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Tuesday, July 10
Keeping focus will be hard
By Royce McGee
Special to ESPN.com
| |  | | | Skinner |
Lowe's Racing is coming off one of its most disappointing weekends of the season thus far. The No. 31 Lowe's Chevrolet was easily the second-best car in Saturday's Pepsi 400 at Daytona International Speedway, but a little mistake by a fellow competitor left us near the bottom of the running order.
We started out Thursday evening's practice intending to make a one-run shakedown because we were scheduled to have another practice Friday morning before qualifying at noon. But once practice started, NASCAR changed the schedule and eliminated Friday morning's practice. We immediately went from a one-run situation to an all-out practice. Not only did the Lowe's team experience that, so did the No. 29 team and about 18 other teams that had only planned on making one run. That kind of threw us off and we made some aggressive changes during that session.
Practice was winding down and Mike (Skinner, driver) was headed down pit road and onto the track for our final run, one he intended to run by himself to see how the Lowe's Chevrolet would perform in a qualifying situation. But another car jumped on the track with us and messed up that lap. That driver came blasting down pit road as we were taking to the track and started running side-by-side with us. That didn't help us learn a thing about the Lowe's car and we didn't have a good understanding about our qualifying situation when we left the garage that night.
So, we took what we knew about the Lowe's Chevy and made some educated guesses for qualifying Friday afternoon. People that have been in this business long enough know that when you qualify at Daytona, you qualify on new tires. Additionally, the engine guys observe the air density and altitude and they adjust the carburetors based on those numbers. Our engine tuners just have to make educated guesses.
Among the most important things to running well at Daytona and Talladega nowadays are keeping the car off the ground and getting the most speed possible out of the car. It's also important to make sure it drives well and the fenders don't rub anything on the car. Cars are going to run a little faster at night because the motors run better in cooler air. However, the change from daytime to nighttime doesn't really affect the handling of the cars at Daytona. If we were at Lowe's Motor Speedway, the change from day to night would be huge, just as it would be at Richmond. It doesn't matter at Bristol, Tenn., or Dover, Del., because concrete isn't sensitive to temperature changes. Daytona and Talladega also fall into that "not affected" category somewhat.
The Lowe's team qualified 23rd -- hardly what we're used to at Daytona. Mike wasn't really excited about the qualifying lap and said the car didn't pick up much rpm on the first or second laps. He said it drove well, but he believed the front springs were too stiff and maybe we should be more aggressive next time with softer springs. The No. 29 team had a similar problem on their qualifying lap. I talked to Kevin Harvick and he said that his car never pulled well or picked up any rpm, either. With the new aerodynamic rules and elimination of bump stops, it's harder to get the car on the ground. We struggled with that a bit. I thought it would challenge us because we were so dominant the past few races at superspeedways while using bump stops. Lowe's Racing had perfected the use of bump stops, but had to run without them last week for the first time at a superspeedway. Obviously, I think the loss of the bump stops hurt our qualifying package, but we expected that to some extent. But during the race, I don't think it hurt us at all.
When they waved the green flag Saturday night, Mike drove the Lowe's Chevrolet all the way from 23rd to 13th in one lap by driving through the middle of all the cars. We worked on our car pretty extensively Friday night during Happy Hour. A lot of people told us to quit practicing because we were so good and shouldn't risk getting caught up in an accident. But we kept working on it. We made two big changes at the end with some front shocks and played with the fenders a bit and got the Lowe's Chevy running well. It showed Saturday night and we had a very competitive car.
The Lowe's Chevrolet was definitely the second-place car -- nobody was going to beat Dale Earnhardt Jr. Obviously, when three or four cars are lined up in the draft and we couldn't drive by him, nobody was going to beat him. The No. 8 team had everybody covered and we were the next-best car. Lowe's Racing could outrun Dale Jr.'s teammates, the No. 1 and No. 15, hands-down. We could outrun Rusty Wallace, who came through the field and made a good run at the end. At the absolute worst, we would have finished 10th. Mike was patient with the draft and was using his head really well.
A little pit road mishap showed just how strong the Lowe's Chevy was Saturday. I called Mike into the pits on lap 89 and was counting him down to our stall. He was following the No. 15 car into the pits and the next thing I knew, the No. 15 wasn't stopping in his pit box! The No. 15 slid through his pit stall and into the Lowe's pit. Michael Waltrip never stopped until he got all the way into our pit box. Mike pulled in and had to slam on the brakes to keep from hitting the No. 15 car. We had two cars in our pit stall. The No. 15 crew finally got Michael backed up and Mike pulled the Lowe's machine into our pit box enough so we wouldn't get penalized for pitting outside the lines. We pitted the Lowe's Chevy and were posted 26th when we went back on the track. Thirteen laps later, we were running second again, so it didn't matter. That shows how good a car the Lowe's Chevy was Saturday night.
Despite the sheer strength of the Lowe's car in the Pepsi 400, we didn't finish the race. Once again, the black cloud that appears to hang over the Lowe's team reared its ugly head again. We had an awesome car and ended up with a less than awesome finish. We had called Mike into the pits with 19 laps remaining and he was waving off the car behind him, but I guess that guy wasn't paying attention. He sent Mike into the wall with a tap to the rear end of the Lowe's Chevy. Our first look at the Lowe's Chevy shows that it's totaled. I don't think we'll be able to repair it at the shop. At the very least, every piece of sheet metal will have to be removed and replaced if we are going to run this car again.
Despite how disappointed we were at Daytona, we're trying to keep our heads up and focus on Chicagoland Speedway. It's going to be the first trip to the 1.5-mile track for the Winston Cup teams. Richard Childress Racing sent Jeff Green and the No. 30 America Online team to test at Chicagoland last month. Green said Goodyear made a really good tire, but tires with a couple of laps on them ran better than brand new tires.
He also said Chicagoland is a really fast track with a lot of grip because it has fresh asphalt. When Darlington Raceway was re-paved five years ago, it became extremely fast with a lot of grip -- Rockingham, N.C., was the same way. New asphalt is coarse and the tire gets in the little holes in the surface of the asphalt. After you've run on a track for a while and it's gone through a winter cycle, and dust and sun have beat on it, the track surface takes on a fine shine and you've got to lay a lot of rubber down to make the tires grip.
The cars are going to run 190 mph the whole time, but a little more than 200 mph going into Turn 1. We run that fast at Atlanta and Fontana, Calif. Chicagoland is going to be a motor track -- that's the first thing we're going to look at. Who's got the most motor and who can run the fastest? The Penske and Yates cars are going to be hard to beat. How well did the car handle for long runs? Finally, it will help if we can beat them on fuel mileage. Some of those guys with great motors won't get as good fuel mileage.
No matter if the race comes down to horsepower or fuel mileage, it's definitely going to be an interesting race. When you have a brand-new, fast track like Chicagoland, you know things are going to be exciting. Lowe's Racing hopes to go down in the history books as the first Winston Cup team to visit Victory Lane at Chicagoland. We'll try to make that happen Sunday.
Royce McGee is the crew chief for Mike Skinner and the No. 31 Lowe's Chevrolet on the NASCAR Winston Cup Series. He is providing a weekly diary to ESPN.com throughout the season. Send this story to a friend | Most sent stories
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