NASCAR NEXTEL CUP SERIES AARON'S 499 QUALIFYING NOTES

TALLADEGA SUPERSPEEDWAY

April 23, 2004

TERRY LABONTE, NO. 5 KELLOGG'S CHEVROLET MONTE CARLO:

"The guys have been working awfully hard to make our speedway program better. It's a brand new car. (ON THE DIFFICULTY OF GETTING ON AND OFF PIT ROAD AT TIMES AND HOW IMPORTANT THAT IS AT TALLADEGA) "It's pretty difficult because we have a lot of green flag pit stops here. Sometimes it's hard to be in the right position and really come into the pits like you want to. So if you can stay up towards the front, your chances of getting in and off of pit road like you want to are probably a little bit better."

ROBBY GORDON, NO. 31 CINGULAR WIRELESS CHEVROLET MONTE CARLO: "Normally we do run better when we come to qualify. They pull the brakes back and do stuff like that. But we picked up four-tenths. It should get us in the show somewhere from first to 28th. If we can just get in there in a good position and work on the car tomorrow during practice and hopefully we'll have a good race car on Sunday."

(WHAT ROLE DOES YOUR SPOTTER PLAY IN THIS RACE ON SUNDAY?)

"The spotter plays a big role because there are a lot of blind spots on these cars. When you get a guy tucked up underneath the left rear corner, you can't see him down there. And that's where a lot of the action happens. So that guy (spotter) lets you know who is down there and when you're clear to move down. I think if we didn't have spotters at race tracks like this, it would be lucky."

(HOW DO YOU GET THROUGH A LONG WEEKEND OF RESTRICTOR PLATE RACING IN BOTH THE BUSCH AND CUP SERIES?)

"The key is having good teams on both sides. We have Richard Childress Racing on the one side and the Fruit of the Loom sponsorship on the Busch side. It's been a lot of fun. Good people back and forth have helped my schedule go from the Busch car to the Cup car and be on time and things like that. It's been fun so far. I've learned a lot. Hopefully we can position ourselves to win races in both."

JIMMY SPENCER, NO. 4 MORGAN-MCCLURE MOTORSPORTS CHEVROLET MONTE CARLO:

"Morgan-McClure cars always run well at superspeedways. I ran finished here once in the Kodak car here. I'm excited about being on board with them. I think the later you go out (for qualifying) the faster it is. But then again, sometimes you're shocked. I think a lot of it is the engine combination. It's opposite of a track where the temperature on the track makes a big difference. The temperature in the air makes more difference to a restrictor plate track compared to a race track like California. If the track is 20 degrees cooler, it's going to be a lot faster. It's the opposite here. It the track is 20 degrees hotter, I don't think you'll notice it on a sticker run but you will notice the temperature in the air on the motor will make a big difference."

JOE NEMECHEK, NO. 01 US ARMY CHEVROLET MONTE CARLO:

"It was a good run for us. The guys have worked really hard. We had a great run at Daytona and finished 6th there. We didn't get the car tore up so we've been able to tweak on it since then. We qualified really well in Daytona and we're expecting the same thing here. Hendrick Motorsports does our engines. We have lots of power. You've got to have the whole package: handling, aerodynamics, and power. We've got a pretty good deal right now. We've been on the pole here a couple of times in the Cup car and the Busch car. We've come close to winning a Cup race here, but never won one. You never know. You've got to put yourself in the right position at the end of the race. If you can do that, you can win it. Right now, I think we've got a really good shot here at Talladega."

JEFF GORDON, NO. 24 DUPONT CHEVROLET MONTE CARLO:

"We've put a lot of hard work and effort into our restrictor plate program. It's paying off. So far we're very excited. We've got the Dupont/Pepsi program this weekend and that's exciting. We're looking forward to keeping it up front all day."

(WHEN YOU MAKE GAINS IN THE ENGINE PROGRAM, IS THAT THE WHOLE PICTURE AT TALLADEGA OR IS THERE MORE TO IT?)

"You've got to massage every area possible - every area of the body, any area to get that spoiler out of the air, anything you can do to make more power and possibly continue to increase power with rpm. Anything you can do like that is going to be an increase in speed on the track. I don't think it is just one area. We have two or three different departments working on their areas all the time."

JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 LOWE'S CHEVROLET MONTE CARLO:

"Really, all I try to do is stay above the yellow line and see what I can do with the Lowe's Chevy. It was a pretty good run for us. The guys have been working hard."

