Watkins Glen winners press conference

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This is kinda long, but thought ya'll might like to read the whole thing. Better than some quotes out of context.

TONY STEWART, NO. 20 HOME DEPOT PONTIAC GRAND PRIX (1ST): (FROM VICTORY LANE) "Ryan [Newman] - to only run two road course races and run as strong as he did today - he's got a lot to be proud of. He did a great job. I owe this all to my Home Depot team and Home Depot. They stuck with me this weekend. This has been a tough weekend for all of us when you get somebody like myself that has hurt my race team and hurt my sponsors as bad as I've hurt these guys - not only last weekend, but through the three and a half years I've been here. We've done a lot of great things together, but I've done a lot of things to hurt this race team, too. It's nice to be able to come back out here on a day like today and go out and work hard like we did. Other than making one mistake, running down there, missing the corner and hitting Robby Gordon, we had a pretty clean day, so I couldn't ask for a better day than this." (DID THAT CONTACT AFFECT YOUR CAR AT ALL?) "No, I just felt bad that I ran into Robby. Robby has come a long way in Winston Cup racing and he is gaining a lot of respect from a lot of drivers. I know that he wouldn't do it to me intentionally. I didn't mean to do it to him intentionally, so I kind of just lifted when we came off the corner, gave him his spot back and said, 'If I'm going to get by him, I'm going to earn it.' I felt like I could let it go and that point. I saw Robby on the next yellow and we waved to each other, so he knew it was an accident. It was just a hard race. This is The Glen." (HOW MUCH DID CLEAN AIR MEAN TO YOU?) "It wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. On fresh tires when there was a lot of grip, it was a little bit more difficult. But, we never really got deep in the pack, either, so I'm not really sure what it was like for the guys three or four spots behind us. But, being able to keep decent track position all day - we did exactly what we had set out at the beginning of the race to do and luckily it worked out for us." (HOW MUCH DOES THIS LIFT OFF YOUR SHOULDERS, WITH EVERYTHING THAT HAS HAPPENED IN THE LAST WEEK?) "It doesn't lift anything off my shoulders. I still did what I did last week and I'm still ashamed of it. But, we worked hard to do what we did and time heals. The great thing is that we had a great guy in Mr. Mook (photographer Gary Mook, involved in last week's post-race incident at Indy) that was very gracious with what he said all week and really downplayed the incident quite a bit. This one is a lot for him. He is going to be a big part of changing my life." (FROM POST-RACE PRESS CONFERENCE...ON THE RUN) "We didn't get a real good start. Robby Gordon kind of banzaied everybody on the start. They always tell you you can't win it on the first lap and I don't know where he was going. He about knocked the right front in on our car because we were pinched - had a car on the outside of us and made contact with him. Then we just got settled in. We went from third to first in one corner there and just kind of settled into the race, and started picking our way to the front. We got to second with Robby in the lead and had that caution. I got behind him there and thought I could get a really good run down into one a dove down underneath him there and just didn't get stopped enough. It was my fault. He gave me plenty of racing room down there on the bottom and left me enough room. I just didn't make the corner. I blew the corner and that's where the contact was in one. I just kind of lifted to let him get his spot back because I wasn't going to take it by shoving him up the racetrack. I just settled back into second there. He drove away from us. I felt like I had a pretty good car then, but just wasn't strong enough to run with him at the time. But, as the race went on we kept getting strong and stronger. Zippy kept making changes to the car. We kept communicating all day and stayed calm and got ourselves in a position there. We stuck to Zippy's game plan to a 'T,' got out and got good track position each time. The guys did great jobs on the pit stops - just keeping that track position was the biggest thing to get us to where we needed to be today."

GREG ZIPADELLI, CREW CHIEF, NO. 20 HOME DEPOT PONTIAC GRAND PRIX (1ST): (YOU MUST HAVE FOUND SOMETHING IN TESTING A COUPLE WEEKS AGO...) "We made a bunch of laps and tried a bunch of things - just 'A/B-ed' some stuff. We came up to get Tony back in a rhythm. We tried some brake stuff. We were able to take what we learned there, put it right underneath the car in practice. We started out and we were pretty good. We just tuned on it a little bit. "Today, we had to make few minor adjustments, but track position was the key. The guys on it road did a good job...and it paid off for us."

