McMurray's strong run places him third in field

LOUDON, N.H. -- After fighting allergies for nearly three weeks, Jamie McMurray served notice to the field for Sunday's Sylvania 300 that he's feeling much better, thank you.

McMurray qualified third Friday for Sunday's race at New Hampshire International Speedway, posting a time of 28.826 seconds, at a speed of 132.131 mph. It was his best qualifying effort of the season.

"I went to the doctor yesterday," McMurray said. "I just moved to the Charlotte area and I had never had allergies before and I couldn't figure out what was wrong, but I feel a lot better."

It wasn't hard to tell after his stout lap Friday.

"Our car was really good off the truck," McMurray said. "The car was just a little bit loose, still. That lap was about what we ran in practice and I had thought that racetrack had slowed down (since practice) more than that. I'm pretty happy."

	Jamie McMurray Credit: Autostock

McMurray added that the good lap puts him in a great spot to get his first Winston Cup win of 2003.

"We're not good qualifiers, so I think that if it qualified well, it'll probably race pretty good."

Crew chief Donnie Wingo agrees.

"We can kind of stay on pace with the leaders now and sure, that will be a lot easier during the day," he said. "Track position here is so important. Starting up front here is going to be a big boost for us, I think.

Heading into Sunday's race, McMurray sits 20th in the Winston Cup standings. He has two top-five finishes in his past three starts, including a third at Bristol in August and a fourth in the Southern 500 two weeks ago.

He attributes the recent upturn to an equipment decision the team made a few weeks ago.

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"We've got two or three cars that I really, really like and that we run really well with. Every time we run one of those cars, we run better, so we're going to try and race those cars for the rest of the season.

That revelation, McMurray said, has helped change the team dynamic.

"Our whole team is working better," he said. "Everyone's getting along better and we're just having fun. When you're running better, it makes it a lot more interesting to be here."

Experience has also played a part, according to Wingo.

"We've been better everywhere we've went the second go-round," Wingo continued. "That's the biggest thing, just as long as we keep improving."