BUSCH: Richmond: Stacy Compton race remarks

Compton survives wreckfest in Richmond.

Richmond, Va. (May 5, 2002) -- Stacy Compton and the Kingsford/Johnsonville Chevrolet team were looking to score another top-10 finish at the NASCAR Busch Series Hardee's 250 at Richmond International Raceway Friday night. Considering the number of accidents, they were thankful to walk away with a 12th-place finish.

The race produced a record tying 11 cautions and used up 85 of the event's 250 laps. Sixteen cars finished on the lead lap and 18 cars didn't finish at all.

For the second weekend in a row qualifying was rained out and owner's points set the field for the race. This put Compton on the outside of row four in the eighth position for the start of the race.

Compton's car was near the top of the charts in every practice session and nearly perfect at the two o'clock final practice run. However, the team knew they would be guessing at the set-up when race time approached and the coolness of the early spring evening became a factor.

"It's tough to force yourself to make big changes to the car when you are as fast as we were in practice," explained crew chief Steve Plattenberger. "We just didn't expect the temperature to drop to 50 degrees by the time the race was over. Stacy did a great job driving an extremely tight racecar. Even though we missed the set-up a bit and didn't finish where we wanted to, we still held our spot in championship points."

"We were tight all night and the team worked hard to make the necessary adjustments to our Kingsford/Johnsonville Chevy," added Compton. "We just couldn't overcome the conditions in time to challenge the leaders."

Jason Keller won the Hardee's 250 and moved into first-place in the championship point standings. Compton maintained the seventh spot in the standings, but closed the gap between him and the points leader.

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