because they took their time and they figured it out. The field freezes now when the yellow comes out, so it’s a little bit different than it used to be. We were ahead of the line. We were ahead of the leader. They did it right the first time. They did it right the second time and they took the time to correct the situation with the 9 and put him back on the lead lap too. That was the right thing to do, so I applaud them for taking the time and sorting that all out so the finish was the correct one with the right cars in the right place.”
WERE YOU AWARE DURING THE STOP? “Both stops I heard it. On the first stop we were just getting around to the left side and on the second one we were still on the rights just coming to the lefts. I actually yelled two tires, so I’m glad they didn’t listen to me and they did what they were trained to do because we would have had to come back down and we would have been the last car on the lead lap and we wouldn’t have won the race. So they did the absolute right thing and they did their job and finished it. We left pit road and didn’t speed and came out because I could kind of see what was going on. I knew what happened the first time, so didn’t speed so I wouldn’t get any penalties and got back out in front of those guys. You always see the officials because they’re always waving their hands right away when the yellow comes out, so I kind of saw that and then our spotter tells us the yellow is out and what’s going on.”
THOUGHTS WHEN THE 9 WENT FROM A LAP DOWN TO BACK ON THE LEAD LAP? “I saw him back there. I sort of knew he was in the same boat as us, but I didn’t know for sure that he pitted the same lap or the next lap or if they had a slow stop or what the situation was. So when I left pit road, the pace car was about even with me and I just kept on getting it and got caught up to the tail end because I knew back here where the race is scored I was way ahead of everybody and I didn’t want to speed. The pace car runs faster than pit road speed, so I think when he pulled off pit road he was probably fourth or fifth in line instead of along the pace car or just barely in front of him, so he probably just pulled up in line and figured he was a lap down. That was the right thing to do to let NASCAR correct it and not pass the pace car and do all that stuff. But, yeah, when I saw him coming around and they put him right behind me and he had four new tires and was in the same boat as us, I was a little bit more concerned because he caught the 42. The 42 was real stout on a short run, too. I think he would have given me as much trouble as the 9 because he was right there at the end, but I knew the 9 had a really strong car last fall and dominated the race. I knew they were gonna be tough again.”
HOW DOES IT FEEL AFTER WINNING ONLY ONCE LAST YEAR? “It feels good to come out of the box and win right away. I touched on that a little bit earlier. It feels good to do that. I don’t think there was much bad you could say about our year last year and that was one of the most common things they talked about, so whenever you can do something that’s good and maybe prove people wrong or prove that we can do things it always feels good.”
DID THE NON-REGULARS DO A GOOD JOB TODAY? “Yeah. Everybody around me did a good job of being respectful to the leaders and giving us a lane all the time. Sometimes that’s difficult to do here because typically on a long run we run right against the wall in three and four and on the bottom in one and two, so it’s hard to get out of the way when you’re running all over the race track as the leader. So I thought they did a good job. I don’t know what happened with that wreck on the backstretch, but they did a good job.”
DID THE SPOILER AFFECT TODAY’S RACE? “I don’t think it affected it much here, really. For our cars I felt good about it because I felt like we were really aero-balanced and I feel like Robbie and Chip and everybody at the shop did the right thing with our cars the way we built them and the different things we did to get our aero-balance right. I feel like we got it right even though it’s a little harder to tell here just because the mechanical grip comes into play a little more than aerodynamics. I think it’ll be good. It won’t be bad. The cars are gonna turn better and I think the racing will be a little bit better.”
WHY WERE YOU SO FAST ON RESTARTS? “I don’t know – because I was the first one in line? I don’t know. We had a little different transmission that we’ve run here the last couple times. I know it’s a little different than what some of my teammates run and it was an advantage to have that when we were in the front. The stuff would stay hooked up and the motor ran real good and I tried to be careful not to spin the tires and we could just get away. We could do that all day for some reason. We really seemed to be strong on those restarts and that helped a lot because when you’re on fresh tires and full of gas and low pressures, it’s nice not to have somebody right on your bumper.”
HOW WERE THE LAST COUPLE OF LAPS? “This place is real fast. You carry a lot of speed, but it does drive like a short track. When the tires get worn out and slippery – the easiest way I can explain it is when you first go out and drive it’s like you’re on 15-inch soft tires and the car is just stuck. In about 20 laps it feels like you’re on gravel and in about 50 laps it feels like you’re on ice, so it’s kind of like when you make those longer runs it’s like running a 100-lap feature at your local short track where those bias-ply tires will wear out the right rear and they’ll get looser and looser and looser and you have to be careful with your tires and do the right thing. To me, that’s really a challenge and a lot of fun.”
