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NASCAR SPRINT CUP SERIES: GOOD SAM 500March 13, 2016Rodney ChildersGene HaasAvondale, Arizona THE MODERATOR: We're going to hear from our winning crew chief and car owner of the No.4 Jimmy John's Chevrolet, and what a finish we had here at Phoenix International Raceway. The margin of victory .010, closest margin of victory in the history of this racetrack, and certainly it ties the margin of victory that we saw in our season opener at Daytona. The first four races of the season we've had two margins of victory .010. Gene, I'm going to ask you first, what was your‑‑ how was your heart beating there that last restart? GENE HAAS: Well, when the caution came out, it just happens this way so many times, a few laps to go, the caution comes out, and it seems like we always come up on the short end of it. You know, you have to give Rodney a lot of kudos there. He has a plan and he stuck with it, and this time it worked. I think Kevin did a great job slowing Edwards down. It made for a great finish is what it's all about, and that was a great finish. THE MODERATOR: Rodney, certainly that last call on the pit stop or on the last call not to go to pit road, I believe you and the 88 might have been the only cars that didn't do that. Talk about your mindset, your strategy on doing that and why you made that call? RODNEY CHILDERS: Yeah, when it's that situation, you always wonder what the right thing to do is, and every race we've won here as the 4 team, that caution has come out late and we've ended up staying out and been able to be okay. Our last adjustments on our last stop just ended up getting it going the way it needed to do, and finally hit it right. I knew that he had kind of been riding and saving his stuff and thought we'd be okay, but every time there's always seven or eight that stay out in that situation, and when there was only three, that turned into a little bit of a panic mode for me. You know, I thought we would be okay, and then after that first lap, I'm like, this is going to be close. Just thankful of the job that Kevin does. It's really a pleasure for us to come here and to work with him. There's a lot of hard‑working people back at Stewart‑Haas that put everything into this race. It's one of those deals where you have to focus on the places that you're good at, and we put everything that we had into it to try to come out here and win the race. Q. How much thinking do you do about what decision to make, or is it just kind of automatic, because you think back to Homestead in 2014, you made a call that was pretty bold and wound up winning you the championship. Is it just kind of a reflexive thing, or do you have to think about it a lot? RODNEY CHILDERS: Honestly you think about it every lap. As you're running along there, you ‑‑ probably every two laps you look up, you see how many laps are on the tires, you look at how you're running compared to your competitors. So about every two to three laps in your head, you say, what if the caution come out now, what if the caution come out now, and I used to always look over at my engineers and ask that question, and we would all kind of say, well, I think we should do this. Honestly, about, I don't know, four years ago, I finally figured out that was the wrong thing to do. You've got to go with your gut. You don't ask anybody anything, you've got to do what you think is right. It's my butt if it's wrong, and I want to be responsible. It was way too close today. That shouldn't have happened. But all in all, we ended up winning the race, which is good. You know, it just happened to work out. It wasn't the right thing to do. Q. You guys were strong in the first half of the race but you didn't lead. Were you kind of where you wanted to be then or did you have some pretty big adjustments in the second half? RODNEY CHILDERS: Yeah, we made our first adjustment, and the car drove better, but it wasn't any faster. And then our next adjustment was just bad. It didn't do what we thought it would do. We just weren't very good, and we had to back up on that adjustment and then kind of see where our balance was and then constantly work on it the whole time. But the very last stop we had was‑‑ we made some good adjustments, and he told me in victory lane, it was pretty awesome that last run. You know, it's one of those things, you don't know what's right. You've got a new package and you've got new tires, and the thing that we did halfway through the race that was bad was something we've always done here to help make the car turn, and it did just the opposite. You have to just weed yourself through it the whole race and figure out what's best. Q. Rodney, am I kind of wrong to think that Kevin Harvick is so good here that he wins races in ways that nobody should really win races in the sense of that somebody with two tires, fourth should really beat somebody who's leading the race with two to go? RODNEY CHILDERS: Just depends. The tires, they did a really good job with the tires, but the tires still need to be softer. There's no reason our car should be able to stay out there at the end