Junior to put lessons to test after qualifying 40th
BRISTOL, Tenn. -- After a slippery qualifying run, Dale Earnhardt Jr. has some work to do at Bristol this weekend leading up to Saturday's Sharpie 500, but he and his No. 8 team appear well-equipped to handle it.
"I was all over the place," said Junior, who'll start 40th. "That car just had no grip. We'll be all right. We'll figure it out. We can still get a good car for the race [Saturday] night.
"With the lucky dog deal, you really don't have to run that hard to stay on the lead lap."
Earnhardt's recent history at Bristol Motor Speedway suggests they will "be all right." In fact, he's run all but two of the laps competed here since Aug. 2001.
Junior said Friday that lessons from his late father have served him well, particularly at the Tennessee bullring.
"My Daddy taught me a lot of things about how to get around here," Earnhardt said. "I get asked the question about 150,000 times, 'What did my Daddy teach me?' He told me a few things about getting in the corner."
That's not to say Junior paid attention to his dad's lessons right from the start.
"When I first started coming here I was running hard and really deep and running the tires and the car all to pieces," he said. "Now I'm just kind of relaxed and I know what the car's capable of and I just try to let that happen and don't really push the issue."
Especially in the corners.
"I try to be careful, I guess more so running down in the corners beside people," he said. "I'm a lot more careful than a lot of people about that."
And that carelessness is one of the reasons that Earnhardt Jr.'s personality changes just a little bit when he reaches Thunder Valley twice each year.
"This whole week, I'm just about as moody as I get," Earnhardt said. "If there's a time when I'm tough to be around, this is probably it. I just don't like the odds, you know what I mean.
"This is more difficult than a road course to me," Earnhardt said. "It's really tough. The air doesn't move around and the carbon monoxide and the heat just sits right around the track so you can't get a lot of cool air."
If Junior is to get his second Bristol victory, there's one guy he says he's going to have to get the better of -- pole-sitter Kurt Busch.
"He's damn sure going to be dominant because of the history of that [No. 2 car] and him," Earnhardt said. "That combination has got to be lethal here, so I look for him to be one of the guys to beat."
Heading into Saturday's race, Earnhardt Jr. sits in the all-important 10th spot in the Nextel Cup Series standings, 49 points ahead of 11th-place Kasey Kahne for the final spot in the Chase for the Nextel Cup.
With three races to go until the Chase field is set, Earnhardt said he's not feeling the pressure, but at the same time he knows what his job is.
"I just really don't get worked up over stuff," he said. "It just gets under your skin. You can't go home, relax and enjoy yourself. It'll always be on your mind if you let it. I just focus on racing when I'm at the track, I'm focused on my car and what it takes to get around the corner faster.
"Those things right there should take care of everything else."
Martin improves quals with better Happy Hour
BRISTOL, Tenn. -- Mark Martin entered Friday at Bristol Motor Speedway in a rare position -- with a win already under his belt this weekend.
And he may be in line for a second.
Martin, a two-time Cup Series winner at Bristol in 39 previous starts and the winner of Wednesday night's Truck Series race at the Tennessee bullring, posted the third-fastest time in Friday's final practice for Saturday's Sharpie 500.
Pole-sitter Kurt Busch led the session at 122.835 mph, a time of 15.621 seconds. Jeff Burton, who will share the front row with Busch on Saturday, was second in Happy Hour at 122.795/15.626 seconds.
Meanwhile, Martin clocked in at 122.631/15.647.
Still, despite the quickness of his No. 6 Ford, Martin isn't leaving room on his mantle for another trophy just yet, especially after a hiccup in qualifying that left him with a 15th-place starting spot.
"We got a bad draw there. I hate that," he said. "We've got a great racecar and I thought for once we weren't gonna start in the back, but that track was just way slick right there.
"I'm sure it will get better here because our car was capable of doing a lot better than that, but it was awful slick. It looks like it's gonna be the same old, same old for us. We'll just battle our way from the middle of the pack."
"I'll do everything I can [to win], but I do every time I come here and I've been in wrecks a lot as of late. You're really powerless here to a bigger extent than anywhere else."
However, Martin, one of the most respected men in the Nextel Cup garage area, knows that he might have a little bit easier road Saturday night than most thanks to his history.
"I get a break almost everywhere based on my history," Martin said. "That's how I view it, but, certainly, you can't give many breaks here. If I earn a break here, I typically always get it and where someone might not that doesn't have the same history that I have. That's how I feel about it.
"I race everyone. If someone earns a break with me on the racetrack, they get it -- here or anywhere else."
Breaks have been tough to come by for Martin in a season where he wasn't even supposed to be running full time. Despite a backbreaking schedule of Cup, Busch and Truck Series events, Martin still has managed to keep himself fourth in the Nextel Cup Series standings with 11 top-10 finishes in 23 starts.
Still, Martin says the schedule is tough to maintain.
"I'm stretched pretty thin this year, but I seem to be holding up pretty well," he said. "I'm driving a lot of stuff --- 67 races --- so it's a lot, but it's all going good.
"You caught me on a day when I've got a smile on my face, so I guess that's a good thing," he said. "I feel like I'm on top of the world. I'm driving for a great team with a great sponsor and have a shot at the Chase. I don't know what else a guy could ask for."
