Jeremy Mayfield is 35th in driver points, 36th in owners' points. Credit: Autostock

Conversation: Mayfield

Jeremy Mayfield finds himself on the outside of the locked-in top 35 in the Nextel Cup owners' standings heading into Saturday evening's Subway Fresh 500 at Phoenix International Raceway.

Mayfield sat down this week to talk about what's gone right and wrong this season, and how he, owner Ray Evernham, team director Chris Andrews and the team can right the season.

Jeremy Mayfield has made the Chase for Ray Evernham the past two years. Credit: Autostock

Ray Evernham said at Texas that he was comfortable with a solution for your season, because he had everything in-house to fix it. What does that mean to you and Chris and the 19 team?

Mayfield: The way I'm taking that is that Ray's confident that we're going to get it turned around and with him saying that, I'm confident in it as well.

While I'm saying I'm confident in it, I'm expecting him to turn it around, also. But it sounds good to hear him say that we've got everything in-house to fix it.

And if that's the case, it should be fixed and it shouldn't be a problem, it sounds like.

At Martinsville, Ray said in a story that was published online that his personal issues at the end of last season had had an effect on the teams. If that were the case, where would you like to see Ray get more involved or resume what his involvement had been?

Mayfield: First of all, I don't get into Ray's personal business because that's not my business, but I do know that it's not like Ray to have one of his teams running as badly as we've been running.

It's not even so much that we're just running badly, but things have been happening. And normally, in the past, I've seen him react to things a little differently than he's been reacting this year.

So first of all, I thought he was just giving us a chance to get it all worked out ourselves, which is kind of what we've asked of him in the past when he was so involved in it.

Now, I wasn't sure if he was letting us work it out, or as he said a couple weeks ago, if other distractions weren't taking his attention away and he wasn't paying as much attention as he had been to it, which maybe is hurting us, for whatever reason.

Kenny Francis played a key role in Jeremy Mayfield's past success. Credit: Autostock

Ray made the team switch over the winter and Kasey Kahne and Kenny Francis, who was your crew chief at the end of last year and whom you'd worked with for three years, are now using the cars you raced last year. How do the cars you're using this year compare to the ones you guys used last year?

Mayfield: It's hard to really pinpoint exactly what's going on. First of all, we do our best, in-house, to build the cars, as close to being alike as possible.

But each team and each team director has their own types of little things that they might do differently, whether it's a standard snout car, or the pivot points have been changed on the front end geometry and all that stuff.

The bodies have little differences in them, as well, and there are differences in what types of rear end housings you run, or whatever.

And the total set-up is different too, as far as what you want to run for a particular driver at a particular racetrack. So it's hard to say that the cars are different, because they were all built in the same type building.

But I do know this: Kenny and them wanted to keep the cars that they had been working on for a reason, obviously. Most of the cars that I am running this year are the cars that Bill Elliott and Chris had run last year.

I pretty much have the same type racecars that Bill drove last year -- and Kenny and them kept our cars for a reason, because they knew what they had.

So it's hard to say that there's a big difference in the cars because honestly I don't know the precise differences in them.

But I do know there are some differences in them, every week when we go to the racetrack, for whatever reason -- whether the front-end geometry is different or whatever it is.

But that's Chris and Kenny's department and they pick whatever cars and what style front snouts and what-have-you that we have on our cars.

Do you feel like, because of that it takes you a little bit of time in the weekend to get to a comfort level where you might have started out the weekend, a year ago?

It's been that kind of year for Jeremy Mayfield. Credit: Autostock

Inside the Numbers Jeremy Mayfield in 2006 Site Start Finish Rank Daytona 26 36 37 Fontana 21 22 29 Las Vegas 24 25 28 Atlanta 20 41 34 Bristol 10 16 34 Martinsville 23 26 33 Texas 34 31 35 Jeremy Mayfield (first seven races in 2005) Site Start Finish Rank Daytona 24 23 22 Fontana 3 28 26 Las Vegas 26 20 26 Atlanta 14 13 21 Bristol 8 7 18 Martinsville 3 15 17 Texas 2 11 16 Jeremy Mayfield (first seven races in 2004) Site Start Finish Rank Daytona 22 25 25 Rockingham 6 11 18 Las Vegas 6 14 14 Atlanta 16 2 7 Darlington 18 9 7 Bristol 16 17 8 Texas 31 24 12 JEREMY MAYFIELD •   2006 Driver Page

Mayfield: Oh yeah, and that's exactly what I see as pretty much a lot of our problems. By the time we get our car right, or by the time Chris and I get our communication to where it needs to be, time has gone by.

