MONSTER ENERGY NASCAR CUP SERIES
AAA 400 DRIVE FOR AUTISM
DOVER INTERNATIONAL SPEEDWAY
TEAM CHEVY DRIVER PRESS CONF. TRANSCRIPT
MAY 4, 2018
JAMIE MCMURRAY, NO. 1 GEARWRENCH CAMARO ZL1, met with members of the media at Dover to discuss his partnership with Gearwrench, the first practice session at Dover and many other topics. Full Transcript:
TALK ABOUT YOUR PARTNERSHIP WITH GEARWRENCH:
“Yeah, so GEARWRENCH is on our car actually last year for I think three races and they are doing six now. Yeah, really excited they are doing a lot of activation around their program, which is really important. I feel like in our sport, when I first came around, that was huge of not only being of partner of the car, but also activating at the track and they are doing a lot of that so it’s really nice.”
HOW AS YOUR CAR IN PRACTICE TODAY?
“Well, we only got about 60 seconds of track time total, which I guess is kind of the same for most, but we were not too bad. Certainly, the Ford’s seem to be the fastest cars every week right now, but I don’t know you build new cars every week, come to the track and we felt like we had better cars this week than we had at Richmond and are closing that gap slowly, but I thought both of our cars were okay today.”
INSPECTION ISSUES AGAIN THIS WEEK, IT LOOKED LIKE THEY WERE LOOKING AT THE SPLITTER, HOW DIFFICULT IS IT FOR YOU GUYS AS A TEAM TO GET THE TRACK TIME THAT YOU NEED WITH ALL THE ISSUES IN INSPECTION?
“Well there seems to be… you know communication is so big. I feel like if they would have shared with the teams exactly how they were going to inspect there would not have been any problem at all and clearly the Penske and RCR cars it looked like knew exactly how they were going to inspect the cars because all of their cars rolled right through and no one else did. It was a really easy fix. They brought out, not even a template, but just a straight edge this week and they were checking the splitter different than they have in the past.”
HOW ARE YOU FEELING?
“I feel pretty good. I actually went and rode Mt. Mitchel on Wednesday which is 8,000 feet of climbing and a 60-mile bike ride. But, it’s crazy to have a wreck that it that spectacular to watch and that many flips and tumbles and I really didn’t even have a bruise on my body. I got to look at the car on Monday and it is amazing how much the roll cage was smashed in, but then how everything around me was still perfect. I actually got our whole fab shop and the guys together on Tuesday when I was at the shop to thank everyone. I feel like a lot of times we get our team together to thank for performance and I told them, I’m like this is a completely different meeting. I am thanking you for keeping me safe and I know that there are times I feel like, probably especially for the interior guys that the drivers nitpick things or maybe even NASCAR nitpicks things that you don’t always see the reasons why and then when you have a wreck like that you are super appreciative of all the attention to detail that NASCAR and the teams put into the cars.”
DID EVERYTHING WORK THE WAY IT WAS SUPPOSED TO? DID YOU MAKE ANY CHANGES TO THE WAY YOUR SEAT IS OR ANYTHING?
“No, I honestly didn’t have any bruising anywhere. My head and my eyes were a little bit sore which I think is expected to be in a wreck like that, but the impacts… for the wreck to be as spectacular as it was it had to be drawn out the fact that it was so drawn out it made every impact not very big and I think that was a huge factor in not being hurt.”
WAS THERE ANYTHING THAT YOU OR YOUR TEAM LEARNED FROM SCOTT DIXON’S WRECK AT INDY LAST YEAR?
“No, he sent me a text to ask if I was okay. I like sent him the laughing emoji back I’m like ‘I have nothing on you.’”
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Greg is the author of "The Nuts and Bolts of NASCAR: The Definitive Viewers' Guide to Big-Time Stock Car Auto Racing" and has been published in major publications across the country including the Los Angeles Times, the Cleveland Plain Dealer and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. He was also a contributor to Chicken Soup for the NASCAR Soul, published in 2010, and the Christmas edition in 2016. He wrote as the NASCAR, Formula 1, Auto Reviews and National Veterans Affairs Examiner for Examiner.com and has appeared on Fox News. He holds a BS degree in communications, a Masters degree in psychology and is currently a PhD candidate majoring in psychology. He is currently the weekend Motorsports Editor for Autoweek.
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