Catchfence

2010 NSCS Jeff Burton - Photo Credit: Sam Greenwood/Getty Images for NASCAR

WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS ABOUT THE PAST FEW RACES AND YOUR OUTLOOK HEADING INTO RICHMOND?: “We’re obviously excited about the way we’ve been running.  We’re disappointed about the way we’ve been finishing, but I feel like we’ve performed as well as anybody.  We just keep putting ourselves in the situation to have things happen.  We’ll hopefully get that behind us.  This is always a big race for me.  I like coming here.  It’s a hometown race.  Having a chance to compete in Virginia means a lot to me and I think it’s one of the best race tracks, if not the best race track that we go to all year long.  It’s fun for me.”

HAVE YOU HAD A SITUATION WHERE ONE OF YOUR TEAMMATES GOT UNDER YOUR SKIN AND HOW DID YOU DEAL WITH THAT?: “Certainly I think every driver has had a situation where they’ve had a run in with their teammate.  It’s inevitable.  This is a competitive business.  We ask a lot out of teammates.  What we do is ask our teammates to help you beat them and that’s hard to do.  This is a self-serving sport, but at the same time you’re asking people to work together in the best interest and it’s kind of contradicting.  It’s a tough thing to as teammates to do.  It’s the way we do things now and it’s the right way to do it, but it is very difficult.  I think it’s better if you can handle them behind the scenes.  I think it takes a little tension away from the situation if you can handle it behind the scenes.  Sometimes you can’t.  Sometimes things come out or things are seen.  After the race at Texas, you couldn’t help but see that so you knew there was an issue.  I think the best way to handle it is to go right at it, discuss it as soon as possible.  I actually think discussing it on Monday is better than discussing it on Sunday because the emotions are too high on Sunday.  I think we’ve all been in that situation.  I’ve handled it well in some cases and in other cases I haven’t.  It’s not the first and it won’t be the last.”

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Audio: 2010 NSCS Heath Calhoun 400 Pre-Race Conference with Jeff Burton

WHY DID YOU PIT AT THE END IN TALLADEGA?: “We had gotten a windshield tear off on the grill so we were sitting there leading the race and the water temperature was 245 degrees in front of the pack.  The caution came out and I did everything I could behind the pace car to get whatever it was on the grill off and it wouldn’t come off.  So when we came on pit road, the temperature had actually increased because the speed had gone down I guess and we were actually 250 degrees water temp.  We had to pit.  We didn’t want to pit, but we didn’t have a choice.”

HOW GOOD WAS THE RACE AT TALLADEGA AND CAN YOU EVER HAVE A PERFECT RACE?: “We led every lap at New Hampshire, I thought that was perfect.  But you all seem to hate it so I guess the definition of perfect is in the eye of the beholder isn’t it?  I just don’t that there’s ever a race that everybody is going to say, ‘That’s the best race you can possibly have.’  There is always a debatable issue.  I certainly thought that Sunday’s race was exciting from the driver’s standpoint. I haven’t watched the race from a fan’s perspective yet, but from the driver’s standpoint, I like the tempo of the race.  I like the pace of the race.  It was aggressive, but I didn’t think it was overly aggressive.  All in all I thought it was pretty good.  Talladega is fun to do, but it’s not fun to do all at the same time.  Its fun to race there, it’s just hard to deal with the consequences when the race is over.  It’s so easy to get caught up in somebody else’s wreck.  It can happen anywhere, but more so there that anywhere.  It’s a real frustrating place to race.  It’s fun to do, but when you’re paying points, that’s a tough race track to go to.”

HOW CLOSE DO YOU FEEL YOU ARE TO WINNING?: “I think we’re right there.  We’ve put ourselves consistently in position to win races.  I’ve been in the position to win more races this year than I was all of last year for sure.  Most races we’ve consistently been running in the top-five.  We consistently have been one of the faster cars most races.  I think we’ve certainly had a real shot at California, we had a real shot at Martinsville, we definitely had a real shot last week and at Texas.  All those races I felt like, I don’t want to say we gave them away because we didn’t give them away, but we could have done a little better job and they were our races.  We didn’t do that.  So I feel like we’re close.  Having said that, we’re 12th in points and I think we have one top-10 finish.  It’s bizarre to run the way we’ve run and to post the finishes that we’ve posted.  I’ve been part of a lot of different scenarios, but I’ve never been part of this scenario where we run this well and finish this poorly.”

