Chevy driver Jeff Gordon wins his first race of season in Bristol

CHEVROLET/TEAM MONTE CARLO NOTES AND QUOTES
SHARPIE 500
BRISTOL MOTOR SPEEDWAY
ROUND 24 OF 36
NASCAR WINSTON CUP SERIES
SATURDAY, AUG. 24, 2002


CHEVY MONTE CARLO DRIVER JEFF GORDON WINS HIS FIRST RACE OF SEASON

KEVIN HARVICK, NO. 29 GM GOODWRENCH CHEVY MONTE CARLO (fourth):
"Congratulations to Jeff Gordon. I¹m glad to see him get his win streak
broken. I know how he feels when people are talking about things that don¹t
mean anything. You can¹t keep people like that down long. Good night for the
GM Goodwrench team. We gave ourselves a chance to win and came up a little
bit short."

"It just started getting tight in the middle; I had to use a lot of brake
getting into the corner and I couldn¹t leave the throttle down like I could
early in that run. This GM Goodwrench team had a good night all night long.
We kept ourselves out of trouble and came away with a top five. That¹s what
we came here for." HOW DIFFICULT WAS IT TO COME THROUGH THE PACK TO THE
FRONT? "We were calm and relaxed and just kind of took our time and picked
them off as we could, we kept the front fenders on the car. We just got a
little bit tight there at the end and loose up off the corners. We gave
ourselves a shot to win, we put ourselves in position and that¹s all you can
ask for. The GM Goodwrench guys did a good job all night long and we¹re
going to Darlington." ABOUT THE LAST SEVEN RACES: "It¹s a lot of fun when
you¹re running like we are and my hats off to Gil Martin and all these guys.
They¹re keeping me calm and keeping me cool." ARE YOU STOKED? "We¹re real
proud of our track record at Bristol and we just have to keep going."

DALE EARNHARDT JR., NO. 8 BUDWEISER CHEVY MONTE CARLO (third): "We did all
right. We really stepped up communications between me and Tony (Eury) Jr.
Everybody just seems to be feeding off each other. We really get along real
well. The last couple of weeks we just bore down as a team. I tell you what,
it¹s hard racing to stay after it. We had a good car; better than I thought
it was; I¹m real happy." WHAT HAPPENED WITH WARD BURTON: "I kind of got
under him. I feel like I was underneath him going into 3 and he just came
down the track to get his position a little more abruptly than I had
anticipated. I hate I spun him out; I didn¹t mean to. Of course I don¹t want
to do that. I checked up but he came down so fast that it was just barely a
little bit of a tap."

JEFF GORDON, NO. 24 DUPONT CHEVY MONTE CARLO (winner; first win of season):
ON RACE WITH RUSTY WALLACE: "He had a good car there at the end and he was
ahead of me. He was going to be the guy I had to pass. So I just tried to
follow his lead (and) every time he made a pass I tried to stick my nose in
there and get up to the front. I couldn¹t believe when we got by Harvick it
was just the two of us. I¹d say, Oh, here we go, all over again, but at
night. This is going to be wild." IS THIS A BIG RELIEF? "It¹s a huge relief.
These guys just work too hard and I¹m not saying that they have to have a
win, they certainly have deserved one in their efforts all year long and
have worked as hard as anybody else out there. Unfortunately all the things
just hadn¹t fallen into place. Thank goodness it did tonight."

ROBBY GORDON, NO. 31 CINGULAR WIRELESS CHEVY MONTE CARLO (20th): TOUGH
EVENING; TAPPED JIMMIE JOHNSON, GOT TWO-LAP PENALTY: "I didn¹t mean to do
it. I think when he went to make a gear shift I got into the back of him.
The biggest thing is Jimmie could have prevented the whole thing. Normally
the guys who are two laps down pull behind the guys that are one lap down to
give them an opportunity to get their lap back first. That¹s kind of common
courtesy. NASCARŠto be honest with you, I think it¹s a little bit two-sided.
I didn¹t see Bobby Hamilton get a two-lap penalty when he turned me early in
the race. I didn¹t see Dale Jr. get a two-lap penalty, so why did I get
one?" TYPICAL BRISTOL? "I¹m disappointed. We had a good car all night and
should¹ve finished on the lead lap, should¹ve finished in the top five and
they gave me a two-lap penalty. I think it¹s really b.s. I¹m disappointed
that they did that. I haven¹t seen that done in a long time. There¹s a lot
of other guys that wrecked guys. I got spun out early in the race by Bobby
Hamilton, I saw Junior spin out the 22 car. How many other guys spun out
guys and none of those guys got two-lap penalties? I don¹t get it. I think
they should have looked at the deal and really concentrated and thought
about it really hard because Jimmie Johnson was two laps down at that point
and he could have prevented the whole thing by getting out of the way and
having common courtesy to do that. I know Jimmie¹s in a points championship
race. I¹m disappointed that he had to go laps down. Jimmie¹s a friend of
mine. I know he¹s going to have other things to say about it and be really
disappointed with me, but it is racing at Bristol. We had an opportunity to
get our lap back and I didn¹t mean to turn Jimmie and it is what it is."