Kenny and them kind of knew, when I would say this that or the other, whether the car was tight, or whatever it was doing. And they kind of already knew which changes to go to, to fix it because they knew what I liked in the cars and stuff.

Whereas this year I feel like I'm kind of starting all over again, and it's what I kind of fought with [former crew chief Slugger Labbe] a little bit -- but I had Kenny there backing the deal up.

So I didn't have to go through much of the learning stages between a driver and a crew chief. This year, I've had to explain to Chris what I like in cars, and he might have a different opinion on it.

So then we've got to go and spend time trying his way or my way, either one. And then, whichever one works or doesn't work, we've got to go to the next step, which it takes time to do that.

I feel like that is one of our weakest links right now, where I'm wanting to do one thing and he wants to do something different -- or vice versa -- and neither one of us is on the right page and we're not heading in the right direction yet.

Q: So would you say the biggest thing there is just the difference between working with Kenny Francis for three years versus working with Chris for four months?

Mayfield: Well, I need time but I don't need that much time. I had a new crew chief last year in Slugger, and I had to go through a little bit of this with him, but this year I've basically got a whole new group of guys that I've never worked with.

My crew chief and team director are new, my engineer I worked with before, the first year I was with Ray's team but the rest of the guys are all pretty much all brand new guys -- from the guy tuning the engine to all the mechanics.

We just really don't know each other yet. I'm not saying that that's everything, but when you've got that first of all, you can pretty much outweigh the rest of the stuff that you may need different, or whatever.

I'm starting over with pretty much everything, and that starts with communication and the whole nine yards. Hell, I'm still trying to figure out how to say things on the radio to get what I need in the car, where we already knew that for the past couple of years because we had all gotten used to that.

Is it right? I don't know. Can it be right? I don't know. Right now I'm sitting here and I can't say anything great about it other than I'm doing everything I know how to do to communicate with them and to get what I need out of the racecar.

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I'm sure not going to sit here and tell you that it's working, because look where we're at? But I know I'm trying hard to get it to work and whether it's getting up to speed quicker, I don't know.

Ray obviously said it the other day -- he's got everything in-house to fix it, so maybe he'll help us from that end.

Q: Going to Phoenix 36th in owner points and you've got to qualify, so is Phoenix a tough place for you to get your season back on track?

Mayfield: We had a good test at Richmond this last week and felt like we got another step or two forward on our chemistry and communication factors -- whatever you want to call it.

And going to Phoenix, we've got to realize that OK, it's a do or die situation here. I've been in that situation thousands of times, it seems like, and it's not going to affect me in any way but the good way.

That's the way I look at that. But it's going to be in the back of everybody's mind that we've got to get a good lap in, in qualifying. All we can do is go there open-minded a little bit, but yet be smart about our changes to the car.

We can't waste time jacking around with something that may work, but it may not work. We've just to go there as a solid race team, suck it up and get a solid starting spot, and then do the same thing in the race.

Hopefully we won't have any trouble and we'll stay out of the wrecks and just get a good, solid finish and hopefully get this thing turned around. That's all we can do.

It's been a long, long time since I've been in this situation and now that we're in it, I'm not going to roll over now -- I can tell you that. But we've got to be smart about what we do this weekend, for sure.

Q: Are you thankful that this weekend is not an impound race, and that you'll be able to concentrate on qualifying, make the race and then do race preparation?

Mayfield: Yeah, I am -- but it's funny that I'm even sitting here having this conversation. I'm sitting here thinking about it now and it about blows me away.

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I'm sitting here having a conversation about making the race, about going out to Phoenix and being thankful that we're not having an impound race so I can make the race and race well -- and not go home.

