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Fontana: Kuettel - Friday Ford interview

Pierre Kuettel, crew chief of the No. 60 Scotts Ford Fusion driven by 2007 champion Carl Edwards, talks about the rain delay that canceled both NASCAR Nationwide Series practice sessions on Friday afternoon at California Speedway. The Nationwide ...

Published: Feb 28, 2008, 6:40 AM

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Pierre Kuettel, crew chief of the No. 60 Scotts Ford Fusion driven by 2007 champion Carl Edwards, talks about the rain delay that canceled both NASCAR Nationwide Series practice sessions on Friday afternoon at California Speedway. The Nationwide Series is scheduled to practice Saturday morning at 9:30 a.m. and race at 4:30 p.m.

ON FRIDAY'S PRACTICES BEING CANCELLED. "Today was a complete loss for the Scotts Ford Fusion in the Nationwide Series because of the weather. But, actually it's not all a loss because we are going to be able to practice tomorrow morning for an hour and a half. We brought a brand-new race Fusion, so obviously getting some time on the race track to make sure we get out height set and everything else is pretty important to us. Had it been a 'let's start the race and have a 25 lap competition yellow,' yeah, we'd be a little nervous and I'd probably be a little more gray than I am now and I can't afford to go much more. Other than that, it definitely could have been worse, so I think with an hour-and-a-half practice tomorrow, we'll be fine."

WHAT DID THE TEAM DO TODAY? "We absolutely ate everything out of the trailer, so there's going to be nothing for the B-team guys when they show up. All the food is gone, so I think we're all about 25 pounds heavier now, each one of us. I think we wore the Internet out, but other than that it was a sit-around-and-wait kind of day. We thought for sure we were going to have some practice time in the morning and just as it looked like we were getting ready to practice, the rain came. Then it washed out the track until the end of practice. And we said we'd see what goes on and hopefully we'll have this late afternoon practice. I guess the track has struggled with getting that corner dry [turn three], so NASCAR did the right thing and calling the whole thing [practice and qualifying for all three series]. Let's get out of here at a reasonable time rather than sitting around until 9 o'clock tonight and have everybody worn out and tired. The garage closes at 6 p.m., we'll go home, get rested up, come back and tackle this tomorrow."

DOES YOUR RACE STRATEGY CHANGE FOR TOMORROW? "I don't think it does. Since we have practice tomorrow, we'll be fine and adjust the car based on what we learn. Once we practice, we can figure out how we are and go from there. It doesn't affect race strategy. We're excited about doing everything in one day. It's actually better to get things rolling and going. I like it because once it gets started we'll keep going."

-credit: ford racing

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