MODERATOR:

“From Columbus, Indiana, the three-time and reigning NASCAR Sprint Cup Series champion, the co-owner of Stewart-Haas Racing, entering his 14th year on the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series, driver of the No. 14 Office Depot / Mobil 1 Chevrolet Impala, Tony Stewart.

“From South Bend, Indiana, a winner of 15 races and 49 poles in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series, entering his 11th full year of Sprint Cup racing, driver of the No. 39 U.S. Army / Quicken Loans Chevrolet Impala, Ryan Newman.

“From Roscoe, Illinois, the first woman to win a Major League open wheel race in a North American series with her win in the IZOD IndyCar Series, Indy Japan 300 at the twin ring oval in Japan, entering her first year in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series with a ten race schedule, driver of the No. 10 GoDaddy.Com Chevrolet Impala, Danica Patrick.

“Now their crew chiefs. From Spartanburg, South Carolina, the crew chief for Tony Stewart, the No. 14 Office Depot, / Mobil 1 team, Steve Addington.

“From Daytona Beach, Florida, the crew chief for Ryan Newman, and the No. 39 U.S. Army / Quicken Loans team, Tony Gibson.

“And from Berlin, Connecticut, the director of competition for Stewart-Haas Racing, and the crew chief for the No. 10 GoDaddy.Com team, Greg Zipadelli.

“The glue that keeps all of this together, from Haslett, Michigan, the vice president of competition for Stewart-Haas Racing, Matt Borland.

“Excellent. Thank you, everyone.

“Tony Stewart, driver/owner of Stewart-Haas Racing. We’ve said it once, we’ll say it a lot. You’re now the three-time and reigning Sprint Cup champion. First off, how’s the view from the top of the mountain, and more importantly from behind the wheel of that Office Depot / Mobil 1 Chevrolet?”

TONY STEWART: “I’m scared of heights, so I don’t try to get up too high. But, no, it’s felt good this winter. It’s definitely been a short off season, but had a lot of changes, obviously, having Steve Addington on board and having my great friend, Greg Zipadelli back on board. We’re very excited about it.

“It’s been a short off season, but we’re having fun watching the changes of Stewart-Haas Racing and how it’s going to help us be better this year.”

MODERATOR: “Ryan, you came off another strong chase performance, and a pretty historic day where you led Stewart-Haas Racing to a one-two qualifying effort, and a one-two finish at New Hampshire, and Quicken Loans coming on board and joining the U.S. Army, as well as a host of sponsors, as well as Aspen Dental which was secured over the weekend joining Outback Steakhouse, WIX Filters, Tornados and Haas Automation, how pumped are you for the 2012 season to begin?”

RYAN NEWMAN: “Really excited. It’s a great list of sponsors, and obviously to have the U.S. Army back, one of our founding partners with the team at Stewart-Haas, it’s a great feeling. To have Quicken Loans, and like you said the whole list of them – with Outback Steakhouse, new sponsors to the sport, and then Aspen Dental, new sponsors to our team – just really look forward to having an opportunity to get each and every one of them a shot at victory lane.”

THE MODERATOR: “Danica, the year that stock car racing takes center stage is finally upon us, and after balancing IndyCars and stock cars last year, it’s all stock cars all the time, including this Memorial Day weekend. For the first time you’ll be in Charlotte for the Coca Cola 600 instead of Indianapolis for the Indy 500. So what’s it going to be like for the GoDaddy girl?”

DANICA PATRICK: “I don’t know. You tell me. I’m very fortunate to be in this position with this team and these people. I’m very fortunate. I’ve been wanting to race stock cars full time for a little while here, and it’s happening.

“We’ve added another challenge with the Coke 600 or Coke 6,000 as I’ve been told. It’s quite long. So I just want to thank everyone for making it happen at Stewart-Haas, and thank GoDaddy for supporting me the whole way through. I even have my own GoDaddy microphone. That’s pretty clever. So life is good.”

THE MODERATOR: “We’ll reintroduce the folks behind these drivers, starting off with Steve Addington. Steve, welcome to Stewart-Haas Racing. How has the transition been as you sort of rejoin the family that you once knew at JGR?”

STEVE ADDINGTON: “It’s been awesome. To come in and work with a group of guys like Tony Gibson has made the transition of just asking me or telling me everything that I need to know and give me the information that I need to get started and where I need to look for stuff.. Matt Borland’s got a great group in the engineering department and those guys have been very, very welcoming in getting me started and seeing where we’re at and see what direction we need to get going.”

THE MODERATOR: “Tony Gibson, crew chief for Ryan Newman, you’ve been at Stewart-Haas Racing since the beginning. Can you talk a little about how Stewart-Haas Racing went from a relatively unknown that people really didn’t know what would happen to, to an organization that consistently wins races and contends for a championship and finally won a championship this past year?”

TONY GIBSON: “I think it’s just being surrounded with good, old fashioned racing people. You know, Stewart’s just an old redneck guy that loves to race and will drive everything. Everybody at our place, we just love racing. We grew together and things happened probably a little faster than most expected.

“But when you put a bunch of guys together that all they want to do is win and perform and run up front, things like that happen, partnered up with Chevrolet and they make things easy too. They give us all the things we need to improve our race teams and our company. We have great sponsors.

“So when you put all that in a Bowl, it’s got success written all over it. Really fortunate to be associated with Stewart-Haas Racing from the beginning and great drivers. Like I said before, Ryan’s one of those guys you want driving, because he’s going to give you 110% whether you’re two laps down or leading a race by half a lap. Doesn’t matter, you get the same effort out of him.

“So it’s a privilege to be hooked up with him, and Matt Borland. I’m looking forward to working with Steve and Greg and Danica, new people in our organization that are going to help us grow and be better. Already we’ve seen huge gains in our company since they’ve come on board. Looking forward to it.”

THE MODERATOR: “Excellent. And Greg Zipadelli, you’re reunited with Tony, but in a different way, as the competition director here at Stewart-Haas Racing. But still not far away from that pit box as Danica’s crew chief for this ten race schedule.”

GREG ZIPADELLI: “Yeah, it’s a great opportunity for myself. Next chapter in my life, maybe stepping back a little bit as a crew chief goes. I was excited to find out I was going to have the opportunity to do ten races and kind of help put this deal together.

“We had a really good test. I have enjoyed working with Danica. A good group of guys. I can’t say enough about the people at Stewart-Haas. The heart and the passion that every individual that I’ve met that works there is truly amazing. Very warm welcomes. Everybody has been very good to work with.

“They have done so much to help me make the transition. The people in the shop, Tony Gibson and his guys preparing cars for us, Matt Borland in engineering, a phenomenal place. We’re very, very excited about the future there.”

THE MODERATOR: “Matt Borland, the vice president of competition wore many hats in 2011, oversaw a lot of change, and also oversaw a lot of success. How did you manage it all?

MATT BORLAND: “I think it’s pretty easy. You look up here and we’ve got three new people up here along with all the people that have been here, each one brings a different talent and experience level to our program. We’ve got Steve who comes from Penske and Gibbs and a lot of new fresh ideas, things to look at, things to try.

“We’ve got Greg that’s come on board and he’s got new ideas from JGR that are all things we can try and try to make our stuff better than it’s been.

“Danica comes on board, another driver with open wheel background. So she’s got a lot of new ideas, new thoughts and new ways of thinking about things, and that just helps everybody come up with new ideas, new thoughts, new processes and hopefully out of that we’ll get a lot of wins and a lot of poles.”

THE MODERATOR: “Well said. We’ll open it up to questions.”

Q. I guess sometimes I miss things, but I don’t think I missed this, Danica. That’s news that you’re running the Coca Cola 600? Where does that leave the Indy 500? I assume you won’t try a double. Is that a difficult decision to race in that event this year?

DANICA PATRICK: “No, you didn’t miss it. I’m going to do the Coke 600. I’m not going to do the Indy 500. I hope to do it in the future, the Indy 500, that is. Maybe it will be a double. But at this point in time after a lot of conversations, it’s just going to be the Coke 600. It’s going to be a big challenge, but I’m looking forward to it, and especially a hometown like Charlotte for NASCAR.”

Q. How did you make the decision?

DANICA PATRICK: “The decision? Well, it was just something that didn’t work out as far as the business side of things. It just didn’t work out. I’m hopeful to do it in the future, but for this year, it just didn’t happen.”

Q. With the fuel injection system, how does it affect this race strategy? And, I think you still get your engines from Hendrick Motorsports. Is there still space left for your own modifications and changes to get ready for the race?

TONY GIBSON: “As far as the engines we get from Hendrick, they do a fantastic job, first of all, and they have done a great job of getting prepared for the EFI (Electronic Fuel Injection) stuff this year. They’ve done a lot of testing. They’ve really kept us involved in it, and we’ve done a lot of stuff with Hendrick Motorsports and Stewart-Haas.

“We get the engines from them. When they come, we put the headers and transmissions and stuff on it. But their engine tuners come over in our shops twice a week, three times a week. So we don’t actually build them, but they keep us in the flow of things. We’re hands on with it. They’re very open about it. They want our ideas and especially from those guys. Borland on the engineering side making harnesses and stuff for us that go in and sink in with the Hendrick side of it. They’re very welcome to our ideas.

“So on that side of it, it’s been a great partnership, and pretty smooth so far.”

Q. Matt, can you talk about the whole development of Stewart-Haas Racing, and people talk about the projects you have going on back there. Can you talk about how you’ve seen the evolution of Stewart-Haas Racing?

MATT BORLAND: “Yeah, Gene Haas and Joe Custer started Haas back in 2002. They put a great program together and when Tony came on board, he added a whole other level of capabilities to the program. It’s allowed us to get a lot more people, get a lot more what is the word I’m looking for? We have a lot more people to do a lot more things to be more specialized at what we’re looking at and refining things.

“I think the biggest thing that’s come about with that is we’re able to dive down into the details of the program. With the cars the way they are now, there’s not huge gains to be made. There are small gains to be made in a lot of areas. So it takes a group of very strong people that can go and try to find all those little things.

“To Tony Gibson’s point, to have a bunch of racers that that’s all they want to do. They want to race. They want to beat everybody. They want to find those little things that gets them that much better than the next team out there.”

Q. Ryan, your whole team comes back intact. You have a lot of new sponsors associated with the 39 this year. Are you in the best position in terms of your career with Stewart-Haas than you’ve ever been before in the last couple of years there?

RYAN NEWMAN: “From a sponsorship standpoint, without a doubt. We’re really proud to partner up with these new sponsors. Like I said in my opening, sponsors that haven’t been a part of NASCAR at all, like Quicken Loans and Outback has a little bit of history.

“But just from our standpoint, when you have great sponsors, you’re allowed to get the great people and do the great things. Without a doubt, the sponsorship is a big part of that.

“So, yes, from that standpoint, no doubt. From a team standpoint, it’s great to have all our group back. We had a great run to get into the Chase. Our Chase was a bit of a struggle for us as a team. But those are the things that you get through them, work on them, build them, and make yourself stronger as a team and an organization for the next years.

“Tony can attest to this too, you can win a championship one year, doesn’t mean you’re going to win it the next year. You have to work really hard. Other teams, when you win, you build fire and desire within them. So you have to have that same fire and desire within yourself to go back and do what we did as an organization last year.

Q. Tony, the spotlight’s going to be bright on your team this year. Not only are you the defending champion, but with the addition of Danica Patrick and with Ryan, how best is the team able to deal with that? From the very beginning, there is a lot of attention given to your team.

TONY STEWART: “Yeah, we’re not worried about that. It’s a good thing with our partners on board. It helps us from the marketing side and the sponsorship sides to make sure we’re fulfilling what our partners need.

“When it comes time to being at the racetrack and doing what we do on the track, this group of people up here are really good at focusing on the task at hand. I think we’re all up for the challenge. It’s a good way to start the year. We came off of a great finish to the year last year, and we got a lot of new exciting partners on board this year, and a new teammate that’s going to be fun to work with. And a teammate that’s always fun to work with over on this side.

“We’re excited. We’re probably as excited to start the year as I can remember being in a long time.”

Q. This is a special championship. What did you do personally to celebrate it?

TONY STEWART: “Stayed at the shop until the Wednesday of Christmas. I didn’t really do anything, to be honest. Like I said, with the addition of Steve and Greg and Danica, we wanted to make sure that we were kind of there to make sure that everybody was getting started off in the right direction. I wasn’t really there for anything more than moral support.

“These guys are the guys that make it all happen, for sure. But honestly, I didn’t really do much of anything. I went and raced a couple of times through the winter here, but for the most part, it’s been business as usual.”

Q. Can you assess the different dynamics in the shop with the addition of Danica, and Zippy, and Steve Addington, and then the fact that Tony won the championship last year, the mood of the team and the dynamics in the shop?

MATT BORLAND: “I think in general, the dynamics are very positive, very excited. Like Tony was saying, everybody’s looking forward to Daytona, looking forward to a great new season. As well, there are so many influx of new ideas this year, that we’re able to look at so many different things and find hopefully some more gains that will elevate us even better than we were last year.

“It’s been very positive. All the people on the team are pumped up and excited. It’s a great deal right now.”

Q. Tony, you won your third championship last year, five of 10 Chase races, and in a driver / crew chief relationship that you ended up changing, how much pressure does that put on the guy to your left when he walks in the front door?

TONY STEWART: “You’re asking the wrong guy. You need to ask him. I feel just fine.”

STEVE ADDINGTON: “I do too.”

TONY STEWART: “I think he’s thinking he’s on vacation now. Just saying. It’s kind of like what Tony Gibson was saying earlier. We’re just low key, down to earth racers and hard core racer that’s want to race. That is the attitude that Steve has coming in here.

“And as far as from my side, I’m not putting any pressure on him. I’m looking forward to going out and racing again. We both know there is going to be a period of getting to learn each other, and just little things that we’ll have to get sorted out to where we get into that weekly routine.

“Daytona’s not going to be… that ten day period’s not going to get it done. It’s going to take more of that. It’s going to take getting through Phoenix and some of those races to really get in tune with each other. But he’s been easy to work with so far.

