Chevy Race Notes - MBNA 400 "A Salute to Heroes"

Chevy Notes & Quotes
NASCAR Nextel Cup Series
MBNA 400 "A Salute to Heroes" Race Notes
Dover International Speedway
June 6, 2004

TONY STEWART, NO. 20 THE HOME DEPOT CHEVROLET (Finished 2nd)
ON TRYING TO CATCH MARK MARTIN:  "Our car really liked to be up front in clean air.  Mark's a hungry guy.  He wants to get that first championship under his belt.  He wouldn't have let that one get away from him today."
 
ON RACING DALE EARNHARDT JR. FOR SECOND:  "The fun thing about that is you can run that close like we did.  You trust Junior.  You have a lot of faith and trust in the guy.  Him and I are good buddies.  I know he wouldn't do anything to put us any comprising positions.  He raced us hard but he raced us clean.  It made it fun at the end."
 
ON DESCRIBING THE LAST 80 LAPS:  "A circus.  It's a joke I thought."
 
ON THE OIL:  "He asked if I'd seen anything and the answer is no.  
 
DO YOU FEEL LUCKY TO MAKE IT TO THE END?  "I feel pretty lucky to get in here with second with the way this day ended up."
 
WHAT HAPPENED ON PIT ROAD?  "I just missed pit road.  I locked up the front wheels and followed the path of where I locked it up.  We've got the commitment line with those cones and I couldn't go around those cones and come on in.  We've got to be inside those cones.  I just missed it getting in and that was it.  It was just a mistake on my part trying to not to give anything up getting into pit lane."
 
DID THE MISTAKE ON PIT ROAD COST YOU THE RACE?  "It's possible.  The hindsight is always twenty-twenty.   Who knows with the accident that happened where we would have been in that pack.  Things happen for reasons.  We ended up second and we're leaving here with our heads high."  
 
DALE EARNHARDT JR., NO. 8 BUDWEISER CHEVROLET (Finished 3rd)
HIS THOUGHTS ON THE RACE:  "We had a real decent car in practice.  The race started and we were a little loose.  Tony (Stewart) went on a terror there running really good and lapped a bunch of people.  We were unfortunately one of those guys.  The rest of the race we just battled all day to get a lap back.  We'd run hard and get in front of all the guys a lap down, and Tony shoots out there and laps somebody else and they'd get the lucky dog.  We had a top ten car most of the middle part of the race.  Then we improved it even better.   I'm glad we was able to finish because I felt like the car was better than it was showing all day.  There's was a lot crashes and a lot of confusion."  
 
"In the past, I'd be shouting over the radio voicing my opinion.  Today we just sat there and let it sort itself out.  I felt like I like got shorted a lap somewhere one time.  We ended up coming out even at the end so I felt good about the finish.   It's good to get a lot of points gained on some guys.  It's a good finish for us and the Budweiser team."
 
DID YOU THINK YOU HAD A CAR CAPABLE OF BEATING TONY STEWART?  "I was able to get up under him.  We put three sets of tires on there with fifty laps to go trying to put ourselves in the best position to get as many spots as we could.   That last set of tires was a little bit loose.  I could get under him but I couldn't make it stick.  I didn't want to get into him.  Anybody else I might run him a little different.  Me and Tony are pretty good buddies.  I give him the benefit of the doubt.  I don't want to hit him and he didn't want to hit me.  I had a good finish to be real happy about too.  I'd like to have a few more laps to try it a couple of times but who's to say I'd been able to get back."
 
DID YOU SEE THE OIL AND SHOULD A CAUTION HAVE COME OUT?  "The caution did eventually come out.   NASCAR doesn't want to throw a rash of cautions every time somebody has a body. He went in the corner and blew the motor up high.  I saw the guy blow the motor, but I didn't see oil layed down on the race track.  I just went where he wasn't.  I don't know why the other guys went up in the corners as high as they did because the oil was way up high.  I went around the bottom and didn't hit anything.  I never saw oil on the race track until we slowed down.  When the car is going at that speed the oil dissipates and it's harder to see on the race track."
 
