NASCAR Winston Cup Series NAPA 500: Post Race Quotes (Pontiac Drivers)

17 November 1997

 
 NASCAR Winston Cup Series
 Pontiac Race Quotes
 NAPA 500
 Atlanta Motor Speedway
 November 16, 1997

HAMPTON, GA - The following provided by Performance Marketing Group:

KYLE PETTY (#44 Hot Wheels Grand Prix) - Started 20th, finished 6th - "We had 
a good run. We started really strong, but the car was loose. That's why we 
kept pitting and going to the back. We made our adjustments early. Bobby 
Kennedy made some good calls in the pits. We had a good day. We had a good 
year. Bobby Labonte was the class of the field. He gets around this place, 
and I know it's a new race track, but he kicked butt here last year, too. I 
think this race shows Pontiac is getting better. I didn't even make this race 
last year and finished sixth this year. Derrike Cope went out on a high note. 
Pontiac ended the year on a real high note, and all its drivers did, too. 

"It was a pretty treacherous race track. It reminded me while I was out there 
running of watching an IRL race on TV. You've got some cars out there running 
20 miles an hour faster than other cars, and you're catching them and you're 
always in the wrong place. That's what made it bad. It's only a groove, 
groove-and-a-half race track. It's not a two-groove race track. 

BOBBY HAMILTON (#43 STP Grand Prix) - Started 40th, finished 7th - "It's 
seventh, but I'm really disappointed. I wanted to end things on an even 
better note. I thank the team for doing such a good job on our backup car in 
order to get a top-10 finish. We got tight, and we couldn't get a caution in 
order to get a rubber out of the right-front. It would literally fly when it 
was free. We just couldn't take a chance of losing too much track position by 
taking the time to take it out. It's a top-10, but we could have contended 
for the win."

WARD BURTON (#22 MBNA Grand Prix) - Started 2nd, finished 9th - "We can take 
a lot of positives out of this. We led some laps, and had a good car for much 
of the race. We really came on strong late in the race to get that top-10. We 
want to build on this and have runs like this on a consistent basis next 
year."