“We’ve been able to work with him directly at Gibbs. So we kind of know him a little bit. I think it’s going to be pretty laid back, and we’re going to have a lot of fun. I don’t think it’s a big stress situation for either one of us right now.”

MODERATOR: “Steve, do you want to chime in on that as well?”

STEVE ADDINGTON: “No, look at what the organization did. One guy’s not going to make the big difference. I’ve got to keep the communication with him going as far as the race car’s concerned, and having that supporting cast, the people that are around you through the organization makes you successful. That’s what I’m looking forward to.

“Everybody that I’ve run into or worked with in the organization, I’ve worked with them at some point or beside them at some point that they’ve welcomed me with open arms. Asking me everything that I need to go racing with them, and that’s it. You’ve got the supporting cast there that’s going to be successful.”

Q. Tony, could you explain to fans how life changes and how life doesn’t change after becoming a champion for the first, second, and third time?

TONY STEWART: “It hasn’t changed at all, honestly. I think the first time it changes a little bit because you’ve accomplished that goal. But after the first one, it really doesn’t change your life so much the second and third one. Like I said, it’s kind of been business as usual. We’ve enjoyed the whole off season with the team, and it’s been fun being at the shop to see how excited the guys are. Guys that three years ago had never won a race, and now they’re celebrating their first championship together.

“It’s been fun to be at the shop around those guys and see how excited they are to have Danica come on board and Zippy and Steve. It’s been fun to watch everybody have fun in the off season. You’ve got these two guys to the right that are always keeping you on your toes and making it fun, too.

“So we’ve just got a great group of people that have made it fun, and it really hasn’t changed my life any. Like I said, I probably took less time this off season to go enjoy myself than any other time. But I’ve had fun doing what I’ve been doing.”

Q. Tony Gibson, the last 30 years we’ve had two owner/drivers win the championship, Tony and Alan Kulwicki. You worked with both of those drivers. Can you talk about what similarities there are between them and what differences there are?

TONY GIBSON: “I think the differences may be the engineering side of it. Kulwicki was more like Newman on the engineering side of it. But he loved the race. He loved all about racing, and all about winning. In his heart it was win, and the grass roots of racing whether it was in Wisconsin doing the late model stuff or in a Cup car.

“Stewart has that same desire. He has in his heart all he wants to do is race. Every time he’ll text you he’s at a racetrack somewhere racing, and that’s all he wants to do. So the difference is probably maybe on the schooling. I don’t know where you went to school at.”

TONY STEWART: “High school.”

TONY GIBSON: “He went to high school.

“When it comes to strapping the belts down and putting a helmet on and taking the green, it’s all with your desire to win. Him and Alan, as far as I’m concerned, had the same desire to win and that’s why they’re both champions.

Q. Tony, will you divide up your time now any differently between the Cup side and the short track team now that you’ve got more people? You’ve got more people to supervise. Are you asking more people to supervise to give you more time for your other ventures?

TONY STEWART: “No, it’s pretty much business as usual. We’re adding more to the program, so you want to make sure that you’re keeping that time to make sure that everybody’s where they need to be and making sure that everybody is comfortable with what we’ve got. So as far as the time that I divide running the short track stuff versus what we’re doing here, it’s pretty much the same balance.”

Q. Tony, the economy has been down the last couple of years, but it seems to be doing a bit of a rebound. You guys have been doing well signing on new sponsors. Can you talk about your efforts signing new sponsors and the economy of your team?

TONY STEWART: “I’ll be honest, I’m really, really proud of our marketing team. Mike Verlander has done a great job introducing some new partners in the sport. I think it’s one thing from day one when we brought Tornados on board with Ryan’s car, and now Quicken Loans and Aspen Dental to bring new partners like this into the sport and introduce them to NASCAR is something that I take a lot of pride in.

“Like I said, it’s our marketing stuff that’s done it. I can’t take the credit for it, but I’m really proud of them. It’s been a tough economy, as we know. But to show these new companies that there is this value in NASCAR is something that we’re proud of. I think Tornados has had a great experience . I think it’s been the same way for Quicken so far.

“We finished up the year last year with them, and I think they enjoyed the first trip in the sport. Looking forward to having Aspen Dental on board.

“I’m really excited about it. It’s the best position sponsorship-wise that our company has been in, and we still have races to sell. But it’s the best position that we’ve been in since I partnered up with Gene three years ago. So we’re really excited about it.

“I think it’s a sign that hopefully things are starting to turn around and work their way back up now.”

Q. For Tony, Zippy, and Danica, what is a reasonable expectation or goals for this season? Danica, when you answer, if you could also address the Nationwide Series.

DANICA PATRICK: “I think that first starting out with the Nationwide stuff, very much it depends on the individual weekend itself. There are still some tracks that I haven’t raced at before, so probably a little bit different expectations for those. But for the most part, solid top-10. Getting into the top-five more consistently through the year would be a goal, and I’d like to get to victory lane.

“As far as the Cup stuff, I think that it would be good if they answered as well on this. But I’d like to know what I should expect. But I think that at Daytona, the cars are very fast as you guys can see, and as we saw already at the test. So I feel good about that race. I feel good about… I mean, I was lucky enough to get to run with Tony in the Nationwide race last summer, and that went pretty good. So I feel good about Daytona.

“I think there is a real chance if luck falls our way to perhaps win. I think that’s a real chance. I mean, a guy like Trevor Bayne last year showed that.

“So those are the expectations for the first race, but then beyond that. I don’t know. Top-20 or so, I guess, would maybe be a good goal. I feel like longer races are good. I like long races. I feel like I learn, I get more comfortable out there and we keep tweaking on the car and making it a little better on each pit stop, so I’m hoping that plays into my favor with the length of these races.”

GREG ZIPADELLI: For myself, it’s just good solid days. Give her as much track time as we can, and support, and just trying to teach her as much as we can about this sport and this series for the following year.”

TONY STEWART: “I’m excited about it. From my standpoint, I crashed everything I drove from the Nationwide cars, and it – on the Cup side – it got better obviously. But looking at it, these ten races for her this year, for me it’s just finishing the races and getting the track time.

“In the short amount of time that I’ve worked with her, she’s so good at processing information and what she learns on the racetrack. She can explain it to you right away and very accurate. I think her feedback is excellent.

“Just getting the time on the racetrack and, I guess are from my standpoint, I’m not worried about the finishes at the end of the day. It’s just finishing the race, getting the laps and getting that experience in the car. Five hundred mile races are long races, especially in the Cup series when you’re dealing with a 3,400 pound car. It’s a learning process.

“I think the success at the end of the year won’t be judged by where the finishing position is at the end of the day as much as what she’s taken away from race weekend. So that’s what my goal is for her.”

THE MODERATOR: “A couple other story lines that are definitely worth asking these folks in their one –on-one sessions. Danica Patrick in the Super Bowl. While the New England Patriots and New York Giants are making a return to the Super Bowl in two weeks, so does Danica. This will be the eighth straight year GoDaddy has run a Super Bowl ad campaign, and the sixth in which Danica has starred.

“So all told, Danica has appeared in ten GoDaddy Super Bowl ads dating back to 2007, giving her the title of most commercials of any celebrity in the history of the event.

“Not to be lost on television, Tony Stewart spent part of his off season doing a little acting himself. He made a guest appearance on ABC’s ‘Last Man Standing’ with Tim Allen. That episode is slated to air Tuesday, Feb. 14 at 8 p.m. Eastern.

“Tony is also running the season opening NASCAR Nationwide Series race. He’ll be in the No. 33 Oreo 100th anniversary Chevrolet Impala. He’ll be looking for his fifth straight win in that event, and his seventh in the last eight season opening NASCAR Nationwide Series races at Daytona.

“Again, from a sports business story, I know we’ve touched about it a little bit, in addition to all the sponsors that have returned to Ryan Newman in the No. 39, new to the sport, Quicken Loans, Aspen Dental, Outback Steakhouse coming back to NASCAR, all affiliated with Ryan and that No. 39 team.”

The performance also gave the Tony Gibson-led team a pair of special awards under the Sprint Cup Series Prize Money & Decal Program. For earning the lowest average of qualifying result and race finish, Gibson claimed the DirecTV Crew Chief of the Race award. Newman won the Mobil1 Driver of the Race award as the highest finishing eligible driver.

Among those contributing to Sunday’s efforts was the team’s second engineer, Wesley Gantt, who has called his position a dream job on several levels. First, he communicates with a driver, Newman, who shares the same educational background.

“Ryan’s ability to look at the data and interpret it [as an engineer] helps out,” Gantt said.

Gantt, who lives in Taylorsville, N.C., also spends most weekends with his father — although at opposite ends of the garage. Rickie Gantt is a longtime Nationwide Series inspector.

“We get to see each other some. He’s pretty busy and I’m pretty busy,” Gantt said. “It’s kind of neat to be doing the same thing [racing] as your dad.”

Although Gantt had been a NASCAR fan since childhood, a job in stock car racing wasn’t his long-term goal. A self-described tinkerer with anything mechanical, Gantt at his parents’ urging, enrolled in the University of North Carolina Charlotte where he earned an engineering degree.

Upon graduation, Gantt went to work as a general engineer for the DANA Corp. in Statesville, N.C., but found himself at a career crossroads when the firm closed those offices and offered relocation. That’s when Gantt seriously considered a NASCAR engineering job, which he found in 2004 at Haas CNC Racing, now Stewart Haas Racing.

Television viewers often see Gantt — and others in similar positions up and down pit road — atop pit boxes working over computer keyboards. His primary job is data entry and interpretation but Gantt also monitors and helps forecast incoming weather, a significant responsibility the past three weekends at Pocono, Watkins Glen and Michigan.

Gantt has seen numerous changes in the sport since the introduction of NASCAR’s new car in 2007 and the end of official testing. As a member of the SHR engineering staff, he oversees a variety of simulations and has been in charge of the team’s seven-post shaker chassis rig.

“You definitely have to hit the race track pretty close,” said Gantt about the set-up, noting that every team in the garage has virtually the same equipment. “You don’t have a very big window to work in.”

Gantt is proud of being part of Newman’s two recent wins, at Phoenix in 2010 and in July at New Hampshire. Phoenix always will be special because it was Gantt’s first victory as a Cup team member. But showing his competitive streak, he ranks Loudon a bit higher on the scale of success “because we sat on the pole, led a lot of laps and had a good car.”

Next on the Cup Series schedule, with three races remaining before the 12 qualifiers for the are determined is Saturday’s Irwin Tools Night Race at Bristol Motor Speedway (7 p.m. ET, ABC).

KANNAPOLIS, N.C. - “You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself in any direction you choose. You’re on your own. And you know what you know. You are the guy who’ll decide where to go” – Dr. Seuss

For each of us, every day is a learning experience. From the moment one wakes up until it is time to sleep, once again, there are moments of growth and understanding that we didn’t have before. So, in turn, at the end of each day, each of us enjoys a “graduation” of sorts.

The same theory can be applied to everything each of us does. For instance, on the racetrack, Ryan Newman and his No. 39 Haas Automation team “graduate” from one race to the next for 26 race weekends until they qualify for the Chase for the Sprint Cup Championship. And then the goal becomes to “graduate” to a championship contender and earn the ultimate degree – the Sprint Cup championship.

To successfully move from one racetrack to the next and eventually earn a berth in the Chase, Newman and his Stewart-Haas Racing (SHR) team must learn from each challenge they face every weekend. They must take their lessons and apply them to the next event. It’s a cycle of learning, growing, evolving and, yes, “graduating.”

This weekend, as the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series travels to Pocono (Pa.) Raceway for the 5-Hour Energy 500, Newman’s crew chief Tony Gibson will be part of another important event – the high school graduation of his only child, daughter Lainee, from Mount Pleasant High School in Concord, N.C.

Gibson will lead his driver through two practices on Friday afternoon at Pocono in hopes of gaining some knowledge for qualifying and Sunday’s 200-lap event. With the help of his driver, Gibson will fly home following the practice sessions for his daughter’s graduation before returning to the racetrack in time for Saturday’s qualifying session.

For Newman, it seems appropriate that this weekend marks the high school graduation of Gibson’s daughter. After all, the “Tricky Triangle,” as Pocono Raceway is known, could be considered the track that helped him “graduate” and launch his career to the upper echelon of stock car racing and the Sprint Cup Series.

Pocono Raceway was the site of Newman’s first-ever stock car victory on July 22, 2000. He scored the win in just his second start for Penske Racing in the ARCA Series. The South Bend, Ind., native started on the outside pole, led 40 of the 80 laps and scored a dominating victory.

Now, nearly 11 years after that very first stock car win at Pocono, Newman & Company are currently 10^th in Sprint Cup points, 103 behind leader Carl Edwards. While the team had a quick start to the 2011 season with three fifth-place finishes and four top-10s in the season’s first five races, the No. 39 team’s fortunes haven’t been quite as impressive in recent weeks. In the last eight races, Newman has scored just one top-10 – another fifth-place finish at Darlington (S.C.) Raceway.

In 18 starts at Pocono, Newman has one win, two poles, six top-five finishes and seven top-10s. He has never finished outside the top-14 since joining SHR in 2009, and has one top-five finish at the 2.5-mile triangle with his No. 39 team.

Newman & Company hopes it can help its crew chief celebrate the pomp and circumstance of his daughter’s high school graduation this weekend with its own celebration in Pocono’s victory lane. He has graduated to the top of the leaderboard at Pocono, before, and a win this weekend would not only serve as proof the team is growing, learning and evolving. It would earn “extra credit” in the form of a valuable bonus point for a win for when “graduation” to the Chase is held in September at Richmond.

