The Mayfields: Chicago

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.

This week, while preparing to head back to America's heartland -- or a part of it in Joliet, Ill. -- the Mayfields have a chance to reflect on a quick view they got of another side of motorsports, Formula One.

Besides that, they're pondering similarities between Joliet and Jeremy's hometown of Owensboro, Ky., along with figuring out who's got the best pizza as they prepare for Sunday's USG Sheetrock 400.

This week: Yeah, I'll take a slice

	Jeremy and Shana Mayfield Credit: Autostock
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Q: Before get to the real halfway event of the season, at Chicagoland Speedway, tell us about the little trip you had last Sunday to see how the other half lives, in Formula One.

Jeremy Mayfield: It was cool. We had an announcement to make about 'Ask Dr. Z,' Dr. Dieter Zetsche, the chairman of DaimlerChrysler. That was the little advertising campaign we had on my car at Daytona, which we'll also have this weekend at Chicagoland.

Anyways, we went and fit right in about like a catfish laid up on the bank of a lake somewhere. It was a press conference about how the bridge between McLaren and Mercedes and Dodge and Evernham Motorsports is still viable and working well.

It talked about the mix of German and American technology that they're applying to new cars today -- whether they're Mercedes, Dodges, Chryslers or whatever.

Shana Mayfield: It was really cool and it was neat because they had Juan Pablo Montoya and his owner, Ron Dennis from McLaren; and Jeremy and Ray and Dr. Z and two other guys from Dodge who are really important.

And then they had the media there asking questions. Jeremy's car was there and they had a McLaren Mercedes F-One car there, which was really cool to see.

It was kind of a neat thing to hear Juan Pablo talk about what he can do with his car. They can do everything on their cars -- they shift when they hear tones and [do the equivalent of] adding and taking out wedge, all on the steering wheel.

So it's so high-tech, whereas with Jeremy's deal, sometimes he wishes he could make all the changes himself so he wouldn't have a hard time communicating with anyone about what needs to be changed.

He could do that all himself, so I think Jeremy needs to look at going Formula One racing. After talking to Ron Dennis about what his drivers make, I said "Jeremy, you definitely need to be the next American driver in Formula One!"

Juan Pablo Montoya and Jeremy Mayfield -- what a team. And after hearing about the salaries those guys make, it's insane. So that's why I say that needs to be Jeremy's next stepping stone -- Formula One racing [laughing].

I'm pushing him towards it.

Jeremy Mayfield: If the fans don't like Scott Speed's personality, we'll throw some personality at 'em. We could definitely do it, though it might not sound right to 'em.

Shana Mayfield: But they all have accents, so Jeremy's accent would fit in perfectly. He'd have that Kentucky-Southern accent with a Spanish twist, or whatever.

Jeremy Mayfield: And I could change my accent, somehow, if I had to fit in.

Shana Mayfield: But it was interesting to hear about everything they do -- about all the technology that they have at their fingertips.

Jeremy Mayfield: It was -- it was cool.

Shana Mayfield: F-One is completely different than anything in this country -- even CART [Champ Car] or IRL. Jeremy and I had the opportunity to go to a CART race when he was driving for Roger Penske, which was very interesting.

But then, F-One is just another notch beyond that and just so much different I almost can't describe it and do it justice.

Jeremy Mayfield: It's the top, the most technical in the world.

Shana Mayfield: What got me were the cars, and I usually don't get into that kind of stuff, but it was completely amazing.

Jeremy Mayfield: What really got me was [Juan Pablo] was talking about the drivers doing all the changes themselves, but they're pretty much told what to do -- through all the computer and telemetry stuff that those cars carry.

Shana Mayfield: And the people that tell them all of that are sitting in England, at the shop -- they're not even at the race. They just monitor it all by computer telemetry.

And he said they do everything based on a strategic plan. It doesn't matter how well your car is running -- like he said, everything is strategized from England, like, they tell him when to come in for fuel, which I think is kind of crazy -- at least compared to what we're used to.

Jeremy Mayfield: It's like space-age racing, for sure.

Shana Mayfield: And they're spending an insane amount of money a year to do their racing.

Jeremy Mayfield: Yeah, like 500 million dollars a year.

Q: What did you do, win a lottery that enabled you to go there?

Shana Mayfield: No, everybody else declined to go.

Jeremy Mayfield: Nobody else wanted to go, so they sent me. I got to go because Kasey [Kahne], I think he went on vacation to the Bahamas or something, and Scott [Riggs] had something to do.

Shana Mayfield: So we had the golden opportunity of getting up at 5 o'clock in the morning after the Daytona race and flying over there.

Jeremy Mayfield: But I tell you what -- I enjoyed all of it. I loved it and I appreciated them asking me to do it. And what I liked, too -- and the best part of it was it was the No. 19 Dodge Dealers/UAW car sitting there beside all that.

