Jamie McMurray Diary: Sonoma a different task

We left Michigan with a top-15 finish, but I really thought we'd have done better there. We took the same car that we almost won with in Fontana, but we just could not find the right balance on the car at Michigan.

	Jamie McMurray

I had to take my first provisional of the year at Michigan and we started 38th, but I felt like we had a good car for the race. And for the most part, we did. I caught a lot of cars, but just had a hard time passing them. Track position was everything at Michigan, and we just never seemed to gain enough ground to get to the front. But we gained some spots in the points, and had another consistent run, so all in all, it wasn't a bad weekend.

There hasn't been much down time this week. We got back Sunday night, and I boarded a plane to San Francisco on Tuesday morning for some media interviews and sponsor appearances before the Sonoma race this weekend. My sponsor, ChevronTexaco, is based near San Francisco, so this is a big weekend for them. I spent Wednesday visiting several television and radio stations and participated in a media lunch that the track hosted. On Thursday, it was a ChevronTexaco plant and then we have employee day at ChevronTexaco headquarters. We have dinner Thursday night with Havoline guests and then we drive up to Sonoma to check into the hotel near the track.

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We tested at Sonoma back in April and I felt like we had a pretty good test. I don't have a lot of experience on a road course in a stock car, but I'm looking forward to racing at Sonoma this weekend. It's something different from what we usually do, and if I can keep the Havoline Dodge on course and out of the sand traps and kitty litter, hopefully we'll have a decent weekend for our sponsor and fans. I raced at Watkins Glen two years ago in the Busch car and had a decent finish, so hopefully the same will hold true this weekend.

While it's a busy week out here in San Francisco, I was thinking today about how lucky I am and how grateful I am to be living my dream. Life couldn't get much better.

Of course, a win wouldn't hurt things.

Jamie McMurray drives the No. 42 Texaco Havoline Dodge for Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates. His diary appears weekly on SI.com.

Each week Jamie will devote a portion of his diary to answering questions from SI.com users.