JEFF GORDON, NO. 24 DUPONT IMPALA SS met with media and discussed
restrictor plate changes for this weekend, Chase strategy, Jimmie
Johnson's popularity, and more.
HOW ARE THE SMALLER PLATES GOING TO AFFECT THE RACING AT TALLADEGA?
"I'm curious to see. I think what will happen is that we'll get out there
and practice and everybody will really be trying to lock-up like we did
before and see how hard it is to do that. We've been seeing it get more
intense and so more and more people will work on that in practice to
actually try to figure out how to do that. I really don't think it's
going to make that much of a difference. I think we're still going to be
able to do that because most of it is aero. But we did have a good amount
of power to be able to get in to that pocket and stay there. It's not a
huge jump in horsepower; it's not a huge change down but we'll see if it
makes a difference."
WILL IT BE SAFER AT ALL OR BE ABOUT THE SAME?
"It's Talladega, I mean. The cars are safe. The track is safe. The
conditions that we're racing in necessarily aren't but we know that; it's
been this way for a long time. Every time it evolves because the drivers
continue to push what the car is capable of and what the drivers are
capable of. We've seen that the last couple of races where you can get a
two-car draft and that's something that's new with this new car; we've
never really seen that before. Now that we can push one another through
the corners and that's what I don't understand. I thought there were
no-bump zones or something like that, but the reason why that's working
and happening is because NASCAR is allowing the cars to push one another
through the corners.
"So until they crack down on that I think you're going to see it come
down to two guys locking up together like that, pushing one another, and
then trying to figure out how to decide it among themselves. It doesn't
have to mean that there's going to be a crash. It doesn't have to be that
way. The leader has to make a decision of whether he's just going to
finish second or whether he can figure out a way to not allow that car to
even get inside or outside of him."
BECAUSE OF HOW THE LAST TWO PLATE RACES HAVE FINISHED WITH CRASHES, WILL
THAT MAKE YOU CHANGE THE WAY YOU RACE ON THE LAST LAP?
"Definitely if I was in that lead position it's going to make me change
how I would race. But other than that, no. I think that as the leader,
you've got to do everything you can to get to the checkered flag first,
but you've got to finish. You can't put yourself in a position to where
you're giving all the control to the guy right behind you and try to take
it away from him hundreds of feet away from the start/finish line. If
they get that kind of position, that kind of control on you, then you've
got to figure out how to take that control away from him before you ever
get to the start/finish line, or you've got to give it up and say okay,
today's my day to finish second and not to win."
YOU SAID THE CARS ARE SAFE AND THE TRACK IS SAFE, ETC. IS IT AS SAFE AS
IT CAN BE?
"Well, is it ever? Is it ever as safe as it can be? It's as safe as it's
ever been in my opinion. But at the same time, we've found out ways how
to draft with this car to put ourselves in position for the situation to
happen like it did the last time. So I think the cars are as safe as
they've ever been, for sure. And the track, I feel like they really
analyzed what went on there with the fence and everything and I feel like
it's as safe as it's ever been (with) safer barriers and all those
things. But the rules themselves and the cars themselves on this track,
you know what it is going into it and its madness; but its exciting
madness. If you're on the outside looking in, it's pretty exciting. From
inside, it's intense and you've got to try to be smart. But when the
closing laps come down, that kind of goes out the window and you have to
do whatever it takes to get yourself hopefully to victory lane."
DURING THE CHASE, DO YOU HAVE TO JUST NOT THINK ABOUT WHAT AN EARLY WRECK
COULD DO TO THE STANDINGS AND KEEP THAT OUT OF YOUR MIND?
"I can't focus on that. I've got to focus on keeping myself out of a
wreck and doing what we can do to put ourselves in position to
capitalize; if that were to happen and we could make it through it. I
think our goal is really to just look at the situation we're in based on
qualifying and running position at the time and our strategy is not set
right now. We have no set strategy. That strategy is going to be
constantly changing as the race goes on."
IS TALLADEGA A LESS OF A CRAP-SHOOT FOR THE No. 48 JIMMIE JOHNSON THAN IT
NORMALLY WOULD BE BECAUSE OF THE POINT SITUATION?
"They've played it just the way they wanted to play it. They wanted to
get themselves in position to have a big enough lead to where this race
doesn't necessarily determine the outcome. And they know they've got
three solid races left after this. And so, the thing you don't want to do
is break the momentum. You don't want to come in here and get caught up
in something, take a hit in the points, and then go next week and have a
problem or get caught up in something there and then all of a sudden
you're like, whoa, wait a minute. You know again, I can't get into their
heads and into their situation. We only can control our own situation and
our own destiny."
