Catchfence

Bobby Labonte Ask.com 2009 NSCS

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Audio: Bobby Labonte on Pocono

“I think for Pocono, the length of the track (is long). When you think of some of the tracks that got shortened from 500 to 400 miles, I didn’t mind it. Pocono is one of those that never has gotten shortened. I’m not so sure, 400 miles might still be too long there in a way because it’s such a long track and it takes forever to get around it. It could definitely go to 400 miles and I don’t think it would loose that much of a flavor for the race track. What we’ve seen there in the past is it’s a long, tough event. Dover was 500 and the last 100 would get you. At Pocono, 400 to a lot of people might still be too much.

“The front straightaway there, you come off the corner which is pretty slow but you pick up so much speed down the front straightaway that it is just forever, forever, forever. And then you just say, ‘Oh my gosh, I’ve got to let off here, I’m probably going about 205 (mph). And it’s hard on the breaks getting it to turn and everything. You’ve got a lot of time to think about turn one. Best thing to do is probably to not think about it but, it’s a long enough straightaway that you can’t ignore that you’re going to be hauling butt when you get down there.”

- Yates Racing, Press Release