WERE YOU SCRAPING THE SPLITTER ON THE TRACK IN PRACTICE?
“I don’t think we’re alone. It’s just really rough down the straightaways trying to maximize where that splitter is in the corners so it’s a tough balance. Plus I think what you see on TV or what you saw, I was actually underneath somebody and when you move a lane down it really hits that left-front. It’s something we need to work on and have been. I think we’ve made some improvements. Our race runs aren’t too bad. I was hoping to get more speed out there for qualifying and hopefully what we learned there, we will when it comes time to lay down a lap.”
WHAT DOES IT DO TO THE FEEL OF THE CAR WHEN YOU HIT THE SPLITTER?
“It doesn’t feel good and you don’t like it, but it’s on the straightaway not a corner. It’s when it’s hitting in the corners that you have a problem. That’s when it gets your attention. We’ve gotten to the point now with the cars where we want to hit that splitter a certain amount in the corners and it’s just trying to get a gauge when you don’t have telemetry, we don’t come here with all the data collection on the car so we’re not really sure how hard we’re hitting it because you’re hitting it so hard on the straightaways. You have to play around with it.”
ON YOUR CURRENT POINTS POSITION:
“Unfortunately, yes. We’re pretty far back. We were running so strong last week and we didn’t run good at Vegas last year either. The only difference at Vegas was we actually still pulled off a 15th place finish. We weren’t so lucky this year with that. We’ve got ourselves in a hole that we’re going to have to climb ourselves out of. We’ve got a great team and fast race cars. We can certainly do it again, but it’s not something you want to do. We definitely focused coming into this season on, even if we’re off a little bit, let’s get some consistent finishes so we’re staying up in the points and don’t get too far behind and here we are in a similar situation.”
HOW DIFFICULT IS IT TO GET FOUR CONSECUTIVE TOP-FIVE FINISHES IN THE FIRST FOUR RACES?
“It’s tough, especially when I look at our first four races. It wasn’t a fluke that they (Penske Racing) were champions last year. They ran solid and strong the year before and then they won the championship and they’re coming out showing their strength again. That’s what it takes to be champions. You can really build confidence based on winning that championship and that’s what I see. Even though they’ve switched cars, manufacturers and engines and a new car, they are still a very solid team.”
WHICH TYPE OF TRACK ARE YOU MOST COMFORTABLE RETURNING TO AT THIS POINT? “Obviously, Bristol. Other than blowing a right-front tire we were fast there. We had a good race car, a top-five race car, which that was our best performance that we’ve had so far this year. I love this race track, I do. Even though we weren’t super-fast in practice, I just love being able to search around different grooves and our race runs weren’t bad. I don’t care where I qualify, I could qualify 35th here today, I can’t wait to go race. It’s a wide-groove race track and from that standpoint, things haven’t changed a whole lot as far as how the cars feel and this type of race track is the first abrasive race track we’ve come to this year. Big racing track and that’s the kind of track I really enjoy.”
IS THERE A TYPE OF TRACK YOU FEEL THE MOST VULNERABLE AT?
“Vegas certainly was. Vegas, we haven’t hit it there in a while, it’s a good thing we don’t go back there twice for me anyway. Texas I think is going to be a big test for us. We look at everything that we did in Texas, our teammates as well and if we run poorly at Texas then that’s going to be alarming for us. We feel like we’ve learned enough to improve when we go to Texas so we don’t run poorly and we’ve run good in the past at Texas. I think that’s probably the biggest test for us.”
DOES YOUR EXPERIENCE RALLYING IN THE POINTS LAST YEAR HELP YOU THIS YEAR?
“We’re fighters, we just don’t give up. We’re a much stronger team than we show in the results and this team is a tight-knit group. We went through this last year and came out strong. We just kind of hoped that momentum would carryover so we could start the season off strong. Don’t count us out, that’s for sure.”
WHY DO YOU HAVE THE BEARD?
“I don’t know. I didn’t shave for some things I had to do yesterday and I woke up this morning and decided I would keep it one more day. Just felt like waiting an extra day to shave, or two. Could be Sunday.”
The article 2013 NSCS Auto Club 400 Q&A with Driver Jeff Gordon is from Catchfence.
Source: http://www.catchfence.com/2013/sprintcup/03/22/2013-nscs-auto-club-400-qa-with-driver-jeff-gordon/
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