STEWART: (ON PONTIAC'S FIRST WIN HERE SINCE 1992) "It's hard when there are only four or five Pontiacs that start the race in a 43-car field. It doesn't give you very good odds of a Pontiac winning. But, the good thing about the road courses is that it takes some of the aerodynamics out of the equation and puts more of it back into the crew chiefs and the driver's hands. We had good luck at the test with the Pontiac. We've had good luck at Sonoma with the Pontiac. I don't really think it was an issue of body style this week as much as it was mechanical balance this week." (DID YOU JUMP THE LAST RESTART?) "Nobody has ever left exactly at those two red stripes in the four years I've been in Winston Cup racing. Nobody has ever taken off exactly at them. They can say what they want. We did what we had to do. This is a tough race on restarts - where the flag stand is and where the last corner is and where the pits start. It really puts the lead car at a disadvantage, so as a driver I just did my job. I did what I was supposed to do as a driver and that is to try to take away their advantage. The road course guys - Pruett and P.J. Jones - were lagging back to try and get runs on us. We were sitting ducks if we didn't do something about it. I wasn't going to throw this race away because of a delay on the racetrack, so they can say what they want. We won it honestly. When I left, they had the same opportunity to get in the gas the same place that I did. It's not like we did something that they weren't able to do, too." (ON THE HEALING POWER OF WINNING) "There is no such thing. I've got a lot of hard work ahead of me away from the racetrack. But, I've got Zippy that is behind me 100 percent, I've got a race team that is behind me 100 percent, a sponsor and a car owner that are behind me 100 percent and every one of these race fans out here that were wearing 'Tony Stewart' shirts. I'm surrounded by a lot of good people. Friday was a real good example of that. To see all the car owners and crew chiefs and drivers and crew members that came over to say, 'Hey, we're thinking about you and we want you to know that we're on your side and with you on this, and we'll do anything we can to help out' - that meant more than anything, to have the support from those guys.

"This was a big win for our race team. It's not going to heal me a bit. Winning races - it's a 'band-aid.' It covers it up right now. But, tomorrow I'm going to work, getting my life straightened out again. This was just a good reward for the race team. They've worked so hard. Even I didn't realize until last week how many hours these guys were working in the motor shop. We had guys that weren't going home for three days at a time and just taking cat naps whenever they had opportunities. I wasn't even aware of that. This is a very good way of rewarding those guys for all of their hard work. They deserve this win today." (DOES IT SOLVE ANYTHING FROM YOUR PERSPECTIVE?) "No. What happens on the racetrack is on the racetrack, and stuff off the track is off the track. We've got to fix one before we can fix the other." (WERE YOU WORRIED AT ALL ABOUT ROBBY GETTING BACK TO YOU AT THE END, KNOWING YOU TANGLED EARLIER?) "Sure, you're watching who is back there and seeing what they're doing. But, there were a lot of opportunities for Robby to get by and Ryan [Newman] was strong and we were strong. I'm not sure if he could have gotten by Ryan if he could have even gotten to us, let alone get by us. We just were really strong late in the race and it didn't look like he was quite as strong as he was early. We were the guy that got into him. But, there were a lot of dinged up cars that passed me and were waving to me when they went by me at the end of this race. Like I said, we had a yellow (earlier) and I motioned Robby up and just kind of waved to him, just to say, 'Hey, it wasn't an intentional deal.' He waved back, so we knew everything was good. I wasn't worried about him back there. But, we knew he was strong and you knew that if he got to second and had an opportunity on the restart that he was going to dive me going into one. We were just hoping that we got a really good start on each of the restarts and just had to run our race. What happened behind us was not in our control, so there wasn't any point in worrying about it. We just had to worry about hitting our marks and not missing any shifts and doing what we had to do." (GIVEN WHAT HAPPENED LAST WEEK, WAS THIS A DIFFICULT RACE TO PREPARE FOR?) "No, as far as preparations, when it comes time to do my job, I do my job. When you show up at a Winston Cup race you forfeit your personal life for three days, so I put my business hat on for three days and that's what we did. We came out and worked hard. We were good in every practice session, we qualified well, we were top of the sheet yesterday morning in the early session and ended up fifth in the second session, just because we didn't want to run a lot of laps and put a lot of time on the motor. We just went about our weekend like we have to about any other weekend. You can't let what happens during a week dictate how you run your race on a weekend. The good thing is that I've got a race team that can stay focused like that. It makes it easier for me to stay focused. But, for the most part, we just did what we normally do on a weekend, except for having to spend a little more time with [the media]."

