Catchfence

Terry Cook

Raybestos Rookie Terry Cook will attempt to qualify for the TUMS Fast Relief 500.  Cook will be attempting to make his fourth start of the 2010 season.

TERRY COOK, No. 55 PRISM MOTORSPORTS TOYOTA: IS THIS A ONE-RACE DEAL JUST TO SEE HOW THINGS WORK?  “You hit the nail right on the head.  Phil [Parsons, car owner] needed some help here at Martinsville and he gave me a call.  I told him I was available to help him out.  I’ve been very fortunate this year to obviously start off the season in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series but been more fortunate throughout the middle of the season that I’m helping another Raybestos Rookie in the truck series, Justin Lofton.  I started helping him and kind of coaching him along, acting as his race day spotter and that’s a lot of fun.  We’ve kept in the Raybestos brakes family all summer long here but to get a chance to get back behind the wheel here at Martinsville is a lot of fun.”

YOU RAN WELL ENOUGH IN PRACTICE TO QUALIFY FOR THE RACE.  WHAT DOES THAT DO FOR YOUR CONFIDENCE?  “Well it obviously helps the confidence.  You always want that chance to prove that you’re good enough to do this.  I’ve been doing this a long time and I realize that there’s a lot more than just the driver.  It’s an entire team and I’ve been with a lot of great teams, even this year I’ve been with some good teams. It’s kind of fun to get back in the car.  It’s been I guess since May that I’ve been in a car and raced it competitively so just a lot of fun to finally get back in a car and get back to the track.”

SATURDAY IS GOING TO BE A BUSY DAY FOR YOU.  “In order to be around on Sunday I’ve got to get a good lap today.  I know I’m already going to be here tomorrow spotting and coaching Justin Lofton for the truck race and hopefully that goes well.  It’s all about this afternoon making sure we get at least one good lap down, get into the show and then we’ll worry about the rest from there.”

WAS THE SPRINT CUP SERIES TOUGHER AND MORE CHALLENGING THAN YOU THOUGHT?  “I think this new car is tougher than what I thought and I think that anybody moving into the Nationwide Series for next year has got a steep learning curve with the new generation car.  This car is just so much different in the way that you approach it; it’s different than what we raced.  I think in the old style Cup car you could still throw it around the track a little bit and get aggressive with it.  These cars you can’t.  It’s all about finesse and making sure that you’re on the right line, the right spot on the racetrack but with the other cars, you can be off a little bit and still make up for it as a driver.  These cars here, the car has to be 100 percent dead-on as a driver as far as making a difference is very small compared to the old car.”

ANY IDEA WHAT YOUR PLANS ARE FOR THE 2011 SEASON?  “No I really don’t.  I’m just looking for a good opportunity to be competitive, whether it’s a team manager position, a competition director or a driver on a race team.  I want to find a race team where I can make a difference and when you’re making a difference on a race team you put in so many long and hard hours you just want to be competitive.  That’s what keeps you motivated and keeps you wanting to go back to the track week in and week out.  When you’re not competitive you just don’t even want to be there.  Hopefully we’ll have a lot of fun this weekend.”

FOR A YOUNG DRIVER, HOW IMPORTANT IS ABILITY TO QUALIFY WELL?  DOES THAT ABILITY CREATE MORE OPPORTUNITIES AT THIS LEVEL?  “Well obviously you’ve got to make the show first but I see a lot of drivers that can qualify but they can’t race and I think you have to have the whole package.  Yes you’ve got to be able to make the race to be there on Sunday or whatever the case is but reality is once you get there you can’t be tearing up cars.  You’ve got to figure out how to make adjustments on the car to keep it competitive throughout the whole race.  And there’s a lot of great talent out there that can do that and I’ve seen a lot of talent come along that are great qualifiers but they get in the race and just can’t get it going from there.  It kind of contradicts myself there by saying yeah, you’ve got to be able to qualify to get in the race but you’ve also got to be able race when you finally get there.”

Raybestos® brand brake and chassis parts are produced by affiliated companies in Affinia’s Global Brake and Chassis Group, the leading manufacturer of braking systems and chassis parts in the transportation industry.  The brake line includes everything from brake drums to rotors, pads, shoes and hydraulic parts, while the chassis line features tie rods, ball points, idler arms and sway bar links.  Raybestos brand braking and chassis systems are also the only systems used by NASCAR’s Joe Gibbs Racing in competition.  For more information about Raybestos brakes, visit Raybestos.com.  For more information on Raybestos Chassis visit RaybestosChassis.com

Affinia Group Inc. is an innovative global leader in the design, manufacture, distribution and marketing of industrial grade products and services, including extensive offerings of aftermarket parts for automotive and heavy-duty vehicles. With more than $1.8 billion in annual revenue, Affinia has operations in North and South America, Europe, Asia and India. For more information, visit www.affiniagroup.com.

* Affinia Group Inc.’s affiliated companies include Brake Parts Inc. WIX Filtration Corp LLC, Affinia Products  Corp LLC and other high quality manufacturers of the Affinia family of brands.

- Camp & Associates, Inc., for Raybestos, Press Release