The Worlds first daily e-newspaper devoted to the NASCAR Nextel Cup Series
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Vol. III,No.VIXII OFFSEASON EDITION
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The Worlds first daily e-newspaper devoted to the NASCAR Nextel Cup Series Welcome to the Cup Scene Daily for Vol. III,No.VIXII OFFSEASON EDITION |
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TODAYS FRONT PAGE<
DAYTONA THUNDER
Busch, Gordon Lead the Way into Preseason Testing
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Quote Of The Day: "Now it's 'Drive for Five in '05,' and maybe this will be the year we'll get it." -Jeff Gordon at Daytona International Speedway Happy Birthday: Walter Ballard, Jacob Dallenbach, Randy Goss 7 DAY ARCHIVE SundayMonday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday INSIDE TODAY'S ISSUE: McMurray not a fan of testing Waltrip adds truck team Nextel Cup teams get back on track at Daytona Stewart, Harvick no-shows at Daytona Fanfest events to benefit tsunami relief Speed Reading Said off to fast start Waltrips aim is $1 million for camp The King' joins in to trumpet Charger's return Robby Gordon falls to 11th after latest Dakar stage Busch seeks sharper image The agony and the ecstasy of 2004
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January 12 The Speedway is boasting a new look for the arriving teams and for fans turning out for the first of the Fanfests later this evening.
All the changes to the infield made the competitors take a second look at the legendary racing facility. "I'm still lost," said Jeff Gordon, a two-time Daytona 500 champion. "It's definitely a big change when you've been coming here for a long time. This is my 12th season in the Cup Series anyway. You get to where you work your way into these tracks and you have an area where you like to park and you know where your truck is and where your team is. "Today when I came, I didn't even know if my team was here. I didn't see my car and I was on the wrong side of the garage. But it's really awesome. We've got to work a little bit on the flow of how the cars come in and out of the garage. But this is certainly beautiful. I'm trying to get coordinated with what was here before and I'm sure everybody is doing the same thing." Even NASCAR legend and seven-time Daytona 500 champion Richard Petty was blown away by the changes throughout the historic infield.
"I'm going to have to spend the rest of the day trying to find where I'm at Daytona and I've been coming since they first opened the place." Kyle Petty, who pilots the No. 45 Georgia-Pacific Dodge, gave a thumbs-up to the FanZone, which features a Fan Deck overlooking the garages as well as windows for fans to look inside the garages. "We've got to get to where the fans can at least see a driver when they come to the race track other than just sitting in the race car," Kyle Petty said. "I think it's pretty cool to have a place where they can wonder around look in through the windows and see the cars and view the inspection process and some of that. I think it's probably something a lot of other race tracks should look at in the future."
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Most of the attention yesterday though centered on two drivers. One is preparing to defend his first NASCAR Nextel Cup Series championship while the other is preparing to pursue a fifth title. Yet both Kurt Busch and Jeff Gordon do agree on this: It’s time to get back behind the wheel. Busch, the reigning NASCAR Nextel Cup Series champion, and Gordon, a four-time series champion, led the group of NASCAR Nextel Cup Series drivers who kicked off NASCAR Preseason Thunder on Tuesday at Daytona International Speedway. NASCAR Preseason Thunder is the annual preseason test sessions at Daytona, and teams that finished in odd-number positions in the final 2004 car owner point standings will test today through Thursday. Teams that finished in odd-number positions in the final 2004 car owner point standings will test Jan. 18-20 at Daytona. On Tuesday, Busch and Gordon were interview guests at Daytona’s media center during the lunch break. Both admitted impatience and anticipation for the upcoming season. “Already I’m reminded of what we did last year at this test,” Busch said, “but yet now we come back as champions and we have a new approach. It’s already begun to change things and how we look at it as a team, too.”
