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NASCAR CUP SERIES: GOBOWLING 235August 16, 2020Scott MillerDaytona Beach, Florida THE MODERATOR: We are now joined by Scott Miller, Senior VP of competition. Scott, why don't you just open it up with a few comments on today's race. SCOTT MILLER: Well, it was really something that came together really quickly once we had to pivot out of Watkins Glen, and it was fantastic what the track did, what the teams did to get ready for this historic day here at Daytona, and what can you say about no practice, no qualifying. These guys just put on a heck of a show right from lap 1. It just says a lot about how good these guys actually are. Q. Scott, in light of what you just said, any surprise at all that these guys did what they did today? I'm a little amazed by it, no matter how good they are. SCOTT MILLER: Well, they've been showing all year that they can unload these things and hit on a setup. With all the technology today that's available with simulators and all of those things, it just really goes a long way in just showing how far all of that has advanced, and again, how good the drivers actually are. I was a little surprised that the first maybe four or five laps weren't potentially a little messier than that, but just amazing what we saw. Q. How would you grade the whole weekend? SCOTT MILLER: I think that we'd have to give it an A, I believe. I mean, I think from the start with the ARCA guys all the way to what we just watched, I think it was a fantastic event, no problems with the racetrack. The chicane on the frontstretch I think really made it possible for the stock cars to run here. I think you all read about some of the challenges with the speeds we would have seen getting into Turn 1 without it. Everybody buckled down, got that work done, held up nice, and really provided for an exciting race. Q. Scott, can you kind of clarify what was going into it as far as the calls on the backstretch chicane, especially like Crafton in the first race? SCOTT MILLER: Yeah, I can tell you. When you go through the grass and you lose ground to your competitors, we pretty much said that going through the grass is self‑penalizing yourself. It's not like it's asphalt like the other chicanes that we've got to police a whole lot more where you gain ground when you miss the corner. Actually you don't want to be on the grass. You lose ground to your competitors and tear your stuff up. Adding a second penalty from the tower would seem a little punitive to me. Q. Going into this race, the consensus was that this was going to be kind of chaotic, we were going to see a lot of crashes. Today everything went on with no issues. Were people underestimating the ability of the NASCAR drivers a little bit and what they're capable of, and jumping into a scenario like this with no practice, no qualifying on a track they've never raced on before? SCOTT MILLER: Well, I think everybody knows what they're capable of, but with the high speeds and having to hit the brake markers getting into those chicanes was probably the biggest worry. The rest of the racetrack is pretty straightforward for them. Both of the chicanes' high rate of entry speed and hitting those brake markers the first few times was definitely going to be tricky, simulator or not. They did a fantastic job, and I don't know that anybody underestimated them, but I think that again, they proved their worth today. It was a heck of a show. Q. We saw a lot with the ARCA series and the Xfinity Series going through that backstretch chicane, really tearing up that grass. They were talking about a hole almost being dug in. Did you look at that prior to the start of today's race? SCOTT MILLER: Yeah, we worked on that overnight. We backfilled all of the asphalt and all of the rumble strips over there, ran a roller, compactor over it, and then we actually went back there and did that again in between the truck race and the Cup race to make sure that that was as well prepared as we could make it and would cause as little damage if they did get out into the grass. Q. What is NASCAR's potential for possibly putting this on a schedule moving forward or using the Daytona road course in the future? SCOTT MILLER: Well, I mean, I think that we certainly proved that it works and we can put on an exciting show here, and will, I'm sure, go into the talks of consideration for us coming back. THE MODERATOR: Thank you for taking the time to join us today, Scott. Really appreciate it. SCOTT MILLER: Okay, guys. Hope you enjoyed it. Thank you. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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