The Mayfields: Phoenix

Throughout the 2006 season the Mayfields, Evernham Motorsports' Nextel Cup driver Jeremy and his wife, Shana, offer an insightful, irreverent and sometimes downright wacky look at the week-to-week happenings around the circuit -- and beyond.

	Shana and Jeremy Mayfield
	JEREMY MAYFIELD •   Driver Page •   2006 Stats •   Superstore: Mayfield gear •   Dodge Fast Track •   Jeremy's official Web site

This week: Is this a "Desert Dream" or a nightmare?

Q: Going to Phoenix this weekend is going to present an unprecedented scenario for you guys, in that you have to qualify for the Subway Fresh 500 on time. But before you got into that you had the Easter weekend off, so what did you and the pooches do?

Shana: We really didn't do much of anything. I went to the beach for a couple days because Jeremy was testing in Richmond. I came back from home in South Carolina and we just laid out at the pool. Little Miss Zoë learned how to swim and she gets in and out of the pool by herself.

We really just took it easy and chilled out. That's really all we wanted to do. We didn't want to travel anywhere because we travel so much as it is, so we just took it easy and Jeremy played with his toys and we just hung out.

Jeremy: We really didn't do a whole lot of anything, but sometimes that feels good not to do much.

Like Shana said, I tested at Richmond for two days and after that, I really got a lot of stuff done around the house. I spent a lot of time piddling around and I went fishing every day.

Like Shana said, we just laid around the pool for a couple days -- or a day, anyway -- and watched the dogs swim.

I know a lot of people went a lot of different places, but we kind of like to come home for a change. Hopefully someday we'll get to go on a longer vacation than what we had this time -- maybe go to the beach together or something.

Q: In a pinch, what kind of a life preserver would a bulldog be?

Shana: Not a good one.

Jeremy: No, it'd be sort of like trying to latch onto a Tasmanian devil.

Shana: No, you couldn't grab onto a leg or an ear or anything else to keep yourself afloat. Zoë is the only one of the Bulldogs that likes to swim.

	Jeremy Mayfield hopes to keep a smile when he leaves Phoenix. Credit: Autostock
	Jeremy Mayfield Mayfield's Phoenix statistics Year Start Finish 1994 41 20 1995 17 20 1996 10 44 1997 22 19 1998 22 42 1999 36 41 2000 25 2 2002 11 25 2003 16 43 2004 24 21 2005 8 13   39 24 Average 22.6 26.2 Leilani ReportsLeilani explores the leadership roles at Evernham Motorsports Sign up for TrackPass now BUY THE NEXTEL i836

We've got one end of the pool that's shallow, for the dogs, and it progressively gets deeper. When she feels her feet barely touching the bottom, she'll swim for a minute or two, but then she's right back to the steps to get out.

So she's not going to be too useful as a life preserver. She's not going to be much help to you because she can barely help herself get out of there.

Jeremy: You know you've got it bad when you build your pool, and you've got one end of it just for the dogs, you know?

Shana: That was our plan.

Jeremy: The shallow end is all theirs.

Shana: And she loves it. Jeremy and I were eating breakfast [the other] morning and he called me over to the window and she was getting in and out of the pool all by herself.

She was the cutest thing -- but now I'm kind of nervous that I taught her that. I'm afraid that one day, if we go out and leave her outside she'll be swimming. But she's sweet. She's a good dog.

Now Mattie, she loves to float. If you put her on one of those big blue floats she'll just chill out for hours.

Q: You're heading out to the desert this weekend, to Phoenix, and the "Desert Jewel" has had its moments for you -- but what kind of weekend do you think this is going to be?

Jeremy: Obviously, we're going out there with a little bit more pressure than we've had on us, before. But if we didn't have pressure racing in the Nextel Cup Series, what would it be like.

I wouldn't know what to do if there wasn't a lot of pressure on us. Anybody could do that. We'll just go out there and do the best that we can, get qualified well up in the front and race our butts off.

We'll enjoy our time while we're out there -- what little bit we'll have and go from there. It should be good.

Q: What's the most enjoyable thing you get to do away from the racetrack in Phoenix?

Shana: Shopping.

Jeremy: Naw.

Shana: There's great shopping in Phoenix, I can tell you that.

Jeremy: I like the place, and I can tell you, one of the most enjoyable things I've done out there is to go to that Casino that's out there on the reservation. There are a couple of them out there, and they're pretty cool.

Shana: Anywhere there is a casino Jeremy will have fun with it.

Jeremy: I love those things, man.

Shana: But there is so much smoke in those places, I can't even breathe. The last time we were there, there was like an 85-year-old man carrying around an oxygen tank.

Jeremy: Yeah, with a cigarette in his mouth.