IS THERE ANYTHING NASCAR CAN OR SHOULD DO AFTER THE SITUATION WITH CARL EDWARDS AND RYAN NEWMAN?
"Who would have guessed the leader would have spun out.  I don't think there was a question on where Ryan was supposed to be.  They were going to handle that situation.  I think they were more concerned about who it cost a lap because everybody was out of sequence.  I came in to pit one lap down.  The No. 9 and No. 19 go by me and put me two laps down.  They pit in their stalls.  I pull out onto the race track under green flag, I'm now still one lap down and those two guys are the leaders.  When they threw the caution they said I was two laps down because Ryan was still out in front of us.  It was real confusing.  They were saying I was two laps down but I thought I was one lap down.  We weren't going to argue when they were giving them back.  I learned this year to keep my mouth shut on the radio when you have a different opinion about NASCAR's opinion.  It's a mistake to voice your own opinion over your radio when NASCAR is sorting it out.  They have a lot of people up there trying to help them and a lot people with a lot of different opinions already in that booth up there trying to help them figure it out.  They don't need every driver and every crew chief banging on every officials shoulder on pit road.  I don't think it's a creditability issue or a problem or a crisis or anything like that.  It was an odd situation.  It rarely ever happens.  NASCAR did what they did.  We got the finish we did and we'll go to Pocono."
 
ON OVER HALF OF THE RACE BEING UNDER YELLOW OR RED:  "I'm sure there a lot of guys that are disappointed about the way they finished or what happened to them.  You've got one guy sitting here that's real happy about where he finished.  I didn't have a problem.  I thought the race was pretty cool.  There were cautions for a reason.  It wasn't like they were dropping the flag on the race track every time.  If you don't think you enjoy the race, don't buy a ticket next year."
 
IF YOU ARE A CONTENDER FOR THE CHAMPIONSHIP, WOULD YOU LOOK BACK AND CONSIDER YOURSELF LUCKY FOR THIS FINISH?  "It seems to be happening to us a lot.  Last week in Charlotte we were running tenth struggling for a top ten and ended up getting a sixth place finish and we're real fortunate to get it.  Just like today for the first half of the race, none of the breaks fell our way.  In the end all the breaks went for us.  I'm not going to complain.  There's a such thing as bad luck and good luck.  You have control of your own fate to a certain extent.  You got to get some breaks here and there and we got a lot of them today."
 
WILL THESE BREAKS HELP IN THE POINTS CHASE?
"This is definitely a good day for us to gain so many points on those guys.  The No. 48 was looking like he was going to win the race.  We gained a big chunk on him.  It sucks, because there's was nothing he could do about his situation.  He got drove into a wreck.  It wasn't like we got our there and outran him.  It's kind of frustrating at one point because Tony Jr. wants the car to be better and I want the car to be better.  We got it pretty good at the end.  If those guys didn't have the wreck I don't know if we would have had good enough track position to get top five.  I doubt it.  The chips fell like they did today and we dodged the bullets."  
 
WILL YOU LOOK FORWARD TO COMING BACK TO DOVER?
"Our car has got to be a lot better here at the start of the race.  My car bounces around so much on the concrete.  We got to get the shocks a little bit smoother.  We got to get our set up a little better and a little smoother where I can get a hold of the race track better so I can be more competitive here.  Then I'll be looking forward to it a little more than I am."
 
ON MARK MARTIN'S WIN:
"He did a great job today.  He's one of the pure racers out there.  He doesn't care about fame or money, nothing but racing and running good.  There's relatively not too many in the sport behind the wheel like him.  It's awesome.  It's great to see him win today.  I don't know what it is about driver.  They kind of lose their edge.  He hasn't lost his.  It's good to see and promising for everybody else.  I'll be in my 30s shortly.  You start to think about how many years you have left. He's in great shape too.  He did a great job by the whole team.
 
DOES IT SEEM LIKE CAUTION PERIODS ARE GETTING LONGER AND SLOWING DOWN RACES?
"Cautions are cautions.  Due to the rule changes they've made, the cautions have been lengthened.  There's no way around it.  Today we had a pretty messy race track for the last half of the race track.  NASCAR is trying as hard as they can to get things cleaned up.  With the recent incidents we had with corner workers and guys getting injured and the fatal injury in Daytona, it caused everyone to take their time a little more and make sure it's done right under caution.  We don't want anybody to get hurt.  I don't think anyone says a word today if we didn't have that 25 lap caution.  That's the way it always works out there.  I'm fortunate we had so many cautions.  That's what the sports about.  It's drama.  It's exciting in the seat when you are out there dodging guys, spinning around, crashing and sparks flying, dust everywhere. It's wild.  I had a great seat. It's unfortunate some people don't have the same opinion."
 