RYAN NEWMAN, Driver of the No. 39 Haas Automation Chevrolet Impala for Stewart-Haas Racing:

It seems as if drivers either love or hate Pocono Raceway because it is so difficult. What are your thoughts on the “Tricky Triangle?”
“It’s one of my favorite racetracks just because it is so difficult. It’s really fun to drive. I like it because it’s challenging. Each corner is different – different radius, different banking, different bumps. Each straightaway is a different length. It just seems like it’s a driver’s racetrack and a crew chief’s racetrack because he has to get the car to the driver’s liking in all three corners. NASCAR’s done a little bit of a soft pitch to us this year with the changing of the transmission ratios, so we will actually shift like we used to. Going back the last couple of years, we weren’t allowed to shift. And then, in the old-style racecar, we could. It adds a different twist to it for the drivers and for the crew chiefs to get the ratios right, to get the car handling when you are shifting and when you’re not. It changes the way we drive and the way we set up the racecars a little bit. It’s fun to have unique situations and unique racetracks. We look forward to going to Pocono each and every time.”

Can you explain what you mean when you say that Pocono is challenging?
“Pocono is about as complex as the road courses are. Road courses, you get a lot of different turns and straightaways. You can easily package that into three or four different corners the way a car drives. Pocono is very different in all three corners, so it’s very complex when it comes to setting the car up and from the driver’s standpoint. It’s all about matching up the combination of how the crew chief sets up the car relative to how the driver drives the racecar to make a happy package and have a shot at victory. Fuel mileage can also be crucial at Pocono. The bigger the racetrack, the more sensitive it is when it comes to fuel mileage. Each lap is 2.5 miles, there. Getting back to pit lane when you’re close to running out of fuel, it tends to be a place where the driver really has to manage his fuel when the crew chief asks you to save some fuel. There are a lot of great things that could happen at Pocono that we don’t really have at some other racetracks. You get to places like Pocono, Indianapolis and Michigan and fuel mileage can be as much of a crew chief’s friend as a foe.”

Pocono is where you got your first win in a stock car. Does the track hold a special significance for you because of that victory?
“My first win at Pocono wasn’t in NASCAR competition. It was in my second ARCA start, but it was so big for me and my family and everyone who had helped me in my racing career along the way. Growing up in Indiana, I always wanted to drive in NASCAR, which wasn’t heard of. Most kids in Indiana wanted to compete in the Indianapolis 500. But for me, I always loved stock car racing. So, winning at Pocono back in 2000 was bigger than I can explain. It was proving that I had made the right decision and that I was ready for the move to stock car racing. It was really a special day. There was some excitement on the final laps, some bumping, but it was a big win for me.”

This year at Pocono Raceway, we also have a different schedule with qualifying on Saturday. We have done this at several tracks, now. What are your thoughts on that kind of schedule?
It does put a lot of pressure on a driver and a crew chief, for that matter, to get it right for that one lap – and that’s all we run that day. I understand when people say it seems like it’s a waste of time to go there and be there for an entire day for one lap. But, on the other side for me, I enjoy the fishing in the area. So I get to go out, run my lap and then go and enjoy some time around the area. My wife’s family lives in that area, too, so we go and spend time with them. I guess there are two sides to every coin. It definitely puts a lot of pressure on a guy to get three corners right in one lap after sleeping through the night and making changes to the racecar for Saturday morning. But for me, I have 12 fishing rods, tackle boxes and a three-piece boat with a trolling motor and battery so we can go out and fish anytime we can. I really enjoy it. It’s a way for me to break away and relax and enjoy the outdoors. Pocono is a great place to go fishing, and I’m looking forward to that on Saturday.”

RYAN NEWMAN’S POCONO RACEWAY PERFORMANCE PROFILE

† Qualifying canceled due to weather, starting position set via car owner points.

* Race cut short due to weather.

× Race length extended due to green-white-checker finish.

Photo by Jason Smith/Getty Images for NASCAR

MODERATOR:
“Want to thank everyone at the Speedway. Always great to be the first bus stop on the tour and very honored to be part of the first day.

“Just to give you a lay of the land for what we have here today, obviously the more time you can spend with our folks, the better. We’ll go ahead and introduce these familiar faces. Obviously, Tony Stewart, the driver-owner here at Stewart-Haas Racing and the pilot of the No. 14 Office Depot/Mobil 1 Chevrolet; his crew chief Darian Grubb; and Ryan Newman, driver of the No. 39 U.S. Army/Tornados/Haas Automation Chevrolet; his crew chief Tony Gibson; and director of competition Bobby Hutchens.

“Tony, it’s Stewart-Haas Racing’s junior year of operation, a phenomenal freshman year, a sophomore year that also had some strong points, as well. What do you envision for the junior year of Stewart-Haas Racing?”

TONY STEWART:
“Hopefully, we just keep building on that momentum. Obviously, the first year was a learning year and a building year but, this past year, I think we all started the season a lot more comfortable in knowing what to expect. It’s definitely not easy, for sure.

“But that’s what having this group of people on stage is all about, and having Bobby (Hutchens) lead this for us, and two great chew chiefs and teammates, that’s the key ingredient you have to have. Really excited about getting the 2011 season underway. And, obviously, we have some great partners here with Mobil 1 coming on board this year, and Office Depot, who was the very first company to ever contact us wanting to be a part of this once we joined Stewart-Haas Racing. And, obviously, great partners with the U.S. Army and Tornados and Haas Automation, which really is the group that helped make all this possible. We have some great partners – Burger King, as well. There are great companies – Coca?Cola, Chevrolet – that have really helped us as a family and made us a part of their family. So we are looking forward to getting going again.”

MODERATOR:
“And Ryan, if you could add to that, specifically, to you and the No. 39 team.”

RYAN NEWMAN:
“Just continue to go build on the relationships with the team, the communication that we have, and working on our racecars and taking everything to that ‘nth’ degree of performance. Had a good year last year, and look forward to this year. I look forward to starting strong. That’s one thing we have not done as a team on the 39 side is start the season off with a good Daytona 500, so we look forward to that opportunity again this year. Had some fun testing down there with the new pavement, and look forward to the entire Speedweeks.”

MODERATOR:
“Darian and Tony, if you guys could add, from a technical perspective, new nose on our Chevy Impalas, new asphalt at Daytona and even a new fuel with ethanol. If you could talk about 2011 from a technical perspective. Darian, if you could talk about 2011 from a technical perspective.”

DARIAN GRUBB:
“It’s an exciting time for us. A few changes coming from NASCAR with the rules and new body style with the nose with Chevrolet, done a nice job on that. Excited working with Chevrolet in its 100th year of operation and being a part of its motorsports program, which has gotten so strong. The competition level is so high, we feel like we have got a leg up with our Windshear wind tunnel program, our new technical partner with Mobil 1. We feel like we have a leg up on the competition and trying to take that technology edge to the racetrack.”

MODERATOR:
“Tony (Gibson) if you can add from the 39 team’s perspective.”

TONY GIBSON:
“I think one of the biggest things we have been working on is our aero department. Chevrolet has done a great job on the new noses and spending time in the tunnel and Chevrolet does well in giving us time in the tunnel and Windshear has been a huge benefit for us. On the aero side, it’s been big and we’ve been trying to pay attention to get most out of it. And keeping the nose down with the least amount of traffic is pretty big, and working on a fuel deal. Hendrick (Motorsports) has been doing a good job and making sure we get good mileage and performance out of the engines going to the new E?15 fuel, and getting that in a bag so when you get down there, you’ve got to work with all of it. So you’ve got to dibble in all of that stuff to make sure that you’re on top of it. You can’t leave one thing unturned. So everybody at Stewart-Haas Racing has done a great job – all the engineering staff, they have done a great job staying on top of that and making sure we are getting as much as we can out of each bag.”

MODERATOR:
“And Bobby Hutchens, our director of competition. If you are to look at this from a holistic standpoint, last year at Homestead and beginning of this year at Daytona – not much off to our offseason – can you talk about the logistics of planning for a season?”

BOBBY HUTCHENS:
“Our engineering department led by Matt Borland has worked hard to get us ready for 2011. They have been out working on our speedway program and up in Michigan this weekend at a GM facility working on drivetrain parts and pieces, and then with our new sponsor, Mobil 1 and WIX Filters, technical partners, hope that helps us over the offseason to make our end product better on Sundays. As these guys said, this shop here has worked really hard to make sure our third season is our most successful season, yet.”

Q: Tony, you’ve had a chance to test at Daytona – new asphalt and everything. Sounds like the guys think the wind tunnel work has been good and cars are good. Hendrick engines, can you see any difference? Can they come with a little more horsepower this year?

TONY STEWART:
“The hard part is, we have a smaller (restrictor) plate than we’ve had at Daytona – than we have had for a while – so it’s hard to really feel it. I know they have worked hard over the offseason and I know they are excited about our package. I know we never really got in a group of more than five cars. So it was hard to compare car-to-car and that’s the only way you can really tell. They always feel like they are lazy with the restrictor plate on them, but when you get around other cars is when you notice that Hendrick horsepower. Seems like when we were able to get around some other cars, I felt like we had really good horsepower.”

Q. You were able to land an important new sponsor this year with Mobil 1. Is the economy starting to turn for you guys, making the sponsorship opportunities maybe a little easier than they were in 2008, 2009? And number two, does your affiliation with your outside affiliations, the open?wheel team, make you guys more attractive to potential partners?

TONY STEWART:
“I hope it does. Obviously, with our open?wheel teams and the (Sprint) Cup teams, I feel like we have the opportunity, especially with somebody like Mobil 1 coming on board. I know that something that was very interesting to them was the aspect of not only, ‘What we can help them develop on the Cup side, but also how does that transfer down to the grassroots racers?’ Hopefully, that does make it more appealing.

“I don’t think that we’ve turned the corner on the economy side, yet. It’s very competitive. The work off the racetrack, between the car owners and sponsors right now, it’s probably more competitive than I ever imagined it would be. And, especially nowadays, I think it’s probably harder than it’s been in the past 15 or 20 years. The good thing is, you don’t see a lot of sponsors really leaving the sport. They just have been moving around a little bit. So I think it’s a very hard time for car owners trying to figure out how they can make an attractive program and package for these sponsors to want to come over and be a part of your organization. I really feel fortunate to have somebody like Office Depot, that was here from day one, and that was when the economy started turning. They were one of the first people who wanted to be on board with us. And we had a great run with Old Spice, but having Mobil 1 on board now and having them come over in this economy is something we are really proud of.”

Q. I wanted to ask Tony Gibson: you were at DEI (Dale Earnhardt, Inc.) when they dominated the restrictor-plate tracks, and now you go with new nose and new asphalt. How much of an adjustment is it? Is the nose mainly cosmetic, or is the asphalt a big deal? What did you find and how big of an adjustment is it for you?

TONY GIBSON:
“The racetrack has a ton of grip. The old Daytona – me and Darian were talking earlier – you would run 15, 20 laps and the grip would go away and it would come down to handling and guys would get single-file. Now there’s so much grip in the racetrack, there’s some different characteristics in track to track versus Talladega, but I think it’s, for us set up?wise, it’s really, really close to Talladega. Get as much speed out of it as you can because handling doesn’t seem to be a big issue right now. I think it’s going to come down to raw speed and, if these guys can stay nose-to-tail and push each other, that will be the key. I think you’ll see a lot more side?by?side racing than you’ve seen in the last few years at Daytona, just based off so much grip in the racetrack.”

Q. Looks like you’ve (Stewart) lost some weight. If you’re in a program, could you describe that program and any other comments on fitness for the job that you do?

TONY STEWART:
“I’m definitely not the guy to be adding a lot to the fitness comments. (Laughter) I can tell you that my left hand controls the volume and the right hand controls the channel. That’s about the best workout regimen I’ve got. But I did start working out a little bit before the end of the year and changing how I eat a little bit. Actually, I wasn’t eating enough, believe it or not, and eating two meals a day.”

RYAN NEWMAN:
“We don’t believe it.”

TONY STEWART:
“I know. I know. (Laughter). Let me rephrase that – I wasn’t eating frequently enough. Went from eating two meals a day to five meals a day, a lot smaller, obviously, and now Ryan is the guy you have to ask about fitness. But no, we have lost quite a bit of weight. Haven’t lost a lot, pound?wise, but we lost a lot of fat percentage.”

Q. For Darian – how will the elimination of the catch-can man affect pit stops and the responsibilities of the remainder of the over?the?wall guys?

DARIAN GRUBB:
“I think that’s something we are all still going to learn as we go along as we get to Daytona and see what the teams have done as a pit stop scenario. We are only going to be allowed the six guys over the wall but I think you’ll be allowed to be creative in how you do that. You’ll probably see guys having multiple gas men and see some guys change the way they work with the tire carriers and the tire changers and the coordination of the pit stop. So far, the fueling process is a little bit slower than it was in the past, so that obviously changes our timing a little bit. But we are still in the learning process with that, now that we have all of the new equipment in.”

Q. The motorcoach lot has changed quite a bit. It seems like the youngsters have come along frequently. Do you guys talk about that? Do the other drivers talk about this whole kids (thing) and what you’re going through? Because your lifestyle is very unique compared to anyone else in the world with the travel and the motorcoaches and everything. Do you share stuff and talk about the kids when you’re hanging out?

RYAN NEWMAN:
“We have, more recently. Just like testing last week, (I) talked to Jimmie (Johnson) about it. He’s further ahead, so I can learn from him. Jamie McMurray and myself were about the same time going through the same thing, so we can compare what’s right and wrong and women and kids and everything else. (Laughter).

“I guess, ultimately, you might see some more trailers behind golf carts in the motorcoach lot. That’s about it. We are just adapting to it. It’s a big change for us and I think it’s weird if you look back at the history of the sport. I’ve heard the stories of the Petty’s and all that stuff back in the day. It’s like it skipped two or three generations, it seemed, and now there’s a big influx of mass production of kids, it seems. (Laughter). There are guys who are doubling up quicker than we ever thought. So it’s different, for sure. It changes the conversation from set-ups to baby cribs and things like that.”

Q. Darian, can you talk about how finding speed is more of a nuance or an “Ah-hah” moment?

DARIAN GRUBB:
“I think that just comes as a property of the NASCAR rule book now. Everything has gotten to be such a tight box that we are all competing in. The performance level of every team is very high. It’s all about the fine details, now, and the hours that you put in at the shop. The detail work is where you’re going to find the speed, now. If somebody could find that big ‘aha’ moment, they will win two or three races, but everybody will be right back on top of them. It’s pretty easy to figure out when they are working two or three feet away from you in the garage. It’s hard to keep a secret when it works that tightly, the whole network. But it’s something we are really happy about because it gives us a chance to go through and show that detail and the expertise of the Stewart-Haas employees and be able to show that at the racetrack.”

