LiveWorld Transcripts

Home Depot presents

Joe Gibbs
Football Coach and NASCAR Team Owner

June 28, 2000

Joe Gibbs discusses in an online interview the ins and outs of being a football coach and a NASCAR team owner.

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Home Depot: The Home Depot welcomes you to a special online event featuring Joe Gibbs. This is your chance to ask Joe about his successes in football and racing, his thoughts on his 1999 Winston Cup Rookie of the Year recipient, Tony Stewart, and his hunt for the Winston Cup title in 2000.

Joe Gibbs: I'm exciting to have an opportunity to speak to the fans out there, and it's fun to field questions - I'm sure there are a lot of football and race fans out there, so I'm kind of curious to see what questions you have to ask!

Carlcarl: You've now built your race team into a championship-caliber organization. How long has it taken, and how did you get to this point?

Joe Gibbs: It's really taken 9 long, hard years. We started our first year in '92, putting the team together the year before. And we've had all the typical rookie mistakes and wrecked cars but it has been fun and challenging. It's been 9 long years to this point, but last year was the first year we felt like a team that could run for a championship, and that also was the first year that Tony Stewart and Home Depot joined us. We're now 1st (Bobby Labonte) and 7th (Tony Stewart) in the points standing, so we're very excited.

Racerx: What are the similarities between building a successful football program and a successful race team?

Joe Gibbs: I've said that everything that happened to me in football is happening to me in racing. Both are people sports - you win with people, not cars or x's and o's. The numbers are about the same.we have about 125 people working on race cars, and that's how many we used to take to football camp every year. When you get that many together, you've got a lot of problems. It's hard to organize, but if you pick the right people that's the right way to success.

Jessiejames: Did Tony Stewart's success last year come as a surprise to you?

Joe Gibbs: I think it definitely did. That was a storybook season. No one else in the history of Winston Cup had that kind of first year. To win three races, and wind up fourth in points, was beyond our wildest expectations. I know everyone at Home Depot was excited about it, and it was one of the most exciting years anyone could experience in Winston Cup racing.

Race Fan: What has been the single greatest challenge of your career?

Joe Gibbs: Well, I think - thinking about football and racing - the greatest challenge has always been picking the right people. It's not one single challenge, but the picking of the people in team sports, and getting them to sacrifice for the team. That's very hard to do - team chemistry. So, it's picking the right people. That's the hardest thing I've experienced in my professional career.

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