SCOTT RIGGS, NO. 10 VALVOLINE CHEVROLET (Finished 5th and Best Rookie)
ON BEING TOP ROOKIE AND HIS BEST FINISH YET:  "We still didn't have the car we needed to be competitive like we needed to be.  It seemed like the last couple of races as soon as the green flag drops it takes us about a third of the race to get our car dialed in.  The same thing happened today.  We fell back and got a lap down and kept making the car better.  We happened to be in the right place at the right time through all those wrecks.  We didn't pit there with those green cycle pit stops.  We stayed out as long as we could.  We stayed out and got a break there and got one of our laps back.  Then we got the lucky dog at the end and got back on the lead lap and had a decent finish.  The big thing was staying out of the wrecks and missing all the melee through three and four." 
 
HAVE YOU SEEN AS WILD AS THE LAST 80 LAPS?  "I've seen massive crashes like that.  Most time it was short track back home where everybody is driving over the top of their head and wrecking each other.  That's what it felt like out there and sort of tip-toe when everybody is two-wide, beating and banging.  I was wondering what was taking so long.  I think they should of stopped it and given us some more laps and figured out where they were going to put the No. 12.  It's a pretty unfortunate situation for the leader to cause the caution.  I'm sure it's a pretty complex situation the way the rules are."
 
"We can go back out there and run twenty more laps and it's fine with me.  I'm sure it was pretty confusing to figure out what's going to happen.  It's better for them to take their time now than it was to do something like what happened to Carl Edwards and say sorry we messed up."
 
DID YOU THINK YOU HAD A SHOT AT THE LUCKY DOG AT THE SECOND FROM LAST YELLOW FLAG:  "I didn't know if we'd have another caution.  The way it was going I didn't want to be in the front.  It seemed like whoever was leading was going to have some bad luck and have the car tore up.  I just didn't have the car to be able to hold him off.  Dale Jr. was able to get by.   As soon as he got by they had debris.  He had a chance to get back on the lead lap.  We were fortunate enough to have another caution later on and get ourselves back on the lead lap.  I'm not complaining about it for sure."  


HOW BAD DID YOU NEED THAT FINISH?  "Team wise we needed a finish that bad about as bad as anything else.  We've been struggling awful hard all year and it's not because of lack of effort on anybody's part.  There's a lot of new guys on the team.  I'm a rookie myself.  These new tires and these Cup cars are a lot different that the Busch cars were.  It's taking a lot time to figure out what the car needs to feel like to be competitive.  It seems like we have so many variables that change the way the race track is and the way the race car is from the time we leave Happy Hour to the time we drop the green lap.  That's the thing we've been missing.  We did the same thing today.  We're still striving to be better."
 
MICHAEL WALTRIP, NO. 15 NAPA CHEVROLET (Finished 6th)
"The car's been running real good lately.  That's our fourth top ten finish in a row.  We've done a nice job of getting the car tuned.  I'm real pleased with what we're doing and going to Pocono."
 
 
KEVIN HARVICK, NO. 29 GM GOODWRENCH CHEVROLET (Finished 10th)
"I don't believe all this.  I've seen a lot throughout my career, but I've never seen so much stuff torn up before.  Maybe Talladega or Daytona, but not some place like here.  It's hard not to laugh, but it's kind of funny."
 
"Our car was good especially there towards the end.  It just took a few extra laps to get going and that hurt me with as many of those late cautions.  I'm proud of the GM Goodwrench guys for sticking with it.  We'll definitely take tenth.  That will help us in the points and we didn't have to do much at the end, we just finished the race.  This has got to be one of the longest days I have ever spent in Dover and I thought yesterday was long.  It's going to be a race to remember."
 