JACK ROUSH, Car Owner – No. 17 DEWALT Taurus – WERE YOU SURPRISED TO GET CALLED TO THE TRAILER? “There was a lot going on in that trailer, let me tell you (laughing). I felt like more of an observer than a participant. I’ve got great respect for everybody that was on the race track – all the competitors. Chip Ganassi, Felix Sabates – they’re two of my good friends and I respect them. They were at serious odds with NASCAR over the rule that exists about freezing the field. It wasn’t a surprise to me that what happened to Matt’s car – to the 17 car – that’s the way the rule was. If they want a different rule, if the rule isn’t what we think ought to be done, well then change the rule. Anyway, there are hard feelings over that and that probably overshadowed anything else. We went up and met John Darby and Mike Helton and the guys wanted Mark and I to look at the video and see how it developed. It was real clear from what Mark said he was doing and from what he did on the race track that he got out of the way as soon as the 9 got to him. It was unfortunate that the 9 and the 42 were racing side by side, but Mark pulled down – not off the race track – but pulled down out of the way of the 9 which was the first car that caught him. He was in line with the 9 and pulled down in such a way not to slow him down at all, but the 42 was impacted by the fact that there was a lead-lap down – who was Mark – that was down there. At the same time, you’ve got to realize that the 19 and the 24 were right behind the 42 and Mark was racing for position there. I feel bad for everybody that got their feelings hurt and this is one race in a 36-race schedule – and some of us want to think of it now as a 26-race schedule – it’s one race in a big, long year. I don’t want to make this sound wrong, but whether Matt won today or whether Jamie McMurray won or whether Kasey had his first win, I would have celebrated any of them. Any of it was fine. Whatever the rules are. Whatever the interpretation is, it’s just fine. But for there to be a question whether Mark tried to benefit Matt, that is out of order. This is my 17th year with Mark and he doesn’t block anybody or get anybody’s way and never has for all those years. For a question to be raised about whether he was intentionally in the way of somebody, Mark Martin is a guy that’s never in anybody’s way.”
THE OBJECTION SEEMS TO BE THAT MATT WAS BEYOND THE SCORING LINE. “We never had a discussion. There was a big brouhaha going on in there before we went up to look at the tape and I wasn’t part of that discussion. I can only tell you that it was apparent that people were not in agreement on what they all thought they saw. I wasn’t asked anything and I didn’t offer an opinion as to what the issues were. I can only surmise based on the comments when they came out about what the argument had been. The reason I was up in there was just simply to look at the tape and say, ‘Guys, look at this. Is this what we’re all supposed to be doing?’ Nobody said that Mark didn’t do the right thing and, for that matter, was there any accusation that there were team orders or anything like that – which there absolutely are not.”
FINAL COMMENTS? “I want to say how much I enjoy coming to Rockingham – how much we’re gonna miss the race going forward. The Rockingham race track, its staff, the conditions – the fact we get to race on a track where the driver’s judgement and the crew chief’s anticipation of what’s gonna happen have such a great affect on the result. This is racing the way I really enjoy and it’ll be a great sadness to come here only once.”
MATT KENSETH CONTINUED – ANY IDEA YOUR CAR WOULD BE THIS GOOD AFTER FRIDAY? “I had a feeling we’d run pretty good. I didn’t know we’d run as good as we did today. I’ve been driving my wife crazy and everybody around me. I’ve been almost giddy for the last two months just because I’ve been so looking forward to this year more so than any other year. I know I touched on it earlier, but we didn’t lose any team members. The over the wall guys – this is their second year together – and they just did a flawless job today. The Taurus got some upgrades and that will get us closer to the GM products. Jack and Robert doing their engine program – we thought that was gonna be a little better. And I thought the smaller spoiler and all that was gonna benefit Jeff Burton and Mark Martin and my driving style. I thought that would come into play more like in ’98 with those short spoilers and Mark and Jeff won all those races. I thought maybe that would help us a little bit with that smaller tire because of chassis setups and things like that, so everything was kind of aligned at the start of this year. I thought we could go out and do these things and I think everybody at Roush is gonna go do a lot of great things this year. So I’ve been anxiously awaiting getting to the tracks. I’ve been waiting to get to the downforce tracks and see what we had and it was nice today to come out and see that the stuff we did over the winter was right.”
PIT STOPS WERE BIG. COULD YOU HAVE MADE IT UP IF YOU WERE FURTHER BACK IN THE FIELD? “We’ll never know. It’s an advantage to be in the front, but we did start 23rd and the first run we made we made tremendous gains. I don’t know what we drove up to, but we drove up to the top 10 anyway – seventh or something – and drove to lead the second run shortly thereafter. We caught all those guys and passed them, so I knew we had one of the best cars on the track. If we would have come out of the pits sixth with 30 laps to go, no, we probably wouldn’t have won, but the important thing is we didn’t. We had a good car early and through the middle of the race. I didn’t do the best job of adjusting on it at the end the way I should have because we were running so good and that’s something I’ve got to learn from and try to do a better job next time. But we had great car all day. We had a car that would pass cars and this isn’t a hard track to pass on. If you’re faster than the guy in front of you, you can pass him.”
