In the Field: Sadler (cont'd)

I'll tell you about one thing we're doing there that's really cool, though -- even though I stole it from Mark Martin, so I have to give him some props.

We're building a replica of Bristol Motor Speedway's Victory Lane at the dealership, so if you, as a customer buy a vehicle from us we'll pull it into Victory Lane and take pictures of you and the car as if you were in Victory Lane with me at Bristol -- which of course is where I won my first Cup race.

That's something a little different that not every car dealership can offer, so that makes it fun for everyone at the dealership and we hope it's fun for our customers.

It's interesting when you talk about growing and learning, but I've learned a lot over the last couple years when Dale Jarrett was my teammate. He taught me a lot about how he treats his fans and how he treats his customers at his dealerships.

I've learned a lot about that and it's something I want to share with my fans, as well.

I'll tell you what. It's no coincidence, either, to be talking about Victory Lane when you look at where we are with our No. 19 Dodge Charger at Evernham Motorsports -- because it's going to happen.

I thought I had a strong race team before I came to Daytona for Speedweeks -- but what they showed me in the Daytona 500 and in the days leading up to it proves to me we can achieve even more than we had imagined.

It's not a matter of just wanting to get there, or trying to. I really think we have the great tools and great possibilities of having a really successful season.

I think we're going to be the biggest surprise in the Nextel Cup Series this season. I read a number of articles before I got to Daytona, and nobody's really picking us to do anything as far as the Chase for the Nextel Cup goes.

And that's great. That's great bulletin board material for us to put up back at the shop -- though it's not like we need any extra incentives. Other than being picked to win the Daytona 500 by a couple guys, we're completely under the radar -- and I think that, in the end, the way we were at the end of the 500 shows they were right.

So we feel like we've got some great, talented guys on my team. And our teammate, Kasey Kahne, showed what you could do in Evernham equipment by winning six races and six poles in his Dodge Chargers last season.

And this year, we think that we can do the same because we've got the same driving styles and we've definitely got all of our cars changed over now to where they're just like Kasey's and Scott Riggs' No. 10 Chargers.

We've got great possibilities to work together as teammates -- better than any of us have ever had before -- because we all like each other very much. I think we're going to have a great season.

One thing Ray Evernham is going to do is he's going to be successful. He stays ahead of the learning curve and he's really up on his engineering right now.

For our group, I love my guys on my race team. They work their butts off -- really hard. We took a shot at Daytona by losing our team director, Josh Browne.

He'll be back on the pit box for Vegas but until then we have a lot of depth in our organization and Josh is extremely involved, back at the shop, in making sure we have a fast racecar when we unload this weekend in California.

Ray made the right decision to give Kirk Almquist the responsibilities of our team director as well as continuing as car director for the first two races, and the rest of the guys stepped up and rallied to have a great sixth place finish at Daytona.

For me, as the leader of the bunch and the one with the most experience and the one who's been in the sport the longest, I feel like I can help these guys with some stuff that's going on, and Daytona was a start for that.

So I think we'll have a great season. I swear I just can't see it any other way.

I mean, my guys are pumped and we've definitely got a ton of resources. I have one of those funny feelings again, like I did in 2004 when we were competitive and we were part of the Chase.

We've got great equipment this year, Ray's given us the major tools and I think we can do it. I've been there and done that -- I've been on both sides. I've made the Chase and I've just missed it. I think I've learned from both experiences.

I think we're going to have a great points year, we're going to win some races and lead some laps and have some fun, so enjoy the ride.