MARCOS AMBROSE press conference…
- Ambrose becomes first Australian to win a race in any of NASCAR’s three premier divisions (Truck, Nationwide, Cup).
- Ambrose, 31, is from Launceston, Tasmania, Australia and the first Australian to race full-time in NASCAR
- Previous best NASCAR Nationwide Series finish for Ambrose: second, Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez in April 2008
- First win for JTG Racing (formerly ST Motorsports) and car owner Tad Geschickter since Jeff Fuller won in the NASCAR Busch Series (now NASCAR Nationwide Series) in the Food City 250 at Bristol Motor Speedway on August 23, 1996
Marcos Ambrose’s Australian V8 Supercar Career: 2001 – 2005
Two Championships (2003 and 2004)
MARCOS AMBROSE – No. 59 STP Ford Fusion (started 12th, finished 1st)
–“Just a huge relief. It feels like a big relief off my shoulders, I’m sure it is for everybody in this room, standing next to us, because we’ve committed a lot to it. I’ve come along way, I’ve dragged my family halfway around the world, away from my dad and mom, and everybody who needs me back in Australia, and today it just feels like it’s worthwhile. It feels like I’ve conquered a huge mountain, and it’s just a great day. Gary’s come on board and turned our Nationwide program around. He came on after six races, we were in a real mess, and here we are, halfway through the year, with a win. So, I’ve got to thank Gary, Tad and Jodi for plucking me out of nowhere. I met them at a hot, dusty day at IRP, I was hanging around like a bad smell until they gave me a test, and here we are. Brad’s come on board. We’re a team that’s moving forward, and I feel like we needed to win to justify moving forward like we’re going to in 2009. That’s just a real weight off my shoulders. I feel like we’re ready to really do something special and it’s just a great day.”
GARY COGSWELL – crew chief, No. 59 STP Ford Fusion – ON SOME OF THE CALLS HE MADE AND WHAT THE WIN MEANS TO THE TEAM. “It’s pretty tremendous. It’s been a long time for me. I happened to have the opportunity to be in this Victory Lane a long, long time ago, and everything’s changed so much. The race was just like a storybook race. It’s hard to just beat people. There’s just so many good cars. And we were just able to put ourselves in the right position to win the race. Everything went the way it needed to for us to win, and we won. The car was good, there were a lot of good cars. The race ran the way it needed to for us, and we took the checkered flag, and we’re all here, extremely happy about it.”
TAD GESCHICKTER – partner, JTG/Daugherty Racing – “It’s been about 12 years – we’ve finished second about 12 times in that time and have come so close. You know, it’s important to note that Kingsford and Clorox and those folks that stuck with us through all of those 12 years, and I think that’s the most special thing for me, is we’re finally going to send a trophy to Oakland, California, to all of those guys and thank them for being so loyal, for believing in Marcos, for believing in us, and we’re excited to just, now that we’ve got some momentum, to keep doing it.”
JODI GESCHICKTER – partner, JTG/Daugherty Racing – “I echo Tad’s thoughts. We were just at a Kingsford sales meeting – Kingsford and Clorox sales meetings – about two weeks ago. They have embraced Marcos and he loves them, and he said, ‘You know, the relationship that we have, we have to win for these people, we just have to do it.’ And, true to his word, here we are a couple of weeks later, and we’re doing it. And I couldn’t be any happier. I guess nine laps from the end I saw the guys in the pits, and they said, ‘We may have a tire going down.’ And I thought, ‘I just can’t believe it. I can’t believe it. No way.’ But, he stayed out, it wasn’t a flat tire, guys started running out of gas, I thought, ‘Maybe the cards are going to fall our way this time. Maybe it’s going to happen.’ Not until he takes the checkered flag do you really believe. We’re really thrilled to be here. You just can’t imagine what it’s like.”
BRAD DAUGHERTY – partner, JTG/Daugherty Racing – “I want to thank Jodi and Tad for the opportunity to be a part of this team. It was a great race for us today; Marcos did a great job. He had a top-five race car – I don’t know whether he had a winning race car – but Gary made some great calls from the box, and Marcos really believed. When Jimmie Johnson ran out of fuel there, I was sitting there watching the race and I had my little calculator going in my head and I knew that Jeff Burton couldn’t be far behind. So, it was going to come down to the last lap for us. Marcos saved us some fuel when those guys ran out of gas. It was just a great job, everyone did a super job today, and we’re fired up. It’s a great win for this organization.”