ARE SITUATIONS LIKE JEFF GORDON AND JIMMIE JOHNSON’S FEUD GOOD FOR NASCAR OR BAD FOR NASCAR?: “I don’t want to sound rude when I say this, but I really don’t care.  I think it is what it is.  When we talk about, is it good for NASCAR?  Is it bad for NASCAR?  I don’t know.  I just don’t know.  I shouldn’t say I don’t care, but when we talk about those things then it makes it sound like it’s fabricated.  It makes it feel like we’re more worried about the outcome than we are about just dealing with our emotions and going out and racing.  I certainly don’t think that’s what it’s all about.  I hope that’s not what it’s all about.”

WHAT IS YOUR THOUGHT ABOUT NASCAR PENALTIES AND THE PERCEPTION THAT YOU CAN STILL CHEAT AND WIN IN THIS SPORT?: “I have a different perspective on it.  I won a NASCAR race, a Nationwide race and went through post-race inspection, deemed illegal and the race was taken away.  Dude, I don’t know what year I got married, what year I graduated, I barely know what year I was born.  It was in New River Valley Speedway.  We won the race.  Victory lane, got the trophy, the rear-end gear was found to be a non-Detroit type rocker and I hand delivered the trophy to Bobby Dotter the next weekend.  When people say you can win the race and you’re illegal, my experience contradicts that.  Now I may be the only example, but it happened to me.  I heard that Richard Petty did it in 1972 or whatever year it was.  I’ve heard it for years.  My opinion is that some penalties would warrant taking the trophy and taking the points and some penalties wouldn’t — does that make sense?  There’s minor infractions and there’s major infractions.  I don’t know how you differentiate the two.  I do see and I do understand that if someone is found to be illegal, from the outside looking in, how people can say, wait a minute if you’re illegal then you should have the race taken away.  The guy that finished second or third is there saying, ‘What about us, we weren’t illegal?’  He still gets the trophy and I think it’s a valid argument.  I’m not trying to tiptoe around the answer.  I can see how you could have some sort of a small infraction that didn’t impact the performance of the car and that should be looked at differently than something that does impact the performance.  If something impacts the performance of the car then there needs to be a real discussion about whether someone should keep that victory or not.  I’m sure that discussion has been had a thousand times.  I understand why people would look at that and it doesn’t sound very good.”

WHAT HAS BEEN THE BEST ASPECT OF WORKING WITH TODD BERRIER AS A CREW CHIEF AND SCOTT MILLER IN HIS NEW ROLE?: “Scott’s (Miller) taken his position and run with it and done a great job.  Richard (Childress, team owner) has given him the latitude to do that.  That’s something that is kind of out of character for Richard because Richard wants to be involved in every single thing.  Richard has given Scott a lot of latitude to go off and do things that have really impacted our company in a positive way.  I think Scott’s done a phenomenal job.  He hasn’t had many rookie mistakes in his position.  That structure and that foundation has really benefited our company a great deal.  Todd (Berrier, crew chief), the thing I like about working with Todd the most is his effort.  He accepts no compromise, he accepts nothing but the very best.  If there is a question, he goes and answers it.  If there is a debate about what is better, he goes and finds the answer.  He leaves no stone unturned.  He doesn’t look at the clock to decide whether something is right or wrong, his effort is incredible.  He’s extremely smart.  Typically people like that struggle in getting  help from the people around him and I think Todd is one of those guys that if you said, ‘Here’s a pile of metal and some welder and some wrenches and some stuff.’  And then you had a crew chief competition with who could go build the best car, Todd Berrier is going to win that competition.  If he had to do it all by himself, there’s no one better in the garage than Todd Berrier, I guarantee that.  From a crew chief standpoint.  Those kind of people tend to not accept help from around them very well because they would rather do it themselves.  Todd has really embraced sort of the new way of doing business by using engineering, using all the design groups, using the fabricators and using the people that can make him smarter.  That’s been really cool to see because that’s a transition for Todd not having to do it all by himself.  His willingness to accept that — his work ethic, his desire, his dedication, all those things have just really been impressive to me.”

DO YOU SEE YOURSELF RUNNING FOR POLITICAL OFFICE AND WHAT WOULD INTEREST YOU THE MOST?: “I see myself serving my community in some form or fashion.  I don’t know what that is.  I never served in the military, I’ve lived my life to be the best race car driver and a good husband and a good father.  That’s been my mission.  I had not served my country and that’s something that I think we all need to do and I haven’t done that.  When I step back from this, then that’s what I’m going to go set out to do.  I don’t know if that’s going to be in a political arena, I don’t know if that’s going to be volunteering.  I don’t know what that means other than to say that I haven’t done my part and it would be my time to do my part.”

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