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NASCAR SPRINT CUP SERIES: QUAKER STATE 400 PRESENTED BY ADVANCE AUTO PARTSJuly 9, 2016Scott MillerSparta, Kentucky THE MODERATOR: We have our Senior Vice President Scott Miller over at the R&D Center. Certainly we saw some exciting racing here this weekend in all three national series, the repave, and then the Sprint Cup Series, the lower‑downforce rules package. Take us through this weekend. Certainly there was a lot of effort put in by everybody concerned, NASCAR, the track, Goodyear. Your assessment of how you thought things unfolded and maybe just your assessment of the race here tonight. SCOTT MILLER: Well, I'm sure Brad covered a lot about how the cars drove and a lot about the race. One of the things that I think has probably been overlooked a little bit is we had some weather, and we ended up with probably one of the hardest tracks on the circuit to dry to one of the quickest tracks to dry. The two times we had to put the equipment out there, the track dried really good, and the drainage that they put in underneath and all that stuff just worked fantastic. That was something that I don't think has really been mentioned, but that's a huge plus for the new facility here. You know, the repave, we've known as an industry that the repaves are very, very difficult historically. This was no different. But really the action in all three of the events this weekend I thought for a repave, it turned out really well, and we had obviously tonight a lot of action, like Brad said, a little dicey getting down there in Turn 3 on the restarts especially. I think the low, low downforce package, if that's what we're calling it now, helped at this race on the repave. I think the corner speeds would have been extremely high, and with the higher downforce stepping out of the groove might have even had more consequences than we had tonight. I think all in all, it was really a great weekend here at Kentucky Speedway. Q. Scott, Goodyear had decided to change the tire after the test that you had because of some blistering. Do you foresee, I know you guys have not been planning on doing any more races for tests the rest of the season, but do you foresee having some where to go maybe just from a Goodyear tire test perspective on matching this particular low, low downforce package for races next season? SCOTT MILLER: Well, there's not any tire testing planned for the low, low downforce package right now, but certainly before we introduce these rules or a tweak of these rules, if we do so for 2017, that we'll try to dot all the I's and cross all the T's, and that certainly is something that we would consider. Q. How much can you really evaluate the package based on the new‑‑ I mean, when you look at it and you're trying to break down the data and decide whether you want to take this for next year or whatever is in the future, what does the tire have to do with it, what does the repave have to do with it, and how can you evaluate the package with all those different factors? SCOTT MILLER: Well, it's a little bit more obviously difficult to make a concrete conclusion, considering all those things that you mentioned. Certainly it's a little bit more gray than if it was at a place that we had had a lot of races and some consistent races over years on the surface. But I think that still we can look at kind of what Brad said. It's certainly going to be‑‑ I think I walked in when he said something, we're professional drivers, and it's not supposed to be easy. Certainly I think that the downforce package that we got, no matter where we're racing, is going to provide that. Q. We asked Brad earlier about the three different packages, All‑Star, Michigan and here. He said that All‑Star was more low skew than low, low downforce. Can you go into a little bit of the background between All‑Star, Michigan, and this package and what benefits you saw of each of them, and what do you see carrying over to 2017? SCOTT MILLER: Okay, well, the All‑Star Race had just one element of what we raced here tonight and what we raced at Michigan, and that was the rear end housing with zero toe. That just induces less yaw into the cars, and that also takes sideforce away and a little bit of downforce away. That was the component from the All‑Star Race that was the same as what we had here, and also at the All‑Star Race was the introduction of‑‑ we all talked about it back then, but the fans that were being used to enhance the aerodynamic performance of the car. So at the All‑Star Race the fans went away, and we ran the rear end housing and rear skew settings like we had tonight. So on top of that for the 2017 package, if you will, is a smaller splitter and a smaller spoiler that took about on the order of 500 pounds of downforce away. So those were the differences in the‑‑ Q. Did you see that tonight, especially in 3 and 4? Do you think that was more indicative of the track? SCOTT MILLER: I think that was certainly a combination of both. I don't think that anybody that's been championing and wanting us to go this way ever felt that the cars would get into the corner like the other one. It's just not in the cards. When you take downforce away, you're going to take grip away, and it's going to be more difficult to get into the corners. Q. Scott, I understand that there's no plans to run this again this season, but in the interest of getting a representative sample, wouldn't it be in the interest of the sanctioning body to consider running this package at a track with a more abrasive surface like Darlington? SCOTT MILLER: There were some strategic reasons why we chose to do it the way we did it, and we engaged the entire industry in putting the plan together of when we're going to do it. That certainly does make sense, but the timing of that and some testing that we had and a lot of other things‑‑ there's a lot things that go into making these decisions and making the schedules, so it just didn't line up for us to be able to do that in the initial plan. Now, after tonight we'll go back and we'll sort of reconvene with the drivers and the owners and the OEMs and decide where we're going. We're open to a lot of different options, and if something like that bubbles up and we have industry support for it, nothing right now is out of the question. One thing that I think we won't do is change the Chase around. We'll stick to our guns and run the 2016‑‑ regular 2016 package in the Chase races. All of this has been geared toward deciding what we're going to do for 2017 and getting it decided as early as we possibly can, which gives the teams the most runway into next season, which is something that they've needed and been asking for, so that's what we're striving toward. Q. I talked to Cole Pearn before and after he met with you and the other guys in the hauler. He was happy neither of those times. Can you take us through that meeting? SCOTT MILLER: I didn't expect him to be happy, but you can't pass on pit road. If you do pass on pit road, it specifically says it has to be to the right when somebody is peeling off into their box. Without getting too deep into it, I didn't expect for him to be happy, but you can't pass cars on pit road. THE MODERATOR: Scott, thank you very much. Certainly thank you and the folks at the R&D Center for all the hard work, and we look forward to the great racing all the rest of the season. Thank you. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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