INTERVIEW: ANDREW HINES, MATT HAGAN AND TONY SCHUMACHER

NHRA MELLO YELLO DRAG RACING SERIES TELECONFERENCE: ANDREW HINES, MATT HAGAN AND TONY SCHUMACHER

The following are excerpts from a teleconference to preview the AMALIE Motor Oil NHRA Gatornationals at Auto-Plus Raceway at Gainesville, March 12-15. Andrew Hines (Pro Stock Motorcycle), Matt Hagan (Funny Car) and Tony Schumacher (Top Fuel) were featured on the call.

MODERATOR: The Pro Stock Motorcycle begins in Gainesville and Andrew Hines begins his pursuit of yet another championship after securing his fourth series championship in 2014.

Talk about last year, the championship was your first one since the 2006 season. A little bit of time between there. Was there ever a point that you doubted you would get another one, or was it just a matter of time?

ANDREW HINES: Well, it was a long road from ’06 to ’14. I had a few stumbles across the way that cost me the chance at a couple championships. Came up really close in ’07 and ’10. Those were mistakes mainly made on my part right at the end of the season that really could have been avoided. I was really overthinking the situations too much. My team just helped me focus and get right back in the mindset for being a racer, focusing more on what needed to happen on each and every run, not worrying what’s going to happen day-to-day. It was great to get back to that point last year. I’m going to carry that No. 1 on the Harley-Davidson all this year. It was a long way to get to that fourth championship. I was chasing it for eight years or so. My team did a great job of getting me back in the game the last few years. Finally got back after the struggle in ’13.

MODERATOR: What is that feeling putting that No. 1 on the side of the bike?

ANDREW HINES: It’s a great feeling. I did it the day after Pomona last year. We had the opportunity to take the motorcycle down to the L.A. Auto Show. First thing we did was pull it out in the morning and stuck the No. 1 on it. When you can stick a No. 1 on the side of your motorcycle or car, it’s a phenomenal feeling. It’s a long road all year long to get to that point. You look at your crew, see what they had to do to get to that point, sacrificing time with their families, long hours, to race and go have fun. We really appreciate the opportunity to race in NHRA, Pro Stock Motorcycle. Carrying No. 1 for another season is a big accomplishment.

MODERATOR: Is it a bull’s-eye, as well?

ANDREW HINES: It is. I know in years past, more recently than ever, whenever someone won a championship, my goal is to take them out whenever I can. I’m sure everyone else has the same feeling as me.

Q. You’ve had a fairly long off-season. Is that helpful or maybe a hindrance?

ANDREW HINES: With being part of the Pro Stock Motorcycle group, we get that extra month off. We don’t have to go and race quite as early as all the car guys out in Pomona. It’s a different situation. We get the extra time, but it kind of makes you feel a little bit rusty. We haven’t done any testing since we left Pomona in November. We’re going to make our first runs here next week in Bradenton, Florida. It’s different. We don’t get to knock the rust off quite as early as all the cars guy, but we get more time to run the dyno in the shop, more time for vendors to get us parts we need to get going for the season. By no means does our progress stop around here. As soon as we got back from Pomona at the end of the year, we had parts trickling in during the off-season, on the dyno here and there. Can’t wait to get out there next week, burn some new Sunoco race fuel and see what we can do.

Q. Is there a point when all of your championship momentum fades before the focus takes over?

ANDREW HINES: With the way we go about it on our team, whatever happened yesterday doesn’t matter. It’s all about what’s coming up next. Yes, we did win the championship last year. I think that’s how we focus on doing so good week in, week out. We kind of put what happened yesterday out of our mind and we just focus on the next task at hand. Anytime we get in a situation where we’re happy about something, we just remember we have something else coming up next we need to conquer.

Q. Andrew, give me some perspective on how good Angelle (Sampey) was when she was winning events and championships. How much has the division changed in the last few years?

ANDREW HINES: She was a phenomenal rider. I didn’t race against her when she was really in her prime in the late ’90s. I was on my brother’s team as a crew member at that point. Watching what she did at the time was pretty spectacular. She has the heart of a champion, the drive to go out there and get it done. She was part of a great team back then. She’s going to be definitely a force to be reckoned with. She’s back with that same group of people. It’s great to have her back. It’s going to bring some more notoriety to have ‘the girl’ as she was always called back in our sport. It’s going to make for good times. We had a good rivalry racing early in my career when she was on the Army bike at Don Schumacher Racing. Good to have her back. Brings back my drive to want to go out there and win even more.