ZIPADELLI: (ON THE ERRATIC FINISHES THIS SEASON) "I guess a small part of it is luck. I think you make a lot of your luck in preparation - the work and the effort you put forth when you show up at the racetrack and keeping that focus all weekend long. There are a lot of good race cars out there that you've got to race. Track position becomes so important. Some places, maybe we didn't do as good of a job at keeping track position like we did today. I think just part of it is that we've had some problems the last couple weeks, and we've had some good days. If you look back at the last three and a half years that is kind of how our seasons have gone. If we can ever figure how to make them just a little bit more level or keep them up to the high side a little bit more, I think we'll be in good shape. That is kind of what we're working on."

STEWART: (WHAT GOES THROUGH YOUR MIND DURING A RED-FLAG, LIKE THE 12.5 MINUTE RED-FLAG TODAY?) "We knew we had a problem with the fuel system. We don't know where it is at, but on restarts, I'd lose my fuel pressure going down the front straightaway and I'd lose it going down the long back straightaway for the first lap. Then, it seems like it would get caught up somehow. But, sitting there on the red I thought we were a sitting duck, with a one or two laps restart, and knowing that we had pretty much tried to pull all of the tricks out of our bag on restarts to try to keep them guessing on where we were going to pick up the throttle. I was just sitting there trying to stay calm and stay cool. I was really warm in the car today. I sat there and left the cool box running to try to keep as much cool air to me without running the battery down. For the most part, I was just sitting there. I even told Zippy at one point, I said, 'I'm getting really hot and it's starting to bother me a little bit. Just talk to me about what's going on and get my mind off being hot and sitting in the car and not getting any air moving through there.' I was just sitting there and Zippy was telling me to concentrate on trying to think about what I was going to do on my restart and gave me some stuff to think about why we were sitting there. I was just hoping that I wasn't going to lose it because of a red flag. I'm seen them won and lost like that, so I was just hoping it wasn't going to be one of those days where we lost it because of it."

ZIPADELLI: (HOW DID THE RED-FLAG FEEL TO YOU?) "It felt like about a half an hour. We were just sitting there. We were watching the big screen. We happened to over in turn one where the fires were (in the safety barriers), so I was kind of relaying back to Tony what was going on, just to try to keep everybody in a light mood and hope that we'd get one, good, last restart. We surely had a car good enough to win and Tony was on his game all weekend, so you'd hate to have a red-flag situation like that where you could potentially lose something that you've worked hard for. But, we've been on both sides of the fence and today it worked out for us."

STEWART: (WAS THERE ANY CONCERN WITH A ROOKIE AND A COUPLE ROAD COURSE RACERS BEHIND YOU ON THE RESTART?) "The comforting thing was knowing that Ryan was back there. He may be a rookie, but he doesn't drive like a rookie. I raced against him in USAC in midgets and sprint cars and Silver Crown cars and he is anything but a rookie. He is just a rookie to the Winston Cup Series, so I had a lot of confidence in him as a racer. You knew that he wasn't going to do anything crazy on the restart. But, after seeing what Robby did on the first start - went down there and could have piled up a bunch of cars in the first corner, just taking the green flag and trying to go through on corner on a 90-lap race - you knew that he would do something if he was in second. It was just a matter of trying to get good restarts. I knew Ryan had a problem with him power steering, so he was really, extremely hard for us to get by and I knew that it might be hard for those guys to get by him also. I was just hoping that if we got by and could get good restarts each time that he would be able to hold them up long enough, even if they did get by, that we could get out and at least get out to where we could run our race and not worry about what they were doing behind us."

ZIPADELLI: (HOW WOULD YOU GRADE YOUR DRIVER'S PERFORMANCE TODAY?) "I'd give him an 'A+' for the weekend. We unloaded, our car was good, we adjusted on it a little bit for qualifying, he went out, he hit all hit marks, he got us a good qualifying spot and yesterday in practice he showed up ready to practice. It was a fun weekend for us. We were actually able to go back racing that is what we're here for. We're looking forward to the rest of the year."