of the race and win. You know, they're learning just like we're learning, and we're going to keep making them softer and softer, I hope, and keep making it better and better. You know, the whole deal is just getting your car where it drives good. The 19 guys did a really good job the whole weekend. I felt like they had a good car, and Dave and Carl did a good job during the race. Their pit crew did an awesome job. They did everything right. When they go home tonight, they're going to feel good about what they've done. And the same thing goes with us. We felt like we had one of the smoothest Fridays we had ever had here, and then we turned around and qualified 18th. You just don't ever know. We've got some learning to do, and we've still got to figure some things out. Q. Picking your way to the front the way you did, do you feel like this was one of the cleanest races that you've had since Daytona, and does that help change the momentum? RODNEY CHILDERS: I think so. You know, we just really haven't had some things go our way. Atlanta we had an incredible car that whole day, and the bad thing about it is our car wouldn't keep tires on it for that long. I knew if I pitted when the 48 did, we were going to be on cords and we were going to get beat anyway. It finally just came down to a situation where we were going to get beat, and there was no way around it. And then once you lose control of the race and have to restart in the wrong line there, you're done. That one didn't go our way. And then last week, I don't know, we were okay in the race, and there was times in the race where we were faster than everybody, but it still wasn't 4 car fashion. We've got to get better and got to take better cars to the racetracks and get better setups in them. So we're working hard to do that. Q. Just wondering, we had a lot of tire issues happen throughout the day. Was that a concern on that final run for you, and were you all having any issues with that? RODNEY CHILDERS: We didn't have any issues. In all honesty that's been going on here for the last few years. I can remember all the way back maybe two, three years ago when Earnhardt Jr. had a right rear bead melt, so every time we come here we just try to keep a bunch of air blowing on that right rear as much as we can to take care of it, but we took one set of tires off and I think the wheel was about 315 degrees when we took it off. Part of it's the learning curve, I think. It's nobody's fault. It's not Goodyear's fault for sure. They brought a good tire. It's just the teams have got to learn more about that stuff and using more brake and all that. I thought it was good. You've just got to be smart and take care of your stuff. Q. The last lap, the last couple of hundred feet here, were you holding your breath? What were you thinking? How quickly when the checkered flag flew did you know that the win was yours? RODNEY CHILDERS: It was a while it seemed like, pretty much from the dogleg all the way back to the start‑finish line, I don't think I was breathing at all. I don't think my heart was beating, either. You know, they crossed the line, and I felt like we won, and then I looked up at the monitor and it said we won, but then they were waiting to look at the camera, and I'm like, you just hold your breath and hope it's the best. Q. Second last year at Auto Club Speedway, how do you feel about going into next weekend after the win today and the new aero package? RODNEY CHILDERS: I feel pretty good about it. I don't feel like it's probably the best car we have, but it's the car we won at Dover with in the fall, and we ran third at Texas with a driver with one hand for 150 laps. I think we'll be okay. I really don't know. I think we have to work on our setups better. I don't feel like our platform was near controlled good enough at Vegas. It seemed to me that the 48 had it figured out better than anybody at that particular racetrack, and we've just got to figure some things out this week and hopefully have a good car next weekend. Q. When you took the wheel off and it was 315 degrees, was that the stop, I guess it would have been your second‑to‑last stop because you told Kevin you had issues with I believe the right rear? Was that the same stop? RODNEY CHILDERS: I don't think it was‑‑ no, no. We had a pit stop deal early in the race. I think a gun shut off or he didn't get a lug nut off or something like that early in the race. Q. And Gene, before the race, I asked you whether or not the change to Ford, if you noticed any change in performance and you said we haven't won yet. You've won, so do you think your team is where it needs to be right now? GENE HAAS: Well, Chevrolet is a winning brand. It's won for us in the past, and we're going to win as many races as we possibly can this season. I think that all in all that we'll have a good season. I think the transition is not really going to have any effect on what we do this year. THE MODERATOR: Congratulations to Rodney and Gene on this win here today, and best of luck out at Fontana. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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