(WHAT ROLE DOES THE SPOTTER PLAY AT TALLADEGA?) "We rely on them more here than anywhere. At other tracks you have a sense of where cars are around you and you almost know if you're clear. But here, you can't tell where cars are if you're three wide, four wide and you really rely on them here more than anywhere else."

MICHAEL WALTRIP, NO. 15 NAPA CHEVROLET MONTE CARLO:

"Slugger and all the boys have done their job. They've given us a car that can compete for the pole. We just missed it by a few hundredths so far. I don't see many people going much faster than that. We should be right up towards the front and having a fast car is the most supporting factor to winning at Talladega. We know how to do the job on pit road. We know how to draft and get that job done. The team has given me that car that can do the job."

(AS GOOD AS YOU ARE ON PLATE TRACKS, DOES THIS WEEKEND GIVE YOU AN OPPORTUNITY TO TAKE A STEP IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION?)

"Definitely. We're heading in a good direction with the way the car is running. If fate is on our side again this weekend, we could be victorious."

ERIC MCCLURE, NO. 04 77 SPORTS.COM CHEVROLET MONTE CARLO:

"I've just got to take my hat off to everybody at Morgan-McClure Motorsports who has helped us. We brought our Late Model team down here to work on the car. We're really thankful to be here and hope we can get this 77 Sports.com Chevrolet into the show. We just sort of jumped in headfirst. That's the way we do things."

KENNY WALLACE, NO. 00 AARON'S CHEVROLET MONTE CARLO:

(ON RACING HIS WAY INTO THE FIELD) "I really want to thank Michael Waltrip - not just because he's a good friend to me. He believed in me. We're going to run five Cup races in the Aaron's dream machine and everybody knows this is an Aaron's dream weekend. We had to make sure we put the car in the field solidly and we're looking good. The last time we raced here we ran fifth, but they penalized me for going underneath the yellow line. We're going to try to do the same thing this race except don't go below the yellow line."

(ON THE CHARACTERISTICS OF PLATE RACING)

"One of the reasons the car runs so well is that Richie Gilmore stop by here. He's the motor builder at DEI and has won the Daytona 500 with five different drivers. If you have him on your side, you get a lot of confidence when you go to Daytona or Talladega."

GREG ZIPADELLI, CREW CHIEF, NO. 20 HOME DEPOT CHEVROLET MONTE CARLO:

(HOW MANY CHANGES WILL YOU MAKE ON THE CAR BETWEEN NOW AND SUNDAY?) "Between today and tomorrow morning the race practice is a lot - the transmission, rear-end gear, power steering pump, power steering box, water tanks, oil thermostats - there's just a lot of stuff - hubs, brakes - a lot of stuff that you do. But I'm just sitting here fumbled. We actually kind of slowed down and don't really know why. That's more frustrating than anything. You come here and lose a tenth or so and it's a big deal.

"We started up about two-tenths of what we think we should have run anyway. I don't really know. We're just trying to figure it out. What could we have done wrong? They give you a restrictor plate when you go through the room. You put it on. They give you rear shocks. There could be a little bit of difference there but not normally enough to show that kind of speed. Our oil temperature was nowhere near as hot as it needed to be and it left hotter than it ever has. So we just need to do a little more work in that area, I guess. We missed it on horsepower a little bit today."

(SOME DRIVERS AND TEAMS LOVE COMING TO TALLADEGA AND SOME HATE IT. WHERE DO YOU STAND ON THAT?)

"It's so much time, effort, and expense to come here and nobody has any idea. It's phenomenal. If you can stay out of the big crash - if we don't wreck, we usually finish well. So if on Sunday we can stay out of the wreck - if there is one - and this Home Depot Monte Carlo can come back with a good top five finish or maybe a win, that would be great. We've got an awfully lot of second and third-place finishes here at Talladega. But we've never won. We'd sure like to. I think this car will drive really good. It was a good car in the wind tunnel. We just missed something here today when it came to qualifying.

"We'll pay for it by starting in the back. But you can start last in this thing and in 15 or 20 laps be in the top ten if your lane goes and the people you're with just happen to go the way you needed to. So we'll just keep working like we need to do to get the car driving really good and suck up the best it can for him (Tony Stewart). Come race day on the last 20 laps, there aren't many people that are better than Tony as far as getting to the front and doing things that maybe you shouldn't do with one of these cars to get you up there. So we'll just see what Sunday brings us."

SCOTT RIGGS, NO. 10 VALVOLINE CHEVROLET MONTE CARLO - TOP QUALIFYING RAYBESTOS ROOKIE OF THE YEAR CANDIDATE - 5TH:

"It's a nice job for all the guys on the Valvoline Chevrolet. The guys back in the fab shop have given us a great car. It's the team, not the driver that's for sure. That's a good qualifying effort on our part. It's great to have a good car. It makes me feel good at a place like this where the car is so important."