Q. With all of the years you’ve (Hutchens) spent going from one season to the next, how can you compare what it’s like now to transition and look forward to the next year versus the way it might have been all those years ago?

BOBBY HUTCHENS:
“Many years ago, we might spend 20 or 30 days (testing) between Talladega and Daytona. Of course, the last few years, we have not been there at all. Going back there three days this year brought back memories of years gone by. But the way we have it now, at least the folks in the shop and especially the guys who travel on the road, have a bit of a life in the offseason where, before, we were gone probably more back in those days during the offseason than we were even when we traveled normally to the races. So from my perspective, I like to see the no-testing during the offseason.”

Q. I guess for Darian – as the changes are going more toward “green” fuels, is there much difference in the performance of the vehicle, and does it create any ?? what kind of work do you have to put in to make any kind of adjustments? Or do you notice much of anything in the way of difference?

DARIAN GRUBB:
“It’s more of the fueling system that’s come into play, since there’s no more catch can. The biofuel addition – that we think is something very good for NASCAR. We are all looking forward to taking that next step and going all the way to E?85 at some point. Partners like Chevrolet and Mobil 1, everybody is on the edge of that green initiative and we are proud to be a part of that.

“So far, we have not really seen that much of a performance change. It’s a little bit more power but a little bit less as far as the fuel mileage goes. So it’s going to be something that’s even through the entire field and not going to make a major change. We have had a lot of testing in?house and also with outside suppliers, determining how the material compatibility is with the alcohol content and the fuels and those things. Everybody has pretty much done the homework. We don’t think there are going to be any hiccups and we are ready to go to the racetrack with it.”

Q. Down there in testing, was there any noticeable characteristic of the new nose that jumped out at you right away, or was it pretty much business as usual?

TONY STEWART:
“I think, for the most part, it was still business as usual. It didn’t seem to be a big balance change and, like Tony Gibson mentioned earlier, there’s so much grip on the racetrack that I’m not sure we know how much change in aero balance it will be. It seems like, with the smaller plate, it was real easy. It was hard to get to the back of guys’ bumpers, and the only way you could do that was to get the guy in front to actually back up to you, and he either had to lift down the throttle or drag the brake pedal while he was still on the gas to back up to a guy to get in that push situation. That was the only noticeable change, I felt like. It seemed like opposite polarized magnets. When you would get so close, finally it would just push you away before you could get to the guy’s bumper. It took more effort to actually get the two cars hooked up together.”

RYAN NEWMAN:
“And I don’t think that we’ll see all of the things that are different in the nose until we get to a different track that’s the same. So, for instance, Phoenix, our second race, mostly from a bump standpoint, the way the splitter touched the racetrack, it’s going to be different this year in how we control that because this nose here seems to be more of a direct connect from the body to the racetrack than with the old splitter stays that we had that were a little bit more forgiving, I think.”

Q. We hear all sorts of crazy stories about Daytona cars, the insane level of detail and preparation that goes into them, bolts being ground off the bottom and decals painted instead of stickered. How much work goes into a Daytona 500 versus a regular-downforce car?

BOBBY HUTCHENS:
“Our cars were started in the August and September (2010) timeframe, and there’s been somebody working here pretty much every day on those cars. And most of the things you alluded to, those are things that we do and, like Darian mentioned earlier, you’re going to get down there and the small details that we are taking care of here by the body shop, by our fab shops, those guys taking possession and ownership of their particular area and rubbing on it a little harder than the next guy is going to make the difference when you get to Daytona. So that is a big, big thing that is going to happen because the cars, and the rules, as Darian stated, are so even.”

Q. NASCAR is discussing setting qualifying order based on your fastest practice times. Is that going to change your strategy of how you attack a race weekend? Are you going to come more focused on your qualifying practice speed to make sure you get that good qualifying draw?

DARIAN GRUBB:
“I think, for myself, what Tony and I have been through the last two years, we learned a lot about each other and the styles of the racetrack and what we need to have. We have done better, personally, as a 14 team by starting out in race trim, letting Tony go out and get a feel for the track and tires. We have had a lot of changes happen between races and tires and aero setups between the wings and the spoilers and all those things.

“Now, we are going to be settling into a new change, once we get that comfort level of where we know we need to be. We might be able to go and spend more time on qualifying. But we personally like to spend a little more time in race trim, get a feel and lay of the land and make sure everything is comfortable and right, and then we know a set change we can make to the qualifying trim that usually puts us higher on the board when we do that. If you’re not close with your race set-up, you are not going to be close at all with your qualifying set-up. So the more we can know the shift and balance we can have, we feel like we can be stronger doing that.”

Q. As a follow?up on that, one of the other things we are seeing is Saturday-morning qualifying sessions. Talk about how that plays into it, whether it’s just how that plays into it on those weekends. Or, it looks like we are going to be back and forth on it, how that plays into your attack of practice sessions.

DARIAN GRUBB:
“As the schedule comes out, it’s definitely going to change a few things, the way we approach the practice sessions, we have two sessions on Friday at a couple of the racetracks, already, and then a Saturday qualifying. It’s going to be a little tougher from the driver’s standpoint more than it is the crew because we are still going to go in and do everything we can do to make the car as fast as possible for both scenarios. It will be up to Eddie (Jarvis, business manager) and Mike (Arning, director of public relations) to get Tony there on time for qualifying and out of bed and get the sleep out of his eyes. That’s going to be probably a big change on a lot of those guys. I don’t think it’s going to give us an advantage because we have the veteran drivers who can be able to step into the car and make the same lap they made yesterday and trying to figure it out and have an hour break before they go qualify. I think we will be really good at that.”

Ryan Newman and his No. 39 Tornados team hope that’s one saying that proves true as they are looking for a big turnaround in their fortunes at Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth. Newman and his Stewart-Haas Racing team are ready to get back on the right track and end the 2010 season on a high note.

Just three weeks ago, Newman was enjoying his best and most successful stretch of the season. The No. 39 team was a force to contend with each week in the top-10 and, more often than not, the best-finishing non-Chase for the Sprint Cup Championship contender.

In a span of seven weeks, Newman finished no worse than 11th. The stretch dated back to the night race at Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway in late August, when he finished sixth. Newman followed that up with an eighth-place finish at Atlanta Motor Speedway in Hampton, Ga., and an 11th-place effort at Richmond on Sept. 11.

After Richmond, Newman posted four top-10 finishes and one top-five effort – eighth at New Hampshire Motor Speedway in Loudon; eighth at Dover (Del.) International Speedway; ninth at Kansas Speedway in Kansas City, Kansas; and fifth at Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, Calif.

Newman and his team appeared to be at the top of their game as, each week, the No. 39 was a contender on the racetrack. Newman & Company were poised to end the 2010 season on a run of impressive finishes. But the last three weekends haven’t been so kind to Newman and his Stewart-Haas Racing team. In fact, Newman has dropped from 13th – the highest non-Chaser – to 15th in points.

At Charlotte (N.C.) Motor Speedway, Newman’s outing ended before it ever really started with an accident on just the second lap of the race. The incident and garage time repairing the resulting damage left Newman with a 36th-place finish.

The team followed that up with what looked to be yet another strong run at its favorite short track, Martinsville (Va.) Speedway. After starting fourth, Newman clearly had one of the cars to beat as he led 32 laps early in the event. But, midway through the race, Newman’s racecar suffered a broken rear gear, sending the team to the garage for repairs and resulting in a 30th-place finish.

And, this past weekend at Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway, Newman’s early strategy didn’t pan out as he went one lap down to the leaders. He was still able to race to the front and showed how strong his No. 39 Chevrolet was, once again. But, in the end, despite getting back on the lead lap, he didn’t get the push he needed and ended up 23rd.

Newman enters this weekend’s AAA Texas 500 with a strong determination to turn around his team’s misfortunes. And, he will pilot a car that has proven to be strong, performance-wise. It’s the same Tornados Chevrolet that he drove to a fifth-place finish at California, just four weeks ago. In that car, Newman battled for the lead and then overcame damage late in the race to drive from 16th to fifth in just 13 laps.

And while Newman’s stats may not shine in the Lone Star State, Texas is a track where the South Bend, Ind., native has long enjoyed racing thanks to the high speeds and multiple racing grooves.

In 14 starts at the 1.5-mile oval, he has one win, two poles, three top-five finishes and three top-10s. His lone win came back in March 2003, when Newman started third and led 77 laps en route to victory. It was the second win of Newman’s Sprint Cup Series career.

For Newman, the goal this weekend is simple – to live up to sponsor Tornados’ slogan written on his No. 39 Chevrolet’s bumper: “Bold Is How We Roll.”

He knows that now is the time to stop the skid from the past three weeks and get back on the right track. Despite the recent run of bad luck, Newman and his No. 39 team’s goals remain the same with three races remaining in the 2010 season – to win another race before the year’s end and to finish 13th in points.

If everything truly is bigger in Texas, perhaps Newman and his No. 39 team will find themselves living large in victory lane come Sunday.

RYAN NEWMAN

After enjoying such a good stretch of races there for seven weeks, your team has had a tough few weeks starting with Charlotte. Has it been difficult for you to keep your focus?
“It has not been hard to keep our focus. We’ve had really good, fast cars. We just haven’t gotten the finishes we have deserved, which is disappointing for all of us on the team. We had a really good car at Charlotte and I lost control of it and crashed it, and at Martinsville when we lost that gear. It was kind of a freak deal and we had a really fast car and led some laps and drove it to the front. It was really something that’s out of character for us as we haven’t had part failures. And then, at Talladega last weekend, we just didn’t get a push when we needed it. But, on the bright side, we were able to avoid any trouble, bring home a car in one piece and finish the race, which is something we hadn’t done at a restrictor-plate track this year, so that was a good thing for us. Yeah, I’m disappointed at how these last few weeks have gone, but I’m not disappointed in our performance. Just in our finishes.

“That’s why I think this weekend is a big weekend for this team. There are three more races to go and we really want to get back on track. We’re still focused on what we said our goals were after we didn’t make the Chase. We want to get top-10s, top-fives, even another win before this season is over with and we know we can do it. While we want to finish 13th in the points, I really think getting another win would be big for our team. I won at Texas back in 2003, and I said then that everything that happens in Texas is big. That was a big win for me back then. And I think a win now would probably be even bigger. A win right now would be huge, not just for getting us back on track at the end of the year and these final three races, but rolling into momentum for next year.”

Talk about racing at Texas.
“I always look forward to racing at Texas. I love the speed at Texas. It’s a fast racetrack and the weather should be cool so, hopefully, we can haul the mail. Texas is actually one of the fastest tracks we go to all year, so you have to be on top of your game because things can happen pretty quickly. It’s a track I’ve always liked, although it doesn’t necessarily show in the finishes. It’s a smooth, fast racetrack and there are multiple grooves, so it is fun to race there. The asphalt has aged the track to the point it has gotten better and better each time we come back. What I mean is that the track has basically gotten wider. It’s gotten a bit more character. A little more bumpy, which is fine. I like it. I think that, in general, the track has gotten wider and racier each time we’ve come back. It’s got less grip, but that is fine. I’d rather slide around a little bit and be in charge of my racecar than be stuck to the racetrack. It’s a race we look forward to. Because the asphalt has aged, it’s really gotten to be a better race. I love the speed. It’s a fast racetrack.

“For us, I think this will be a good track. Over the past two years, our mile-and-a-half and two-mile programs have improved dramatically. We didn’t have our best race at Texas in the spring, but we finished 11th and we had a shot at a top-10 finish. More recently, we had a good run at mile-and-a-halves like Atlanta and Kansas. We had a great racecar at California. I think our car was just as good, if not better, than Tony’s (Stewart) and he won the race. Had we not gotten caught up in some beating and banging on one of the restarts, I would like to think we would have been challenging for the win. And then, just a few weeks ago, we had a superfast racecar at Charlotte. I was so mad at myself after the wreck on lap two. I told the guys I had no warning. The car just jumped sideways. I haven’t had a racecar jump sideways that quick, that fast, in a long time. There was just no saving it and I backed it into the fence. I knew we had a fast racecar and we still had a fast racecar when we came back out. It was just damaged. So, I think our program has really improved by leaps and bounds since we were at Texas back in April. I think we’re all looking forward to this weekend’s race.”

TONY GIBSON

It’s been a frustrating few weeks for the No. 39 Tornados team, especially after having such a good stretch of top-10 finishes. How hard is it to stay focused and not get down on yourselves after something like that?
“The important thing is we had good cars – cars we could have won the races with. Charlotte, we definitely had a car to win with and we made a mistake. Martinsville, our short-track program has been really solid and we had a car that led and we could have won, but we had a failure. And then last week at Talladega, we had a car that could win. We showed that we could run through the pack and lead. We just lost the draft trying to play the conservative deal and it bit us. We go every week to the track and we know our cars are good enough to win, so we’ve got to be positive. I think that’s something we hold in our pocket. We go to the track knowing every week that our cars are competitive and they are good enough to win. We just have to put ourselves in the right situation.”

In the spring, the No. 39 team didn’t have the best run at Texas but finished 11th. Since then, it seems like the No. 39 team’s mile-and-a-half and two-mile programs have really made some improvements with top-10 runs at Charlotte this spring and Atlanta, Kansas and California this fall. Has it, in your opinion? And what are the keys at Texas?
“We’ve definitely been better on that style of racetrack. We’re taking the setup we had at Charlotte and California. We’re taking it to Texas and, hopefully, it will pay dividends there as it has in the last several mile-and-a-half races. I think we’ve learned a lot and we’ve come a long way. We’ve found some things that Ryan likes and we have made some changes that really seem to fit his driving style. So, we’re excited to go back to Texas this weekend and see what we can do. We’re taking the California car. We know it’s a proven machine and that it’s a fast car so, hopefully, we’ll go out to Texas and have a shot to win it at the end.