YOU DON'T WISH THE NO. 48 ANY BAD LUCK, BUT IN THIS CASE, HE (JIMMIE
JOHNSON) GETS IN THE BIG ONE AND YOU DON'T, CORRECT?
"Yeah, you can't wish anybody that. The championship is going to play out
the way it's going to play out. Whatever is meant to happen is going to
happen. All you can do is go out and work really hard and what I'm doing
as a driver and everybody else on my team is doing the same thing and we
just go out there and try to put ourselves in the best position and in
the best finishing position and hopefully that's a win. We're not
counting ourselves out of this thing by all means, but obviously some
things have to happen in order to get us back in it. And those are things
that are not in our control. All we can do is control our own race team
and do the best we can there."
NORMALLY HERE YOU WANT TO HELP YOUR TEAMMATES UNTIL 10 TO GO, OR 20 TO
GO, HAS THAT CHANGED AT ALL GIVEN THE POINTS DYNAMIC?
"A little. I mean I think that you get to this point in the season and
the Chase and you start to separate yourself when you're battling them
for the championship. We'll go to our debriefs and we'll share
information and do all those things, but when it comes to what's going to
happen on the race track, I don't see the NO. 48 having a lot of friends
out there. I might not either, I don't know. I think that we're all in
the situation. We're more of in a 'must win' situation and they're not.
And I know Jimmie is going to be driving like he always does. And if I
see it being a position that's going to help us get to the front, then
absolutely. But I can't say that's a whole lot different than any other
time we've been here at Talladega. We work together to better ourselves.
It's hard for people to understand that, you know? You are teammates, but
there is no pecking order. There's no, this is the guy that we all have
to help. If I were in ninth in points right now, I'd be out there to do
whatever I could to help, no doubt about it. But until we're
mathematically not in this thing, then we're still out there trying to
beat those guys and the No. 5 (Mark Martin) and the No. 42 (Juan Pablo
Montoya) and the No. 14 (Tony Stewart) and we're treated the same way."
WHAT'S THE BEST HALLOWEEN COSTUME YOU EVER HAD?
"I was a one-night stand (laughter). That one was pretty good. My pirate
last year was pretty good. But you guys would have gotten a kick out of
seeing me running around our house this week in my Superman outfit
because that's what (daughter) Ella wanted me to be. I didn't leave the
house in that uniform (laughter), but she certainly enjoyed it a lot more
than I did. Ingrid was trying to talk me into taking it to her little
class. She had like Halloween class pre-school thing and Ingrid wanted me
to wear that and I said, 'No. Not happening. I'll wear it all day long
around the house (but not outside)."
ON THESE FIVE TOPICS, COULD YOU PLEASE ANSWER "AWESOME" OR "AWFUL"?
ON MARK MARTIN BEING THE NEW YOUNG GUN
"Awesome."
ON JIMMIE JOHNSON GOING FOR HIS FOURTH CHAMPIONSHIP
"Awful for me. Awesome for him."
ON FUEL MILEAGE RACES
"I think all races are great, but I guess awful."
ON UNIFORM START TIMES FOR THE RACES IN 2010
"Awesome."
ON DANICA PATRICK MAYBE COMING TO NASCAR
"Awesome."
DO YOU THINK PEOPLE THOUGHT YOU WERE MESSING UP THE SHOW OR RUINING THE
SPORT BACK WHEN YOU WERE DOMINATING IN THE '90'S LIKE THEY SAY JIMMIE
JOHNSON IS NOW?
"Again, back then from my standpoint, I was loving it. And it didn't
matter to me what other people thought. But there was a rivalry there and
it was great. It built up that rivalry because it made people that were
Earnhardt fans only hate me more and it built up the people that started
to like me; it built that fan base up more. And it was really sort of
divided and I think the more you dominate, the more they divide and
that's only a good thing for this sport as well as for Jimmie."
SO WHY DOES JIMMIE JOHNSON GET CRITICIZED FOR DOMINATING MORE THAT YOU
DID?
"Oh, I don't know if he does. I wouldn't necessarily say that. There was
a lot of criticism back then too."
AFTER GOING THROUGH SEVERAL OF THESE CHASES, DOES THE RHYTHM GET ANY
EASIER? IS THERE MORE OR LESS PRESSURE NOW?
"I think there has always been a lot of pressure. For me, each year that
passes that we don't win I feel like it adds pressure. So, to me it's
more intense than it's ever been. But for us right now, being 150 points
out, I don't feel a lot of pressure because we really don't have anything
to lose, you know. We're just kind of in a situation where if things go
great for us for the next four weeks, we'll win it. But if they don't
we're hopefully going to be second or third."
