Jeff Green: “Road courses are a lot of fun. It’s definitely a whole different animal”
Aug 07, 2007
JEFF GREEN
NO. 66 HAAS AUTOMATION / BEST BUY CHEVROLET
WATKINS GLEN PREVIEW
TESTING: Jeff Green and the No. 66 Haas CNC Racing team tested at Road Atlanta near Braselton, Ga., on Wednesday, August 1, in preparation for this weekend’s race at Watkins Glen International.
CHASSIS- HAAS CNC RACING CHASSIS NO. 409 – Jeff Green drove this chassis to a sixth-place finish at New Hampshire International Speedway in June, his most recent top-10 finish.
NEW PIT CREW MEMBERS: Adam Davis has joined the No. 66 Haas CNC Racing pit crew, serving as front tire changer, and Tony Cardamone is the team’s new jackman.
Both men were formerly members of the No. 14 Ginn Racing team’s pit crew, and Davis was also the team’s strength and conditioning coach.
Q&A WITH DRIVER JEFF GREEN:
DO YOU ENJOY ROAD COURSE RACING? “I enjoy all kinds of racing, so yeah, road courses are a lot of fun. It’s definitely a whole different animal than an oval, but I enjoy the challenge. We tested at Road Atlanta last week, which gave me a chance to get reacquainted with turning right. It usually doesn’t take me too long to get back into the rhythm of road course racing, but it definitely helped to be able to have a day where you’re not on the practice clock to work on my timing and on hitting my marks on a road course. ”
THIS IS A “COT” RACE. YOU’RE A BIG FAN OF THE NEW CAR, RIGHT? “I definitely prefer the COT races. Our best runs this season have been in the COT car, so yeah, I’m a fan of the new design. As I’ve said before, the driver can have more of an impact on how the car performs than with the ‘old’ cars. I’m a little more old school and have been in NASCAR for 12 or 13 years, so I remember how the cars used to drive six or seven years ago. To me, the COT drives more like the cars did back then, and I’m all about that. ”
Q&A WITH CREW CHIEF HAROLD HOLLY:
DO YOU FEEL THE INFORMATION GATHERED AT YOUR ROAD ATLANTA TEST WILL TRANSFER WELL TO WATKINS GLEN? “Road Atlanta and Watkins Glen have several similarities. I’d say Turn 1 at both tracks are almost an exact match, the ‘esses’ are similar, and Turns 8 and 9 at Road Atlanta are pretty similar to Turns 10 and 11 at Watkins Glen. We feel like we gained a lot of good info that will help us this weekend. By the end of the day, we were pretty much where we hoped to be in terms of lap times. ”
JEFF GREEN’S HISTORY AT WATKINS GLEN: In five Cup starts at Watkins Glen International, Jeff Green’s best qualifying effort was a 16th-place starting spot, which came in August, 2002, while driving for Richard Childress Racing. Green’s best Cup finish at “The Glen” was a 12th-place result in that same race.
In five Busch Series starts at Watkins Glen, Green never qualified worse than 11th, and posted three top-10 finishes (fifth and sixth-place finishes in 1995 and 1996, respectively, while driving for Dale Earnhardt, and a 10th-place result in 2000, the year he won the Busch Series championship with PPC Racing).
HAAS CNC RACING’S HISTORY AT WATKINS GLEN: In four Nextel Cup Series starts at Watkins Glen International, the Haas CNC Racing team’s best start came with driver John Andretti in the August, 2003, event (Andretti started 15th). The team’s best finish came in this event one year ago, where driver Jeff Green finished 15th.
