NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series
Photos and story © 2005 Dwight Drum
Web work by Gary Larsen

Ford Racing Focus

"I was mad when we lost our first game and I'm still mad every time I lose a race."

Time: NASCAR finale 2005
Place: Los Olas River front, Ft Lauderdale, Fla.
Event: Ford Championship Weekend at Homestead-Miami Speedway

When the Ford Championship Weekend revs up at Homestead-Miami Speedway for the NASCAR finale the energy seems to spread to the entire Miami area and beyond. Ford Racing treats fans in Ft. Lauderdale and Miami to the annual Ford FanFest held at Las Olas Riverfront in coordination with the Ford Championship Weekend NASCAR finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway. Ford NASCAR drivers, Greg Biffle, Dale Jarrett, Mark Martin, Elliott Sadler, Matt Kenseth and Todd Kleuver, this year posed for photos and sign autographs for hundreds of fans queued up in long lines in the quaint downtown park.

Popular driver Dale Jarrett is frequently busy during fan events, media moments, sponsor obligations, and of course when practicing and racing. Jarrett's stature seems amplified by his slender, groomed appearance and his polished direct delivery of both words and image. Zoomster.com has interviewed Jarrett one-on-one three times over the past three years. We always come away from a privileged Jarrett encounter with renewed respect for the driver, his team and the sanction.

Jarrett allotted the time for our interview, please take time to know more about a great NASCAR driver.

Dwight asked Dale Jarrett:

"Oh I think there's something that I probably did every week that changed the way that I look at things and the way I went about doing my job better. I think you are always learning. I've been doing this for 28 years now, but I learn something still each and every week. As far as defining moments I don't know. There are certain people that you race against, maybe you learn more than others. I think each and every time I go on the racetrack I'm learning still. "

"Hopefully there's a few more victories out there. I don't know if I've got two or three more years that I'm looking at, but something in that range. Hopefully it can be competitive. That's all you want to do is as a driver is have opportunities to win races. To take advantage of a few of those opportunities and get to victory lane, that's great but just running and being competitive is really what it's all about. Hopefully we can get back to doing that on a regular basis."

"Ha ha. I don't know. It may seem a little odd, but I'm pretty laid-back. I enjoy life. I enjoy what I do obviously so that's fun. I'm a big sports fanatic. Sitting around watching college football or basketball, the NBA, the NFL, other motorsports. I just love sports in general. That's kind of me. I don't get too excited about a lot of things, but I love to compete. If we're going to do something, play cards or whatever we're going to do, I'm going to try to beat you at it. "

"No. That's the one thing, even when I retire that's not going to be the reason I retire. It's not going to be because of my age, it's going to be simply because of the grind here. That competitive spirit, I don't think that's ever going away. I've had that since I can remember. I started playing baseball as a kid at 5 years old and had that same competitive desire. I was mad when we lost our first game and I'm still mad every time I lose a race. So I don't know that will ever change."

"I think it's almost hard to make strategies. I think there are certain days that you accept different levels of what your car and team is capable of doing. I try to set goals. I think that's important in life. Here it's a weekly basis you set goals. There are certain racetracks that we run better at than other racetracks and that I'm better at than other tracks. You have to change those to make sure the goals are attainable."

"My dad is pretty competitive. He was a good race driver but I think our while family has always been one that loves to compete whether it's on a golf course or on a racetrack. I think a lot of it came from my dad. "

"Oh no I'm not good enough to do that. I'll play a lot of golf and might play in a lot of Pro-Ams but that will be as close as I get to the pros."

"You don't know what a feeling that gives you a corner of basically 14 degrees up to 34 or 36 how that sits you down in the seat - the different degrees of banking how much it sits you down or how it leans you to the right in the seat. That's just not really something that most people have the opportunity to experience. When we talk about it really sits you down in the seat that's taking your rear end and really wanting to push you down through the bottom of the seat. At other racetracks it's more of a side issue to where it's wanting to throw you out the right side of the seat. Unless you've been there, that's really a hard to explain because it's something that's totally unique to our sport."

"Oh I'm good. That gets me in trouble."