RAY EVERNHAM (Car owner Evernham Motorsports Dodge Intrepid R/Ts) NOTE: Ray Evernham and Bob Wildberger were Saturday morning's guests at the Winston Breakfast Club. "I feel like that Dodge as an overall program deserves high marks.
RAY EVERNHAM (Car owner Evernham Motorsports Dodge Intrepid R/Ts)
NOTE: Ray Evernham and Bob Wildberger were Saturday morning's guests at
the Winston Breakfast Club.
"I feel like that Dodge as an overall program deserves high marks. We're
proud to be back at Homestead. It dawned on me yesterday that this is the
place we actually put the first Dodge on the race track after 20 odd years of
absence. We came here for our first test, so it's good to be back. Overall,
the Dodge program still amazes me. The one team concept, the engineering that
went behind the car and the motor to be finishing races, to have one car in
the top 10 in the points and another car close to the top 15. We've won some
races and sat on some poles and plenty of front rows. I give Dodge's program
some high marks. Every team that has joined the Dodge program, and my teams
are new teams so they didn't exist, but if you look at the performance of
every other team, their performance is I think comparable or better than last
year, so I give Dodge high marks on its first year in Winston Cup.
"The one-team approach can only help develop equipment, the aerodynamics,
the horsepower. We do good at sharing that stuff. Obviously, the closer we
get to being competitive, everybody wants to win the race. The truth is we
really have worked together to help all the Dodges. When my cars haven't run
good at places, or Kyle or Petty Enterprises people have offered and lend
Kyle motors and cars and aerodynamic advice. One thing you can't put a figure
on is people. It takes time to gel. Kyle has been building a lot of his
organization and it just takes time to build people and skills. I think you'd
be surprised, but not really surprised, because if you look at the chassis
dyno numbers from Phoenix, the 44 and 19 were very close. I think across the
board, the Dodge equipment is very close. It's just a matter of putting the
finishing touches on it and getting the right team to gel.
"One of the goals as a car owner, I never really expected it this fast.
When I looked at the 66 and 26 on the pole at Kansas City or Chicago, I
thought what an awesome feeling this must be for Travis Carter. Yesterday,
you look at all the highlights of my career in Winston Cup, whether it be
crew chief or mechanic or whatever, yesterday was a big day for me. I think
it was a big day for Dodge, and Dodge Dealers, my sponsors. It was a big
thrill there. We've learned how to make our cars go faster. Now we've got to
learn how to race. I think the cars will be OK tomorrow. We've got to not
make any mistakes. We're a little bit worried about the weather now. Sun to
clouds, I don't think anyone is going to get a real good handle on what the
setup is going to be today. If the sun comes out tomorrow, this place is
going to be different. We learned some things we got burned on at a couple of
places. Hopefully that will help us. I'm going to be in the 19 pit tomorrow
where I normally am working with those guys. Bill is pumped up. Casey is
pumped up. I told 'em I don't care what they do, just don't wreck going in
the first turn on the first lap. Hopefully they'll get in line and behave
themselves.
"Taking on an engine program and starting an engine shop and trying to
start the two teams and doing the development for Dodge, it was a big job.
My goal all through this is to build a championship organization one step at
a time. I couldn't see working really hard to put the proper people and cars
together and getting close to a championship and then have something out of
my control, like an engine program. I feel if you're going to have a
championship program, you've got to bite the bullet and start with the
foundation and the engine program is part of that. I'm very proud of my guys
at the engine shop. They're certainly doing a good job. Their stuff is
getting better and better. Again, it's something new for me. I'm not an
engine guy. I was always the crew chief who said I needed more horsepower. I
beat on my guys pretty hard for horsepower, and I know they're working on it.
Ted Flack and the people from Dodge have worked really hard with us and sent
engineers down to my facility to work with my guys, to help us with cylinder
head development and manifolds and camshafts and doing the right things. I'd
like to sit here and take a large part of the credit for our engine program,
but really, Ted Flack and the people at Dodge have made a huge difference the
last six months in that engine program.
"I play to win, but you've also got to be realistic. I'm not sick enough
over it where I'm going to go stick my head in the sand. You've got to look
at everything realistically. A year ago I basically had nothing. On Dec. 10,
we had two Dodges and had taken over Bill Elliott's facility. I see forward
progress. I see our cars getting competitive. I see our pit stops doing
really good. I see all the things taking place that will get us to victory
lane. As long as I continue to see that, I can deal with it. If I was sitting
here and we hadn't make any forward progress, I would probably be pulling my
hair out. I know if we continue to work hard and do the things we're doing,
it will come.
"I don't think I'd be mad (if I were a Pontiac car owner). Didn't Pontiac
win the Winston Cup championship last year. I don't know, don't care. I'm a
Dodge team owner and damn happy.
"I get confused when they talk about all that. What brand of car won
Phoenix? (Ford). What brand is leading the Winston Cup points championship?
(Chevrolet). What's in second place? (Ford) What's in third and fourth place?
(Pontiac and Ford). Where is the first Dodge? (Fifth). Every car has
characteristics at different race tracks, period. You go to some of the race
tracks and the Fords are going to run good, the Chevys are going to run good.