BRIAN VICKERS, NO. 25 GMAC CHEVROLET (Finished 23rd)
ARE YOU OK?  "I'm fine, I appreciate that.  The GMAC Chevy team put down a good job all day.  We got the car a lot better there at the end.  We got our five points for leading early on.  We were on our way to a top five.  Somebody blew up or was riding around the groove putting oil down.   A couple of us ended up getting into it.  You're going to have that.  It would have been nice to have those soft walls though, I can tell you that.  That was a hard hit.  Hopefully they'll be coming soon.  Thanks for all the fans coming out and enjoy the rest of the race."
 
JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 LOWE'S CHEVROLET (Finished 32nd)
"People need to use their heads and race smart.  They're three, four, five laps down and they're racing like they're racing for the win."
 
CHAD KNAUS, CHEW CHIEF FOR THE NO. 48 LOWE'S CHEVROLET
"No. 15 (Michael Waltrip) checked up a little bit for some reason going into (turn) three or the No. 23 (Dave Blaney) just got a good run on him.  No. 23 drove up into him.  It all happened from there.  I don't know what was going on behind us but obviously the people behind us didn't have spotters and didn't say 'spinning in front of ya.'  We just drove into the middle of it." 
 
HOW MUCH OF THAT DO YOU THINK HAD TO DO WITH THE CHAOS 20 LAPS PRIOR TO THAT?  "Chaos is brought in by people not paying attention to what's going on around them."
 
JEFF GORDON, NO. 24 DUPONT CHEVROLET  (Finished 36th)
"I was just so tight and trying to get the car to turn.  I was doing everything I could - using the brakes, getting the high line, the bottom line.  It didn't surprise me that it blew."
 
"It blew the right front tire.  I was really tight.  I was afraid it was going to go.  I'm kind of surprised it held on that long."
 
ON THE TRACK CONDITIONS:  "The track is good.  It's got a couple different grooves.  It really tightened up a lot."
 
ARE YOU DISAPPOINTED TO NOT DO WELL AT DOVER?  "We'll be able to continue.  That's more disappointing than anything else.  We didn't need this.  It's certainly not going in our direction right now.  We got to make sure we get some good finishes.  We're taking a big hit in the points right now.  We had a great car."
 
ON THE SOFTER WALLS:  "I'm very disappointed.  I don't understand why they don't have them here.  Of course you say that after you hit 'em.  Thank goodness for my seat.  These guys do an awesome job with the seat.  That thing held up beautifully.  As hard as I hit for as slow as I was going, I think they need to put that on the priority list here."
 
ON TODAY'S RACING:  "This is a tough place.  Track position is hard to get.  We fight almost harder for track position here than anywhere else because of pit road.  Pit road is so narrow and small.  I was having to battle with the No. 9 (Kasey Kahne) and the No. 97 (Kurt Busch) really hard because I needed to be ahead of those guys especially the No. 9 to get in to my pit stall."
 
JOE NEMECHEK, NO. 01 U.S. ARMY CHEVROLET (Finished 38th)
"It's just one of those racing deals.  We're trying to go as fast as we can go.  The car was a little bit tight.  I was trying to keep the bottom.  I knew Terry (Labonte) was coming on the outside.   It pushed up off of turn four really bad and I had to come up out of the gas.  He just got in the back of me.  It's just unfortunate.  We've had some really good cars over the past few weeks but we haven't been able to take advantage of it."
 
"Terry and I are good friends.  It's just one of those deals.  My car was really tight.  I had to run right on the bottom to make the car work.  At that point in time, I just saw him in the mirror coming on the outside.  I tried giving him that groove but my car pushed.  When it pushed up I had to come out of the gas to keep from hitting the wall.  He just got in the back of me.  Stuff happens here.  It seems like the way the tires are wearing, if you get up out of the groove, you almost spin out.  It's incredible.  Everyone's trying to run right on the bottom.  Tony Stewart is setting a heck of a pace.  You try to go as best you can."
 
IS THE TRACK GREEN?  "It's wearing tires.  It's doing all the same things its always done before.  Everybody is racing pretty hard today.  It's kind of tough to see what's going on out there.  There's not a lot of give and take today.  Everybody's gouging for that bottom groove."
 
ON GREG BIFFLE GETTING INTO THE NO. 38:  "It's typical turn four.  If your car pushes up off to keep from hitting the wall, you've got to check up out of the gas. It's just one of those things.  My car didn't hook as good as it did in the past.  I had to let off the gas and stuff happens."