JOHNNY BENSON, NO. 10 VALVOLINE PONTIAC GRAND PRIX:
NOTE: Michigan native Johnny Benson returns to his home track this weekend for the Sirius Satellite Radio 400 at Michigan International Speedway. Benson, a native of Grand Rapids and a second-generation racer, also owns Berlin Raceway in Marne, one of the country’s premier short-track venues.

On the track, Benson is coming off two straight top-10 runs, including his first top-five of the season June 2 at Dover International Speedway.

WHAT’S THE SECRET TO GETTING AROUND MICHIGAN COMPETITIVELY?
"It’s the same as it is every week. You have to have good horsepower, a good body on there. The race is always fun there because there are two or three grooves. You can start running three-wide in the corners and I think that’s pretty neat. Some guys choose to run the bottom, some guys choose to run the middle and others choose to run the top. As the race goes, you have to identify where your car works best and then work on it there. There are areas to pick. At Pocono and a lot of other race tracks, it’s just one groove, the bottom. Michigan is that way to start with, because the bottom is quickest to start with, but it’s not long before it starts to raise up the track."

DO YOU THINK THE NEW ’03 PONTIAC WILL MAKE A DIFFERENCE AT MICHIGAN?
"I don’t know. I think the cars are all getting pretty equal, or at least there’s nobody complaining. They’re all pretty close. With Pontiac, because we only have five cars, it’s kind of hard to get on top of the program. We hope it’s going to be better. We haven’t run there yet with it, but we are looking forward to it."

BEING A MICHIGAN NATIVE, IS IT NICE TO GO HOME TO RACE?
"To me, all the tracks are the same, but it is neat to go home. When I do go home, I race at my local track and do appearances and things like that. That’s the good part of being home. I like racing at MIS. We’ve always been decent there, I like the track and that’s because it gives you options. If you come up on someone, you always have someplace to go to get around them."

YOU’RE COMING OFF A TOP-FIVE RUN AT DOVER, YOU’VE RUN WELL IN THE PAST AT POCONO. DO YOU FEEL LIKE YOU’VE GOT MOMENTUM, AND HOW IMPORTANT IS THAT TO YOUR TEAM?
"Having a good finish, obviously, the team likes that. That’s what you strive for and it pumps them up a little bit. They haven’t had a good year, it’s been up and down, but we’ve had some good runs. We’ve had some mechanical failures and we’ve had some incidents. Obviously, I think we’re a lot better team than we’ve shown in the points. Dover was a great race for us and we know we are capable of doing that. The hard part is trying to make it week ina nd week out. We’ll make that happen. Obviously, momentum is something a lot of people try to bank on, but by the same token, it’s about a lot of hard work and the guys have been doing that. It’s a matter of being able to put those together and have good runs. I’m really looking forward to the race at MIS and the whole rest of the year."