Mark Martin says next year is best chance in career to win Daytona
Quote selected text Published December 1st, 2006 in NASCAR News
Though he has not so much as tested at Ginn Racing Chevrolet at Daytona International Speedway, Mark Martin says he’ll enter Speed Weeks 2007 with the best chance of his career to win the Daytona 500.
“It’s like asking for a championship in ‘06 — it’s a little too much to ask for, but it’s a very realistic proposition,” Martin said Thursday at the Myers Brothers NMPA Awards Luncheon. “To win the Daytona 500 is a very legitimate possibility. Very legitimate.”
Martin’s best Daytona 500 finish in 19 tries with Roush Racing was third, on Feb. 19, 1995. He’s finished among the top 10 eight times.
“Go back and look where the MB2 [the team Ginn bought] cars have qualified for the Daytona 500 in the last few years — it’s a heckuva lot better than my car ever did,” Martin said.
“Just pull out the paperwork and look at where I time-trialed in at Daytona. We’ve had some decent starts there through the 125s and racing our way in, and I’ve had a lot of people tell me, ‘Don’t worry about it, you’ll race good.’ And the only thing I’ve ever said was, ‘Yeah, but I’d race better if my car would go that fast [as the No. 01].’”
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Three words….. “GO MARK GO!!!”
Martin can down play his 6 car team all he wants, but at the end of the day, Roush put competitive equipment and competitive people with each of his teams. I guess Martin don’t remember how good the Roush-Yates engines were. Martin as a driver would never get aggressive to try and press the issued for a 500 win. Any and everybody knew they could pull out from behind him and go and he’d never put up a fight. So just remember this when they show the run down of where he finished this year in the 500, I bet it won’t be any different than the martin finishes of the past.