Martin spent his first weekend away from a Cup race in Florida, traveling from his
home in Daytona Beach to Ellisville to help tutor Ginn Racing development drivers
Ricky Carmichael and Matt Martin.And he had to hustle home because Matt wanted to play paintball the day after the short-track race.
Martin had no such obligations last weekend as the Nextel Cup Series was racing in Martinsville Speedway.
"The Bristol weekend was kind of a blur," Martin said before testing Tuesday at Richmond International Raceway. "This weekend was perfect."
Martin said he flew to Chattanooga, Tenn., to pick up a grandson and then went to his hometown of Batesville, Ark., to relax.
"I watched practice on Friday on the computer live," Martin said. "I missed qualifying because I was flying. I watched the truck race on Saturday. I had a ball. I watched the race on Sunday. When they hit the rain delay, we packed up and headed back to Florida.
"It was really awesome. It reconfirmed that I have the best gig in motorsports right now."
Martin did say he will return to Ginn's No. 01 Chevrolet for the race at Texas Motor Speedway on April 15, his next scheduled event.
Watching the Cup races on television did nothing to challenge his commitment to a part-time schedule, Martin said.
"There was the fear that I might look at it and say, 'I wish I was there,'" Martin said. "When they said, 'Start your engines' at Bristol, when they focused the camera on the dash of somebody's car, that's something I have done for a long, long time. That's sort of a profound snapshot in my mind because finally we're not doing anything else. ... That snapshot got real clear in my mind. I saw that, and it was like, 'That's weird.'"
Martin also found it odd that he's still in the top 15 in the Nextel Cup point standings.
"It's kinda crazy. I've spent a number of years of my career struggling to be 15th in the points," Martin said. "I'm 15th in the points, and I didn't go to the last two races. Didn't even go, so it's pretty crazy."