Q. How much has that division changed over the last five, six years?

ANDREW HINES: It’s been way more competitive over the last five, six years. There’s multiple teams out there with multiple bikes. People get a lot more information from each and every qualifying round. Matt Smith had four bikes almost every race last year. Multiple teams with two bikes, three bikes. That makes it that much tougher because people have more information to tune off of. You got riders that are excelling on the starting line, getting better as they finesse the bike down the track, tighter times near the front of the pack. You have to be on your game every time you go up there. You can’t give up any time really on the starting line. Everybody’s going out there and trying to cut each other’s throat. It’s a great time to be associated with Pro Stock Motorcycle, something I’m going to look forward to for a long time to come.

MODERATOR: Andrew has 38 career wins, which is third on the all-time list. Angelle has 41. The late great Dave Schultz has 45. Angelle talked about, when she came back, trying to run down Dave. You’re trying to probably run down Angelle and Dave. Do you look at those numbers at all or is it the next day is the next day?

ANDREW HINES: Unfortunately I am a statistics guy. I follow what numbers are happening at the time. But realistically I just need to focus on one race after another. 41 hopefully will come this year. I’m always happy to get one a year. That’s just something that has happened every year for the last 11 years. I think there’s a running list of drivers that have won at least one race in consecutive seasons. Jason Line won the Winternationals this year. We’re good buddies. He one upped me there. I have to keep up pace with him. Hopefully they’ll keep coming after that.

I have a great team that inspires me to go out there and put forth the best effort I can every single weekend. Hopefully we can just keep racking them up.

Q. Andrew, have there been any off-season rules changes for the engines or weight distribution that might give one manufacturer the edge over another?

ANDREW HINES: No. Everything is the same as it was last year. If you looked at the lap times and speeds all through the Countdown last year, it was very competitive between the four-cylinder Suzuki, the V-Twins, and the Harley-Davidsons. We were running close E.T.s, close speeds. It was a matter of who had the better setup off the starting line. Our runs are pretty much make or break in the first 60 feet. Got to make a good time off the starting line, have a good reaction time to go with it. NHRA kept the field exactly the same. The only learning curve that the whole field is going to have is the new Sunoco fuel. We’ve been running on the dyno. Everybody is going to have to deal with the same issues whether it’s good or bad. We’re going to go out there and see what it has to offer for this year.

Q. Is there a difference in octane rating?

ANDREW HINES: It’s got a little higher specific gravity. It’s 116 octane versus 113. We’re thinking it’s going to actually open our tuning window a little bit. Hopefully we’ll have more consistency from run to run. Last year, few years past, the octane may have been a little on the low side. You really had to be spot on on your tune-up. You had a small window that would make the bike go really fast. We’re hoping that will open the door a little bit to have a little more balance between being on that edge. Hopefully it’s all good.

Q. Is there tangible proof that Harley-Davidson actually gets a great benefit from being in this series, like Ford and Chevy are in NASCAR? Is there a definite correlation to being in NHRA?

ANDREW HINES: Absolutely. We have a huge correlation with our Harley-Davidson Midway truck that brings out all the new models every year. People can go over there, sit on bikes, get pictures taken on the race bike. We can get feedback and send our potential customers anywhere from now to three to six months out, send them to local dealers, get contact information.

They’ve had success of many sales of motorcycles just based on the NHRA Midway. They’re getting positive feedback from that angle. It’s great that Harley-Davidson got involved in the class over a decade ago and they’re still pushing strong.

Q. Gainesville is known for records, known for miles per hour. We’ve been talking about it for a couple years now, many calling the last major milestone in drag racing: a Pro Stock Motorcycle going 200 miles per hour. A couple years ago Eddie (Krawiec) was very close. Is that on the horizon? Is it possible? How much do you want to be the person who does it?

ANDREW HINES: I’d obviously love to be the person that does it. I was the first one to run under seven seconds in the quarter-mile. We are coming up on the 10-year anniversary of that this weekend in Gainesville. If I can add [the first 200 mph speed] to my list, that would be an awesome achievement. Right now we’re still low enough on the horsepower where we really have to depend on Mother Nature to push us to 200 miles per hour. We’re not seeing those big enough strides in horsepower to achieve that extra speed on a normal run where we had a 75-degree racetrack, no tailwinds. Right now we need about a 15- to 20-miles per hour tailwind to push us in that direction. The aerodynamics are a little off on all the motorcycles. Gainesville is one of the fastest racetracks on the tour. I’ve had good success there in the past. I’m not saying it’s out of the question. It could happen on the very first qualifying run. It just depends on what air is in town. We’ll see what happens. We have stout motorcycles that were putting up huge speeds at the end of the year. There are going to be a lot of guys vying for it for sure.