AMBROSE, continued – DO YOU FEEL ABOUT THE WINS THAT GOT AWAY THAT YOU GAVE THEM AWAY OR THEY WERE TAKEN AWAY? “It feels like a weight off my shoulders, it really does. I felt like I’ve been trying so hard to win, I’ve been tripping over myself. Montreal was a classic example, last year, and we’ve come close and run fast but haven’t been able to close the deal. I knew that the road races this year was my best chance to win, and I’m just really pleased. I’ve had to be patient. Two and a half years here in America – I was pretty used to winning down home, I was a two-time champion and won a lot of races – so you had to eat a little humble pie when I came here and just learn the craft. It’s a very different discipline, NASCAR racing, even on a road course. The cars are very difficult to drive and set up. You have to be very aggressive the whole day. You’ve got to forget about getting a car to handle well; you’ve just got to race the heck out of it, and I did that. I just raced hard every lap. I tried to force positions when I could. It was a treacherous race out there. There was a lot of slow cars that seemed to be in the way. You’ve got to be careful out there, and at the same time you can’t be soft because people take advantage of you. We’ve got some damage there late in the race, about 15 to go, side-swiped a lapped car and bent the steering, that’s when I thought the tire was going flat. It was pulling hard to left. I was just trying to keep it straight there on the brakes, but we survived that, and here we ar, we’re in Victory Lane. You’ve got to commit yourself to try and win, you’ve got to use all the car up, you’ve got use all the track up, and sometimes other people. But, here we are, it’s our day, and we’ve been waiting plenty long enough for this day to come, and we’re going to enjoy it.”
COGSWELL, continued – ON THE FINAL LAP, WERE YOU CONCERNED ABOUT PASSING THE 52 CAR? “Of course I was concerned; I wouldn’t have said that. I try to watch all the traffic and pay attention to what’s going on, and I called to him the last few laps what his interval was to second place. In the course of finishing laps there, we were on full screen on the camera so I had a pretty good idea of what was going on on the whole lap. Yeah, I told him that, just so he knew there was no need to take any chance, because he had a significant enough lead there that he just needed to get back over here. So, communication’s good. He knew I meant it when I said it, or I wouldn’t have said it. Just a fantastic working relationship that we have here, and it just couldn’t be any better. If I would’ve told him to lock the brakes up and he was still going to win, he probably would’ve done it. So, that’s just the way we work together.”
AMBROSE, continued – WHAT TIME IS IT BACK HOME, AND HOW DO YOU THINK THIS IS GOING TO BE PERCEIVED THERE? “Well, it’s 14 hours in front, and Tasmania doesn’t get the telecast this race because it’s an ABC event, so I guess the phone is going to be running pretty hot for the next 15 hours because I’m going to have to explain the race for the 25,000 people down there. My dad caught the race. He was in the capital city where they get the telecast, and it’s 14 hours in front, so it’s Sunday morning his time, so he’s feeling pretty good for a Sunday morning right now. So many people have an interest in what I’m doing over here in America, a lot of Australian fans. Every time I go home, or catch up on emails or whatever, they’ll ask me why can’t I win. So, at least now I can say, ‘I have won and just shut up.’ I need this win to really justify my move over here to the U.S. I’ve come from a winning deal down home; big fish in a pretty small pond, to be honest with you, and I’ve come across and taken on the best in the business here in NASCAR. And today’s field wasa tough field. There was a lot of really good drivers and really good cars, and a lot of Cup teams in this race. So, we didn’t luck into this, we deserve it. We worked hard for it, and we do deserve it and we should feel proud of it.”
ANY SPECIAL SIGNIFICANCE THAT THERE WERE 20 CUP DRIVERS IN THIS FIELD? “As far as the field goes, it was a real tough field, and you couldn’t have asked for a tougher field to compete against. We’ve got the best open-wheel drivers competing here, we’ve got the best sports-car guys competing, and the best Cup guys. So, yeah, it’s a tough field and every lap we had to push hard because it was a strong field. It does field when you race against those guys. It really does.”
WHEN YOU CAME HERE, DID YOU THINK IT WOULD TAKE TWO AND A HALF YEARS TO WIN? IF YOU KNEW THAT WOULD BE THE CASE, WOULD YOU STILL HAVE COME HERE? “I was prepared to sit on the sidelines for two years. And when I came to America, luckily I had enough smoke and mirrors for Tad to sign me up before I came across, but I was prepared to come over here for two years without a ride and just turn up in NASCAR world and try and forge my way into the sport. I was committed. It’s no secret that our team has been moving forward. We’re now a team that’s in Victory Lane, but when I first joined, we’ve come along way since then. So, I feel liked I’ve learned a lot, and the team’s grown. We’ve grown into each other, and that’s what you have to do; you have to start at the bottom and work your way up. There’s no miracle for me, there never has been. No one’s ever picked up the phone and given me the magical ride. I’ve had to do it the hard way. And that’s the way I enjoy to do it, too, is start from the bottom. I know that this sport is really tough. I expected it to be really tough before I got here. I wanted to win; I didn’t know whether I was able to. So, I guess I can tick that box now and move on to the next one.”
WHAT WAS GOING THROUGH YOUR MIND DURING THE CLOSING LAPS? “Tad is my team owner, he’s also my spotter. And that’s good job security when you do a good job – not so much when you have a bad day. Anyway, I could tell he was at the end of his rope because he told me there was one to go when there were four laps to go, so I really had, like, four one-laps-to-go. I was hoping and praying that the gear box was going to hold together, the motor was going to hold together, the tire really wasn’t flat, that a caution wasn’t going to come out, and I saw guys starting to run out of fuel, and I had three corners to go before I got the white flag, and I just knew that I had to try and compose myself and treat it like any other lap. And it’s very hard not to. You start to tense up. It was probably my worst lap of the race, the last one, just because I was so anxious to get it done. You know, I’ve been in this position before – maybe not this height of competition and competitiveness that it is in North America, so I just kind of relied on my previous experience, and brought it home. But, it is a blur, no doubt, that last lap. It’s not nice. You just want to get it over and done with.”