DO YOU THINK NASCAR SHOULD MODIFY THE WAY THEY HANDLE SITUATIONS LIKE
WHAT HAPPENED WITH A.J. ALLMENDINGER? IN SOME LEAGUES LIKE THE NFL WHEN A
GUY GETS IN TROUBLE THE LEAGUE CAN SUSPEND HIM.
"This is not a franchise sport. This is independent contractors. I think
that obviously you have to reprimand certain actions. I really haven't
gotten into the details of that. All I can tell you is that this sport is
dictated by our fan base and our sponsors. And if your actions off the
track impact that enough, you're going to get penalized. To me, that
penalty is far going to outweigh anything that the series can do. We all
have situations where we make mistakes. I think each one is handled no
differently."
WHY ISN'T JIMMIE JOHNSON'S POPULARITY SKY-HIGH?
"I don't know. It's amazing to me. I really don't have an answer for that
other than for me, what helped build up my popularity was the rivalry we
talked about with me and Earnhardt Sr. He had such an incredible fan base
that anybody that came in and competed with him or beat him for a
championship which was pretty rare, again, divided up the fans and it was
extremely good for me and I think right now Jimmie doesn't have a
rivalry. One, he's dominated; but there wasn't somebody that was
dominating prior to him.
"We won our fourth championship in 2001 but since then and we're kind of
teammates and friends and all this stuff, so it's not like this love-hate
relationship that it may have appeared to have been, perception-wise,
between me and Earnhardt. And so, you never know what does this. I'm not
a marketing genius. I have no idea. You guys see it and hear it more than
I do, but it definitely makes you scratch your head a little bit when you
see the dominance that they've had."
OBVIOUSLY YOU CAN HAVE A LAST-LAP CRASH AT ANY TRACK. BUT WITH WHAT'S
HAPPENED AT THE LAST TWO PLATE RACES, IS THAT COINCIDENCE OR A TREND
THAT'S A LITTLE BOTHERSOME?
"No, it's bothersome because I look more at the one here. The one at
Daytona is different because, in my opinion, you can't really lock onto a
guy at Daytona and just push him all the way through the corners like you
can here. And that situation here was that the guy in second had complete
control of the guy who was leading and when it was time for him to make
his move, he made his move. And then the leader sees the checkered flag
and he's like I’m not going to give it up that easily and there's a
wreck. And I think that can happen over and over and over and over again.
And it definitely brings up that question of are we in control of that as
a driver or does NASCAR have to step in and take control of that? And
that's going to be something that we're going to debate I think for a
little while.
"And I wouldn't be surprised, even with the restrictor plate change, if
we see it come down to that again. I'm not saying there has to be a
wreck, but it's really this weekend, I don’t think they've changed
anything. But I'll find out once we get out there, with the restrictor
plate. But I think you're going to see the cars be able to do the same
thing. If two guys time it perfectly like they did, then it's going to
come down to the leader and is he okay being second? The only way he's
going to win the race is to block that car. And that's what's going to
cause a wreck."
DRIVERS DON'T LIKE TO HAVE NASCAR INVOLVED IN THINGS LIKE THAT. AS A
DRIVER, HOW COULD IT BE ACCEPTABLE FOR NASCAR TO PLAY A GREATER ROLE?
"I don't think NASCAR wants two cars breaking away, period. I don't think
they want to see that. They want to see a pack of cars. And so I think
that's why they made the restrictor plate change. I think they saw how
fast these two cars were able to go by themselves but I think there's
some aero and a little bit of aero package testing that needs to be done
as well that could possibly prevent those two cars from locking together
like that.
"Also, when we go to the drivers meeting here and they say this is the
no-bump zone and they draw a yellow line or a red line all the way around
(the track map) and the only way those two cars can do what they're doing
is to hit one another all the way around the corner. That, I think, is
the short term of a decision that they have to make. Do they want to get
involved in that, or not?"
WHAT'S YOUR REACTION TO LANCE MCGREW BECOMING THE PERMANENT CREW CHIEF
FOR DALE EARNHARDT JR.?
"All day long people can tell you within the organization that you're the
guy, you're the guy, but the perception has been out there for him to get
questioned, and when you're Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s crew chief, the last
thing you want is any extra questions (laughs). So I think it's a great
move and I like Lance a lot. I think those guys are good together."
ARE YOU INVOLVED IN ANY OF THE SOCIAL NETWORKS LIKE FACEBOOK OR TWITTER
AND IS THAT A GOOD WAY TO STAY IN TOUCH WITH YOUR FAN BASE?
"I'm not. And I should. I have my own website and we just did a blog on
there a couple of weeks ago. I'm not that good at it and I intend on
getting better at it in the future and it might include FaceBook and
Twitter, but as of right now, no."
-credit: gm racing
