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NASCAR Sprint-Cup Series
CUP: Can McMurray Keep Rolling?
Right now it's Jamie McMurray's world, everyone else just lives in it...
Mike Hembree  |  Posted February 21, 2010   Fontana, CA
Jamie McMurray has struggled since winning the 2010 Daytona 500. (Photo: LAT Photographic)
Can the Jamie McMurray Show continue?

Five days after winning the Daytona 500, McMurray was posing for race photographers once again after winning the pole position for Sunday’s Auto Club 500 at Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, Calif.

It’s been a heady time for McMurray, who isn’t that far removed from wondering where his next job would be after being the odd man out at Roush Fenway Racing last year. Now he seems on the edge of stardom.

It’s been a lesson, McMurray said, in the highs and lows of competition.

“Racing is so strange because you can win one week and you can have two or three bad weeks, and you just don't ever seem to remember all the good stuff,” he said. “But what I had tried really hard over the last couple of years to do is not base my confidence on performance or results.

“When the day is over, as long as I feel like I did everything I could all weekend long leading up to the race, that there are certain factors that determine the outcome of a race and you can have a flat tire. You can get stuck in the wrong line on a restart. You can have problems in racing that sometimes are out of the driver's control. As long as I feel like I did everything at the end of the day, my confidence is fine.”

McMurray said the Earnhardt Ganassi Racing team cars unloaded fast at ACS, a sign that things should roll along well. Joining McMurray with a strong qualifying run was teammate Juan Pablo Montoya, who will start second.

“The car feels really solid,” McMurray said. “It was refreshing to go through everything this week (following the Daytona win) and then get here and have a fast car again. I think this weekend is what really sets the standard for the rest of these races.

“The car is really good, and so is the No. 42 (Montoya). The way the cars are and the way the set-ups are, when you unload, if your car is good, you're going to have a pretty good weekend. And if it's not, you can't fix it. I mean, you're just stuck with what you have.”

Also in the top five on the starting grid Sunday will be Clint Bowyer, Kasey Kahne and Dave Blaney.

Six of the top 10 qualifiers were in Chevrolets.

As usual, there will be unknowns to challenge the contenders. Teams will be racing with a new tire compound, one that was expected to provide more grip. However, some drivers reported their cars sliding in practice.

Auto Club Speedway often produces fuel-mileage races, and NASCAR’s new “green-white-checkered” possible triple-overtime finish could come into play, making fuel calculations even more critical.

Mike Hembree is NASCAR Editor for SPEEDtv.com and has been covering motorsports for 28 years. He has written several books on NASCAR, including "NASCAR: The Definitive History of America's Sport" and "Then Tony Said To Junior: The Best NASCAR Stories Ever Told". He is a six-time winner of the National Motorsports Press Association Writer of the Year Award.


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