Last week, NASCAR’s David Ragan, driver of the No. 6 UPS Ford, delivered the goods in Richmond. Ragan, UPS and Richmond International Raceway joined forces as part of the Henrico Education Foundation Schools Supplies Challenge, an initiative designed to help local students get ready for the upcoming school year. While in town, Ragan climbed in the jump seat of a UPS deliver truck filled with school supplies then dropped them off at Douglas Wilder Middle School.

  “Doing something for the local community and the kids is the number one reason for being in Richmond today,” Ragan said. “With UPS Freight’s involvement, being based out of Virginia, that’s certainly a good reason to come up. You see the reaction from the teachers and the principal, they really get a kick out of it and they appreciate it.”

  After his work was done, Ragan returned to RIR to field questions from a select group of fans before providing them with pace car rides around the track.
 
  The following is an excerpt from Ragan’s Q&A session.
Question: Being from Georgia, how much does it hurt losing the Atlanta race?

  Ragan: It hurts a little bit because I grew up going to that race in March. I grew up going to the season finale, until a few years ago, in November. It was always two weekends out of the year and it was always cold and sometimes rainy and sometimes snowy and it was tough but you look at Darlington and I think they’re doing great with the one date they have; sold a lot of tickets and it’s always a good race. I think the same with Atlanta. They can put a lot of emphasis on their Labor Day race. It can be a good race weekend and have a lot of fun. And things change over time and who knows, years down the road they may get one back.

Q: If you hadn’t gone into racing what would you have done?

  I probably would be a farmer back home in Georgia, that’s what everybody did. We lived in a small community and all the guys and girls that I went to school with are kind of living in that local community. I enjoy racing. Now, if something were to happen and I couldn’t race I would still be involved in motorsports in some way, shape or form. I’d probably go back to school and get some type of engineering degree. I like traveling. I like the racing. I like the competition. I like the sport that I’m a part of.

Q: How is Jack Roush doing?

  He looks good. He came back with us from Michigan. He was in Bristol this week. He was at the shop all day yesterday, hanging out and talking, he’s doing good. He’s a tough guy and I’m sure he’ll be up here in two weeks for the race, probably won’t miss another race all year. So, he’s going full throttle and I don’t know if his flying days are over or not. I’m sure he’ll get back in the plane some and go at it one day.

Q: Did you get training to do public speaking?

  My mom and dad are both talkers and they made me feel comfortable talking. I used to get in trouble at school for talking too much so I think that finally did help me when I got out of school. But no official training.

Q: Do you believe changes need to be made because of all the Cup drivers running in the Nationwide series?

  I do agree that there needs to be some kind of stepping stone series that the young drivers can compete in. They need to compete with the Cup drivers because that’s makes you better but you don’t need to steal the thunder from a young kid that may have a chance to win the championships. It’s definitely got out of hand the last four or five years.

  Ten years ago, you had guys like Mark Martin and Dale Earnhardt and all, they raced a lot of Nationwide races, Busch races but they didn’t run them all. So you had guys like Matt Kenseth that can win the Busch Championship or Dale Earnhardt Jr. or this one or that one and that’s the way it should be.

  NASCAR’s got a tough job in pleasing everyone. 

Q: What’s it like coming to Richmond with a chance to make the Chase?

  Two years ago I didn’t realize how hard it was to get to that point. That was my second year in Sprint Cup and we were like 150 points out a few races before Richmond and we had a good Bristol, a good Michigan, we were in the top 10 in Atlanta or a few races leading up to Richmond. We were within 50 points coming into Richmond and we knew we could do it and we were running in the top 10 early in the race. We got involved in an accident and we lost a lap but Clint Bowyer wasn’t racing much better. At one point we were locked in. At one point we were out, we were in, we were out and we ended up finishing a couple laps down in 20 something. We missed the Chase but we finished 13th in points and I just felt like man this is pretty easy we should be a lock in next year. So next year we finished 20 something in points and this year we’re 24th. So it’s certainly close.

So those guys that are 10th to 14th in points are sweating it out, including a couple of my teammates are 10th and 11th in points. One bad race, an engine failure in Atlanta and you lose 75 points in one race and they’re fighting for their lives here in Richmond in two weeks. So there’s definitely a lot of drama when the cars unload here at Richmond.