Q&A with Harvick/Kahne

[CanadianKahne]

Q&A: Harvick, Kahne
Press Release
January 9, 2007


Q: Is there one overriding question mark you have going into this new season?

Kevin Harvick: I think the new engine is obviously a huge question mark for the Chevrolet team just because we just have to build them and there's a lot of development. Chevrolet has done a great job getting us to this point. It's going to be up to the teams to keep the progress going forward.

We're still trying to make our current car better, so there's just a lot of things going on and just a lot of work, I know for our guys in particular, the winter was really short this year, just for the fact they didn't get a lot of days off just because we had to build a lot of stuff.

Kasey Kahne: You know, the Car of Tomorrow is going to be something different. The car that we have that we are starting the season with has a new nose which will be a little bit different, too. We'll be doing a lot of testing with both of those. I don't know, I think Evernham Motorsports has done a pretty good job of trying to stay on top of it and trying to be prepared and being ready to race whatever car it is and we'll have to see what happens when we get to some of these tracks.

Q: Can you talk about your feelings about what you think [Toyota is] going to bring to the game?

Harvick: Bringing a new manufacturer puts a lot of pressure on the other manufacturers and the teams. I think all of the talk is over. It's time to finally go race and we don't have to hear about Toyota is going to change the sport and how this is going to happen and how that's going to happen. We're going to actually see what's going to happen.

I don't think adding another manufacturer is going to hurt anything at all. I think it's going to make it as competitive as it's ever been.

Kahne: I agree with Kevin on that. I think the first time I saw one was this morning, and to see a Camry sitting there was something different.

Q: Can you address after a phenomenal year, what precautions does Richard Childress Racing take in order not to hit that lull again?

Harvick: Well, you don't want to stink again. We didn't stink in the past. We were just mediocre, and I think everybody got a taste of success and everybody wants to keep elevating that to the next level.

So everybody didn't mind working the extra hours and they didn't mind working over the winter to keep going with the Car of Tomorrow. And you know, we tried to just keep everything going as it was ... keep everything evolving in the right direction. That's the main focus for us is to make sure we don't become kind of stagnant with what we had.

Q: Are you maybe the one Dodge team that's maybe not happy to see the new nose because you had an advantage over the other Dodge teams last year?

Kahne: No, I think we're happy, too. We figured out the nose last year and ran really well, but certain places we just didn't feel like things were right with it. Even on the tracks where we weren't good, when we got back in traffic, it was really hard to get back to the front. It was probably the same for a lot of the teams, but we're hoping that the new nose helps that a little bit.

Q: Can you talk about running the Sprint car in Australia and what was the crowd like?

Kahne: Running the Sprint car over there was great. I grew up wanting to race there because they race during the wintertime which is their summer. It was great. I finally had the opportunity to go and do it.

Q: How did you do?

Kahne: I finished third the first night and fourth the second night.

Q: They said that you didn't particularly like being away from home over the holidays, is that first time you've been out of the country?

Kahne: That was the first time I had been out of the country and the first time I had missed Christmas. I thought it would be a good idea, you know, just to go and do something different over the holidays. And once I was there, I realized I was wrong; it was not the right thing to do. From now on if I go to Australia or anywhere else, I'll go maybe on the 26th instead of the 20th and stay at home for Christmas.

[~*Diana*~]

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