Richie Wauters returns to the crew chief position for the Billy Ballew Motorsports No. 51 Miccosukee Resort/Red Top Auto Auction Toyota to be driven this week by Kyle Busch. Doug George, who guided Busch to wins at Fontana and Atlanta earlier this year, will move to the No. 15 Gateway Pharmaceuticals Toyota of Aric Almirola. Wauters and Busch won the O'Reilly 200 in 2008 and have combined for nine of the team's 12 series victories.
Waters discusses the change and other Bristol thoughts in the following Q&A.
What about this week's changes at BBM? "Aric (Almirola) and I have built a good chemistry and in one respect, it is difficult due to the friendship we built and it is tough to walk away knowing how close we are to getting to Victory Lane and all that we've worked to build up his solid finishes. On the other hand, it is always great working with Kyle. We have a lot of history and nine wins together. He has unlimited talent and if you give him something to drive, he'll win the race with it and that is what we are hoping to do is go back and repeat the win."
Billy Ballew Motorsports generally is thought of as a speedway team. "I feel our short-track program is better this year. We've done more local track practice to help develop our short-track program. Our intermediate-track program has always been strong but I feel our short-track program this year is just as good, if not better."
This week's truck has been fast in the past. "We are bringing chassis No. 28 which we ran second in New Hampshire with Kyle last year and we were caught speeding leaving the pits. In Phoenix '08 we led 90% of the laps and pitted at the end and just came up one lap short of the win at the end. We qualified second with the truck at Martinsville this year where we were fastest in practice but we came short on fuel at the end. We took the truck to Memphis and was again super fast finishing fourth and ORP where Aric finished third so we're pretty confident in the chassis and hopefully we'll get it set to where Kyle likes it and we'll repeat what we did in 2008."
What's different about racing on concrete? "Concrete is a rougher surface and is not heat sensitive. It doesn't change from day to night. The track gets black with the more rubber down on it, making the truck tighter."
How will Goodyear's tire change affect this week's race? "I don't know if the softer right side tire should have an overall effect on the grip. It may play into a different pit strategy of pitting twice if the tires wear out. We might have to make two pit stops for tires instead of the usual one and done (one pit stop for the event)."