(ON HIS SEASON TO DATE)

"We definitely haven't had the kind year we've expected so far. It's definitely been a struggle. We've had a lot of curve balls. There have been a lot of tough situations for me and the entire newly-assembled team to overcome. When you can qualify good here at Talladega you can usually run pretty good in the draft. I hope that's the case.

"We've been learning by leaps and bounds every single week - not only me as a driver in the seat learning the new feel of the tires -- but also learning what I need to feel to be competitive every week. You never can underestimate just how tough the competition level is in the Cup series until you're here running in it. I'm proud of the way the team has pulled together.

"They all have faith not only in me, but in each other. It's a good working environment working there. When you get out of the car no matter what, everybody is still 110 percent behind each other. There are a lot of people that don't see how this team is growing. I think we're going to turn around and give everybody something to talk about before it's finished.

We thought by this point in the year, we'd have a couple of top 10's and maybe a top five under our belt by now. It's easy to get frustrated. But our team is behind each other and that keeps everybody's spirit charging into the future.

"When Pontiac made the unannounced withdrawal from the sport, it put all of us at MBV and MB2 behind. We've been working on building cars. Every week the fab shop has been cranking out a new car and each one is better than the last. There is no favoritism. There is one team and we share. That effort is showing today when you have two cars that come out of the stable that can be so close on speed (Joe Nemechek qualified 4th). We're just going to continue to get better.

"In the past, the 01 team and the 10 team have used different chassis combinations and you really couldn't compare apples to apples. Now we've got it down to the same car combinations for both sides."

(HOW DOES A ROOKIE PREPARE FOR THE BIG ONE?)

"The first way is to qualify pretty far to the front so you're hopefully in front of the big one. Hopefully we've done that so far. I need to be patient. Hopefully we'll have a good enough car that can stay up front the whole race."

DALE EARNHARDT JR., NO. 8 BUDWEISER CHEVROLET MONTE CARLO - QUALIFIED 3RD:

"I'm really happy with the team. I'm really happy with the car. That was a good lap. You know we've got our best car over at the museum in Daytona. This is the one we weren't too sure about, but it seems to be running real good this weekend."

(WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO YOU TO KNOW THAT ALL THE OTHER TEAMS LOOK AT YOU AND YOUR DEI TEAMMATE, MICHAEL WALTRIP, AS A THREAT COMING IN THERE?)

"Well, everybody is saying this is the house that Earnhardt built. I'd like to keep it that way."

POST-QUALIFYING PRESS CONFERENCE WITH DEI TEAMMATES MICHAEL WALTRIP (QUALIFIED 2ND) AND DALE EARNHARDT JR. (QUALIFIED 3RD):

MICHAEL WALTRIP, NO. 15 NAPA CHEVROLET MONTE CARLO:

"We came here and tested a week ago and it was obvious to me that the car had the speed in it to qualify well and to race well. With the No. 15 car, we generally don't change the set-up any from qualifying to race. So that's encouraging when you know the package you qualified second with today is the same one you'll race on Sunday with. It gives you a lot of confidence that you've got a car capable of winning the race. We're very optimistic about our chances and very pleased with the effort from DEI. You know, Dale (Earnhardt) was the best at racing these plate races. He understood that in order to be successful you had to have a fast car. That's what he left us with at DEI. We knew he expected for the cars to be the fastest. Everyone has worked so hard at DEI to make sure that they provide Junior and I with the fastest cars. I think you can see today, with of course the results of recent history, that we're on top of it."

DALE EARNHARDT JR., NO. 8 BUDWEISER CHEVROLET MONTE CARLO:

"I felt like I could have run a little better than I did - maybe almost a tenth better. I might have messed up a little bit myself. But I went in the corner and the front of car was hopping up and down a little bit getting into the corner and I don't know whether I just drove in the corner on the bottom too low to try to turn the car too tightly around the bottom of the corner. But, I figured we'd run just a little bit better. But overall, I can't really be too disappointed. We brought a car that we don't have a lot of time on the race track in. We ran this car in the Shootout and weren't real happy with it. Tony (Eury) Jr. and Tony (Eury) Sr. and everybody at DEI just cut and grinded and beat and banged on it until they got it better and better. So I thought we'd struggle a little bit in qualifying today. Overall, I'm pretty happy. I think the driver could have done a little bit better job on his qualifying lap."

