Mark Martin won last year's all-star race and is looking forward to hitting the newly paved LMS track again. Credit: Autostock

Q&A: Mark Martin

Mark Martin is the defending champion of the All-Star Challenge, making him one of only five drivers to win the event multiple times.

Martin was NASCAR's guest for its weekly teleconference, and was asked, among other things, about tying the record of three all-star victories shared by Dale Earnhardt and Jeff Gordon.

Mark Martin is fourth in the points heading into next weekend's Coca-Cola 600. Credit: Autostock

Inside the Numbers Mark Martin's 2006 results Race Start Finish Status Daytona 10 12 running California 10 9 running Las Vegas 18 6 running Atlanta 11 2 running Bristol 4 6 running Martinsville 30 13 running Texas 3 9 running Phoenix 18 11 running Talladega 10 35 running Richmond 2 11 running Darlington 17 8 running Average 12.1 11.1   One final shotMark Martin hopes to duplicate his '05 success in '06 Sign up for TrackPass now BUY THE NEXTEL i836

Martin: We've really been performing well. We've had really outstanding cars this year with our Fusion and, I don't know, you know, I don't like to make predictions, but I don't think that it would be a prediction to say that we expect to run real well here. I'd say that's more of an expectation than a prediction.

Q. Could you talk about the effect of the hard tires there. Is this going to be a race that cars are going to be slipping and sliding around and kind of almost a dirt tracker's type thing?

Martin: I think it will be -- I think there will be a lot of mistakes made because it's -- you know, it's going to be a little bit more tricky. It's different than Darlington, because at Darlington, the tires give up, and you can -- you actually slide like you're sliding on a dirt track. What we have here is when the traction breaks away, you lose -- let's say you lose 90 percent of the grip or 80 percent of the grip. When the traction broke away at Darlington with that surface and the way that tire was, you only lost 50 percent of the grip. So you had a lot more control once the car started to slide.

The challenge that's going to be to the drivers and the crews is going to be, you know, keeping the cars under control when you push them right up to the edge where they start to slip. Because once they start to slip, it's a lot more difficult because of the speed and because of the fresh asphalt and the way the tire matches up to that asphalt. Once it starts to slide, it's going to be a great challenge to keep the cars, you know, under control and off of one another. So, you know, I think that the prospect of having better racing from a driver's point of view at this race is good than a year ago.

Q. Is the difference maybe going to be in who is smart enough to lift a little bit when they need to and who just kind of refuses to lift; is that going to be the key between getting grip and all of a sudden losing it?

Martin: You know, I think much like a lot of places where the most decisive factor in this racing will be track position and how well your car works. If you have a better working car, you're going to be able to drive it, you know, harder and still have -- still have grip or still have control of the car. So I think that we're going to be in good shape for racing this weekend.

I'm very proud of the paving job that they have done here. You know, I will be honest with you, it will be much better in two or three years than what it is going to be this weekend. I think this weekend will be a start, and by the time we get to the [Coca-Cola] 600, we're going to have a lot of rubber on it and a lot of racing on it, and I think that we've got good tires that will hold up.

You know, they may be a little bit too conservative. I would much rather have that than the tire issues. And this is going to be a preview. This weekend, the truck race and the all-star event are going to be a tremendous preview for what's to come the next week, and with every race that they run here, this racetrack will get better and better, this racetrack surface will get better.

	Mark Martin takes pride in passing down the family business to his son. Credit: Autostock
	FAMILY TRADITION Despite the time conflicts, Mark Martin continues to teach his son, Matt, the family business.  •   Complete story, click here Even though Mark Martin is clearly running like a youngster in the Nextel Cup Series these days, he admits that as the clock continues to tick, he's starting to feel his age.  •   Complete story, click here

Q. Your son, Matt, won a Late Model race last weekend. How would you compare him to how you were, and the second part of the question is, how hard is it from a father's standpoint to not be there to watch him week after week on his local track?

Martin: It's interesting, last week, Saturday afternoon, I had an urge to call and tell him not to race. I just didn't feel good about it. I wasn't going to be there and not that it wouldn't make any difference, but, you know, I just felt like that I know they have a lot of crashes in that division. I just was uneasy about it. But you know, he's younger. He's been racing seven years. He's 14 now. I didn't start until I was 15. So he is definitely ahead of where I was, you know, getting started.

But his competition for the greatest part is that young as well, you know what I'm saying. Everybody gets started -- like I was considered young as a racecar driver at 15 because I started in stock cars, but everybody couldn't get over me being so young. Well, if you started at 15 now, man, you'd be behind. So it's a different world now.

There are a lot of great, young, really young, 12-, 13-, 14-, 15-, 16-year-old talent with a lot of experience today. But yeah, that was really, really great. He qualified well and he ran a fantastic race and he did finish second to Sam Watts. But Sam was considerably light after the inspection. So something that I never expected us to be able to achieve this year because you know in the Late Models down there, that's pretty -- that's pretty, you know, almost over our heads. But he's just really caught on real well, incredibly talented driver, but he only races about probably -- I'm going to say once a month. And he races against folks that race every week, sometimes twice a week.

But that seems to work well for us. Keeps him motivated, interested, desire, and, you know, he seems to do better when he's challenged than trying to just do repetition over and over and over again. So he doesn't race as much as the guys that he races with. But we're just having fun. That's one of the most cool things and just one of most cool experiences that he and I have had. It was cool for me to be in the car and cool for him to tell me while I was still on the racetrack at Darlington to tell me how things turned out, really happy.