Q. The class has been ripe with rivalries for some years now. Each year you are able to build on those rivalries in a respectful way. We’re seeing a new manufacturer coming into the sport. You are with Harley-Davidson. Just the idea of multiple manufacturers, the number of manufacturers increasing, you representing your manufacturer against others that are in a competition for the motorcycle buyer in the grandstand, how does that stoke the flames of those rivalries and increase the intensity?

ANDREW HINES: It’s going to bring awareness to the whole class. We’re going to have more rivalries with guys that are riding those specific manufacturers in the stands. It will get people talking about the class, get the excitement pumped up. You might see a little more feuding from people on the racetrack, at the end of the racetrack, depending on how tempers flare, which way the win light turns on. I’ve always had a pretty good rivalry with Matt Smith on a personal level. We can talk and joke and things like that in the staging lanes, but when it comes down to the starting line, you never know what’s going to happen with us two. Also there are the Harleys and the Hectors. That’s an ongoing battle that’s going to go on. It’s all something to bring a little more awareness to the Pro Stock Motorcycle group. We want our Harleys to be on top. We want people to go home feeling excited and go home and buy a V-Rod the next day.

MODERATOR: Thanks for your time Andrew, we are now joined by Matt Hagan who is continuing his hot streak from the end of last season into the early part of 2015. He’s won the first two events of the season and this marks the first time he’s won consecutive events in his career. It’s the fifth time he’s had multiple wins in the season and his win streak technically dates back to the season ending event in Pomona where he won while clinching his second world championship. Matt, you have yet to win at Gainesville. Start there with going into the event. You’d love to have three in a row, get that Gainesville win. Is that what you’re looking at?

MATT HAGAN: I think you want to win ’em all. You have to win the first two to win ’em all. It’s going to be a hard thing to do to win three in a row or four in a row, so to speak, now. There’s just so much competition out there. Honestly, this team blows me away every weekend. The car performs, it runs. I try not to mess it up, keeping it in the groove, all the stuff we have to do as far as leaving on time. The car continually impresses me, and my crew guys, they work so hard to make sure things are right. What’s so tough about Nitro Funny Car, 10,000-horsepower, over 300 miles per hour, you can do everything right, driver does everything right, crew chief does everything right, and the crew guys wrenching on it do everything right, and you still lose because it sticks a part out there, drops a cylinder. To be able to turn on 12 consecutive win lights on Sunday, to have the streak we’ve been on, be able to win a championship at the end of last year, win the race, come out here and win two more races to start the year off, it’s been pretty phenomenal. It goes to show you why we are a championship team. Hopefully it continues. But, you know, it’s like anything, you just got to keep running with the ball till you hit the end zone. All in all I think we’ve got a great car, a great team. I’m looking forward to big things in the future.

Q. Matt, it’s often said surrounding yourself with good people is the key to good success. What is your take on that?

MATT HAGAN: Absolutely. Honestly, I’d love to sit here and tell you I’m the greatest driver in the world. But it’s because I have the greatest team around me that we’re doing so well. I just try not to mess it up. These guys that put these cars together really are make or break for you as far as your success. I’ve had a crew chief at one time, one year he took the year off pretty much. You can’t wish that thing to the finish line any faster than what it’s going to get there. It really comes down to crew chiefs, it comes down to guys putting your car together, it comes down to that team, charisma, the energy you have together. Honestly, this team I’m with right now, I’ve never been in that situation where we’ve had such great chemistry, such great charisma. Everybody jells, gets on. We’re turning on win lights. Even when we were struggling last year at the beginning of the year, we started out with a new combination. It didn’t work out. Five races in we said we’ve got to change back to what we know. It took another five races. Half of your season is gone. Even then, when things were a little tough, nobody got down. Everybody was really up and ready to go, ready to race. Everybody brought their A game every week. Then the car started coming back around. We got our combination back, started running strong again, came out and won the championship. We continued that momentum into this year. Honestly, it’s really, really about the people you put around you. I’ve been very, very fortunate here at DSR to have the best of the best. I wouldn’t trade my guys for anybody.