For some reason the Dodges are a little bit better on the flat tracks. I
think it's got something to do with the engine combination, it could be
aerodynamics. The point is, we've worked really hard on the flat track
program. That's just something that Dodge has worked on. Going back to
aerodynamic development, a lot of stuff we did in the wind tunnel; it's a lot
more than just making the shape on the bodies. Do we have an advantage here?
I don't know. Maybe, but it's certainly one we've worked at. When we go to
Dover or Martinsville and places like that, are we at a disadvantage? Yeah,
probably, but that's just the name of the game. Not everybody is going to be
equal all the time. It's just the nature of the beast. Those guys are doing
their job. If they're unhappy and they feel we've got an advantage, then
they'll talk about it. When we go to places, we'll talk about it. As long as
the cars are different and there is no common template and there's going to
be different teams, everybody is going to have to complain every once in
awhile. It's just a part of the sport.
"Look at the new tracks they're building and the venues we're going to.
Kansas City, Chicago, Vegas, here -- relatively flat. In the future, I don't
think they're going to be building banked tracks. We've got to get the speed
out of these cars somehow and get to racing better. It's my personal opinion
the cars are way too aerodynamic, not just our cars, everybody's cars.
They're too dependent on aerodynamics. We need to take some of the banking
away and give racing back to the guys who know how to sling springs and
shocks and swaybars.
"You'd have to be an idiot to not want Jeff Gordon in your car. Period. I
miss him as a friend. You'd have to be a plain idiot not to want Jeff Gordon
in your car. That's all I can tell you.
"There's still some pretty big holes in our program. We're still putting
people in the right places. We've learned how to make the cars go fast at a
couple of places, but not consistently everywhere. Our pit crews are getting
strong. Our engines are getting strong, but I still feel like we've got a way
to go before we're a weekly top 10 contender. I can't put a time limit on
that. I don't know what it is. Something like that just starts clicking. It's
a matter of getting people going or getting your skills going, but there's
still some pretty big holes in our program. We seem to struggle at the banked
tracks, the places I used to be really good at, the Atlanta, Charlottes,
places like that. That bothers me, but again, those are things we've got to
work on and I can't put a time limit on it. We're far from target, but we are
making progress.
"I had to stop and realize I had the wrong target. You can't start
something from scratch with nothing and go, 'we're going to win our first
year, we're going to do this and we're going to do that.' The targets I
needed to be working on were making sure I had my aerodynamic program in
place, making sure my engine is strong, making sure my pit crews are strong,
making sure the crews are communicating and I've got the right engineering
support. When I readjusted my goals, I feel now we're on our targets. You
can't just say I'm going to win five races next year. My targets now as car
owner is making sure that my part of the equation -- engineering, engine, pit
crew, cars, those things are in line.
"After we got our first round of cars built, we built 14 cars in 15
weeks. We were wiped out. April was just a killer month, and I realized I had
to concentrate on just getting things done. You can't even think about
winning races until you get your program in order. We're worried about
winning races and we didn't even have a car built for that race track. I
started to realize I had to put my targets on the foundation and the worry
about your performance.
"This is not a sport for weak people. When you take on the deal I took
on, you'd better be tough. I'm going to stick it out and we're going to get
there. You've got two choices in life. You make it or you don't. I just don't
look at not making it. It might take me 20 years to get back to where I want
to be. I'm doing it. I'm not going to whine and cry and say I used to win 10
races a year. It doesn't seem like anybody is winning 10 races a year now. I
know if I do the things I do, we'll get there. You've got to be tough."
BOB WILDBERGER (Senior Manager, NASCAR Operations -- Dodge Motorsports)
"I think we all share a lot of apprehension. We worked very hard using
the one team concept we believed in. We learned that from our truck program.
As we got into the year and we started off with the first race and got the
pole position the very first race we entered at Daytona. I think immediately
expectations went up from being competitive to 'OK, where's that first win?'
Of course we achieved that benchmark later in the year at Michigan. Then came
a second and a third. To give ourselves a report card for a launch year, we
couldn't be more pleased. We have an attitude for a one-team approach and to
convince a lot of big teams to change over to Dodge for 2001.
"It wasn't real difficult to get our teams to work together for the first
race this year. We knew the key would be to get everyone to work together
after we started racing. I think Kyle Petty said it best. He said, 'if we can
be one team for six days of the week and race on the seventh, then that makes
good sense and we'll be able to continue to grow and become better if we do
that.'
"When you get into individual teams, performance won't be the same for
every team every week. The fact is, a lot of knowledge is being shared.
People are working together to make us better as we continue to grow in the
sport.
"We're happy with our performance here yesterday at Homestead. We're
still growing. There's a lot to learn. We don't do that at every track. A lot
of extra notice is being taken because this is our first year back in the
program. All eyes are on us to see how we do. You look back at other tracks.
You're sitting in the same seat we're sitting in. We'd like to be here more
often.
"The biggest key to the success of our program is we look at this thing
differently. We partnered with our 3,000 Dodge Dealers, so this is not a
matter of somebody in one location deciding we wanted to go racing. This is a
matter of teamwork with our network and all recognizing the value of NASCAR
to market our products. It's that type of marketing effort that's going to
help us increase sales and go forward. We're getting full support from
management and all the plans are to go forward for the long haul. This is a
multi-year program."
-Dodge Motorsports-
