After a promising start to the Coca-Cola 600 last weekend at Lowe's Motor Speedway, Dale Jarrett and his #44 UPS team were excited about their potential to earn their best finish of the year. The team brought in a new Toyota engine that promised more lower-end torque and more overall horsepower. But a transmission problem ended the night early for Jarrett and the team was forced to wait another week before realizing the true performance of the new engine. However, they head to Dover this weekend with new-found confidence that they are heading in the right direction.
"We had a transmission problem that blew the motor up," said a dejected Jarrett. "I knew it from the beginning and tried to be really careful. I don't know what's wrong with the gate that's supposed to keep it from going from third to second gear. I needed to be careful on the restarts, and it started jumping out of gear when I was riding around under the pace laps. I wasn't as careful as I needed to be on that last restart and over-revved the engine. I hate it for our team because we were going to have a real good night and that's what we need."
The Autism Speaks 400 is scheduled for a 1:30 p.m. EDT start this Sunday.
Dale Jarrett Discusses Racing at Dover International Speedway
What kind of test is this going to be for the new COT?
"This is going to be an interesting test for the new car because I think this will be the track where we'll see just how much the aerodynamics will affect the handling on the car. Although we've raced at mile tracks, none of them have been tracks that are as fast as Dover is. Dover is a very fast track with wide sweeping corners. Obviously the updated engine on the Toyotas will help us but I think there are a lot of unknowns for our race team when it comes to the aerodynamics, especially on these COT cars."
What is the best way to get around the race track at Dover?
"Dover is a very fast track that's extremely wide with multiple racing grooves so you have the opportunity to do some searching and try to figure out where your car is going to work best whether that's at the very top of the track or hugging the bottom of the track. Obviously for speed purposes you ideally want to be able to run along the bottom because that's the quickest way around this place but it may be that your car handles better up a groove or two from that location. For us it will be a matter of finding the combination that works best with the additional horsepower we now have from the exit of the turns to the straight-aways."
UPS Racing Team Notes of Interest
- Dale Jarrett picked up his only victory at Dover in the spring of 1998 by leading only eight laps.
- Jarrett has one Bud Pole Award, earning the top starting spot during the 2001 fall Dover race.
- In 40 starts at Dover, Jarrett has earned 12 top-five finishes and 14 top-10 finishes.
- Jarrett has led a total of 545 laps in his 40 career starts at Dover.