STEWART: (HOW ABOUT A GRADE FOR YOURSELF?) "I don't give myself grades. I gave myself an 'F' last week, so anything above an 'F' this week, I'll take." (WHAT DID YOU MEAN REGARDING MR. MOOK BEING PART OF YOUR REBOUND?') "He was part of an incident that is probably going to change my life, or at least get it back in the right direction. I guess that's what I meant by it. He has been a topic all week, just like we've been a topic all week. I'm looking forward to putting the incident behind me to where when I come back to the race weekends, [the media] will actually let me go back to work and do what I do best and let me worry about my personal life away from the racetrack, instead of wasting my time here when I should be talking about how good a day we had and how good a job the crew did, instead of talking about the personal life." (ON HAVING A GREAT DAY IN POINTS...IS THE CHAMPIONSHIP STILL IN REACH?) "If we are fourth, I'm extremely happy just from the standpoint that every time we've gotten to fifth this year something would happen the next week and we'd go back to seventh. I was like, 'Either get us to sixth or get us to fourth. I don't want to be seventh anymore. I don't want to be fifth anymore, so if we're in fourth, I'm tickled to death leaving here. Anything is possible. You look at the bad luck we've had this year and you look at the things that have happened to us and you look at where we're at. If anybody can rebound from all of this stuff that's happened, it's this team. If anything it should put some fear in these other teams that they've got to stay on their game because I think last week and everything we've done this week has given this team more focus than we've ever had before. We had more fun this weekend than we've had in a long time as a race team and look what happened today. The end result is that we won the race, so it makes me very optimistic that we can still win this championship. We'll probably have more determination now than ever to do it. If we win this thing, we're going to know that we did it having a good time the last half of the season and not being a stressed-out race team and a race team that is battling with each other. We're going to be happy and be one giant unit kicking everybody else's butt the rest of the year."

ZIPADELLI: (ON THE POSSIBILITY OF A CHAMPIONSHIP RUN) "Tony's right. Every time we move up in the points we get kicked right back down. It's been an up-and-down year. But, for us to move up to fourth - I think we're 104 points out of the lead - that is absolutely, positively in our hands to grab. We just need to do what we did here today. We need to stay focused, work hard and win some more races before the end of the year."

STEWART: (YOU RACE A LOT ON THE SIDE FOR FUN...DOES THAT COST YOU ANY FOCUS?) "It's no different than somebody that goes fishing for a day or goes golfing for a day. That is what I do to relax. The situation I got myself into this year is that I was doing so much of it that my body finally was just getting worn out. Physically, I was getting fatigued, but mentally it's always been refreshing. But, when times aren't good, though, it even makes it a strain sometimes to do things you love. Zippy and I sat down and talked about it and we're not opposed to me doing that stuff on the side - just need to make sure we're doing it for the right reasons and make sure that we're having fun doing it because if we're not having fun doing it, there is really not point doing it, considering all the dedication and time and effort it takes to do what we do. I don't people fully understand what it takes for drivers, crew chiefs, pit crews - the guys that never even get a chance to go to the racetrack - that's all they do is just work at the shop - it's a 24-7 day job anymore. We've had guys working 24-hour days. I'm not at the shop every day, but I'm busy and on the road, doing things, whether it's appearances or races. Zippy works seven days a week every week. He doesn't take a day off. He's got a son that is month away from being one year old and he doesn't get to spend much time with him. This series is getting more competitive and it's getting more time-consuming every year. I'm hoping that eventually something will happen to where it will at least give us an opportunity to get our regular lives back and somewhat have a regular life. But, it's like Zippy said. This is what we signed up for. We're not going to complain about it. If that means we've got to work seven days a week, we'll work seven days a week. That's what we decided we wanted to do. We'll do it day in and day out. He doesn't complain about it. The crew guys don't complain about it. Nobody complains about it. We just all do it. In the back of our minds, I think we all hope that we hit a point in time when things change a little bit to where it does give us a little bit of a break to actually see some of the other things in the world other than chain link fences and guard rails and concrete."

ZIPADELLI: (ANY DIFFERENCES THIS WEEK AT THE SHOP?) "No, it was another day at the office. We put everything behind us. Everybody just came focused. Everybody came with a goal in mind - to come here and qualify well, practice well and to win --- and that is what we accomplished. I know what we went through this week and to know that we can, as a group, focus like that when we need to, put those things behind when we need to, I think just makes us stronger and better in the future."
 
that is crazy how he has had this up and down year and still right in the championship hunt, imagine if some of those races he finished normal, might be a different points leader:)
 
The same for Ryan Newman. Hes got 10 top 5's...more than anyone, but since he blew up in so many races he is only in 9th spot. And yeah Tony has had a up and down year, but doesnt everyone?
 
Tony would be the points leader, if they just didn't race at Daytonna!!!!
 
There is a lot of What ifs for the top ten drivers right now,that would make them the points leader.Thats why a close points race is good for Nascar. ;)
 
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