Q. Matt, a lot of people are talking lately about NHRA Mello Yello drag racing, the entertainment of it. It makes me think about the history of this sport, how every racer was a driver who wanted to win, but at the same time they were in many ways a showman out there to put on an entertaining race for the fans to increase their fan base. Seems that can only come from confidence of knowing you can win. How do you find yourself increasing that as you win more races, getting more notoriety, more TV time, fans following you? Does that confidence allow you to be more entertaining, to talk more, speak more, interact more? What do you think the balance is between those two?

MATT HAGAN: Yeah, I mean, I think that obviously it goes hand-in-hand. The more you win, the more TV time you get, the more exposure, the more opportunity you have to reach out and touch new fans and also grow your fan base along with drag racing’s fan base. So, yeah, it’s very important as far as the confidence side of stuff. I mean, I know I crawl in a racecar, I can win any Sunday that I sit in it. That’s huge. To be able to say I can turn four win lights on this Sunday no matter what, the confidence there is just phenomenal. It’s just a matter of getting it right and doing it right, turning the win lights on. I know we’re capable of doing that. So when we do that, the exposure is going to grow. But I think it comes down to just being a personable person as well. You look at some people who’ve had huge success, and nobody likes them. Some people just don’t jibe, they don’t do well on TV, they don’t do well with the media, they don’t talk to the fans. I think if you have that opportunity, it is very important as a showman, as a driver, as a representative of the sport, to get out there and be interactive with your fans, get these young kids involved in the sport, do things above and beyond what a lot of other drivers aren’t doing to engage the fans. I like to think I’m one of those guys that can do that. Some of these guys hide in their trailers because they don’t want to sign autographs. Dude, what are you doing? I can remember when I couldn’t give an autograph away. Now I’m grateful that someone wants my autograph. I don’t know. I guess I’ve had such a huge amount of success in such a short amount of time, maybe I haven’t forgot where it came from. It’s been really humbling to me. I feel like if we can get these fans involved. NHRA drag racing, is truly a phenomenal sport. It sells itself once you get onto the racetrack. But we’ve got to get these kids there, get these families there, and the rest of it will take care of itself. I’ve never had a new fan come up and say, I did not have a good time here, I want my money back, whatever. It is just an amazing experience to see two 10,000-horsepower cars go down the racetrack. Isn’t anything you can explain to anybody. You have to get out there and see it. As far as my opportunity to do that, I want to get out there, engage with the fans, grow the fans with everybody else.

Q. Regarding the Gatornationals, this is the East Coast opener. If there were crown jewels or big four races, this would certainly be one of them. Many of the rivalries in the past, East Coast, West Coast, we see it in virtually every sport, this is the East Coast opener. I’d like your thoughts on the Gatornationals as a premiere event in motorsports, not just in drag racing, in terms of what it means as an East Coast guy to go down and potentially win this race.

MATT HAGAN: I mean, I want to win the Gatornationals more than I want to win Indy. It’s just something I have a lot of history there, I started my Pro Mod racing there. There’s so much history at that track. I have some personal history there with it as well. I want to win it, man. I want to win them all. I’m kind of greedy when I say that. It’s true. If you go out there and you don’t have that desire and drive to win, you shouldn’t be sitting in the seat anyway. It’s important to put it in perspective just because it’s like the first bang for the East Coast to come out here and experience nitro. Cooped up all winter long in the house, everybody goes down to Florida to smell nitro, gag, watch your eyes run. On the East Coast, people go crazy for Gainesville. It’s a packed house. We’ll be racing in front of thousands of fans next weekend coming up. It is really cool to do your burnout, look around in the stands, it’s slammed. For me, it gets my blood pumping.

Q. Matt, regarding the fan base, we’ve seen more and more women come into NHRA over the last 10 years. It’s been a while in your division. What have you noticed in terms of how that’s changed maybe the fan base in the grandstands and pits, what have you?

MATT HAGAN: I think it’s great for our sport to have women out here driving these cars because they do bring the woman side of things to the sport when it’s been predominantly a gearhead man kind of sport. I think it is huge. No different than Erica Enders-Stevens with the Pro Stock stuff. I remember when I was a kid, deciding whether I was going to drive Pro Stock, you see her with the Slammers Milk. You have little girls lined up around the corner to get her autograph. Some of these little girls out here, they’re tougher than some of these boys. They got to have somebody to root for, too. I think it’s just a great thing all the way around. It’s not really about whether being a girl or a boy, it’s about the skill set you have, being able to utilize that. When I beat somebody knowing they’re a good leaver, a good driver, I still turn the win light on, that’s what does it for me. It’s not, Oh, I beat this girl, I beat this guy. It’s about, you’re a competitor and how good are you? You know what I mean. That’s just the way it draws out to be. I think it’s good that we do have women in our sport, though, because we need to grow our sport in every way, shape and form we can.