Looking back a year ago I would have bet anybody anything that they wanted to bet that we would not have been in this situation -- ever. But yeah, we're in it now and we've just got to go for it and get all we can out of the first practice, get it ready to qualify and on the second day, get it set up for the race.

We'll have to play defense all night Saturday. It's hard to race like that and to race the right way, because you've got to change your whole strategy on how you do things.

You've got to look at qualifying a whole different way and you've got to look at your race practice -- both practices -- and the whole race totally different, now.

We're playing defense from here on out, for awhile until we get back up there, and that's not any good. But we've dug this hole that we're in and we've got to dig ourselves out of it.

That's the only way I know how to do it.

Q: How was the Richmond test for your team and can you cross-reference what you learned there to Phoenix, Darlington or anywhere else?

Mayfield: It was a good test. There are a lot of things you do at Richmond that aren't going to help you anywhere else, but I felt like there were a lot of things that happened at the Richmond test that I think are going to help us in general.

Inside the Numbers Jeremy Mayfield at Phoenix Starts 12 Wins 0 Top-5s 1 Top-10s 1 Poles 0 DNFs 3 Avg. Start 22.6 Avg. Finish 26.2 Jeremy Mayfield at Evernham Years 5 Starts 151 Wins 2 Top-5s 15 Top-10s 38 Poles 3 DNFs 18 Avg. Start 16.8 Avg. Finish 19.7 Jeremy Mayfield career Years 14 Starts 388 Wins 5 Top-5s 48 Top-10s 96 Poles 9 DNFs 56 Avg. Start 20.0 Avg. Finish 20.4

There again, when I go out and then say it's doing this or that, they're narrowing it down and trying to relate that to what the car is actually doing. It's not that hard, and I can tell you it's not as hard as we sometimes make it.

Hopefully, some of that stuff we learned by communicating better will apply to our cars and help us at other places, too. We're hoping the communication factor is another step or two better.

The good thing about the Richmond test was that everywhere we've been this year we've struggled off the truck and we've struggled for most of the weekends. We were running decent if you want to call 15th or 16th decent, for a while -- which we don't.

At Richmond we came off the truck and we were decent in relation to those that were there. Scott Riggs was the same way and Kahne was worse than we were.

That was the first time they'd struggled all year. They were terrible the first day and they had to put one car up because they couldn't even get it around the racetrack.

It was good that they weren't good and we were struggling, and as the two days went on we all got better, so that was a good step, for all of us, but for us especially.

Q: Have you talked to any of the guys that have tested at Lowe's, and what's your take on how that place is going to be next month?

Mayfield: Scott tested there with Goodyear, along with Kevin Harvick and Jimmie Johnson and they said the place is really, really fast; so I do know it's going to be faster than it's ever been.

Whenever you repave a racetrack like that, or make banking changes, it's going to be faster -- but we knew that going in. Some people are concerned about what kind of racing there's going to be, but we should have known that before we repaved it.

If we make it that fast and we can't put on a good show they'll have to do something about it.

	Shana and Jeremy Mayfield
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Q: A couple of your fans have e-mailed us saying you're being made the whipping boy at Evernham's after you kind of carried the load for the past two seasons, making the Chase both times. What do you say to people who support you and have that opinion?

Mayfield: I've got to say this: It's real, that's what they see and it's the way they perceive it. I've got to say I appreciate the fans that are out there for me, and that support me like they do.

You can't ask for better fans than that. You've got to look at what they see as a race fan -- and what they see is that we're not running good, and the way they interpret that is what they see.

I can only say that I'm not happy with where I'm running, either, by no means. But like I said, I'm not going to roll over.

If they're looking at me as a whipping boy, this whipping boy usually doesn't get whipped very long. All I can say is I'm going to keep digging hard and keep my head up.

I don't think I am the whipping boy by any means but I do know that we've got to get running better and we've got to do the best we can to turn this deal around and that's what we're going to do.

But I want to say thanks to all the people that do support me out there and maybe they'll figure out we are for real. I appreciate their thoughts and comments.

I learned a long time ago that if you let yourself get down, you're going to fall down, so you've got to stay up and that's what I'm going to do.