“At Texas, obviously track position is huge because it is an aero racetrack. It’s so big and fast. The other big thing is the tires. We saw a huge swing in tire temps during the race there in the spring and some guys were chunking tires and having problems. Hopefully, we’re not one of those people. We’ve done our homework on our cooling and that type of thing. I think the setup we’ve been leaning toward will help that. Hopefully, all those things will go our way.”

With three races to go, what are the No. 39 team’s goals for the end of the 2010 season? Can you still get to 13th in points, which you have said was your goal all along?
“We can, definitely. We closed up our gap on (13th-place) Jamie McMurray last week, so it can definitely happen. We’ve seen how easy it is to gain or lose points in one race. So, yes, we can still end up 13th in points. But, in my opinion, our biggest goal is to win another race before the end of the year. No matter where the points fall, we want to win another race and just build up and keep our momentum going for next year.”

Short tracks have been the backbone of the No. 39 team’s success since Newman joined SHR in 2009. Newman & Company have racked up impressive stats at tracks under a mile in length – Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway, Richmond (Va.) International Raceway, and Martinsville.

In fact, Newman has posted a finish outside of the top-10 only twice in a combined 11 starts at the three short tracks on the Sprint Cup circuit, and that was a 16th-place finish at Bristol in March and an 11th-place finish at Richmond in September.

So, after last weekend’s disappointing outing at Charlotte (N.C.) Motor Speedway, in which Newman had to settle for a 36th-place finish after an accident on just the second lap of the race, the No. 39 team is looking forward to this weekend’s return to short-track racing – its safety net, of sorts – and catalyst that more often than not has resulted in solid finishes.

In three starts at Martinsville with SHR, Newman has earned one pole and has posted one top-five and three top-10 finishes.

Last season, it was the back-to-back short-track races at Bristol and Martinsville that were the turning point for a struggling No. 39 team. After suffering through a series of misfortunes in the first four races of the season, Newman entered the Bristol race teetering on the verge of being outside of the top-35 in points.

At Bristol, the team rallied. It started the weekend by claiming the outside pole for the grueling 500-lap race. That momentum set the stage for its first top-10 run of the season as Newman led 25 laps en route to a seventh-place finish.

Newman followed his strong run at Bristol with an equally strong sixth-place finish at Martinsville. The back-to-back top-10 finishes marked the beginning of a run for the No. 39 team that saw Newman post six top-10 finishes in the next nine races – including five top-five finishes – and move from 27th to fourth in the championship point standings.

Newman’s 2010 season got off to a similar start. In fact, it was almost a mirror image of the No. 39 team’s struggles during its inaugural season. Back in March, Newman and his No. 39 Tornados team entered Martinsville still looking for its first top-10 finish of the year.

Although Newman posted the fastest times in practice at the Virginia oval, he was relegated to a 26th-place starting spot after qualifying was rained out and the field was set by owner points per the NASCAR rulebook . But having to start deep in the field didn’t discourage Newman and his SHR team.

He steadily moved through the field, and claimed a spot in the top-10, where he raced much of the day.

A key call by crew chief Tony Gibson for Newman to stay on the track following a caution period at lap 491 moved the SHR driver from fifth-place to third on the restart at lap 496. Newman made quick work of passing Matt Kenseth and settling into the runner-up spot behind Jeff Gordon.

However, the caution flag flew at lap 498, setting up a green-white-checker finish, which extended the race eight laps past its originally scheduled 500-lap distance. Newman, who was on older tires than the cars directly behind him, did everything he could to hold onto second-place, but he got shuffled out of the groove and lost two positions. He was posted in fourth-place when the checkered flag flew.

Nonetheless, it was Newman’s first top-five finish of the 2010 season, his third consecutive top-10 at Martinsville and his sixth top-five in 17 career Sprint Cup starts at the paperclip-shaped oval. Oddly enough, Newman scored his first victory with SHR in a similar scenario at Phoenix International Raceway the following week.

This weekend, Newman once again enters Martinsville needing a boost. Prior to last weekend’s race in Charlotte, the No. 39 team had finished 11th or better in the previous seven races, which included six top-10 finishes and one top-five.

Newman wants to get his team turned back around and headed in the right direction in hopes of securing 13th-place in the points by season’s end – the highest spot a non-Chaser can earn. Currently, Newman is 14th in points, 75 points behind 13th-place Jamie McMurray.

If history has a way of repeating itself, with their impressive record at short tracks, expect Newman and the No. 39 to be back up front, contending for the win this weekend.

RYAN NEWMAN, Driver of the No. 39 Tornados Chevrolet Impala for Stewart-Haas Racing:

The No. 39 team has posted three top-10 finishes in three races at Martinsville, and you earned the pole position there in the spring. What is it that you like and suits you about this racetrack?

“I like the short-track racing. The more a driver has input – especially with some of the racetracks we go to, you don’t have to brake a lot – the more the driver has input, the more the driver has an effect. The short-track racing I definitely enjoy because of that. You go to a place like Michigan or California, it takes less driver and more car than it does at a short track, in my opinion. That is one of the things I enjoy about Martinsville. We had a good run there in the spring. We were fastest in practice, but we had to start pretty deep in the field because qualifying got rained out. But we had a good enough car that I was able to drive it into the top-10 and race there all day. And there, at the end, Tony Gibson used some strategy and made a pit call that put us in position to win the race with just a handful of laps to go. I was just unlucky on the outside there on the last restart. To get a top-four out of that and on older tires, I can’t complain. So, I look forward to going back. Gibson is a great fan of Martinsville and short-track racing, and he’s got a great understanding of the racecar there and what I like, and that makes a big difference, obviously, for me. We’ve been able to get three top-10 finishes in our three trips to Martinsville, and we’re looking forward to continuing that streak. It’s a fun racetrack, as long as you stay out of trouble and keep your brakes cool.”

Both years, your season has definitely improved after the Series’ first stop at Martinsville in the spring. Do you look forward to coming back to Martinsville, and why?

“I definitely look forward to coming back to Martinsville. I’ve always said that for me, and for whatever reason at short tracks, the driver has a little more of an impact on the end result than some of the bigger racetracks, and I like that. I enjoy the short tracks. It’s a little bit of extra driver activity when you have to push the brake pedal. The more the drivers are involved, the more I think you get to race and, from that standpoint, I think it’s more fun. Tony Gibson has some great setups with our short-track program at places like Martinsville, Bristol, Phoenix, Loudon and Richmond. I enjoy them, he enjoys them, and we just go out there and have some fun.

“I like that part of it and I think Clay (Campbell, track owner) and everybody has done a great job with this speedway to accommodate everybody and make it a nicer racetrack. Each time you come back, it seems to be a little nicer. Martinsville’s spring race has been big for us both last year and this year. In 2009, it was the track that to me was a turning point for our organization, getting the two cars good finishing positions and showing what we were capable of to everybody. And, this year, we got our first top-10 finish with our fourth-place effort at Martinsville. That was a big step for us in the spring to get that top-10 finish.

“Martinsville has been a really good track for us. We have some good notes from our races there, so it’s nice to come back to these racetracks and apply the things that you’ve learned, where you made your gains, and do your homework. Your homework is based on the past problem-solving that you’ve had.”

Your team has been on a pretty impressive run, recently. Prior to Charlotte, you had four consecutive top-10 finishes and had posted six top-10s in seven races. Obviously, Charlotte was a disappointment for you and the No. 39 team. How do you rebound from that race and get back to where you were before this past weekend?

“Charlotte was definitely not what we expected. Our No. 39 Chevrolet was really fast, and I really felt like we had a good enough car to contend for a win, but that didn’t happen. I was so mad at myself for that wreck on lap two and just so disappointed. I told Gibson and the guys during the race that I had no warning. The car just jumped sideways. I haven’t had a racecar jump sideways that quickly, that fast, in a long time. There was just no saving it, and I backed it into the fence. I’m just mad at myself because I know we had a fast race car. We still had a fast racecar when we came back out. It was just damaged. But that’s just part of racing. You have bad outings and bad weekends, and you have to put them behind you and focus on what’s ahead of you. You can’t sit there and think, ‘What if,’ or what might have happened. Just like we can’t do that about what happened at Charlotte last weekend, we haven’t done that about not making the Chase. We had our chances to make the Chase and we could have put ourselves in a better position to get that 12th spot, but the circumstances didn’t play out that way. Basically, you just have to put it behind you. That was last weekend, and now our focus is on Martinsville.

“For our team, we’ve had three really good, solid runs at Martinsville. We’ve had a pole, we’ve had a shot at the win and we’ve had three top-10 finishes. Martinsville has been a really good track for us. And we’re bringing back the same car that we have raced here each time. In fact, Martinsville is the only track that this car races. We’re all looking forward to getting the pole and improving on our finishes at Martinsville. It’s a good track for me, for Gibson and for this team, so I think we’ll get right back on track with our finishes. We’ve made it very clear that our goal is to finish 13th in points. We have some ground to make up now, but Martinsville has been a key track for us in the past in helping us achieve our goals and getting turned around in the right direction.”

TONY GIBSON, Crew Chief of the No. 39 Tornados Chevrolet Impala for Stewart-Haas Racing:

In recent weeks, you’ve talked about how close your team is to getting its second win. Martinsville has been a good track for this team. Could it be the place for that win?

“I just think it’s one of the tracks that we’ve run well at from the beginning. When we go there, we know we have a shot at a top-five and a win. Typically – knock on wood – we run well there and it kind of builds momentum for the next weekend. Take Charlotte out of the equation last week and we were definitely on a roll, for sure. If you keep running in the top-10, top-five, you’re going to win pretty soon. I feel like we’re at that point right now where we’re running well enough to win. We just have to get the circumstances right, and keep the bad luck out. We could very well do it this week.”

The No. 39 team has one pole and three top-10 finishes at Martinsville. What makes this team so good at Martinsville?

“We’ve run really well there. I’ve always run really well there with other teams, too. I don’t know what it is. For me, I guess it’s kind of like Bristol. It’s a really cool racetrack. It’s a lot of fun. It’s a finesse track for the drivers. For Ryan, you’ve got to run hard all day, beating and banging. Obviously, the short-track stuff is what Ryan really likes. I don’t know why. I ran really well there before with John Andretti and Aric Almirola. For some reason, that track just fits my style. I love going to Martinsville and I’m excited to go there this weekend. We should have sat on every pole last year and this year if it hadn’t been for the rain in both of the spring races that cancelled qualifying. Hopefully, we can go up there and have a shot at the pole and, if not, get a top-five starting spot. It’s critical to start up front. I know we started 26th there in the spring because of the rain and we ended up finishing fourth, but I would much rather start up front. We definitely had a shot to win it there at the end. I think the 11 car knocked us out of the way and we ended up fourth. We’re going to Martinsville with the same racecar we ran there last year and this spring. We only run this car two times a year and that’s at Martinsville. Hopefully, it’s ready and, hopefully, we can go up there and get a win to make up for last weekend.”

How hard is it to rebound from something like Charlotte? Like you said, this team was on quite a roll and you were taken out of contention on lap two. How do you come back from that?

“It’s difficult. It’s not so bad for the guys. I really have felt bad for Ryan because he felt horrible. He felt like he let everybody down. But, like I told him after the race was over, there are more times that we have let him down with bad pit stops or wrong strategy or something stupid has happened, where we’ve had cars that should have finished in the top-five or could have won, and we’ve messed it up for him. Everybody’s human. They are going to make mistakes. He was just trying to gain as many spots as he could, early. That move has worked for us so many times on that high line early on restarts, passing guys. You know, maybe the track temperature was a little too cool or there wasn’t enough heat in the tires to do that move at that point, but it didn’t work. The thing is, we’re a team. We win together, we lose together. And, like I told Ryan, there are still five races for us to go out there and win, and I think we’ll get one. I expect Ryan will come out on fire this weekend, for sure.”

You’ve said since not making the Chase that your goal is to finish the season 13th in points. Following Charlotte, the No. 39 team sits in 14th, 75 points behind 13th-place Jamie McMurray. Is 13th-place still attainable for this team?

“Definitely. It’s one race. We lost what we gained, but we can definitely get back to 13th pretty easily. We had a pretty decent lead on them before Charlotte, and we had a great car for that race. I know we had a top-five car and even a shot to win the race. I feel like we had that good of a car when we finished up with practice on Friday night. It’s disappointing, but that’s racing and that’s part of it and, luckily, we have this week coming up to prove what we can do. We lost it in one race, and I’m sure we can gain it back in one. I just want us to win another race before the year is over with. We’ll get to 13th in the points.”

In the last seven races, Newman has six top-10s and one top-five finish, which he earned this past weekend at Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, Calif. His worst finish during that stretch was an 11th-place at Richmond (Va.) International Raceway on Sept. 11.

However, in a lot of respects, Newman & Company feel the impressive numbers are too little, too late, for a run in the Chase for the Sprint Cup Championship was not in the cards for them this year. Newman and his No. 39 Haas Automation team fell just short of making the Chase and were relegated to the outside looking in on the battle for the championship.

As the always analytical Purdue engineering graduate has said, his team is off to a great start in a Chase that unfortunately doesn’t matter to them. In fact, the team has performed so solidly in the first four races of this year’s Chase that it would be sitting in fifth place, 86 points behind Chase leader Jimmie Johnson had things worked out differently for the No. 39.

While Newman and his team don’t have the chance to make a run for the championship, they still have six races to prove they are the best of the rest. Newman’s team doesn’t dwell on the “what-ifs.” Instead, they’re focusing on their goals over the final six races of the 2010 season. They want to finish 13th in points, making Newman the highest non-Chase driver in the final standings.

Newman and his team want to keep their streak of top-10 finishes alive and, more than anything, they want to contend for wins over these next six races. And with Newman’s recent runs, it seems that the No. 39 team is certainly poised for its second victory of the year.

Perhaps, there’s no better place for that to happen than this weekend at Charlotte (N.C.) Motor Speedway in the Bank of America 500.