MODERATOR: You talked earlier about your team. I think you talked at the end of last year your team coming together, doing a lot of stuff outside of the track. Is that still the case? Do you still get together even outside of the races as much as you can?

MATT HAGAN: Yeah, absolutely. This is honestly my family away from my family. Those boys have skin in the game. I think they know it’s not just a job to them. There are a lot of boys out here that wrench on these cars that are just there for the paycheck. They like doing what they’re doing, but their heart’s not really in it. I know for a fact, 100 percent, that my guys, their hearts are in it more than they’re worried about the paycheck side of things. It goes to show you, those guys that come in on Friday, we burnt the car to the ground, they worked till 4:30 in the morning, coming back in on two hours of sleep, got the car qualified, we go out there and win the race. I couldn’t ask for a better group of guys. We hang out outside of the racetrack. We eat together. We drink beer together. We hang out together. We’re whole as a group.

MODERATOR: Thanks Matt for your time and good luck in Florida. We are now joined by Tony Schumacher. He is the most recent Top Fuel winner in Phoenix, which was his 78th career victory and his first of the season. He also set a career best lap time of 3.720 seconds. He has four career wins in Gainesville. Tony, like we talked about with Matt, where has this strong start for you and your team come from?

TONY SCHUMACHER: We’ve done it before. It’s not the first time we won races at the beginning of the year. Hopefully we continue on because so often you see these awesome starts peter off in the middle of the year. It takes a team that’s outstanding to maintain that. There’s a lot of races this year, man. Honestly, I’m not going to jinx myself, because we were not elite, we weren’t the only car going fast. Everybody is now. The battles are tough. I said it at the end of last year when we were doing this exact thing, it’s all over the time of one car being good and everybody else fighting for second place. I didn’t drive very well at the last race. I think the crew really carried me. The car was fast at the right times. Not the fastest every lap, didn’t have lane choice every time, but we raced well. I think we saw the results were good. We’ve had years where you do almost everything right and you get beat, too. Little bit of a lucky start, but a good, fast racecar to get the year going with.

Q. Tony, Doug Kalitta won a bunch of races but not a championship. How much do you respect him as driver? Could he break through at any point and win a championship?

TONY SCHUMACHER: Absolutely. We’re all pulling for him. He’s a great guy. Great guy. Humble. Just an outstanding dude. Won a ton of races. They’ve had that luck where you start out so amazing, come down to the last race and get beat. I don’t know. I’m the guy on the other side that’s done it to him. But I respect him as much as I respect any other driver out there; him and his team. Connie, just a guy that is so giving, not only for our sport of drag racing, but for our military. He flies a ton of flights. I’m behind him. I’m their competition. Obviously I want to win. But he could break through any day. Really I’m not going to say he deserves to, because last year I took a bath of questions from people when I said, Nobody deserves anything. I’m not going to change my stance on that. They deserve it when they hand you the trophy. They all know what the rules are. But are they worthy of it? Absolutely. Great guys. Great family man. He’s someone that if I can’t win the championship, my dad is not listening, my teammates are not paying attention, I’d like to see him do it. Doug is a great guy.

Q. We have all these women now in NHRA. It’s happened over the last 15, 20 years. Has it transformed the fan base? What have you noticed in the grandstands, the pits, et cetera?

TONY SCHUMACHER: Wow, that’s a really good question. I think Phoenix, the last couple races have been really, really good. But over the last bunch of years, I haven’t really seen it change too much. I see the fans stand by the pits more. I mean, heck, who doesn’t want to go over there and see a Force girl, Leah Pritchett. They’re great for the sport. That’s a question for NHRA, the demographics of what the women in the sport have drawn. You have to remember, Shirley Muldowney, Lori Johns, we’ve had girls for a long time. The change would have been probably long before I started racing in ’96 in Top Fuel. I’m not sure it’s as drastic as you see fan change. You see it in NASCAR, a driver shows up as a woman, maybe change the demographics over there. We’ve been doing this a long time. We’ve had women win championships. We’ve had Angelle do it. Heck, Enders-Stevens now, what a great opportunity. Are we drawing more people? I think they’re just going to be hanging around their pits. We’re curious. It’s something that is still pretty extreme, even though we’ve had Shirley Muldowney and other people doing it. There’s definitely a lot more men. When you get ladies out here doing a great job, they’re probably going to stand over there at the ropes.