Q. What inspired your rap anthem as opposed to country, and are you a big fan of hip-hop and rap?

MARTIN'S RAP ANTHEM As a continuation of the Salute to You Tour the official Mark Martin rap anthem, "Start Your Engines," will debut during the Nextel All-Star weekend.  The rap song was inspired by Martin's career and love of rap music. The song is being promoted in conjunction with Roush Racing's diversity initiative.  Round House Multimedia owners Derrick Garrett and Kevin Dent are the executive producers of the song.

Martin: I am. First of all, I'm 47. Most people don't expect me to listen to rap and hip-hop, and I do, and I really like it. But I will say this. I mean, still I mean, I'm coming home from somewhere the other day, rare occasion I'm driving by myself, and the radio station I was listening to, AC/DC comes on, and I did get myself a headache and I do have brain damage from listening to AC/DC at painful levels of volume. So I mean, I do listen to everything. I do listen to country. I do have a love for AC/DC. The greatest singer alive is Stevie Nicks; I listen to Neil Young. But I certainly do enjoy the latest stuff that's out there and rap and hip-hop as well.

Q. What's the inspiration to come out with a rap anthem? What prompted you to do rap?

Martin: Well, that's I guess because it's unexpected for me, or was, you know, until about a year ago. So that's kind of at the top of my list today of what I listen to.

Q. Can you talk about the difference of mentality in racing this weekend versus a regular points race?

Martin: Well, you know, it is a little bit, because it's not a points race, you know, your concern about things going back, either being in an accident or taking a chance, taking a risk, whether it be pit strategy or anything else, it means less. It's more OK. In other words, if you're running along, you're running good, but you're probably not going to be able to win the race. To take a stab at the -- the difference between running sixth and taking a chance to win, you don't hedge for that. You just go for the win.

If you're racing in the 600 and you're trying to make the Chase, you probably don't want to take a risk. You probably want to take your sixth-place finish rather than risk a 20th-place finish trying to pull a rabbit out of a hat, if you can follow me a minute. It's more than driving recklessly. We can drive recklessly all the time, all the time. We have to drive with the desire of not wrecking, so we drive as reckless as we can all the time without, you know, over-jeopardizing ourselves. So I think it's more in other decisions rather than it is how wild do you drive.

Q. Has there been in one of these all-star races that you can point to, maybe a move that's helped you in one of those two that you might not have made if it were a points race?

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Martin: No, I drive these things very much like I do any other race. It is so far to go -- after the green flag comes out, I don't consider it a short race. I consider it whatever it is. When the green flag comes out, it's time to go and I race accordingly. So in the short race, you don't rest. You've got to be getting with it all the time. And in a 600-mile race when the green flag comes out, you can kind of rest a little bit. You don't have to be incredibly intense, and the intensity builds, and at some point in that race, it becomes just as short as the all-star race. You see how my philosophy is?

Q. Yeah, it's just compacted, is basically what you're saying.

Martin: Yeah, it's almost over when it starts, where the 600 only gets to that when it's almost over. But it's still the same thing. You strategize, you think, you put yourself in a position, you do everything you can. In the all-star race, you just can't wait and think about it as long. You've got to start doing things and putting yourself in position now, whereas the 600, you have to gradually ease yourself into that, and then at some point, it's only so many to go, and at that point, you'd better be making things happen just as you did in the all-star race.

So I approach these races obviously different because I never hear anybody else talk about that. But you know, when they talk about the 600 being so long, you know, after you get the green flag, it's 399 to go ... 399 laps to go. I don't think about being -- at some point, it's 99 to go, which makes it -- at that point it's the same as every other race at that point. I don't know, that's sort of my philosophy on these things.

Q. You've addressed this in different ways, I'll ask you straight out: What do you want your legacy to be when you leave the sport?

Martin: Let me just rearrange that just slightly because I've come up with an answer to how do you want to be remembered. My answer is: I just want to be remembered. I hope that I'm respected for the drive and desire and commitment that I've made to my career.

Q. One of the things that seems to jump out about you more so than anybody else, year after year after year, being a very clean racer.

Martin: I try. I've always tried to, you know, to race people the way I wanted to be raced. I never wanted to be robbed, and so never wanted to rob anyone. I had to fix my own wrecked racecars for a lot of years, and I had to race against a lot of people who had to fix their own racecars for a lot of years, and we raced hard and put on fierce races and had great shows. But we didn't run over each other, because we neither could afford it or, you know, had time to fix them. So you know, we made this stuff -- we were able to race without, you know, running over each other.

I don't know, I would have to think that people who have raced me would say that I'm a fierce driver. I believe I'm a fierce driver. I believe I've raced with great ferocity. Also, there is that other side of me, which there's not a lot of room for in today's racing. That era is pretty much going by the wayside.

Q. Three out of the past four years, you've finished in fourth. Would you say this season is going according to your plan or where do you think it stands right now?

Martin: I'd say overall, I'm thrilled. I am really thrilled with the way things are going. But I would say that the cars I'm driving are as good as I ever drove in my life and better than last year. We do have some minor issues that have held us back from doing better on the racetrack, and, you know, we're working to try to sort those out, you know, with pit stops particularly, which is a great challenge today. And we'll get those sorted out. If we make the Chase, by then, we'll have them sorted out and hopefully we'll get them sorted out, you know, gradually, soon, so that it doesn't take us out of a shot to be in the Chase.

But at this point in time, my luck has been better than almost ever, and the car's performance itself has been better or as good as ever. And my relationship with AAA and the issues that we've been able to work on with the team, driving safety, seat belts and those things like that with AAA has been incredibly rewarding for me. I'm having the time of my life.