YOU HAVE ANOTHER RACE TOMORROW, AND YOU WERE PRETTY GOOD IN PRACTICE TODAY. “I’m going to have a clear view of probably 1 o’clock in the morning. I just really have got to keep a lid on it. The Wood Brothers and the 21 and Little Debbie, who have given me the chance to go Cup racing, I owe it to them to give it my very best tomorrow, so I’m going to get to bed nice and early, and try forget about today, and go in and race as a whole new day tomorrow. Cup racing is a big level, and I just want to give it the best I can. We’re starting in the back, I’m going to have to pass a lot of cars if I want to put myself in contention. The car is a great piece, we’ve got a really good car over there in the Cup garage. I just hope I can make the most of it. It is very special to drive for the Wood Brothers. They’re historically one of the most famous teams. I remember them growing up. I read a lot about them with their race wins here in NASCAR, and I want to do well for them and play my part in getting them back on track. They’ve had a tough year and they need some momentum to move them forward, and I hope I can help them do that.”
MATT KENSETH press conference
MATT KENSETH – No. 17 CitiFinancial Ford Fusion (started 16th, finished 3rd) – “It was good for us. That was the best that we’ve probably run at a road course, the best finish, for sure. We were fairly competitive. I didn’t know the 29 and those guys had as many problems or were short on fuel or what was going on there, so I was surprised when it was just Kyle [Busch] and Marcos [Ambrose] up in front of me. So, overall, it was pretty decent. I wasn’t fast as the top few cars – there were three or four of those guys that seemed to be a fair amount faster – but, other than that, I could hold my own with other guys.”
“I didn’t know it was our first top five, it probably was. But, we’ve run decent here a couple of times back in the day with the Busch cars – one time we were leading at the end and spun out. We had a couple of decent runs here with these cars before, so I don’t know necessarily it’s the best we ever ran in the Nationwide series car, but, yeah, it feels good to get a good finish and at least be competitive with most of the cars out there. It’s a lot more fun than running around in the back.”
IT WAS AN EXCITING RACE WITH THESE CARS TODAY. CAN THAT BE APPROXIMATED TOMORROW? “I don’t know what the race is going to be like in the front. My Sprint Cup car is not running very good, so I don’t know how to answer that. I don’t know how the race is going to be up front, I really don’t. I’ve never been a threat to win in one of those things.”
WHAT ARE YOUR EXPERIENCES RACING WITH MARCOS AMBROSE? ARE YOU HAPPY TO SEE HIM WIN? “I’m happy to see him win. I think the law of averages works out a little bit. Last week, obviously, he had that race won. I don’t know him that well, so I don’t know how miserable he would’ve been all week, but he kind of gave that one away, so it was nice to see him win this week and get that first victory, for sure.”
DAVID RAGAN – No. 6 Discount Tire Ford Fusion (started 34th, finished 9th) – “That was a good day for our Discount Tire Ford Fusion. It wasn’t that great in practice and didn’t qualify well at all. It just shows you that you can never give up in this sport. It was kind of a long race today, and the Discount Tire team did a great job on pit road and we had track position. All I had to do was drive a mistake-free race, and I probably made a few mistakes out there somewhere, they just weren’t big enough to cost us. It was a lot of fun. I was absolutely driving it as hard as I could, and just real fortunate on that big wreck on the front straightaway and was able to dodge the bullets and come away with a nice run.”
BRAD COLEMAN – No. 27 Carino’s Italian Grill/Life Without Lupus Ford Fusion (started 28th, finished 10th) – ON THE TORN UP LEFT FENDER. “That car looked like that on lap 15 or lap 20. We struggled through adversity through the whole race. My crew just did a great job fixing the car. That is the hardest I’ve ever driven in my life. I was driving that thing as hard as I could, every single lap just squealing tires. I was just getting killed down the straightaways because of all this damage right here – not aerodynamic, I was getting killed through the esses because it wouldn’t turn. But the slow corners, we were just dominating everybody. This was just an awesome race.”
ON THE TOP-10 FINISH DESPITE THE EARLY DAMAGE TO THE CAR. “That shows what determination will do for you – and heart. I mean, anyone would’ve given up with this car. I was pointing up at the sky, my front was a good couple of feet off the ground, but I just didn’t give up, my crew didn’t give up. We were determined to get a good finish.”
Boris Said, No. 52 7-Eleven Slurpee/No Fear Energy Ford Fusion (started 22nd, finished 27th) – “I never got a pit-road speeding penalty in my life and today I was nailed twice for speeding -- unbelievable. We had a fast car and looked like we were going to have great track position at the end. The fuel strategy was working, but the second speeding penalty killed us. We still had a chance for a decent finish but at the end I went for it and tried to pass Max Papis. I couldn't quite get by him -- he came down on me and then I wheel hopped, went through the gravel and wrecked. Two speeding penalties and wrecking at the end equals a very frustrating day.”