An off-season’s reflection and a four-time champion’s confidence boosts Gordon as he prepares for the new season. He and crew chief Robbie Loomis are a solid, respected duo, and several seasons’ of team chemistry adds another crucial ingredient. He also recognizes that the “Chase for the NASCAR Nextel Cup” format gives him the opportunity to make that fifth title a reality. Why? Gordon believes his team is a constant top-10 performer. “We’re going to have many chances if the points stay the same way,” Gordon said. “When we do win it, it will be much more gratifying because once you’re in the Top 10; it’s even harder to win it. It takes a lot of things, almost doing everything right.” Busch’s 2005 mandate is to add a second title. He won the 2004 championship by winning the inaugural “Chase for the NASCAR Nextel Cup,” the sport’s new format of crowning a champion during the season’s final 10 races, and he hopes the experience of winning that title on the last lap of the final race will help his Roush Racing team defend the title. “One good thing about a champion is you keep that same buzz – that same vibe – all year,” Busch said. Then there’s the unexpected, such as Tuesday’s greeting from NASCAR President Mike Helton. “To come back here today and to see Mike Helton and to have him refer to me as champ, it’s here,” Busch said of the realization. “It’s now, it’s great and it’s time to go to work.”
“It’s just good to get the guys back into the swing of things because we’re able to smell the race car at the race track again and it’s comfortable again,” Busch said. Gordon topped both of the day’s charts, posting a session-high speed of 185.448 mph in the morning and 185.265 mph in the afternoon. "The first three or four years we'd do Cup testing, I'd look forward to it. Then there was a period of time where I'd dread it," Gordon said,"And I just realized how important it is to be behind the wheel of the car, getting laps and getting the team information. "These days, the information you're getting is so important. By the time we come to this particular test, we might not make big changes, but the fine-tuning can affect how you do in the race." Before the cars hit th track Tuesday morning, Dodge returned its Charger nameplate to NASCAR competition, unveiling an all-new 2005 Dodge Charger Nextel Cup car as preseason testing kicked off at Daytona International Speedway. "The Charger name has charisma," said John Fernandez, director of Dodge Motorsports. "It takes you back to the early days of NASCAR and we're excited about it." As the season-opening Daytona 500 nears, the Dodge camp is optimistic that there will be no fall-off in the performance of its new machine as compared to its previous Cup car, the Intrepid. "Everything we've done in testing so far suggests we've got a car that's as good as the car we had last year," said Fernandez. The press conference introducing the car was full of references to the past and was fittingly hosted by NASCAR legend Richard Petty, who stood alongside a replica of the No. 43 Charger he once drove. NASCAR's all-time winningest driver scored four Daytona 500 victories in the car.
Aside from the raciness, Dodge's latest stock car also serves a marketing purpose. "Careful attention was paid to making sure that the racing Charger looked more like the showroom model," added Fernandez. "We never really had that with the Intrepid." The development of the new car, which began in late 2003, was led by Dodge Motorsports Engineering with the support of each of Dodge's primary Nextel Cup Series teams: Evernham Motorsports, Petty Enterprises, Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates and Penske Racing South. NASCAR approved the car for competition last August, and veteran driver Bill Elliott did much of the on-track testing Since Dodge returned to NASCAR racing in 2001, the manufacturer has scored 24 victories (10 by Ryan Newman) in 144 races. As for the previous incarnation of the Charger, that car won 124 races over a 12-year period during the '60s and '70s. It made its NASCAR debut in 1966, and journeyman driver Earl Balmer piloted the Ray Fox-owned No. 3 Charger to its first victory in a 100-mile qualifying race at Daytona Beach in February of that year. Neil Bonnett drove the car to its last victory in 1977 in a 500-miler at the now defunct Ontario Motor Speedway in southern California. Petty's success in his blue and orange No. 43 Charger is the stuff of record books, as he found victory lane 37 times in the car. His best year with the Charger was 1975, when he won 13 races and the championship. In all, three drivers won championships in the Charger: David Pearson (1966), Bobby Isaac (1970) and Petty (1972, '74, '75).
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