Earlier this year, Newman called the 1.5-mile oval “the centerfold of racetracks.” The high-banked, high-speed Charlotte oval has always been a favorite of the South Bend, Ind., native, ever since the first time he drove it in a rental car with mentor Buddy Baker.

Newman’s love for the track was obvious in his first stock car outing in the 2000 ARCA race at Charlotte, when he started on the pole and dominated the race, leading 66 of 67 laps en route to victory.

He followed up that win by claiming his first-ever NASCAR Sprint Cup Series pole position in just his third Cup start in May 2001. And the following season, Newman shocked the field when he went from worst to first to become only the second rookie to capture a victory in the All-Star Race at Charlotte.

Newman’s record in the NASCAR Nationwide Series at Charlotte is equally impressive as he has one win (2005), three top-five and four top-10 finishes in four starts.

Obviously, Newman has proven he knows what it takes to get around Charlotte.

In 19 Sprint Cup starts at the 1.5-mile oval, he has nine poles – the most of any active driver and second on the all-time list only to David Pearson, who has 14 poles. Newman has four top-five and seven top-10 finishes, with a best finish of second – in the fall of 2003 and in the 2009 Coca-Cola 600.

This weekend, Newman’s focus is on continuing his impressive run of late. While Newman is known for his lightning-quick qualifying efforts at Charlotte, he hopes to turn that one winning lap into a race victory and perhaps become the first non-Chase driver to score a victory in the 2010 Chase.

Newman and his No. 39 team are determined to prove that they are the best of the rest.

RYAN NEWMAN, Driver of the No. 39 Haas Automation Chevrolet Impala for Stewart-Haas Racing:
You have nine poles at Charlotte Motor Speedway – the most of any active Sprint Cup driver and five behind David Pearson, who has 14 poles. What is it about this racetrack that has made you such a good qualifier?

“In general, I like this racetrack. I like the speed. I like the banking. When I first came here with Buddy Baker, we drove around in a rental car and, after one lap I told him I was going to like this place. I always have. It is a place that I like. I have been fortunate to have good equipment and I have been able to take that good equipment and make it fast. It is just a combination of team effort and, nine times out of 19, we have been able to pull it off.”

Your team is on a roll right now. Last weekend, you got a top-five at California, and you’ve had six top-10 finishes in the last seven races. To what do you attribute that success?

“We’ve definitely been on a good run, recently. I’m proud of what we’ve done over these past few weeks. We’ve shown how strong our team is and how good we are capable of being. I told someone the other day that we’ve gotten a great start to a Chase that, unfortunately, doesn’t matter to us. But although we don’t have a shot at the championship, we still have a lot of goals. And those goals are to go out there and win races. We have a responsibility to our sponsors to go out there every week and try to win, and that’s what we’re doing. We have six races, and we still want to win one or two more before the end of the season. And we want to make sure that we finish 13th in points at the end of the season. And we’re doing well right now. Obviously, we’ve made big strides and you can see that in our finishes. Our pit crew is doing an excellent job. They’ve stepped it up really big, and I really appreciate their support. We’ve had good cars and good calls on Tony Gibson’s part to get us the top-10 runs. I said last week I felt like we needed to improve on that and make those top-10 runs top-fives, and we were able to do that at California. We just need to keep on doing what we are doing and we’ll get the wins. We want to end this season on a high note.”

What would it mean for you to eventually tie or overtake David Pearson’s pole record at Charlotte?

“Ultimately, it’s what we all strive for is to be the fastest, to be the best, to be the quickest and get to victory lane. It would mean a lot to me. I think David Pearson was an excellent racecar driver. Still is. Ultimately, it is just a number, but to be where I am and have a shot at it, that’s cool. But I’m still a long way away. It took me this long to get nine, not that it took me that long, but it’s not easy to win one, and five more is not going to be easy at all. But I know that when we go to Charlotte, we know we want to have – we know we can have – a shot at the pole.

“I really enjoy the racetrack – the speed, obviously, and the banking. I’ve always said I really enjoy banked racetracks and this is one of the best and fastest banked racetracks out there. I’ve had fast racecars with Penske Racing, and now with Stewart-Haas Racing, and just have been blessed with fast racecars. I couldn’t do it without fast racecars. I’ve always told my crew chief, whoever it is at the time, ‘If you give me a straight arrow, I’ll shoot it straight. But don’t expect me to shoot a crooked arrow to the pole.’ And they’ve done a very good job for me.”

You said that you knew from the first time you and Buddy Baker took a lap in a rental car around the 1.5-mile Charlotte track that you were going to like it. Explain what you like about Charlotte.

“It’s the centerfold of racetracks. It’s just sexy. I was doing SIRIUS Radio back in May with Buddy Baker and Steve Post when I said that and they kind of laughed at me. But to me, it is. It’s got the banking. It’s different on both ends. It’s fast. There’s a lot of grip. If you’re going to build some criteria for a racetrack, I think that’s what makes a perfect track.”

You have nines poles at Charlotte, but you haven’t been able to turn those poles into wins. Why not? What would a win at Charlotte mean to you?

“Honestly, every time I’ve won the pole here, that seems to be a question that comes up. And in May, I kind of laughed and told the reporters, ‘Seriously, you tell me. You listen to everybody who has come in here after they’ve won and they tell you how they’ve won. So just go ahead and tell me what you know, if you want me to win.’ Honestly, I just don’t know the answer. I’ve had really good racecars here. I’ve had really bad racecars. I’ve had good racecars that have gone bad and bad racecars that have gone good, but I’ve just never been the one to cross the start-finish line first. I won the All-Star race in 2002, and I’ve been fairly close to winning at Charlotte in a points race before. I’ve had some fast racecars at Charlotte and, at the end of the race, I have just fallen short. For me, my All-Star race win at Charlotte during my rookie season in 2002 was really special because that was the race we weren’t expected to win. I was a rookie. We weren’t even in the race to begin with, but we raced our way in that night. And we beat everybody at the home field on a given night and we did it because of the pride and the money, not because of the points, and there’s a lot to be said about that. So to me, a win at Charlotte would mean the world.”

TONY GIBSON, Crew Chief of the No. 39 Haas Automation Chevrolet Impala for Stewart-Haas Racing:
The No. 39 team has been a model of consistency, recently, scoring six top-10 finishes in the last seven races. To what do you attribute this success?

“Well, I don’t know that we have done anything differently. We had worked on some different set-up packages starting before Bristol. We saw some good things there, so we just kind of continued on with it. I think that Ryan is adapting to it, and us learning what to do to it and how to adjust on it better has really been the big thing. I think it’s definitely going to pay dividends for us next year, for sure, hopefully with the new nose. I don’t really know that we’re doing anything differently. I think things are just clicking. Knock on wood, we haven’t really had any bad luck. This past Sunday at California, I think we had the car to win, for sure. We just had to fix that damage to our bumper cover on the last pit stop and that put us behind. But he was able to drive back up there to the top-five. I think a few more laps and we would have probably been in a little bit better shape. We were definitely in the catbird’s seat there when we were running second, and Ryan thought he had the car to beat at that time. I just think it’s really like anything else – if you run well, everybody feeds off of it. The team, the pit crew, our pit stops have been better. All that stuff just comes together. So there’s not one thing I can put my hand on to say we are doing something different, but we are doing little things. It’s just building momentum and everybody’s feeding off of it.”

Do you feel like another win for this team might be just around the corner because of how consistent you have been, recently?

“I think real soon, if things keep going like they’re going and we can keep everybody motivated and going in a positive direction, we definitely could win one, here, pretty soon.”

This team has been incredibly consistent. You didn’t make the Chase, but you were the first team that didn’t make it. Had you made the Chase, you would now be sitting fifth in points. Is that something you look at? And if so, do you look at it with disappointment or pride?

“You have to look at it because it is a performance thing. You have to look at it as, ‘Should we have been in the Chase?’ Absolutely. That being said, you have to look and see how would we have been if we would have been in it. We definitely have shown that we can be a consistent contender every week. I think guys would be worried about us if we were in it. That’s been our deal. We never give up no matter what. We could be 30th in points and we would go every week like we could win the race. That’s just the attitude of this race team. That pays dividends throughout the year. This team never gives up and never will. I think teams know that about us. They never count us out. It’s pretty cool to steal points from those Chase guys.

“It’s more a pride thing than anything. Guys know we’re there every week and we’re competitive. It’s just more pride than anything else. Our goal is to finish 13th in points because that’s the best we can do, so that’s our new goal. After Richmond, we had to set a new goal and that was to win a race or two and make sure we’re that first guy who didn’t make it in. That’s where we need to finish. That’s our goal, to make sure we finish 13th and to try and win another race.”

Ryan has a great qualifying record at Charlotte. He has nine poles in all, and he actually won two of those with the No. 39 team. Is qualifying a big part of your focus at Charlotte?

“I don’t put a big emphasis on qualifying at Charlotte because Ryan does well there. Every week, we want to sit on the pole. There are a lot of guys who are good at qualifying now that weren’t before. At Charlotte, we have been extremely good and Ryan is great there. That doesn’t mean we’re just going to go back there this weekend and sit on the pole because qualifying draw does have a lot to do with it. We’re going there with the goal of winning the race.”

In three point races at Charlotte, the No. 39 team has never finished lower than 11th. What would a win at Charlotte mean?

“We really don’t have a whole lot to lose, so we can gamble on things. We want to win at our home track. To go there and win would really be something special because it’s in everyone’s backyard and everyone has family and friends there. It would be cool. We’re going to go hard at it and try and win a race here pretty quick. We need to. And we want to for the pride side of it. That’s what we are feeding off of right now – our momentum and our pride. We’re going to win one before it’s over. It’s just a matter of being there at the right time. We’re just going to try and use this momentum to make it happen.”

Despite not making the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup championship, Newman & Company are in the midst of their best stretch of race performances this season and are firmly focused on finishing the last seven races of the 2010 season on a high note.

Next up for the No. 39 team is Sunday’s Pepsi Max 400 at Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, Calif., where Newman and his No. 39 Tornados team will be “hometown favorites.”

While calling the California racetrack “home” might be a bit odd for the South Bend, Ind., native, the statement couldn’t be more accurate. Ruiz Foods, the parent company of Newman’s sponsor Tornados, is headquartered just 250-miles northwest of the 2-mile oval in Dinuba, Calif.

Not only is Tornados – a bold rolled snack food that is quick and easy – sponsoring Newman in Sunday’s Sprint Cup race, but another Ruiz Foods brand – El Monterey, America’s No. 1 frozen Mexican food – is sponsoring Newman’s NASCAR Nationwide Series effort in the No. 1 Chevrolet on Saturday.

And Tornados is showing up in full force in hopes of making Auto Club Speedway feel like home for Newman and his Stewart-Haas Racing (SHR) teammates as hundreds of Ruiz Foods team members will make the trek to Fontana for the weekend’s events.

Newman would love nothing more than to give them something to cheer about by continuing his streak of top-10s with a performance befitting the words written on the bumper of his No. 39 Chevrolet: “Bold is How We Roll.”

In 15 starts at the California track, Newman has one pole, two top-five and four top-10 finishes. The track hasn’t been one of Newman’s favorites in his nine-year Sprint Cup career, but his most recent effort at the 2-mile oval earlier this season gives him and the No. 39 team something to look forward to and build upon.

In February at California, engine troubles spoiled a solid top-10 run for Newman and the No. 39 team. In fact, just a couple of laps before Newman’s engine expired, the No. 39 was at the front of the field, restarting the 250-lap race in second-place.

However, Newman didn’t get the restart he had hoped for as he spun the tires and fell back through the field. When he crossed the start-finish line the next time on lap 147, Newman was posted in 16th-place. He circled the track one more time and had just passed the flagstand on lap 148 when smoke billowed from the No. 39 Chevrolet. Newman came over the radio and reported he had lost an engine and was no longer under power. So after being a fixture among the top-10 for much of the afternoon, Newman was relegated to a 36th-place finish.

Despite the disappointing finish, Newman was upbeat about his performance at a track that hasn’t been home to his better results over the years. In fact, Newman said he felt it was the most competitive he had been at the 2-mile oval.

This weekend, Newman and his team return to the track in the midst of the their best and most successful stretch of the 2010 season, and they are looking for redemption.

In the past six races, Newman has posted five top-10 finishes, including three consecutive top-10s – eighth at New Hampshire Motor Speedway in Loudon; eighth at Dover (Del.) International Speedway and ninth at Kansas Speedway in Kansas City, Kansas. In fact, Newman’s only finish in the past six races outside of the top-10 was 11th at Richmond (Va.) International Raceway on Sept. 11.

For Newman, the goal this weekend is to continue his team’s successful run of solid top-10s and even improve upon that streak of finishes. And this weekend could be the perfect time for him to do just that.

The last time Newman and his No. 39 Tornados team traveled out west together was in April to Phoenix International Raceway. That trip culminated with a celebration in victory lane as Newman scored his first win at SHR and the first for his sponsor Tornados.

Perhaps a second trip out west with sponsor Tornados will lead to a similar outcome for Newman and the No. 39 team. One thing is for sure – the No. 39 Tornados team will have the support of the crowd. After all, they are the “hometown favorites.”

RYAN NEWMAN, Driver of the No. 39 Tornados Chevrolet Impala for Stewart-Haas Racing:

In February, you had an engine failure about 100 laps from the end of the race at Auto Club Speedway. However, you felt like you were the most competitive you had been at the 2-mile oval. Talk about your thoughts going into this weekend.

“We had a really good car in February at California. Our No. 39 Chevy was good all day long. We were mixing it up, and I really was the most competitive I’ve been at California in a long time. At least that’s the way I felt, even though we had the engine failure. We were working forward every run the entire race, and we showed what we are capable of out there on a couple of those long runs. I mean, two laps before the engine failure put us out of the race, I was racing for the lead. When we came to California in February, I felt like we had made some big improvements as a team on our speedway program. I think we’ve made some big gains on that program over this year, too. So we’re looking forward to the return trip to California. Our finish in February wasn’t indicative of how we were running, and it’s one of those finishes we have pointed to and said hurt us when it came to the Chase and not making it this season. We definitely want to show how strong our program is and get a good finish at California this weekend.”