Credit: Autostock

Inside the Numbers Jeremy Mayfield in 2006 Race Start Finish Status Daytona 26 36 running California 21 22 running Las Vegas 24 25 running Atlanta 20 41 running Bristol 10 16 running Martinsville 23 26 engine Texas 34 31 running Phoenix 28 26 running Talladega 36 13 running Richmond 38 32 running Darlington 30 38 running Charlotte 2 15 running Dover 2 18 running Pocono 26 23 running Michigan 18 36 running Sonoma 32 22 running Daytona 42 36 running Average 24.2 26.8

Shana Mayfield: And it was a great opportunity, again, for Jeremy to meet some people from another side of the sport, from Formula One. I think the guy might give Jeremy a shot if he was real interested.

I think it would be so cool to see Jeremy drive one of those cars. I don't know -- I asked him if he thought he'd be good at it, and he said 'of course I would.'

Jeremy Mayfield: I drove the simulator thing that Mobil 1 had, one time and I did pretty good in that, so who knows?

Shana Mayfield: I think it would be neat and a pretty awesome experience, you know, to get to race in Monaco instead of Martinsville.

You'd be all over, like Korea and [Juan Pablo] said they were going to be in Russia. That puts a whole 'nother spin on shopping, doesn't it? I mean, just imagine that.

And he said they only race what, 18 weeks? And they make four times as much. And they have so much support from McLaren and Mercedes. It was really cool.

Q: I guess more than anything else it had to make you pretty happy that DaimlerChrysler is still behind its motorsports programs, because there have been rumors about a manufacturer bailing out, right? Besides, you and Kasey have made Dr. Z a hero now, right?

Jeremy Mayfield: I don't know if I did that the other night, the way I ran. We'll give it another shot this weekend. We got him on TV, anyway.

Shana Mayfield: And you know what, Dr. Z is a great actor.

Jeremy Mayfield: He's cool.

Shana Mayfield: I told him that the other day and he said, "I don't know about that." But I watched his commercial and I thought he did awesomely well.

He's such a cool guy and he's got the best personality. I love his German accent and it's so cool to hear him talk.

Q: Well anyway, after Daytona and Indy, it's back to the grind, and off to Chicago, so what kind of city is that, anyway?

Shana Mayfield: I've been to downtown Chicago with my family before, down to the mile, or whatever it's called, with all the great shops and restaurants. I've always wanted Jeremy and I to go down there, but the schedule makes it so hard once we get there.

We're always trying to get out there a day early to do something like that, but we haven't made it happen, yet.

Really, the only thing we've gotten to see is last year, when he threw out the first pitch for the White Sox game.

Jeremy Mayfield: And by the way, they went on after that to win some kind of deal, some series or other.

Shana Mayfield: The World Series.

Jeremy Mayfield: Oh yeah, the world championship.

Shana Mayfield: I didn't think they had a shot in hell until Jeremy came around, so I thought that was pretty cool.

Jeremy Mayfield: Well, that's something I might have to consider, too. If F-One doesn't work out, I might have to play a couple years of baseball. Or do real estate for Trump, who knows?

Q: So I guess Joliet is not exactly Chicago, is it?

Jeremy Mayfield: No, but it's real close to Owensboro. The way it looks, it's a small town like that.

Shana Mayfield: Yeah, I guess in that way, it's kind of like Owensboro, but the city [Chicago] is only 45 minutes away, so it's not that far. Maybe I can talk Jeremy into it.

If he's running decent, he'll be in a good mood to go, so we'll see.

Jeremy Mayfield: We should run good there, because I've always run good at Chicago. If we don't, I'll be surprised. Seriously, that's why I'm looking forward to Chicago, because I know we should have our stuff running better and I can't wait to have a good run.

Shana Mayfield: Getting our first top-10 of the year would be awesome.

Jeremy Mayfield: That would be. Getting our first top-10 at Chicago would make me real happy, to start that second half out right -- since it's a whole new part of the year. Come out with a bang.

Shana Mayfield: Our goal right now is to at least finish in the top 25 in the standings.

Jeremy Mayfield: We were up to 28th in the points at one stretch there, Saturday night, according to live point standings on NASCAR.COM -- but I guess that was on a pit cycle. We were getting good fuel mileage.

Shana Mayfield: Yeah, we were going to try to make it on one stop at one point.

Word Association: Chicagoland

Pizza
Jeremy Mayfield: Domino's -- thin crust pepperoni.
Shana Mayfield: Domino's -- thin crust veggie.

Al Capone
Jeremy Mayfield: The mob.
Shana Mayfield: Tommy gun.

Joliet
Jeremy Mayfield: Romeo.
Shana Mayfield: Chicagoland Speedway, that's it.