Open pole highlights thrilling week for Park

CONCORD, N.C. -- Steve Park sat on a canvas director's chair in the Lowe's Motor Speedway media center Friday evening, blue eyes gleaming, confident grin screaming, "new beginning."

Getting fired never felt so good.

	Park says he's having fun again behind the wheel of a race car. Credit: Autostock

Park won The Winston Open pole Friday evening, culminating what he considers his best week in recent memory. During the past 10 days, Park was fired from the only Winston Cup ride he'd ever known and hired by his mentor's mentor.

"I think everyone knows I'm just elated," Park said. "The last seven days have been unbelievable. Losing one job, then landing at RCR -- just a whole bunch of mixed emotions. When I lost my job and signed up with Richard, it was a big weight lifted off my shoulders.

"Richard said, 'Know what? We've got to have fun. This team is struggling. They're not having fun going to the races.'

"I said, 'I'm not having fun, either.' These last few months were miserable, and it showed on the racetrack. To have the supposed confidence in you from your team and two weeks later you're fired."

Park was the driver Dale Earnhardt chose to build his Winston Cup program around, and feels that were Earnhardt still alive, he wouldn't have been taken by surprise.

THE WINSTON OPEN  •  Lineup  •  Happy Hour Speeds  •  2nd Practice Speeds  •  1st Practice Speeds

"Do I think it would have been different? I know it would have been different," Park said. "He'd have had me out in a field bailing hay, working, telling me to pick it up. He wouldn't be out there patting me on the back, then two days later fire me."

When Park was fired in favor of Jeff Green, Richard Childress saw an opportunity. He called Park and told him to come to dinner. Didn't ask. Told.

Fourteen hours later, Park was unemployed no longer.

"He reminded me of Dale -- Dale never asked you to do something, he told you (to do it)," Park said. "He called me and said 'Come up here and have dinner.' I said, 'Yes sir.'

"It didn't take me half an hour to sit down with him and hear the forward thinking he had with the AOL team and what he wanted to do, where he wanted to be. I said, 'sign me up, man.'"

Childress did just that. In the brief time since, a solace has engulfed Park. He's happy. Change is good.

"You feel good, like you're capable of running up front and you're not (running up front)," Park said. "You ask yourself 'Why not?' You don't question yourself, you question your race team. They're questioning you, too, so suddenly everybody's pointing fingers.

"We had a huge loyalty to each other (at DEI) and that may have gotten in the way. Change was in order for them. I agreed. We just were not getting it done together as a team. Maybe change is good. I think I was out of work for about 14 hours."

After Park won his first career Winston Open pole Friday, he jumped from the America Online Chevrolet and slapped high-fives all around. He didn't quite know how to thank his team. He didn't even know some of their names.

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"I wish I knew everybody's name on the team, but only been there seven days," Park said with a chuckle. "I can't remember everybody's name ... but (they told me) 'If you run like that, you don't need to know our names.' That's what I was shooting for.

"I'm not a very smart person -- I just know I got fired from my last job. I'm real happy to be integrated at RCR. That main thing, for us, we need to run good, but have fun doing it. The most fun I've had in a long time is past seven days, even before we came to Charlotte.

"(Getting fired) caught me off guard, but things happen for a reason. If they'd waited a month, this opportunity with RCR wouldn't be available. Time is everything. I'm a true believer in that. We're one qualifying lap old."

Not a bad start. Or new beginning, as it were.