PREVIEW: CASEY MEARS (NO. 5 CARQUEST/KELLOGG'S CHEVROLET) VENUE: BRISTOL MOTOR SPEEDWAY (.533-MILE OVAL) CIRCUIT: NASCAR SPRINT CUP SERIES 
(RACE 5 OF 36) EVENT: MARCH 16, 2008 (500 LAPS, 266.5 MILES)

-NEWS & NOTES -APPEARANCES -QUOTES -ONLINE RESOURCES -CONTACT INFORMATION

DEFENDING CHAMPIONS: The CARQUEST/Kellogg's Chevrolet team returns to Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway this Sunday as the reigning winners of the Food City 500. Last March, the No. 5 Chevy started 20th and led 29 laps before scoring its sole victory of the 2007 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series season. It was the 200th NASCAR victory for team owner Rick Hendrick and the 600th Cup win for manufacturer Chevrolet. It also was the first win for the new Impala SS race car.

TOP-10 TEAM: Last March's victory at Bristol marked the team's third straight top-10 finish at the short track. The team continued the trend when it finished ninth there in August. In six previous Bristol races, the No. 5 has recorded two top-five finishes and four top-10s.

MEARS AT BRISTOL: Casey Mears earned his first career top-10 finish at Bristol Motor Speedway last March with Hendrick Motorsports. It was also his first top-10 result of the 2007 Sprint Cup campaign and helped him climb to 15th in the standings by season's end.

HENDRICK AT BRISTOL: The last time a Hendrick Motorsports car failed to produce a top-10 result at Bristol happened on Aug. 26, 2000. At the time, the organization was a three-car team with Jeff Gordon, Terry Labonte and Jerry Nadeau. That is a streak of 15 races with a Hendrick car in the top 10. Since 1986, when Hendrick became a multi-car team, the organization has recorded a top-10 finish in all but five of 44 Bristol races.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CASEY: Mears will celebrate his 30th birthday on Wednesday. One of his family's favorite stories happened on March 12, 1994, when Mears celebrated his 16th birthday. He won an Off-Road Super Lites race in Seattle, and his parents panicked slightly when the cake announcing his age was brought into Victory Lane. The Mears had fudged their son's age to make him eligible for the race, and they didn't want the officials to know.

ANOTHER BIRTHDAY: Brad Pickens, the CARQUEST/Kellogg's Chevy's lead mechanic and gasman, also will celebrate his birthday on Wednesday. Pickens will be 34 years old. He joined the No. 5 team in 2000 and has held several jobs ranging from general mechanic to setup director during that time.

VETERAN SPOTTER: Spotting isn't an easy job, and it can be particularly tricky at a short track like Bristol. That's why the No. 5 Chevrolet team is glad to have veteran spotter Eddie Masencup on the team. Masencup spotted for Dale Earnhardt Jr. when he won the NASCAR Nationwide Series championship in 1998, and he earned the Sprint Cup title with Bobby Labonte in 2000. After that, Masencup settled in with the No. 5 team and driver Terry Labonte. He still works as a pilot for Terry Labonte.

ATLANTA CHASSIS: Crew chief Alan Gustafson has chosen Hendrick Motorsports Chassis No. 414 for Sunday's race at Bristol. Mears raced this particular car at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway last year. The team also tested the chassis at Atlanta Motor Speedway and The Milwaukee Mile last season.

STILL STREAKING: Hendrick Motorsports' streak of top-10 finishes improved to 69 races after last week's race at Atlanta Motor Speedway when Dale Earnhardt Jr. took third and Jeff Gordon was fifth. The last time a Hendrick driver wasn't in the top 10 was April 9, 2006. Finishing 11th, Jimmie Johnson was Hendrick's top performer that day at Texas Motor Speedway.

AUTOGRAPHS: Casey Mears will greet fans and sign autographs at the Kellogg's/CARQUEST souvenir trailer at 10:20 a.m. ET on Sunday.

CASEY MEARS, DRIVER, NO. 5 CARQUEST/KELLOGG'S CHEVROLET (ON TURNING 30.): "I don't really think about it much. I just don't worry about things I can't control, like age. I mean, I know I'm going to turn 30. I know I'm going to get old. If anything, I'm more like 'Wow! I made it to 30. That's pretty cool!' You know?"

MEARS: (ON HIS BIRTHDAY PLANS.) "Birthdays have never been a big deal to me. I feel guilty if people celebrate my birthday. It's almost more stress to know people are making a big deal over you. Now if it's someone else's birthday, I like to go all out. But a nice quiet dinner with the family is all I want to do for my own. I like it pretty low key."

ALAN GUSTAFSON, CREW CHIEF, NO. 5 CARQUEST/KELLOGG'S CHEVROLET (ON DEFENDING LAST YEAR'S WIN.): "Last year we had a very good race car at Bristol. But the win didn't come easy. We had to battle it out all day. (Tony) Stewart and (Denny) Hamlin were both really good but had issues. Then it came down to the very end with us and (Jeff) Burton. It was an exciting race.

"The coolest part of it all, though, was that it was the first Impala SS victory, the 200th NASCAR win for Hendrick and the 600th Sprint Cup win for Chevrolet. All of those things are a pretty big deal. It's nice that the (No.) 5 team was the one to earn that for everyone."

GUSTAFSON (ON THE NO. 5 TEAM'S SUCCESS AT BRISTOL.): "We've had drivers in this car that are just really good at Bristol. When you have a driver who knows the race track, they can come into the garage and educate the team on what it needs to do to the car. The more they can communicate back to us about the track, the better we can set up the car for them."

GUSTAFSON (ON KEEPING YOUR DRIVER PATIENT AT BRISTOL.): "To keep my driver calm and patient, I first have to remain calm. I remind myself to not get too excited, even though with short track racing, excitement just comes naturally. If something goes wrong, I have to be able to minimize the effects of that as much as I can. There's a lot going on up in that spotter's stand too, but Eddie (Masencup) will play a big role as well, during the race, to keep Casey focused."

GUSTAFSON (ON THE IMPORTANCE OF PIT STALL SELECTION AT BRISTOL.): "Back when pit road was split, it absolutely killed a team to have a pit stall on the backstretch. Qualifying well was so important then. Now that everyone enters pit road off of Turn 2, it really doesn't make that much of a difference anymore. If you're not in the top four and can't get an opening, then it doesn't really matter what side of the track you pit on. Qualifying well still helps, however, as track position is extremely important. If you start in the back at Bristol, you could go a lap down early, and there's nothing good that comes from that."

EDDIE MASENCUP, SPOTTER, NO. 5 CARQUEST/KELLOGG'S CHEVROLET (ON SPOTTING AT BRISTOL.): "I don't think it's hard to spot at Bristol. I don't say that too much around the other spotters because they think I'm crazy. But I actually enjoy spotting at short tracks like Bristol and Martinsville more than I do restrictor-plate races. There's just so much going on, so much excitement. The race goes by really fast for us up on the spotters' stand. I'm looking forward to it."