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Crew Chief Corner: Knaus down with Dover

By Chad Knaus, Special to SI.com May 29, 2003
3:15 PM EDT (1915 GMT)

What a great May at Lowe's Motor Speedway!

Chad Knaus and Jimmie Johnson had a great month at Charlotte
Chad Knaus and Jimmie Johnson had a great month at Charlotte

Team Lowe's is coming away with two wins in two of the biggest races of the season, The Winston and the 600. To be able to start in the back of the field in the 600 and cruise up to the front, I think all of that had to do with the momentum we gained in last week's The Winston.

Jimmie Johnson loves Lowe's Motor Speedway. He didn't run very well here in a Busch car, but he drives the heck out of the Lowe's Chevrolet here every time we race at Lowe's.

Everybody in Winston Cup nowadays is so competitive. If you look at the top 15 drivers out there, what separates those guys is the entire team, from driver to crew chief to the guys in the pits, being "on" that day. That's all it really is, and Team Lowe's was on at Lowe's Motor Speedway in May.

It's unfortunate that we didn't get a chance to make a qualifying run because I think we had a great shot at the pole.

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But you know what, Jimmie's tremendous here and everyone was really switched on these past two weeks.The pit crew did a great job and that's what won us the race here.

Some people have made some comments about Team Lowe's 600 victory because of it being called as a result of rain. You never know what would have happened if the race continued, but I'd like to think we'd still have been the race car to beat.

To come from 43rd to 1st shows just how good that Lowe's Chevy was.There is no question that Jimmie did a great job driving all day and the crew was pulling off great stops -- stops that were giving us and keeping us in the lead.

In addition, I remember in Daytona when we were on the other side of the coin.We finished third there because of rain, thinking that we had a pretty good shot at winning that race. On the tire stop call that we made in Daytona, we were in the lead and praying for rain. Unfortunately, it went back green and we finished third.

But by being able to come here, to Lowe's Motor Speedway, and have a good enough race car to win, I felt like if we would have run the last 135 laps, I believe the race car, Jimmie and the pit crew still could have won the race.

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Now we're off to Dover, a place that Team Lowe's had just a little success at last season.

For those of you that don't know, Dover was our best results track last season because we swept both races there.Keeping that in mind, it comes as no surprise that we are excited about going back to Dover this weekend.If we can get a good qualifying effort and start in the top 15, I think we might have a shot at victory. But you just never know.

Racing technology changes so quickly that you've got to keep moving. We can't go back to Dover with the same set-ups we had last year because it's not going to be as competitive. So we're changing some things around and we'll see what happens.

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