Shana: And I'm like, 'What's the purpose of that?' I guess if he's going to die gambling, he's going to die happy, I don't know.

Jeremy: They were pushing him around in a wheelchair, with an oxygen tank and a mask on -- which, God bless him, because he's out and doing things.

Shana: Yeah, in a smoky casino, smoking a cigarette.

Jeremy: And the guy that was pushing him around was smoking.

Shana: That just doesn't make sense, sometimes.

Jeremy: If you want to smoke, I guess that's your own deal if that's what you want to do -- but I'd hate it if I had to go somewhere and have to have an oxygen tank just so I could smoke.

I don't know exactly how those systems work, so if he mis-adjusted a valve he might blow himself up, or what, because pure oxygen burns pretty good, you know?

Shana: And I'll be darned if he didn't have a drink in his hand, too, so he probably wasn't too steady.

SUPERSTORE •   Get Jeremy's firesuit jacket!

Jeremy: He was probably about half-lit. I saw him two or three times that night. The guy was pushing him through the casino and they were hauling butt.

Shana: Finally I told Jeremy I had to go outside because I couldn't even breath and my hair was getting all filled with smoke. It was awful.

Jeremy: But other than that it was fun. It was good.

Shana: I guess at some point you say, 'I've lived my life and I don't care what happens to me next.' I guess you say 'If I'm going to die, I'm going to die doing what I love to do.'

Jeremy: That's what I'd want to be seen as. I should have found out if he had any mechanical aptitude -- he could have been my honorary crew chief for this weekend.

That would be pretty cool for him, but I'll tell you what -- the casinos are a lot of fun for me and I like going there whenever I get the chance.

It gives us a little change in scenery -- and I love the desert. I love the atmosphere. There's that little river across from the track -- the Gila River. I might have to take a ride over there this time and catch a few fish.

I'm gonna get my waders on and wade down in there. We've been catching a lot of fish here, so hopefully they're biting there, too. I wonder if they've got any carp out there, because that's a pretty wide river, if it were fully flowing.

Shana: All right, time to change this subject, because I'm bored.

Jeremy: All right -- let's talk about shopping.

Shana: No, we want to talk about something else.

Q: You know what I found out? Phoenix has one of the best road systems in the country, but some of the worst drivers. Dallas and Fort Worth must have one of the crappiest road systems for the amount of people that have to drive on it -- and they drive as bad as they do in Phoenix. Which makes it worse, do you think?

Jeremy: You got that right about drivers in Phoenix.

But I'm going to slam on driving around Texas, too. Because I've never seen so many traffic cones. I saw about 200 or 300,000 cones put out in Texas, it looked like.

I'm just joking about the numbers, I guess, but they put out a ton of cones and they make you turn the wrong way so you can't go this way, and you can't go that way -- so I think Bruton Smith needs to do something about that deal.

I've never seen anything like that -- and it really is kind of like that all the way through the state, isn't it?

	Jeremy Mayfield must qualify his way into the Phoenix race on time due to being 36th in owner points. Credit: Autostock
	SUBWAY FRESH 500 •   Entry List •   Complete Coverage

Shana: Phoenix is easy, because it's like a perpendicular grid. Everything crosses over and is a straight line.

Hell, DeLana [Harvick] and I found our way all the way over to Scottsdale and back for a shopping trip, pretty much OK and that's saying a lot. For us to get all the way to the mall and get back by ourselves, we did pretty darned good.

Jeremy: If you're going straight, you're going to run into the road you're looking for. And if you don't, you can make a left and do a block and get back to it, probably.

Shana: It's easy to find your way around.

Jeremy: It is cool. The only thing you have to be careful of is running into that ol' sheriff, or using Kurt Busch as your designated driver -- at least in the Phoenix area.

Shana: I don't think you want to do either, right now.

Jeremy: Obviously, that sheriff is not a Kurt Busch fan, and he is a Jeff Gordon fan. So you've got to watch what you say out there.

Shana: Exactly.

Jeremy: I got pulled over out there one time because I didn't stop all the way for a stop sign, I guess -- because I thought that I had. They don't play around out there, man.

Shana: I think he's the one that has his jail painted pink, isn't he? Don't they make the prisoners paint and wear pink uniforms?

Jeremy: I think they do -- pink suits. And I think -- naw, he doesn't wear pink, does he?

Shana: Jeremy, you'd better be careful.

Jeremy: Pistol Packin' Paula wears pink, I can tell you that.

WORD ASSOCIATION: Phoenix
Desert Dream
Jeremy: Win the race.
Shana: Make the race.

Coyotes
Jeremy: Howlin' at the moon.
Shana: Mean.

Sheriff Arpaio
Jeremy: Johnny Law.
Shana: Takes his job seriously.