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Tuesday, July 31
Blaney likes new rule change
By Dave Blaney
Special to ESPN.com
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A big factor that will play into this weekend's Brickyard 400 for us is the rules change NASCAR officials announced last Friday, which gave the Dodges an additional two-inch extension forward on the front air-dam. In one respect, since we've spent four days testing at Indy with the configuration we've had all year, we'll be going back on Friday with only two hours practice prior to qualifying to learn what the change really means to our cars.
The rule change will change the balance of the car. We'll have to keep working with it as time goes on. It'll give us more downforce on the front and in theory you'll be able to hook the back end of the car up harder and have a better hooked up race car. The more aero downforce you can have, the better you are. It should help us once we learn how to use it. I don't know how much it'll affect what we learned at our Indy test. We'll go back knowing what the car should act like with the nose we had and go from there.
Eventually, I hope it will make a big difference for our cars in an area where frankly we've been struggling a bit. We're talking about the same kick-out with the nose that the Chevrolets have, so I don't think there's anything too extreme with it.
It's pretty obvious that's where the Dodges have been hurting. The fast high-banked tracks where downforce isn't quite as important, the Dodges seem to be running comparable with everybody else. The flat tracks where it really takes downforce -- like Pocono and Indianapolis -- the Dodges haven't been able to keep up. I think it's going to make us more competitive at those places.
We've got an hour of practice at Indy on Friday and hour before qualifying runs Saturday morning. When we tested at Indy, we worked mainly on qualifying set-ups. We went to the race set-ups on the second day after lunch and most of the afternoon was rained out.
Before this rules change, we were planning on using the Friday practice to work on race-runs and then do qualifying runs on Saturday morning. We've changed our plans a bit now. It might help us a bit in qualifying but the real benefit will be in race conditions on flat tracks and old tires where everything gets slipping and sliding. That's when a better feel for the nose will pay off.
For the past 10-15 years, NASCAR has been all about trying to make the competition more equal. That's what they've been all about. It's a constant process. Every year, we get a several rule changes across all the brands. This year, it's Dodge's turn. Ford got the rule change for the superspeedways -- the narrower spoilers and shorter roof spoiler -- so it's always been give and take. Everybody wants to give nothing and take it all. It doesn't matter which manufacturer you work with. If another brand is getting something, the rest will complain.
Regardless of how the change for the Dodges works out, it's always exciting to be at Indianapolis. For me, it's also the weekend when the World of Outlaws run one of their "Month of Money" races -- "The Big One" at Eldora (Ohio) Speedway. The WoO team I own -- with my brother Dale driving -- won it a couple of years back and I'm always thinking I want to commute over to Ohio each night after we get done at the Brickyard. We'll see how it goes this week before I decide if that's a good idea.
For me on the NASCAR side -- when I think about the Brickyard 400 -- I'll probably always think about the first time we made the race, which was 1999. I was still running full-time in the Busch Series and it was the third Winston Cup race we were attempting to make as a team that year while still running the Busch car.
I had to go back and forth to Indianapolis Raceway Park (IRP), where Busch practice was going on. (Bill Davis Racing's general manager) Mike Brown was spotting for me and they were so close that his radio at IMS could pick up Busch practice at IRP. The tracks are close, but the situations were miles apart. Race day made that even clearer to me.
When you come out of Gasoline Alley and the entire front-stretch is filled from corner-to-corner with people, it's an awesome sight. We had qualified 20th. When they lined up for the national anthem, our Amoco team was 10 people short of what everyone else's teams had lined up on pit-road but we were in the show.
It was the 50th stock-car race I had ever been in. Period. I was just beginning to figure out the stock cars where we were running at the front every week in the Busch Series. I was finally thinking I had made the right choice to make the move to NASCAR. And it was Indianapolis, the place where every kid in this country dreams of someday racing.
We've come a long way as a team in the two years since then. We'd like to be the first team to get a Winston Cup win for Dodge and this weekend would be an unbelievable time to get my first NASCAR win. Looking at who's won the Brickyard 400 in the six races we've had there -- Jeff Gordon, Ricky Rudd, Dale Jarrett, Bobby Labonte, Dale Earnhardt, the odds would appear to be against a more inexperienced driver like me winning one of NASCAR's biggest races.
But I've always liked those kinds of challenges. So many people said I would never be able to make the move to NASCAR from sprint cars and that probably made me even more determined to get this far. But both Bill Davis and our No. 93 team want a lot more than we delivered so far this year. We've run good but we've made mistakes that have cost us.
Maybe this weekend will be the start of what we all hope will be a much different fall stretch for the BDR teams. The elements look like they're all in place. It's really up to us now.
Drivers, crew chiefs and car owners involved in Dodge's return to the NASCAR Winston Cup Series in 2001 will provide periodic features to ESPN.com throughout the season. Send this story to a friend | Most sent stories
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