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NASCAR CUP SERIES: SOUTH POINT 400September 27, 2020Matt McCallLas Vegas, Nevada THE MODERATOR: We are now joined by tonight's race‑winning crew chief, Matt McCall. We're going to go right to questions for you, Matt. Q. Matt, this season you guys have it seemed like a lot of times gone for the longer runs. Tonight it paid out. I think you tried it at Darlington, got some points in at that first stage, maybe didn't work as well later on with the same things went. Why is that as much the strategy or seems to be the strategy this season for you guys in? MATT McCALL: Well, I mean, the second stage we tried to pit early and it was a disaster. Everything went wrong, so it was like one of those things. Most of the time our long run speed is pretty good, and short pitting obviously if you're racing first or second it makes a pretty big difference, but we've been fifth through eighth or ninth or whatever it is at that point in time at least gives you options later in the race. Obviously it was a little bit of an outlier to be able to do what we did there, but just gives you more options if the caution was to come out. Today it was just one of those things that was ‑‑ the 24 obviously did it in the second stage and made it really, really good, so I was surprised that they pitted so early because once we got to the lead the lap times were within a few tenths of what the fastest you could run on new tires on a green flag stop, so it just made more sense for us to keep running at that point in time, so that was why we sort of stuck to that. Q. How early was that when you were deciding, or is that as much in the back of your mind going into the race that second stage you want to run a little bit longer? MATT McCALL: Yeah, obviously it depends on ‑‑ the caution falling made that a little bit different there to where it ended up being, 70 laps or whatever it was. I mean, I think it's all dictated by where you think you are, and we had lost so much track position from the end of second stage and then to the pit stop. We had a hiccup there, so we had lost a ton of track position. We got put in a spot where we felt like our car was fine when we were in clean air, we'd catch a group of cars and it was junk again. It just gave us ‑‑ I guess almost opened the invitation to keep running as well. Q. What was it like guiding Kurt through those final restarts? Three of them in a 15‑lap window. Are you stressing? Are you having to keep calm? Any adjustments you're thinking about? What's going on at that point? MATT McCALL: No, he's a veteran and he's a machine when it comes to restarting and he was on a mission tonight once he got a chance to taste clear air. He knows how good clean air is. Obviously once you get to the lead you don't want those cautions to fall, but his restarts were on point tonight. Shift points must have been really, really good. It looked like we could almost clear before we got to the start‑finish line there, so that worked out really well. Q. Curious when it was apparent you guys were sitting pretty and that caution came out, were there any flashbacks to Daytona last summer and saying, all right, maybe the racing gods are on my side for a change tonight? MATT McCALL: Well, honestly the past three weeks. At Darlington, sort of the caution fell the wrong spot, Richmond the same way. Not that we've had winning cars, but we've had ‑‑ easily could run top 5 at most of them if it plays out, and it's like for one time I actually‑‑ it was a joke today on pit road, I was like, I'm just asking for it to happen one time for us to feel like we're on the good side of it. Today it paid off pretty big. The ones where they hurt us a little bit for a couple spots are not near as gratifying as this is. Q. On a personal level, being able to bring Kurt the victory at his home track after 22 tries in his career, what does that mean to you on a personal level? MATT McCALL: Yeah, that's pretty big. He beats himself up when he comes here and he talks about how bad he is, but he just literally ran wide open for 25 laps, so he was on a mission. I think he doesn't give himself enough credit. He's obviously an amazing race car driver, and we're lucky that he's able to critique us every week because he was already critiquing after the race. We know what we've got to work on for next time. Yeah, it's pretty special, a guy that's from here to be able to get a win here that he's obviously been chasing for a long time. Q. How much of a relief is it knowing‑‑ I know you're going to prepare and you're going to go out there and race, but how much of a relief is it you don't have to worry about 'Dega and you don't have to worry about the Roval, you guys are locked in? MATT McCALL: Yeah, honestly, Kurt is obviously really good at Talladega, but anything can happen, right, and Daytona Road we were okay, so going to Charlotte Roval you think you would be all right, but you never know, right. How you have to run the race when you're in a spot that ‑‑ we were such in a deficit starting the points‑wise and then not to get any stage points tonight, it was going to be an uphill challenge for sure. Not that those races don't mean anything; now really we're just racing for stage wins and the wins until we get to Kansas. THE MODERATOR: Matt, thank you again, and congrats. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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