Texas notebook: Pit stops key to winning and losing

Dale Earnhardt Jr. was the leader at the time of the caution and his pit crew made the same decision. Unfortunately for Earnhardt, his crew gave him their slowest pit stop of the race and that sent him from first to ninth when the race was restarted.

"We came in and I decided to take on four tyres because I thought it would win the race, but not the set that we put on," said Earnhardt, who led 107 laps before finishing eighth. "We thought about a two-tyre stop, but it just didn't pan out for us. We didn't have a great set of tyres. You know, they're a little different here and there. They were able to get through the traffic better than we were. I was just too tight. We had a really good car before that."

Jarrett passed Johnny Benson Jr. on the outside of the second turn with five laps to go and was able to drive away to the victory.

"We had a good car all day from the beginning," Jarrett said. "I don't know if the track changed, but we got a little bit tight toward the middle part of the race and we just had to adjust from there. Todd Parrott (crew chief) made a good adjustment on the last stop we made and, once again, our pit crew got us out in front of the guys that changed four tires and that was really the key - getting out in front of Steve Park and Junior (Earnhardt) and being able to get past those guys at the end that either took on no tyres or two tyres.

"We had a fast car, an incredible engine. Our engine department is just on top of its game right now. This car has been great. Todd is building great cars and making my job a lot of fun."

Parrott made the decisive pit call on the final pit stop to take on four tyres.

"I knew there would be a couple of cars in the back that would probably get two tyres, but I watched that Busch race yesterday and saw what happened with Joe Nemechek at the end of the race," Parrott said. "He really made up a lot of ground with four new tyres and there was never a question as to whether to take two or four.

"If we were going to win the race, we had to get four tyres and take a chance. The pit crew did a great job and got us out front of Steve Park and Dale Jr. He was able to work the traffic with some pretty incredible driving, I must say. I about fell off the pit box watching him out there, but it was really a good day for us."

Actually, it took Jarrett's tyres a few laps to get up to optimum performance and left Jarrett and Parrott wondering if they had made the right call.

"Three laps into that run when he said that set of tyres was ploughing, I was like, 'Man, this set of tyres just isn't going to hook up like the others had all day long,'" Parrott recalled. "But like he said, he had to search and work to find a groove that suited the car and that set of tyres. When that happened, the thing took off. It was just one of those things.

"When you've got that many green-flag laps on your tyres, you can take a chance. It would have been a big gamble to put on two tyres. There was no question in my mind we were gonna get four tyres. If we would have finished third, fourth, fifth - so be it. We would have come in and at least made the best effort that we possibly could by putting four tyres on and that's what won the race."

What lost the race for Earnhardt was the late-race caution flag that erased his advantage and his fuel strategy, followed by the poor pit stop by his crew.

"You come out and you say, 'That's how it is. There ain't much you can do about it,'" said Earnhardt, who started on the pole. "I knew everybody was frustrated. I was too. We were sitting there with an opportunity to win the race and then we weren't. We lost two or three spots on pit road and then our tyres weren't that good.

"And coming off pit road that far back, the odds are against you compared to where we were two minutes before that. There wasn't much I could do about it. I drove it as hard as I could, I moved it around, I couldn't get nothing to happen."



Kurt Busch, a 22-year-old driver from Las Vegas, and Dave Blaney had outstanding races at Texas with Busch finishing fourth and Blaney sixth.

"That was too much fun," Busch said. "I got to go race again. That's what I'm used to - running up front and racing the guys, racing clean, making pit stops. It was just an awesome job by the new crew chief, Ben Leslie, to feel what changes I needed. We just needed to keep digging after we went through the grass. Once we got through that I knew we were gonna be alright.

"It was great to finally finish as the first rookie."

Blaney started last on Sunday and finished sixth to lead the way for Dodge. It was Blaney's best career finish in 46 starts. He passed 27 cars in the first 24 laps.

"We had trouble in the pits," Blaney said. "I got together with Ken Schrader early in the race and busted the front end up and couldn't go. We were really fast on the first run in the race. Then we struggled and got a lap down. Then I got back up in the top 10 and got together with Rusty Wallace in the pits and fell back to 16th again. We had a fast car. I thought we were real good there at the end, but we faded the last five laps.

"I felt like we had a top-five car at Atlanta, too, and just didn't get the finish. It looked like we could do better than sixth today, but we'll take what we can get. This was our Atlanta car, and we never got it turning quite good enough, but it was pretty close. You've got time in these races if the car is fast enough, and it was fast enough today. I feel bad that we lined up fifth on that restart with 20 to go and couldn't take advantage of it. It was a good finish. We needed a little boost in the points. We were fair all the way through today.

"You can only do what your car will do. We've got a nice car for this kind of track. We've got a nice engine combination, a nice body, and we get it pretty close."



Another NASCAR pit crew member was run into by a race car during pit stops in Sunday's race. Daren Wolfe, 39, is a tyre changer for Sterling Marlin's crew and was hit in the pits by Rusty Wallace's car during a pit stop.

"I haven't been hit that since I played football at Jones High School in Orlando," Wolfe said. "My whole left side hit, but my ankle is the only thing bothering me. It got my ankle right up under the front valence of the 2 car (Wallace). He was being smart by not moving until I got it out. The 2 car tried to pinch the 93 (Dave Blaney) out so he couldn't get to his stall quick enough. The 93 just took the 2 on down into me.

"I've been doing this 11 years. I started out with Bahari Racing, and then I went to Larry Hedrick. Then I went to Robert Yates and now I'm here. This is fun. I've just got to get straightened out now."



Steve Park finished second after making a pit stop on the next to last caution to get enough fuel to make it to the finish plus four tyres. Unfortunately, he lost valuable track position but was able to drive through the field to finish ahead of every car but Dale Jarrett's Ford.

"The back of that No. 88 car is getting pretty familiar and I'm not really liking it too much," Park said of Jarrett's car. "The only consolation to anything is to look where we were a year ago when we weren't even contending for a win. I think just the competitive side of me is not happy with finishing second, but when a day or two goes by you look back and look at the points and everything that really means a lot and you think maybe second isn't that bad after all. But we're definitely getting tired of finishing second to that 88 car.

"The pit stop and fuel decision, that wasn't by design. We thought we could make it the rest of the way on fuel and then after how much gas the car took we knew that we couldn't. So we knew we were going to have to pit again. So, a little bit of a miscue, but we were able to rally back from it and it shows you how strong this Pennzoil team is. By in large, it was a good day. But we're getting tired of finishing second."