Dale Earnhardt Jr. talked to the media between practice sessions Saturday at Atlanta. He talked about the tires and discussed what's caused drivers some much angst at this track in the last year. While many have blamed Goodyear, Dale Earnhardt Jr. says you need to look elsewhere (end of the transcript).

 

Here's part of what he said to a few of us Saturday:

 

 

“It’s slick. It’s an old race track. It’s like Rockingham used to be years ago. I don’t mind it. It’s fine.

 

 

(Optimistic about chances Sunday)

 

 

“We always run good here. We need this next practice to go really well to gain. We’re running a different setup totally than we run last year. Exact opposite really. I think we can get it working better and get it dialed in. It’s hard to say if it will be as good as last year. We need to try to learn and try to go for the rest of the season and keep working at it.

 

 

(Some guys feel that tire or overall package is worse than last year, what about you)

 

“A bunch of guys do?

 

(A bunch of guys do)

 

“I’ll join them. I don’t want to say too much yet. We ain’t run a race yet. It’s handful man. It’s a handful. I kind of like how the track surface is. I’m running a different setup, too. If I had my old setup I might be able to do a better job of comparing apples and apples.

 

(What kind of race are we looking at for Sunday, lot of wrecked cars?)

 

“I hope not. I don’t think everybody is going to be wrecking. It will be just a bunch of guys trying not to wreck.

 

(In a perfect world, what do you need these tires to do?)

 

“I think you want a certain amount of grip. Everybody is different on what they like. I like a different sidewall. I like less sidewall deflection like a soft left-side sidewall so the car rotates in the turns good. Everybody is different what they like about the tires and what they’ve tested before.

 

“I don’t really care what they do as far as fall-off. I don’t care if they fall off a ton. That doesn’t really bother me. This is an old surface. We’re sort of closet to the Rockingham, Darlington area where you get a lot of age in the track and it turns gray and does like it is. The track surfaces really slick. It’s a challenge to get a tire to work on it. We’ll figure it out.

 

(Are the other tracks so much easier to drive than when presented with a challenge, drivers complain too much about it?)

 

“I hear you. I don’t think it’s unnecessary griping because the track surface was about the same about four or five years ago. Even three years ago, we had a better handle on the tire, I felt like, and the track and how things were going and cars drove better. Everybody loved it. Everybody loved coming here and just in a matter of a year or two we seem to have … I don’t know why we’re not as comfortable here as we used to be. It’s definitely a big difference than two or three years ago and it’s not a difference in the track. It was already worn out a couple of years ago.

 

“The tire, I felt we had a better understand and a better comfort level several years ago.’’

 

(How much does that have to do with the car?)

 

“100 percent. This is … this is a (heck) of an excuse for a race car. It’s hard to drive. It makes everybody’s job harder. Even Goodyear's.’’