To what do you attribute your recent streak of top-10 finishes? In the past six races, the No. 39 has five top-10s and the only finish outside of the top-10 was an 11th-place effort at Richmond?

“We’ve had a good start to a Chase. That unfortunately doesn’t matter for us, but our goal is to do our best and go out there and try to win every race. We have seven to go. We’ve definitely had an impressive run. Unfortunately, I guess we put it together just a little too late in the season for us to make the Chase. We knew we had this ability in us all season to put together a consistent run and, finally, in the past six weeks, we’ve shown just how solid of a team we are. We didn’t make the Chase, but we still have goals and we are still focused. We have seven races left, and we want to win a couple more of those races. We want to keep finishing the way we are, and we want to finish 13th in points. That’s the best we can do this season, and that’s what our goal is. I’m really proud of this team and their efforts this season, and I’m really proud of what we have accomplished recently. We want to end this season on a high note.”

The parent company for your sponsor Tornados, Ruiz Foods, is based about 250 miles northwest of Auto Club Speedway, so this is its home track. They have a lot of events going on at the track this weekend, such as hospitality, and they are sponsoring both your Sprint Cup and Nationwide efforts this weekend. In your opinion, how important is this weekend for your sponsor?

“I’m really proud to have Ruiz Foods and both of their brands as a partner for both myself and Stewart-Haas Racing. It’s been a lot of fun working with Tornados this season. They took a big chance on NASCAR, on SHR and on me. They had never been in the sport, and they wanted to do something big to bring attention to their Tornados brand. To think about how big of a chance they took, it’s pretty amazing. I’ve had a lot of fun introducing them to the sport and working with them. Their family has become more than just a sponsor – they are part of the SHR team and our family. I’m really honored that this weekend they decided to put their El Monterey brand on the racetrack with me and the No. 1 Phoenix Racing Chevy.

“This weekend at California, Tornados is going to be everywhere. I know they’re going to be sampling the bold, rolled snacks to the race fans, and they have signage around the track. Also, they are bringing a lot of team members and family members out to the racetrack. I think they are bringing three busloads of people down to the track, and they are going to do hospitality, pit tours and even pace car rides for their team members. So they are really going to get the full experience, and I’m looking forward to spending some time with them on Sunday morning. This is really a big weekend for them, and we want to give everyone associated with Tornados something to cheer about on the track. You know, the 39 team got our first win as a team back in the spring at Phoenix, and Tornados was on board with us that weekend. So, obviously, it’s been a successful partnership on that front, and we want to continue that. We’re really looking forward to going back out West, and maybe by crossing the Mississippi, we’ll get back to victory lane again.”

Talk about racing at Auto Club Speedway.

“Unfortunately, it’s not one of my favorite places to go. I have not had the best record at California. The racetrack can be a lot of fun because it’s a very smooth track and super fast, but I just haven’t done all that well there throughout my career. I do think we’ll see some better racing at California because I think the racing has gotten better each time we’ve gone there. At this track, in general, the more it’s aged, the better it’s gotten, as with most racetracks. I think the double-file restarts help the racing a lot, too. They are more advantageous at bigger racetracks, especially the wider ones. When you have a wide racing groove like at California, the cars can get three-wide in the corners and anything can happen. California is not my favorite racetrack. I’ll tell you that first-hand. But that doesn’t mean we can’t have a good showing there. We had a great car there this spring. I was having a lot of fun, and I was really able to mix it up on the racetrack there like I hadn’t been able to before. Unfortunately, we didn’t get the finish we wanted because of the engine failure. We’ve had good runs on the 2-mile tracks this year, so I feel like our program has made gains and improvements. I’m looking forward to getting back on track at California this weekend, and I hope we can pick up where we left off in the spring. I really think we can have another solid, top-10 run this weekend.”

TONY GIBSON, Crew Chief of the No. 39 Tornados Chevrolet Impala for Stewart-Haas Racing:

The No. 39 team has been on quite a run of late. What is the goal with seven races to go?

“We are definitely running strong, and it’s a shame we didn’t make the Chase, considering how well we have been running. But those are the cards we were dealt. Right now, we’re focused on keeping this string alive. We want to win another race or two before the season is over. We want to try and win every race. That’s our focus right now. We’re trying to take advantage of these next seven races and learn some things for next year, obviously. Our focus is to make sure we finish 13th in the points. That’s the best we can do right now, so our goal is to finish in that position. We’ve got to do whatever it takes to do that. And that’s going to take running in the top-10 every week because the No. 1 car is going to be strong, so we’ve got to make sure we put the extra effort in and beat those guys.”

In February, Ryan and the No. 39 team had a great run going before the engine expired with about 100 laps remaining in the race at Fontana. In fact, he told you and the team it was the best car he had at that track in a long time. What does knowing that mean to you and this team heading back to California this weekend?

“We definitely made some huge improvements. Our previous year, we weren’t very good at the mile-and-a-half and two-mile racetracks, so to go back there and run as well as we did really, really pumped our hopes up. We blew up there in February, but we actually learned a lot of stuff during the weekend that actually helped us on our 2-mile program. And I think we were even better when we went back to Michigan in August. I know we got spun out late in the race this last time we were at Michigan, but we definitely had a solid top-five, top-10 car. So going back to California with what we have learned so far and the improvements we feel we have made just makes us that much more excited.

“We’ve run a whole lot better on the 2-mile racetracks. We feel like we have something to prove, and we feel like that racetrack owes us a little something. We’re going back out there and we’re taking our Indianapolis car. There’s only one race on that car. We took it to Indy and it ran really well, so we’re pretty excited about getting back out there and showing what we can do on a 2-mile track.”

Auto Club Speedway is the home track for the No. 39 team’s sponsor Tornados. This weekend, they will have quite a large contingent of team members coming to the track, participating in hospitality and cheering the No. 39 on in the grandstands. What does that kind of support mean to you and the team?

“We want to do well every time we are on the racetrack for our sponsors. But the fact that this is sort of the home track for the Tornados people and they are bringing so many family members and team members to the race gives us some added incentive, some extra pressure to do well. We don’t get to run the Tornados colors a whole lot through the year, so whenever we get the opportunity to run their scheme, we really want to run well. I mean, we got our first win as a team with them and it was their first win as a sponsor back at Phoenix, so it’s almost like second isn’t good enough now. It would mean a lot for us to have another good weekend with them this weekend.”

In fact, the story he loves to tell when he talks about Dover happened in his own backyard in Statesville, N.C. Well, to be more specific, it happened in his shop.

Back in September 2004, Newman showed no mercy to his other Sprint Cup competitors at Dover. On that autumn day, the engineering graduate from Purdue University turned in one of his most dominant performances to date.

Newman qualified on the outside pole for the 400-lap race, but by the end of lap one, he was posted as the leader. And it wasn’t very often during the day that Newman gave up the point position on the track.

Newman led an astounding 325 of 400 laps, and that wasn’t all. Over the final 134 laps of the race, the South Bend, Ind., native built a commanding eight-second lead over second-place on his way to winning his third Sprint Cup race at Dover and to claiming the first ever “Monster Trophy.”

And that’s where Newman’s favorite story about Dover actually begins.

You see, the Monster Trophy is fairly big, and it could be called scary-looking with its broken-concrete look and its red beady eyes as it holds a toy car in its hand. It is quite the overwhelming centerpiece.

Newman thought the trophy was pretty cool and one of the more unique prizes he had earned. Once he got the trophy home, he put it on a shelf in his shop behind his house with the other trophies he had earned during his racing career.

He thought little about the trophy or the Monster until, one afternoon, he walked into the shop with his dog Mopar to do a little work. While Newman walked through the shop, Mopar stopped and began growling and barking just as loud and as hard as he could.

It didn’t take long for Newman to realize that Mopar was barking at the Monster and its glaring red eyes. Newman still laughs as he tells the story about his dog being afraid of the Monster.

But being afraid of the Monster, or the “Monster Mile,” as the Dover layout is known, is one thing Newman definitely is not. In 17 starts at the high-banked, concrete oval, Newman has four poles (spring 2003, fall 2005, spring 2006 and spring 2007), three wins (spring and fall 2003 and fall 2004), six top-five and 10 top-10 finishes. Newman also has one NASCAR Nationwide Series win at the track (2005).

And while Newman and his No. 39 Haas Automation team didn’t secure a spot in this year’s Chase for the Sprint Cup Championship, they’re definitely not afraid to shake it up a little bit and compete for the win each and every outing.

After last weekend’s eighth-place finish at New Hampshire Motor Speedway in Loudon, Newman is looking forward to returning to his favorite track and turning in another dominant performance, like the one that earned him his first Monster Trophy back in 2004.

RYAN NEWMAN, Driver of the No. 39 Haas Automation Chevrolet Impala for Stewart-Haas Racing:

Unfortunately, the No. 39 team didn’t make the Chase for the Sprint Cup Championship this season. How does that change the focus for you and your team for the remaining nine races?

“Honestly, whether we are in or out of the Chase doesn’t matter. We have one job, and that job is to go out there each week and try to win races. It’s definitely disappointing that the No. 39 Haas Automation team didn’t make the Chase, but all that means is that we don’t have a chance to win the championship. It’s disappointing because I know how hard these guys have worked all season long and how much heart and dedication they have when it comes to this team. We all wanted to have an opportunity to be in the mix for a championship this year and, unfortunately, that’s not going to be the case. SHR still has a shot at winning a championship with Tony (Stewart), and we’ll do whatever we can to help and support them over the next nine races. We’re a team, and that’s important for everyone to remember. For the No. 39 guys, there are still nine races to go out there to try and win. And believe me, we’re going to go out there and try our hardest every week to win those races. Not making the Chase doesn’t change that. I’m really happy about what our team accomplished this season. I think we’ve had some strengths that we’ve expanded upon from last year. Our teamwork and our racecars, I feel, are better. We gave it our all every lap of every race, and it just didn’t happen for us in the end. Like I said, now we’ll just have to go out there and try to win every single week.”

You have said time and again that Dover is one of your favorite racetracks. What makes you like Dover so much?

“I’ve always liked Dover. It’s just a track that driver’s like – well, that I like. It’s absolutely one of my favorite tracks, if not my favorite. I like the banking. I like the elevation changes. The concrete provides a different type of racing for us because the track doesn’t change a whole lot. Once you get your car right, you can keep it right for the rest of the race. And for me, for whatever reason, I’ve always adapted well to racing on concrete. To me, the characteristics of the track make it both demanding and fun. It’s really unique how you drop off into the corners and then climb up the hills onto the straightaways. At Dover, the entry into the corners is the toughest part. If you don’t get a good entry, you’re not going to have a good middle or a good exit. You have narrow straightaways and then the track opens a lot in the corners, so there is a good bit of give-and-take. To me as a driver, it is just a track that is a lot of fun and one that I look forward to going to each year.”

How physically demanding is Dover for the drivers?

“It’s definitely pretty physically tough. It’s not as physical as the road courses – I think they are the most physically demanding – but with the banking and 400 laps, you are just constantly maneuvering the racecar. You get just a short distance on the straightaways to take a quick breath and get ready to go back at it in the next corner. We talk about what it takes to be ‘Army Strong’ and it’s mental, emotional and physical. To me, this is one of the most physical racetracks that we go to. Mentally because it’s so physically tough you have to stay in shape and stay on top of things. When you hit, you hit hard here so, emotionally, you have to be ready for a lot of things. I’ve always enjoyed it. I’ve always enjoyed the speed, banking and everything else here.”

TONY GIBSON, Crew Chief of the No. 39 Haas Automation Chevrolet Impala for Stewart-Haas Racing:

Unfortunately, the No. 39 team did not make the Chase this season. Can you talk about what that means for the team? How does it change how you approach the rest of the season? Does the thinking change? Do you start doing things differently working on stuff for next year? Do you just go out there and try to win?

“It’s disappointing, but we had four DNF’s early in the season. We wrecked at Daytona, we blew up the next week at California and then we had two more DNF’s at the other two restrictor-plate races and it is extremely difficult to make up that amount of points in 26 races. We’re just now getting caught up to where we should have been with those guys and the guys you are racing against have been so consistent. It’s tough. It’s not easy at all. You know, last year, we hadn’t had a DNF until the last Talladega race and we had completed the most laps of anybody in the Chase along with Tony (Stewart). It’s just crazy what a year will bring to you. We’re proud of where we’re at with four DNF’s. And to even have a shot to get in – we were one of the last to have a shot at getting in the Chase – we were proud of that. It didn’t work out like we wanted, but we gave it a heck of a run. The last month-and-a-half for us has been solid top-10 runs and that’s what we needed to do. We needed to be consistent and run well. Unfortunately, (Clint) Bowyer was just as consistent. So it makes it tough, but we’re proud. We’re proud of everybody at Stewart-Haas Racing. Our teammate, Stewart, is in the Chase, and they just barely missed a win this past weekend at New Hampshire. I felt bad for those guys. They rolled the dice there and it looked like it was going to pay off, and then they pull the rug out from underneath you at the end, but that’s just the way it goes. Sometimes you can be on the other side of those calls and you’re a hero and, on the other side, you’re not. But to have both cars run in the top-10 and solid all day is cool. That’s what we need to do.

“Well, obviously we want to win another race or two. That’s our goal. But we’re also going to do whatever it takes to help our teammates with the 14 team to win this championship. Whether it’s taking a setup and working on some things that they would not normally do to try to help them find something, then that’s what we’ll do. We tried a different setup this past weekend and it kind of bit us in qualifying a little bit. We didn’t qualify how we needed to qualify. We had to start toward the back, but our car was really fast and we drove up to the front. We had an awesome racecar. We were doing something different trying to help our teammate, so that’s what we will continue to do. If Darian’s (Grubb) got something he wants to try, setup-wise, then we’ll plug it in and roll the dice and see what comes out. We want to finish 13th in the points. We want to be that position. We don’t want to lose sight of that, either, but our main goal is to help them win the championship.”