Perhaps another Bristol victory?
"At this stage of the game a win anywhere would be a big deal," Martin said. "I've said a lot that you don't get to choose where you win, you're just lucky if you get the win, so I'll take it wherever it comes."
Denny Hamlin, who'll start sixth on Saturday night, was fourth in the session at 122.318/15.687. Kyle Busch rounded out the top five at 15.736/121.937.
mayfield to drive no. 36 for bill davis in 2007
BRISTOL, Tenn. -- Jeremy Mayfield got a sneak preview last Tuesday of what he's got to look forward to for the next three years in Bill Davis Racing's Toyotas, and the Kentucky veteran likes what he saw.
On Friday morning at Bristol Motor Speedway, Davis announced Mayfield's deal to drive one of his Toyota Camrys, carrying No. 36, beginning in 2007. A new sponsor to the Nextel Cup Series, 360 OTC, will back the effort.
Davis, as expected, also confirmed that Dave Blaney would return for his second consecutive season in his second tour of duty with BDR, driving the No. 22 Caterpillar Camry.
"We haven't had a great deal of success this year but we've been trying to get better every weekend," Blaney said. "I had hoped that we would continue on because I knew better things were coming here at Bill Davis Racing.
"I'm excited about next year because I got to drive the first [Toyota] Monday and it was very good."
"I like Dave a lot and I think it's going to be a good teammate situation," Mayfield said. "He's a great, level-headed driver and I feel like he can help me and I can help him.
"We're both secure in our roles as drivers at Bill Davis Racing and when you have that, you don't have any of the cutthroat stuff going on, where you're not trying to help each other [so] I think it will be a good situation."
Mayfield, for his part, said he was also on the verge of announcing plans to compete in either the Busch or Craftsman Truck Series for most of the balance of this season.
Davis said he was uncertain what, if any, racing action he could promise Mayfield in one of his Cup cars for the final 12 races.
"As far as racing, we haven't really talked about that because so far we've just been trying to get to [Friday and making the announcement]," Davis said. "But we'd love to, because it would be a good head start on next year. Testing is testing, but racing is racing so we'll just have to see what shakes out."
Mayfield said his part-time action could begin as early as next weekend at California Speedway, a track at which he has one of his five career Cup victories.
"I definitely want to race somewhere, or race something -- whether it's a Busch car, a truck or whatever -- even a Cup car," Mayfield said. "But I just want to get in the right situation.
"I don't want to get into anything and just ride around. I've got to make sure that any time I get into a car that it's fast and it runs good. I think that will help me stay in tune with all the new stuff coming out.
"People are changing setups all the time and I just want to make sure I keep myself up to speed."
Both Mayfield and Blaney tested a Toyota Car of Tomorrow this past week for Davis: Blaney at Michigan International Speedway on Monday and Mayfield at Kentucky Speedway on Tuesday.
Mayfield, who worked at his test with an engineering group that included Todd Holbert of BDR affiliate Triad Racing Development, was enthused about that session and the promise it indicated for the future.
"The test was awesome," Mayfield said. "It gave me a lot of confidence knowing that there is a light at the end of the tunnel.
"The car drove great and I was really impressed that, the first time out in the Car of Tomorrow, being a Toyota Camry and involving all new stuff for me, to be able to run as great as we did.
"It was a deal where nothing weird was going on, you could drive the car and tell them what it was doing. It responded to every change that we made, and when you've got cars that respond that well and drive that good, we'll hopefully be in Victory Lane pretty soon."
Mayfield's crew chief wasn't announced, and the driver said there was a chance he would be paired with Tommy Baldwin, who won the 2002 Daytona 500 with Ward Burton for Bill Davis Racing.
"Tommy's taken over the role of looking over both teams [at BDR] but he could very well be my crew chief starting in 2007," Mayfield said. "Tommy and I have worked together before [at Evernham Motorsports] and I like him.
"He brings a lot of experience back to Bill Davis Racing and [he and Davis] were a good combination and had some success before. Tommy knows what I like and that's something that's going to help us, so I figure we're already ahead of schedule there."
The announcement was the latest bright spot in nearly three weeks for Mayfield, 37, who was released by Ray Evernham as the driver of Evernham's No. 19 Dodge, before the Watkins Glen weekend on Aug. 18.
Davis said that before he had any conversations with Mayfield, his newest driver had a release letter from Evernham giving him permission to talk to other owners.
"I've been so excited about Toyota and next year with Bill Davis Racing that I haven't really felt badly about this whole situation," Mayfield said. "I've been pretty positive because all the positives outweigh the negative [of being released].
"The future for me and Bill Davis Racing is what I'm looking forward to and what keeps me motivated."
Davis and Mayfield plan a heavy test schedule of their new Toyotas for the balance of this season.
"For the amount of testing that we're talking about doing, I think we'll definitely have a leg up on pretty much everybody out there," Mayfield said. "We'll be able to test more than anyone because I don't have a lot to do right now, but test.
"So if we're not running a Busch car or a truck or another Cup car, we'll be testing every week, hopefully, to get a lot of laps and figure these things out real quick, so we'll have a good head start on next season."
