RICK CRAWFORD – No. 14 International Truck Engine Ford F-150 – WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS ABOUT THIS MARK AND YOUR WEEKEND AHEAD? “First of all, let me make it quite clear that it’s 300 steroid-free starts (laughter). It means a lot to me and means a lot to me as far as the Circle Bar race team and Tom Mitchell as an owner. The Mitchell family support for 18 years as a driver for them and over 13 years here in the truck series, so that’s what means a lot to me. Hopefully, we’ll have a good day here tomorrow.”

 

HOW IS YOUR CAR OWNER GOING TO CELEBRATE THIS MILESTONE? “At home. He’s sending his daughter. Lisa Mitchell is gonna be here and she’s representing her dad. She usually does. She was at Daytona and then she’s gonna be here. He’s very proud. Back 13-14 years ago when we were thinking of running the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series at the time, we had talked about other divisions of racing. We talked about the Cup Series. We talked about the Busch Series. And anybody that knows Tom Mitchell, he could pick just about any series he wanted to race in and field a team. The man had been at Indy in the early eighties for three or four years. He’d been in Cup in ’86 with a Cup team, so his advice to me was, ‘Let’s keep an eye on this truck series and see how we’re doing. I own two truck stops in southwest Texas and that’s what I want to do. I want to field a truck team. Do you want to drive it?’ And I’m like, ‘Heck yeah. Let’s do it.’ So that’s where we’ve been and that’s where we’ve stayed. We’ve been very loyal to the series. We started with one truck and one engine, and now we’ve got two really nice race teams sponsored by International running in the series, so it’s quite a commitment by the Mitchell family.”

 

HOW DID YOU GET YOUR START AND WHO DID YOU LOOK UP TO GROWING UP? “I’m a third-generation racer out of Mobile, Alabama. Probably one of the first races I remember coming to is this one back in the sixties. I remember when NASCAR was running the legends of the sport that paved the race track here to allow people like me to be able to race on them were racing here. I remember clinging to the fence here in the infield. I started running short tracks around the Mobile, Pensacola area and then went on to run the All-Pro Series. Then I met Mr. Mitchell, but along the way several people – probably too many to mention everybody – but everybody from auto parts vendors to tire vendors to volunteer help on the weekend because we all had jobs. There’s a lot to say at this day and time for young drivers. Young drivers meet their angels real early in life and they’re able to go race and can still go to college. They can still do a lot of things. Back then in racing we worked regular jobs during the day and we had volunteer help at night working on our cars in the evening, and we raced on the weekends. We put everything we had, and even from Cup to racing locally, everything people did back then – whatever they made that week got them to the next week. That’s how we made it back in the late seventies and early eighties.”

 

FINAL THOUGHTS? “I’d like to also mention that this is 300 starts with Tom Mitchell, but it’s also 300 starts with the same make – Ford Motor Company. If that don’t mean Built Ford Tough, then you probably need to look for another definition.”

MATT KENSETH – No. 17 DeWalt Ford Fusion – THOUGHTS ON ATLANTA? “I’m glad to be here in Atlanta. It’s a track I always enjoy coming to. Last weekend wasn’t exactly a great weekend. We only got to race three-quarters of a lap before we broke, so I’m glad to get here and get to try again. It was a long weekend last weekend for that, so I’m looking forward to getting here and see what our stuff is like. We’ve still only raced really one downforce race because we didn’t get to race last week, and I’m real curious to see how our stuff runs compared to everybody else and get here to race 500 miles and see where we stack up.” 

 

HOW HAS BRISTOL CHANGED SINCE THE REPAVE? “It’s changed a lot since they reconfigured it. It’s kind of the more calm, friendlier Bristol than what it used to be. Since they reconfigured it, us as the 17 haven’t had as much success there. I don’t feel like I get around there quite as good as I used to. We used to have some little tricks that seemed to be able to help – some of the guys that have ran there a lot – and the track is just kind of more plain. It’s kind of like a lot of other tracks, although it’s still fast and small and stuff happens in a hurry, so I look forward to going there and trying to improve because it hasn’t been one of our best tracks since they re-did it and we’ve run the other cars there. We’ve still been kind of searching for what we need there to run as good as Carl and some of the other guys.” 

 

WHAT DID YOU DO AFTER HALF-A-LAP LAST WEEK. DID YOU BEAT THE SNOW BACK TO CHARLOTTE? “You always hate it when you blow up, but nobody’s gonna feel too sorry for me after the two weeks before that, so really once they said we were out, I just packed up and headed toward the airport and tried to get home. I made it home that night, but didn’t beat the snow.” 