So, right now, the team’s focus turns to staying 13th in points?

“We want that position, and we have it right now and it’s a dogfight between us and the No. 1 car. We both seem to run well on the same weekends. And when we run badly, we both seem to run badly on the same weekends. I’m sure it will be a dogfight between us and the 1 team for that spot until Homestead. I think that’s kind of cool, too, because it gives us something to fight for and it gives us somebody to compete against. We’ve got our own little Chase deal going on with those guys. It’s a lot of fun. A lot of respect goes along with that. You want to go out and do your best every week, and you want to finish as high in the points as you can. To us, finishing 13th is our Chase. That’s what we have to do right now. We need to win another race or two, and I think it’s very possible the way we’ve been running the last four or five races. We’ve been right there. That’s what we have to try to do – win some races and be the spoiler in the Chase, be the team that wins a race and takes it from a Chase guy. Hopefully, it’s not our teammate, but if it’s a win, it’s a win. We owe that to Tornados, U.S. Army, Haas Automation and all the sponsors that support us, no matter what. We’re working hard to get that done.”

You have to feel good about going to Dover considering Ryan’s record there? He has four poles, three wins, six top-five and 10 top-10 finishes in 17 starts and he says it is one of his favorite tracks.

“He’s amazing at Dover. It’s really cool to watch Ryan get around at Dover and Bristol. Those are just two places where it is really fun to watch him drive. We are excited every time we go to Dover because Ryan does have such a good track record there. I’ve watched him for years, and he has dominated races there, he’s won there, he’s fought through some tough issues like the lack of power steering and he’s really just had some great runs at the track. When you’ve got Ryan Newman in your car going to Dover, you are pretty excited about it. You just hold your breath that something doesn’t happen because it can happen easily and quickly there. It’s one of his favorite tracks. We’re taking a chassis that has been really good for us at both Bristol and Dover the past two years, so we’re definitely looking forward to it. Dover is a track where we feel like we can steal one of these races and win it. The tracks that are left in the Chase are really good tracks for us – except for Talladega. Other than that race, I’m pretty excited about the rest of them and getting another win or two.”

After all, the Irwin Tools Night Race at Bristol is infamous for its treacherous demeanor. Don’t blink, because anything can happen at any time. It’s all part of the inherent challenges of short-track racing at Bristol – having someone wreck in front of you, having nowhere to go, thus being wrecked.

With that in mind, Newman & Company will surely welcome the help from WIX Filters, the number one filter in NASCAR and an exclusive NASCAR Performance product, as they try to “filter” out all the bad that can happen at the .533-mile bullring nestled in the mountains of East Tennessee.

Heading into the “World’s Fastest Half-Mile,” Newman sits 14th in the championship standings, 103 points away from the 12th-place cutoff for the Chase for the Sprint Cup Championship with three races to go. Although a spot in the Chase isn’t lost for Newman, it’s going to be a tall order, and now is the time for him to make his move starting at the concrete short track.

Now Bristol, and the “you-never-know-what-you’re-going-to-get-because-it’s-all-a-crapshoot” mentality that the track is known for, wouldn’t appear to be the most logical place for Newman and his team to believe they will make big gains. But it’s difficult to argue with their short-track performance.

Since joining forces in 2009, Newman, crew chief Tony Gibson and the No. 39 WIX Filters team have posted solid performances on tracks under a mile in length. In nine combined starts at Bristol, Martinsville (Va.) Speedway and Richmond (Va.) International Raceway, Newman has finished outside of the top-10 just once – and that was a 16th-place effort at Bristol last March.

In 17 career starts at Bristol, Newman has two poles, one top-five finish and nine top-10s. The South Bend, Ind., native also holds the qualifying record at the track – which he earned by turning a blistering fast lap clocking in at 128.709 mph (14.908 seconds) in 2003.

Prior to his 16th-place effort at Bristol this past March, Newman had posted two consecutive top-10 finishes at the .533-mile oval – a seventh- and a sixth-place finish, respectively.

In fact, it was at Bristol in March 2009 where Newman and his team made huge gains to turn around a season in which they were seemingly teetering on the edge. The team was 32nd in owner points and in danger of falling out of the top-35. Despite the bad luck that Bristol can instigate, Newman and his team marched into the short track with no fear.

They qualified on the outside pole, led 25 laps and finished seventh. It was the first top-10 finish of the 2009 season, and it marked the beginning of a run for the No. 39 team that saw Newman record seven top-10 finishes in the next 10 races and move from 27th to fourth in the championship.

To kick off the next three races, Newman and his No. 39 WIX Filters team hope and believe a solid performance at Bristol Saturday night can once again serve as a springboard that helps catapult them into the Chase for the Sprint Cup championship. And the key to that solid, momentum-building finish is simple in Newman’s eyes – to be able to “filter” out all the bad luck.

RYAN NEWMAN, Driver of the No. 39 WIX Filters Chevrolet Impala for Stewart-Haas Racing:

This will be the 100th Sprint Cup race at Bristol Motor Speedway. What are your favorite memories of Bristol?
“Bristol is always fun, on and off the racetrack. As a fan, watching (Dale) Earnhardt rattle cages was always interesting there. Even going back in history, watching cars smoke the right-rear all the way around when it was asphalt was cool. For me, personally, I’ve had some good memories there. I won a Nationwide race at the track. I guess running that 14.90 lap in qualifying back in 2003 was probably the most special moment for me, personally. That was definitely a fast lap, and I would be lying if I told you I didn’t shock myself. And in the end, it’s how I ended up with my nickname. I’m not really sure if it was Mike Joy or Larry Mac (McReynolds), but one of them said during the live broadcast of qualifying that it looked like I rocketed off the corner. And they may have gone on to say it was like I was a ‘Rocketman.’ I’m not really sure, but I do know it stuck. From that moment on, people started calling me ‘Rocketman,’ or using ‘Rocketman’ in their headlines about me. So that’s how it happened.”

Talk about running the WIX Filters Chevrolet at Bristol this weekend?
“I am excited. I know that it is a big race for everybody. For us, it is crunch time. Where our points position is, and the fact that it’s Bristol, makes this a really big race. And to have WIX come on board with us and give some fans a chance to have some fun at the racetrack is cool. Of all places to have WIX on the car, I’m really glad it’s Bristol because, hopefully, they can help us filter out all the stuff that we don’t need to happen to us on the racetrack. Things happen to fast at Bristol. Any extra help we can get is something we will most definitely take. I’m definitely excited about having WIX Filters on the car and, hopefully, we’ll be able to give them a big run that will help us build some momentum and get our spot in the Chase.”

Following last week’s race at Michigan, the No. 39 team is now 14th in points, 103 back of the 12th-place cutoff for the Chase for the Sprint Cup Championship. Does that change how you approach racing at Bristol? Is a spot in the Chase still attainable?
“Yes, a spot in the Chase is still attainable. And getting that spot in the Chase is still our goal. We’re obviously not in the situation we want to be in because we’re not already in the Chase. But we are glad we are in the situation we’re in because we still have a shot of locking ourselves into the Chase. I don’t know that we can approach it any differently. We know we have to have a good points day and that some of our competitors have to have a bad points day. I guess, in some ways, it’s out of our hands. We’re just going to keep doing what we’ve been doing. We race for wins every week, and we do the best we can. Sometimes we finish fifth, sometimes 15th, but we’re always racing for the win. Bristol will be no different. I think if we have a chance to gamble and gain points or spots in the end, that’s something we’ll probably have to do because of the position we’re in. The one thing that’s important, though, is that I have a lot of faith in this team and what we can accomplish. I’m definitely excited about a couple of short tracks being part of the next few races to get into the Chase. That’s a strong point for us, and I think that will be instrumental in the points race.

The No. 39 team has enjoyed a lot of success at the short tracks on the Sprint Cup circuit. You have only one finish outside of the top-10 in nine combined starts at Bristol, Martinsville and Richmond. That finish was a 16th-place effort at Bristol last March. What is it about short-track racing and Bristol that has been so good for this team?
“The short tracks have really been where the No. 39 team has excelled. You didn’t mention Phoenix on that list, but that’s where we got our first win as a team, too. We’ve just been good on the short track. We had a really good short-track program from the get-go. I really like Bristol and I always have. Then, you add the fact that Bristol is one of Tony Gibson’s favorite racetracks, and I think you saw that my driving style and the package Gibson put underneath me really worked well for us. We finished seventh and sixth there last year, and that seventh-place finish last spring was a finish that gave us some momentum and built confidence for us and helped us click off some top-10s and really make a jump in the standings. In March, I’m confident we had another top-10 car for the race, but we ended up with a lug nut issue on the next-to-last pit stop that just trapped us in traffic and we finished 16th, which was disappointing. I’m confident that we’re going to have a good car right off the truck, and if we can stay out of trouble, I’m expecting to have a good night in the No. 39 WIX Filters Chevrolet.

Talk about racing at Bristol Motor Speedway. How has the track evolved as your racing style has over time?
“There’s no place like Bristol. I’ve told people before that Bristol is like a baby superspeedway. If something happens in front of you, it may not be your fault, but you can get caught up in somebody else’s wreck in the blink of an eye. You have to really be on your toes at Bristol, and that seems to be where frustrations can rise and flame up quicker than at any other racetrack. Everyone will tell you Bristol has always been a game of survival. Everything happens so fast there. You don’t have time to think or blink. I learned that in 2003, when I won the pole there. I knew I had a good car but I never anticipated I could put down a lap that fast. You just don’t realize how quickly everything happens at Bristol. You could have the best car out there, but everything is completely out of your hands. One minute, you could be running in the lead and, just seconds later, you could be wrecked in the corner and out of the race and it would be no fault of your own. You won’t even realize what has happened to you until afterward.

“I think the racing and the track are definitely better the way they are now. I think it’s more a combination of the tire and the track than it is the age of the concrete. Concrete doesn’t change very much, if at all, over time. It’s more the combination of the tire and the racing we can do with that tire. With the tire Goodyear has been bringing, the racing has been very good. I think we put a lot of emphasis on qualifying because Bristol is a track where, if you miss the first run set-up wise, you’ll be a lap down before you know it. We’re going to make the best of it, like any other track. It just happens to be Bristol, and everything happens very fast. To me, the racing is at an all-time high at Bristol, compared to the way it used to be. We can race side-by-side and actually gain spots without having to wreck someone.”

TONY GIBSON, Crew Chief of the No. 39 WIX Filters Chevrolet Impala for Stewart-Haas Racing:

Short tracks have really been this team’s forte. Why do you think that is the case, and what is it about Bristol?
“I like racing everywhere but, for some reason, for me, my setups seem to work better at those tracks. They fit Ryan and they fit whoever I’ve been with. It just fits both our styles a little bit better. Ryan really likes short tracks, and he really likes the high banks of Bristol because I think they remind him of Winchester (Ind.) and Salem (Ind.) and these tracks he used to run and enjoy. He likes the speed and the banking. For me, Bristol is probably my best track. I’ve had a lot of success in the past and it really hasn’t mattered who I’ve worked with. Everybody I have been with over the years, from Alan Kulwicki up until now, we’ve done well. It’s my favorite track. I’ve had a lot of success, and the biggest thing – probably traumatic – that’s happened to me was the year Alan got killed and we all showed up. So, it’s an emotional track for me. It means a lot for me to go there and run well. Hopefully, this weekend, we can go there and get a win, lead some laps and get some bonus points and be solid. And that’s really all we can do. We have to do as much as we can on our side, and just see what happens to those other guys.”

Following Michigan, the No. 39 team is sitting 14th in the points, 103 back of the 12th-place cutoff for the Chase for the Championship. Do you approach Bristol any differently with that deficit? And what are your thoughts on the No. 39 team making the Chase?
“Last weekend at Michigan hurt. We went in being 83 points out, and it looked like we were going to have a good day, but we got turned around on the track and we ended up ending up 103 points out of 12th. So it hurts, but we all know we can do it. It’s a setback, but it’s not the first setback we have had. At Daytona in July, we were 15 points out before the race and, after the race, we were 88 points out. We came back from that, and we put ourselves back in contention. You know, we gained 55 points after Watkins Glen. So, we know it’s just as easy to gain those points as it is to lose them. And we know we can gain back as much as we did two weeks ago, if not more, if the circumstances are in our favor at Bristol. We know we’re going to have to be really aggressive, and we know we’re going to have to take some chances. And you don’t wish bad luck on anybody, but some of those guys are going to have to have some problems for us to get in. It’s definitely feasible. We just have to have a strong mental attitude as a team, and go into it with a positive outlook and just see what cards we are dealt.”

You mention Alan Kulwicki a lot when you talk about Bristol. You were Kulwicki’s car chief and you worked with him from 1986 until he died in a plane crash in 2003. Are there a lot of special memories that get stirred up when you go to Bristol? Would a win at Bristol be more special to you because of that connection to Alan Kulwicki?
“We used to fly into Bristol – back when I worked with DEI (Dale Earnhardt, Inc.) and Hendrick (Motorsports) – and every time I flew in there, I couldn’t help but look down. It would just bring back memories of that plane laying on the ground and the pictures of it broken in half. I’ll never forget it. Every time I fly into Bristol, and now just drive around that area, I think of Alan. I’ll never forget riding out of Bristol in the hauler with Peter Jellen when it was pouring rain and heading back to Charlotte. There’s just a lot of emotion around Bristol for me. There are a lot of good times and some bad times there. But I think it’s a good thing for me, because it keeps me in the game with my heart and my mind.

“With him getting killed going to Bristol, it was pretty tough to take. We were supposed to have been on that plane. Our luggage was on the plane. We were running late, and we ended up driving up and he went on to his appearance. Things just didn’t work out, or we would have been on that plane, too.

“Every time I walk into the track, I think of Alan and I think about the times we had. We won the last race there when it was pavement (1992). We won two in a row and I think the last one that we won was the last race on asphalt. There are a lot of memories there, a lot of good times and, of course, there’s the one bad time. Every time I walk into Bristol, I feel like Alan is by my side and he’s helping me make decisions and do some cool stuff, so it means a lot for me to go to Bristol.”