Jack Sprague Post Race Notes & Quotes

NO. 24 NETZERO CHEVROLET MONTE CARLO

LOWE'S MOTOR SPEEDWAY/LITTLE TREES 300

RACE STATS:
RACE DATE: Saturday, October 12, 2002
TRACK:       Lowe's Motor Speedway
DIVISION:       NASCAR Busch Series
STARTED:       6th
FINISHED:       25th
PTS. POSITION: 4th with 3699 points

RACE OVERVIEW:
    Jack Sprague's 25th-place finish in Saturday's Little Trees 300 NASCAR Busch Series event at Lowe's Motor Speedway is no reflection on his performance.  The disappointing effort was the result of engine failure on the No. 24 NetZero Chevy, nothing of which Sprague and the NetZero team could avoid.
    Sprague took the green flag from the sixth position after posting a qualifying lap time of 30.010 seconds, 179.940 miles per hour and marked Sprague's 14th Top-10 start of the season.
    The NetZero Chevy was a rocket from the word 'go' as Sprague made his way into the mix of things early.  His crew fired off incredible four-tire pit stops keeping Sprague in the hunt.  In fact, only moments before his day took a turn for the worst, Sprague had radioed the crew that the last set of tires he received was the best yet and the car was really good.  That all changed on Lap 124.  Sprague radioed back in that he had lost a cylinder.  He was forced to ride around as he began his descent from fourth to 20th. 
     Sprague managed to gain a few spots and on his last pit stop, the crew only changed right side tires hoping Sprague could gain a few more, but that wasn't how the story ended.
     On Lap 189 Sprague said the motor had let go and forced him to the garage with only 11 circuits left in the 200 Lap event.

JACK SPRAGUE POST RACE QUOTES:
"They say you're running your absolute best before the motor lets go - don't they?  I've heard that before and I'm telling you.  The NetZero Chevy I had out there today was the best car I've had all year. Right from the start of the race she never skipped a beat.  We never made changes - only took on four tires and fuel on the first two stops.  Man, I can't believe it.  We had a car to win today.  We'll just take it to Atlanta with us and see how she does there."

ON STARTING POSITION:

"My qualifying run felt really good - especially seeing my number up on the scoreboard," said Sprague who also started sixth in the May race at Charlotte.  "The NetZero Chevy felt really good in Turns 1 and 2, but I drove into Turn 3 too hard and the car pushed, but hey - I'll take those good starting spots whatever way I can."

LOOKING AHEAD TO MEMPHIS.
"Last year's race had started out good, but ended up terrible for us. We had a really good truck, took the pole and then went out for the race and led a ton of laps. I couldn't believe it when an oil line had failed and cost us the race. It was ours to win. It's crunch time.  We've had a pretty good year coming out the new guys on the block, but because t started out so good it looks like we've slowed up. We won the race at Nashville, but we want another one under our belts.  Memphis is a track we have the capability to win at. I won a truck race at Memphis a few years ago, but other than that, I don't consider Memphis one of my best tracks."
"Memphis is a little challenging, but you get used to it after you run a bunch of laps. It's a little bit like Richmond.  It has two grooves so you can run up high and down low, which makes for good racing.  You need to have a good handling racecar to be good all day.  Aerodynamics isn't important when you're running Memphis.  What's important for this race is chassis and tire wear.  We've got a decent car for the race.  I don't really know how it will do in qualifying, but it should be good for the race."

ABOUT NETZERO.
Originally launched in 1998, NetZero is a United Online company. United Online is a leading value-priced Internet service provider that offers both free and value-priced Internet access services through its subsidiaries NetZero and Juno in more than 5,000 cities in the United States and Canada. The company is headquartered in Westlake Village, Calif., with offices in New York City and Hyderabad, India. United Online's common stock is traded on the Nasdaq National Market under the ticker symbol "UNTD." For more information about NetZero and United Online, visit http://www.unitedonline.net.  To obtain a NetZero CD, please call 1-877-NETZERO.