 

IS THIS THE START OF ANOTHER KYLE BUSCH HOT STREAK AND DOES IT MEAN ANYTHING WITH JIMMIE AND CARL GETTING OFF TO SLOW STARTS? “No, it’s only the fourth week out of 36 races, so I don’t think where anybody is positioned right now matters a whole bunch. I’ve never seen Kyle not on a hot streak since he went over to Gibbs to be honest with you. I know they struggled a little bit in the chase and had some problems here and there, but they’ve been one of the cars to beat if not the car to beat. It seems like no matter what he drives, no matter what track we go to since the beginning of last year, so I didn’t really think that was gonna be any different or didn’t see a reason why it should be any different because it’s the same team and all that stuff. I think it’s kind of the same guys that probably ran good last year are gonna be the same guys to look at this year. We know we’ve got to aim at the 48, 99 and 18 – all of those guys – you’re gonna have to beat those guys to be able to have a chance to get some wins and to be able to position yourself for the end of the year.” 

 

DO YOU LOOK AT WHERE YOU STAND IN RELATION TO THE GUYS YOU RACE WITH ON A CAREER BASIS? “To be honest with you, I don’t, no. I think maybe, at least I hope I’m not close to the end of my career, maybe when you’re at the end of your career you kind of look at where you stacked up throughout your career – the things that you’ve done or not done or wish you could accomplish or you’re still trying to accomplish. But I don’t really look at that right now. To be honest with you, the only reason I knew the number of wins was when we won at Daytona they said that was 17 and there were all these 17s that lined up, so that was really the only reason that I knew. Really, I just focus on every week. The time goes by so fast and you just keep focused on next week, and it seems like they keep rolling by. You don’t really have time to sit and think about what was good and what happened before, you’re just trying to focus on that next upcoming race and trying to figure out how you can win that or finish that and get you positioned in the points.” 

 

WHAT WAS THE COOLEST PART ABOUT WINNING THE DAYTONA 500? “The whole thing was cool. Probably the coolest part was to be able to back it up at California, really, to be honest with you, once we got there. It probably works a little backwards than what you think . We got done with Daytona and we went and did all that crazy media tour, did all this stuff, and, really, that’s when I thought about it the most. Once we got to the track at California – from then to today – I’ve probably thought about it way less than what I thought about it then. That was probably the week I’ll think about it the most for the rest of the season. You’re just not gonna sit and really think about it that much because you’re concentrating on the next deal and trying to run good here. I think it takes 100 percent of your focus to be able to be competitive every weekend. It is so competitive and it’s tough to beat these guys. There’s a lot of good teams out there and I think once I was done with that week, we really just shifted focus to California and shifted focus to Vegas and so on. But a lot of parts were cool. Of the media stuff, Letterman was the coolest probably, if I had to pick a media thing because I always wanted to be on there. It took me a long time for them to let me sit on the couch.”

CARL EDWARDS – No. 99 Aflac Ford Fusion – ARE YOU DISAPPOINTED AT HOW YOUR SEASON HAS STARTED? “Yeah, but not in light of any of the predictions. In general, I would have loved to have not blown an engine up last week. I think we were gonna be second and maybe fighting for the win. We were pretty fast, but this is racing. Jimmie sure didn’t get off to a stellar start last year. It only matters to get into that chase and then to be good in that last 10 races. We’ve got our heads up. I would have loved to have won the last three races, but that’s just the way it is.” 

 

ARE ENGINES A WORRY FOR YOU THIS WEEK? “No, the engine isn’t a worry for me this week just because last week the problems were things that just happened with engines. It wasn’t something, I don’t think, that’s necessarily gonna show up again. It’s not like a problem we’re looking into overall or anything. Really, we’ve just had two races. Daytona is a crapshoot. I was on Matt’s bumper when we went through that wreck, so I figured if I would have made it through without any damage, I could have had just as good a chance at winning. That 99 car was the fastest car last week. We had a bad pit stop and the engine blew up, so our performance is there and we’ve actually had some pretty good luck. That’s the only time I’ve rolled across the finish line with a blown-up engine and seeing the checkered flag. I coasted a lap-and-a-half. That’s how fast we were going. I coasted a lap-and-a-half. It’s still so early. This weekend, next weekend, if we can have a couple good runs, it’ll be great.” 

 

ANY PLANS FOR THE WEEK OFF? “I don’t know exactly what I’m gonna do with the week off. This will be the first off weekend during the season that I’ve had since I started running the Cup cars, so it’s kind of cool how the schedule worked out.” 

 

HOW ARE THE TIRES? “The track is real slippery. It’s pretty wild. That’s fun, though. I like this place when it’s like that. It’s a track that you can run three-wide on, but, at the same time the car moves around quite a bit. It’s totally different from a place like Charlotte or Vegas, where the car is really nailed down. You can get a little aggressive with the wheel here. It’s fun.” 

 

CAN THE TRACK ITSELF CURE THE ENGINE ISSUES BECAUSE THE TIRES WILL FALL OFF? “Jack and I talked about it and he didn’t feel like the RPM issue was the only thing that hurt us last week. He thought there might have actually been a little problem with the one of the clearances on our bearings, but, in general, the cars will only turn so many RPM before the engine will break. This place, it’ll slow down and there will be more change in RPM over a lap, so it should be easier on the engine.” 