Q. The thing that has changed over the last six or seven years is you have so many now. You’re saying basically you haven’t noticed a gradual change in the grandstands?

TONY SCHUMACHER: No, I haven’t seen more kids or more young men because there’s women. We have a lot of people. The thing is, I stand at the ropes and watch. We have a lot of fans. I wish we had more. I don’t wish we had more so we all got paid more. That’s nonsense. I wish we had more because I love our sport so much, I want our people to see it. If there’s a way to get more people out there. We need to get kids out there, draw these young kids that have never seen a Chevelle, those old cars we all grew up on as guys in our mid-40s. We love that stuff. Drawing them out there, no matter what we got to do. I don’t know if women are going to help. What I think is going to help, honestly, is the junior drag racing program. These kids are growing up racing with it in them. I think it’s fantastic. Starting at age five these kids get to come out and race, and many women. That’s going to draw them out their whole life. I think that’s helping a little bit. You guys are all asking tough questions today (laughter).

Q. You’ve had more intense moments than most human beings on this planet. What part of the preparation is most intense to you?

TONY SCHUMACHER: You know, as far as the run itself, what’s more intense, or the whole having to get your job done part?

Q. Actually, all of that. In other words, those are intense moments that a lot of people don’t get, the preparation, then the speed.

TONY SCHUMACHER: I think the preparation, I’m not sure that I try harder than anybody else. Honestly in a professional category everyone tries. They’re all good, prepared. They eat right, train, prepare. Hiring great people is very, very important. But who doesn’t do that? So I live for that moment. I’m a God-fearing man, buddy. I get in that car and I don’t pray to win, I pray for miracles. I’ve been a part of so many of them, so many of them. I hope every American in the world gets a chance to live those moments. Now, it’s funny, when I pray that, I hope everyone gets to live that moment, bottom of the ninth, bases loaded, scary moment. I don’t think everyone wants that. I think a lot of people are very content being a spectator. But I hope at some point they get to enjoy being a part of something so big with people capable of pulling off those moments, you know. You guys have all heard my speeches. I only enjoy those moments because I’ve surrounded myself with nine guys capable of that moment. Think about the run. Think about when we set the world record. When I looked out of my visor and saw my guys, they were fantastic guys capable of that moment in every way, shape and form. Kids that read these magazines, listen to what you guys are saying, listen to me closely, you have a chance to drive a car that goes 330 miles an hour, you may be blessed at that particular moment, make sure when you look out your visor, that nine guys are A-plus bad-to-the-bone dudes that are capable of that moment. If you look out of your visor and you see five of your high school idiot buddies looking at you, you’ve got a problem. Surround yourself with people capable of the fight and battle at all times. We win and lose by inches. Set world records on runs that absolutely matter. It’s all about the people you surround yourself with. So start while you’re young, surround yourself with people capable of passing good tests, studying for the correct test. Like I say in every speech, guys, don’t get rid of the idiot. When you’re having a bad day, it’s nice to look over at him and say, I’m having a bad day, but at least I’m not the idiot. But don’t bring him to the test when it matters. The Army has taught me that for 15 years now, surrounding yourself with people that are capable of the job are the way you get home. I’m pretty fortunate. 15 years with the Army, man, I’ve learned a lot.

Q. Not everyone can go to a racetrack like Gainesville with four wins in their back pocket. Does that give you extra confidence or is that just great history?

TONY SCHUMACHER: It’s great history. Honestly, I have no better chance of winning Gainesville this weekend than I do of winning Atlanta, which I’ve never won before. We’re going to win if we show up and are better than the rest of the field. I told everyone, last week I drove okay, I drove average at best. Drove my car straight, leaving the start line I was a bit off. I wasn’t exactly sure why. We have to show up machine like, do our job. Gainesville, I’m pretty sure I haven’t won all four with Mike. I’m not sure if I won any with Mike. It’s a group effort. What they know, the data. Take all that data, add it to all the clutch parts, fuel parts that you have. All that stuff changes every year. Come Friday night after I make the first couple runs, I’ll know if I have a good car going in. I love going to Gainesville just like I going to Sonoma, California. Any track you go to, the stands are so big and so full, that’s where you want to go. You want to race in front of a big crowd because we love what we do and we want people to see it.

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