Goulds Pumps/ITT Industries Salute to the Troops 250 presented by Dodge

July 31, 2004
Fountain, CO

Derrike and the #49 Advil Team will be in Denver this weekend for the Goulds Pumps/ITT Industries Salute to the Troops 250. "We are looking forward to a good run Saturday for Advil," Derrike commented. "I have never been to Pike's Peak International Speedway. We are looking forward to Saturday's race and are planning to put together a good run."

Saturday's NASCAR Busch Series race in Colorado might be hundreds of miles away from home but the race is a key one for the series. At least, that's the opinion of #49 Advil Ford driver Derrike Cope.

"You have all of these teams hauling out to Colorado for this race. It's a long trip and that in itself raises the bar a little bit for everyone," Cope said. "You want to do well. You want to do really well. It's horrible to go all that way and not do well.

"In baseball, they say the longest walk is from first base to the dugout after you get picked off. In basketball, from the foul line to the locker room after missing a no-time-left free throw. For our sport, it's hauling all the way out to a track like Colorado (from North Carolina) and having a bad weekend. It's an even longer ride home that you can imagine," Cope said.

Because few, if any, NASCAR Busch Series teams want the expense of testing at Pikes Peak, few do so. That requires special preparation for the event, said the former Daytona 500 winner.

"You take your notes from last year and your notes from the year before, and you take your notes from tracks that are similar, and see what you can come up with," Cope said. "It's not as unscientific as it sounds. Remember, testing isn't exact. You go somewhere a couple of weeks before the event and the weather, the track and everything else can easily change drastically by the time you get back for the race. You are still relying on notes, just more recent notes when you actually test.

"If somebody tests a track, that can give them an advantage. If several teams test, that can give them an advantage over the ones who didn't. But if nobody tests, then nobody has that advantage. At Pikes Peak, that is normally the situation," Cope added.

Temperatures can play havoc on the track surface as well. Cool nights and mornings, followed by very warm and sunny days, can cause changes.

"That's another thing it is difficult to test for – temperature changes throughout the day," Cope said. "Even practice is difficult sometimes because of that. On Friday, we'll practice on one track and then qualify on another. Unless there is a cloud cover, the sunshine and temperatures can make the track into something totally different from hour to hour.

"It's the same thing during the race, maybe even more so. The heat and weight of the cars, coupled with the temperature changes, the track surface can turn into just about anything. But if you go into the race planning on making adjustment after adjustment – and figuring it's your lucky day if you don't have to make many – then you can have a good day there.

"That also makes track position pretty crucial. The track changes make it hard to pass a lot of times. So you are looking for every edge you can get, whether it is two-tire stops on pit stops or getting a really good restart or whatever. Every position is crucial," he added.

In the first practice, Derrike was 36th fastest with a time of 27.919 and speed of 128.944.

In Qualifying, Derrike produced a time of 27.444 and speed of 131.176. This was not fast enough for the top 38 so the team had to take a provisional, hence Derrike will be starting in 40th position.

The team did not participate In Happy Hour.

Derrike started the race in 40th position and finished in 43rd after early engine failure.

Reflecting on Saturday's race Derrike commented, "Obviously our weekend was a disappointment. We had difficulty getting through inspection. Also, we had some brake issues that took a lot of time to resolve. The bottom line was that as a result we had limited practice and had to take a provisional for the race. Because of some other mechanical issues we didn't get on the track for Happy Hour. Right after the green flag in the race we picked up an engine vibration and quickly the engine froze up. We will put all that behind us as we go to Indy for Saturday's race. Let's hope that we had our run of bad luck at Pike's Peak."