 

SO THE TIRE SHOULD FALL OFF MORE THAN LAST WEEK? “It seems like the tires are gonna fall off quite a bit, which I think is great for the racing. We talk about how hard it is to pass and how many passes you don’t see, well, if the tires don’t fall off, you’re gonna see passing because there will be guys who gamble and stay out and guys who get new tires and come through the field.   What Jimmie did in that last race, coming all the way back up to second, that’s fun for the fans to watch, so I love this place for that.” 

 

DO YOU SEE THE PROBLEMS FROM LAST YEAR BEING RESOLVED? “Personally, I enjoyed running on the tire they had last year. It was a bear to drive, but it was the same for everyone. It was enjoyable. I don’t think they’re much different. I think they’re pretty hard to drive. I think there are gonna be a lot of people with their hands full and, in a way though, that’s kind of what makes it fun. You come to a place like this and there are gonna be guys who get the setup right and who can drive it and feel good, and there will be guys who are out to lunch, and there will be guys in-between working on it all day. I think that’s fun. I think that’s part of the sport. If you make it easy to drive and everybody goes the same speed, that’s not much of a show.”

 

WHICH ONE ARE YOU GOING TO BE? “I hope we’re not out to lunch. We’ve been really good here. This is one of my best race tracks, probably my best race track. I enjoy coming here. I don’t care what they do with the tires as long as they don’t blow out.” 

 

THAT FIRST WIN HERE. WHAT DO YOU REMEMBER ABOUT THAT?   “That day in 2005 here in March, that was a career-changing day for sure. The idea that you cross the finish line, and I try to explain this to people, but up until that point I didn’t really think of winning the races at this level. It was a goal, but I didn’t think of it as a realistic thing. I don’t know why. We crossed that finish line and I thought, ‘Man, I think the race is over and I think I beat him.’ I guess that’s it. That’s winning a race. I kind of went through my mind, ‘Why did I win? Did something happen? Did we get lucky? No, we just had a good race and we won.’ That was a whole big shift in thinking for me.” 

 

IT WAS IMPORTANT FOR YOU TO STAY THE SAME AS A PERSON, BUT THIS SPORT CAN CHANGE YOU. HOW HAVE YOU CHANGED? “I think we all grow and learn things, but I was thinking about that today. I drove out on the race track and I thought of Victory Lane that day and how I went home after that and the things that went on that week. I’m really, really fortunate that I can say I still live in the same place, I hang out with the same people. I do the same things and I still get the same enjoyment out of the racing, so I hope that doesn’t change. I hope that stays the same.” 

GREG BIFFLE – No. 16 3M Ford Fusion – HOW WAS YOUR CAR IN PRACTICE? “I’m not real, real happy with the way my car is driving right now. I’m a little bit frustrated and don’t understand. I did the tire test here and the cars were extremely fast. I felt almost too fast. We were running a 29.50, a 29.30 in race trim, which is just phenomenally fast around this race track. Then we get here and we pull out on the race track for the start of practice and it’s just unbelievable. The car was just slipping and sliding all over the place. A lot of it has to do with us and our car. We were way off when we started. We’re getting closer and closer. Finally in the qualifying run I finally ran 30.50, which got me 14^th and we feel like we’re making big gains and we’re doing big things getting closer to qualifying times. I’m still gonna be off a little bit qualifying. I know I’m not gonna get to where I want to be, but, certainly tomorrow I think we’re gonna be able to get right on it. I’m a little bit miffed on how we were that far off. Maybe it’s just the lack of grip with the warmer temperatures. I’m just kind of surprised that the tire doesn’t have more grip or like it did when we tested here, but I’ve got hope that if we get our car handling better, maybe we’ll see it driving a lot better, but right now it’s not driving very good.” 

 

IS THE OFF WEEKEND A GOOD TIME TO RELAX OR WORK HARDER TO GET CAUGHT UP? “I think it’s a little of both. It’s a good time for me to take a break. It would be nice to have a weekend off because a lot of the teams, we’re in Daytona for two weeks and then a lot of them spent a week on the west coast, and then obviously we all didn’t get home on Sunday after the race in Vegas, so I think this weekend off is gonna be much appreciated by all the teams. It’ll do both. It’ll give us a chance to catch up and get our lineup ready for all these spring races and it will give the guys a day or two off to kind of recharge their batteries, so I think it’s gonna do both. I’m looking forward to having the guys up to my mountain property for a little r&r. We’re trying to put that plan together for Saturday. I know all the team guys enjoy getting together and doing stuff, so I’m looking forward to the weekend off for sure.” 

 

IS IT THE SAME CAR YOU HAVE HERE THAT YOU TESTED WITH? “That’s a good question and I do not believe it is. I believe this is the car we tire tested, I’m pretty sure. But I couldn’t answer that 100 percent. I’m just gathering that we would bring the same car back that we came here and tested with, although these cars are so much the same now. We’ve gotten so good at them being so close to the same that we would feel comfortable bringing any one of our cars and put that shock and spring and bump stop setup in it and be ready to go. I would think it’s the same car, but I can’t answer it 100 percent.”