Would you believe which driver's first car was a Plymouth Volare?

 

A busy day at the track Friday at Michigan. In case you missed it, Dale Earnhardt Jr. said  NASCAR needs to do more to fix the car and improve the racing (go here to see all  that he said). A lot of other things happened Friday. Here's a rundown (and keep reading to get the answer to which driver's first car was a Plymouth Volare)

 

# Kasey Kahne had hit photo taken with a Toyota for a Budweiser photo shoot for 2010. Hmmm, so will Richard Petty Motorsports switch from Dodge to Toyota?

 

"Why?'' Kahne said of a Toyota in the  photo shoot. "I don't know why it was. I'm Dodge, man. I think I'll be Dodge next year, truthfully. The Gilletts (team owners) put a car in there to do the photo shoot and I took my pictures and, hopefully, I don't have to take my pictures again.''

 

# Jeff Gordon says his back is fine but did grow tired of the numerous questions asked about it in a group session with reporters Friday.

 

"Couple rough days,'' Gordon said of his back, ''but feeling pretty good. It was a hard hit and that's an area that I'm focused and working on. I feel like we have done a great job with (safety items for) head, neck, shoulder and hips but the last couple of hits I have had have really affected my midsection, especially my back.''

 

Gordon also says he plans to talk to NASCAR about the section of the track where Sam Hornish crashed and bounced off the tire barriers back on to the track and into the path of Gordon and Jeff Burton. Jason Leffler had a similar incident two days before the Hornish crash in a Nationwide practice session. Leffer's was a single-car incident because no one was closely behind him at the time.

 

# Toyota driver Brian Vickers, who won the pole, on if he noticed an emphasis on qualifying at Michigan because it's so close to the headquarters of the Big 3 manufacturers:

 

"I don't know if it's the Big Three's home or not. I guess a couple of them are based out of Washington, D.C., now, and I don't know where the rest are based. ... I don't come here to sit on the pole because General Motors or Ford or Dodge used to be headquartered here. I'm not trying to be funny. I don't know where they're headquartered. any more. The government owns them, so I don't know what they'd call the headquarters, except Ford.''

 

# Brad Keselowski, who remains a hot commodity on the free agent market, says he's confident he can put together a deal that will allow him to run fulltime in the Nationwide series along with Cup next year. "I think I have a lot of good options on my plate,'' he said. "I am asking a lot of the teams that I want to do something with and it just takes timie to put all that together. We'll see. I'm not there yet. I feel like we will put it together. It's just taking time.''

 

# Tony Stewart said he didn't get his driver's license until he was 17 -- "My parents wouldn't let me have my license when I was 16, which was probably a very smart decision on their part,'' he said. He said he paid $350 for his first car -- a 1979 Plymouth Volare. "It was used as a mail route car in the country,'' Stewart said.

 

# Greg Biffle is 10th in the points entering Sunday's race at Michigan and teammate Matt Kenseth is 12th. Biffle was asked what it was like to race a teammate to make it into the Chase:

 

"It's funny,'' Biffle said, "because Matt and I run fairly close setups and we like our cars about the same and our driving characteristic is not a  lot alike, but it's similar. Hopefully, Matt and I will both be able to make it. But, we've traded that spot, that 12th-place spot, a couple of times now. Hopefully, we can just continue to both stay in the Chase.''

 

# Kasey Kahne, Mike Skinner and Dave Blaney all blew engines Friday and will start at the rear of Sunday's race.

 

 

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