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| Photo courtesy Getty Images for NASCAR |
Here is a transcript of a telephone interview with defending Whelen Southern Modified Tour champion George Brunnhoelzl III leading up to Saturday's South Boston 150 at South Boston Speedway:
How much are you
looking forward to this upcoming race at South Boston?
“I’m really looking forward to it. I love that track. It’s a
fun track, great people up there with Cathy Rice and everybody at the track.
Really look forward to going there each and every year; hopefully go there this
year and hopefully be able to win.”
What about the track
allowed you to pick up on it so quickly?
“I don’t know; just kind of took a liking to the track. It’s
a little different, a little unique and always like going to places that
require just a little different driving style and different aspect.”
How does the good
early start to the season confidence-wise coming off your championship season?
“It’s definitely a great way to start the season. We went out
in a brand new car and were able to win the first race out. Last week we had
some issues, but hopefully this week we’ll rebound from it and capitalize on it
and hopefully end up in Victory Lane.”
You’ve already locked
yourself into the Modified race at Daytona during Speedweeks with your win in
the opener at Caraway. How excited are you to know that you’ll be a part of
those two days?
“That will be an amazing event. It’s very good NASCAR was
able to work with the guys at UNOH and everybody involved to put together such
a special event. Being that we’re locked in definitely makes it a lot more fun
to go down there and not have to have the pressure of trying to make it. It’ll
be a really cool way to start the year in 2013.”
How much are you going
to rely on notes from previous trips to the track, especially since last year’s
race was rained delayed and raced on Sunday afternoon compared to the two
previous trips which were run in the evening?
“Outside temperature will play a huge part in it and
hopefully, like you said, be able to pull out our notes from back in ’09 and
prepare what we did in the day versus what we did at night and improve on it a
little bit.”
There’s only one
practice session Saturday prior to qualifying/racing? How quickly do you need
to find the right setup during the short time you’ll have on the track? And do
you work toward getting a fast qualifying setup or strong race setup?
“We’ll primarily focus on the race. We will attempt to make a
qualifying run in practice just to kind of feel it out to see what we’re going
to need to do to get a good starting spot. Like anywhere, track position is
huge and definitely want to try to start up front.”
There’s the halfway
break this season in the Whelen Southern Modified Tour. How much will that help
you out in getting your Modified ready for the final 75 laps?
“That’s definitely something new this year. Myself
personally, we liked the old format better where you worked, you did your
homework and you get the car right for 150 laps. That’s where I think our team
excelled; we were able to put the car under me for 150 laps, where now, they’re
giving everybody the halfway break time to adjust on theirs. It’s going to
bring the field a lot closer, so hopefully we can use that to our advantage as
well and get it dialed in a little better for the second half.”
What did you learn
from the first two races about the halfway break and how will you take
advantage of it at South Boston?
“Tracks are obviously so very different but the characteristics
of what you do at a halfway break to help you for the rest of the race, doing
it at one place versus the other will definitely help you.”
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