(WHAT ARE YOUR FEELINGS ABOUT DEI'S SUCCESS ON THE PLATE TRACKS?)

DALE EARNHARDT JR: "We've done nothing dominant in qualifying. I think everybody knows that Michael's car and my car will be real strong in the race. But it's really anybody's game when you come out here to qualify. Everybody had their tricks - new tricks, old tricks - nobody knows yet and what have you. The No. 21 car has obviously found something to gain a lot of speed since we ran at Daytona. Everybody learns something new over time with testing and whatever. So it's really anybody's game in qualifying. But I'm like Michael and am just glad to get a good solid starting spot so when the race starts we don't have far to go to get to the front."

(DOES DEI'S SUCCESS AFFECT OTHER TEAM'S APPROACH TO PLATE RACING?)

MICHAEL WALTRIP: "We're not necessarily dependent on each other. You saw Dale Jr. win the Daytona 500 with Tony Stewart as his partner. When I won the 500 in 2003, Dale Jr. had a problem and he wasn't anywhere around. The cars are that good where we can be successful without each other. But my goal is for us to finish one-two. That's what I want. I want his car to be right behind mind, or vice-versa. Preferably, his right behind mine.

"I never well forget this. And I usually don't reflect about things that Dale Earnhardt said. But he told me before the Daytona 500 in 2001 that he and Dale Jr. and I could win that race. He said, 'We've got to work together'. Those words really echo in my head every time we head to one of these places. We owe it to the company. We owe it to each other to do everything we can to make sure the cars are first and second whenever possible. Junior and I have had that mentality.

"But we don't ever plan anything. We just figure we're both going to wind up at the front and when we both wind up there, whoever is in front is going to support each other and help each other at that point. We don't ever figure out how were going to get there. If we're both there, we know what are responsibilities are."

(HOW WILL SUNDAY'S RACING AT TALLADEGA COMPARE TO THE SPREAD OUT RACING WE SAW AT DAYTONA?)

DALE EARNHARDT JR.: "I think it's going to be the same racing we saw here last year at the last race of the season. It'll be real similar and about the same package. It was good racing. We weren't all over the top of each other or in each other's way. Everybody was spread out. The good guys were up front and that's how it was most of the day. I don't really prefer the small fuel cell because it presents me opportunities to make mistakes on pit road. But one benefit of it is that it causes a lot more pit stops where the pit crew determines whether a guys loses or gains some time on the race track.

And that's really an interesting addition to the mix in my opinion. I just don't like coming off pit road more than I have to. But if you get lucky like we did in Daytona - don't make mistakes on a pit road and have a good day - it's going to be a good race. It seems like the group of guys we've got in the field I hope we won't get a lot of cautions - or any cautions - and we see a lot of green flag laps."

(IS DEI ADVANCING FASTER IN YOUR RESTRICTOR PLATE PROGRAM THAN THE OTHER CHEVY TEAMS?)

DALE EARNHARDT JR.: "I don't know. All three companies, and there are other Chevrolet teams out there, has great people. Everybody has the same access to the same tools and the same pieces and parts and ideas and engineering and whatnot. The only thing that we have that a lot of people don't have are individuals. Richie Gilmore and Tony Sr. and Tony Jr. and other people within our organization understand what the air does under the car and on top of the car and all different things. It seems to bring together an awesome race car. We're just in a phase and I don't know if this is something that'll always be the case, but right now we're just enjoying the opportunity to have success and such good cars."

MICHAEL WALTRIP: "The only thing I'd add is the intangible that we have with Dale Earnhardt. We prepare for these racing knowing what is expected of us and knowing of what is expected of the team in order to be successful. It's an intangible that other people don't have. In sports, there are tangibles that line up on your side, that generally makes you a more successful organization and in this case we benefit from that."

(WHAT FEEL LIKE YOU ARE EXPECTED TO WIN AT PLATE RACES?)

MICHAEL WALTRIP: "I come here expecting to win. That's my main goal."

DALE EARNHARDT JR.: "Yeah, we come here with great race cars and one of us should win the race. With as competitive as our cars are, one of us should go out there and win."

(ON KERRY EARNHARDT MAKING THE FIELD FOR SUNDAY'S RACE)

DALE EARNAHRDT JR: "I was real excited that Kerry had a good car. I knew Richard Childress would give him a great opportunity. I know Kerry is probably pretty happy right now knowing that he's going to be in the field on Sunday. Richard has been a good friend of the family even behind the scenes since 2001. He's done a lot of things for me and my sister and my grandmother and the rest of the family personally that a lot of people don't know about. This is one of those things. I'm just real glad that program met its expectations."