MORE FROM EARNHARDT AND HARVICK:

DALE EARNHARDT, JR., NO. 8 BUDWEISER CHEVY MONTE CARLO: "Yeah, it was a
great finish for us. Finally kind of getting the hang of this place."

KEVIN HARVICK: "We gave ourselves a shot to win. We came in about 15 laps
before those guys did. I¹m glad to see tires making a difference in Winston
Cup racing. Everybody should have to come in and put on four tires.
Sometimes you benefit from the strategy, but a lot of times you don¹t."

JEFF GREEN, NO. 30 AMERICA ONLINE CHEVY MONTE CARLO, crashed into No. 32 on
the 315th lap, resulting in heavy front-end damage. The No. 29 crew was
helping make repairs. Green went back into the race, finished 35th.

"I couldn¹t tell you what happened. The 32 was like he just stopped. There
were a couple of cars between me and him and I couldn¹t see him until the
last minute. Run all over him before I could get stopped. There was a car
inside of me so I couldn¹t go left. The only thing I could do was hit him.
We weren¹t real good, but we weren¹t real bad. We just made a few
adjustments and we only made one stop there. We screwed it up on the pit
stop. I guess it¹s a night at Bristol." CAN IT BE FIXED? "I think so, if it
didn¹t hurt the motor. We could surely get back out there, but that¹s not
what we¹re looking for." THE NO. 29 RCR TEAM IS HELPING: "We got a team
effort. These guys work on all three cars in the shop and that¹s how they
feel about it here at the race track too. That¹s what it¹s all about."

JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 LOWE'S CHEVY MONTE CARLO (crashed on the restart on
lap 376, after being tapped by Robby Gordon: "He had me turned sideways
before we even took the green; I didn't even have a chance to grab a gear. I
guess he's a lap down and he thought he deserved to restart in front of me
because I was two laps down. He beat my bumper cover off with two to go
trying to get by and I wouldn't let him by; so when we came to take the
green he just had me sideways before we even took the green. He was trying
to blame it on me missing a shift and it's just him never using his head."

POST-RACE PRESS CONFERENCE WITH TOP THREE FINISHERS:

DALE EARNHARDT JR.: "I was trying to keep it about as uneventful as I could.
Staying up front was real good for us to stay out of trouble. Really didn¹t
race too many people real hard. Kind of let Jeff get up there. I wasn¹t real
good or didn¹t feel that confident about lapping cars so I let somebody get
up there and let them lap cars for me. Kind of sat behind Jeff there for
awhile and just waited. I felt, sitting about 14th with 100 to go and I
didn¹t feel like we were going to get a shot at the win,, and we just kind
of came right up through there, just followed that 24 and the 2 right to the
front, passed all them cars. I¹m real, real happy about how we finished,
real happy."

WHAT WAS THE DEAL WITH 22 CAR AND WHAT WERE YOU THINKING WHEN YOU SAW HIM
STANDING ON THE TRACK? "I was real disappointed that happened. I don¹t
really keep it no secret when I wreck somebody. I don¹t do it that often.
Hopefully for sure Ward knows that that wasn¹t intentional. I kind of got a
run up on him off of 2 and he made a real abrupt entry going into 3 and I
checked up; I couldn¹t get out from under him, keep from spinning him out. I
tried slamming on the brakes, did everything I could to keep from spinning
him out. What else am I supposed to do? Of course, he showed his emotions
there, real colorful. I didn¹t mind. I was disappointed that he didn¹t get
whatever he threw into the car Œcause I¹d like to have seen what it was.
It¹s disappointing. I like Ward and we don¹t really talk that much. Of
course, I don¹t talk to too many drivers. I never had no problem with him. I
just hope he can kind of see a little bit of my side of it."

HOW MUCH OF A CONFIDENCE BOOST HAS THE PAST COUPLE WEEKS BEEN FOR YOUR TEAM?
"We¹ve had a real disappointing middle part of the season; a little bit
larger than the middle part. It¹s good to come back and run good. Of course
it is. We¹ve got, let¹s see, two top 10s now in the last two weeks; that¹s
maybe eight for the year. I¹m pretty happy. Hey, it¹s hard work. We had to
kind of bear down a little bit harder to try to do better and it¹s taken a
lot out of me. And taken a lot out of my team. We¹ll take tomorrow off.
Thank God we got Sunday off. They¹re smart enough to put lights around this
place so we can run on Saturdays. And hopefully get a little rest. I¹m real
excited about just trying to do this every week. It takes a lot of luck,
takes a good race car, takes a good driver and a good team. And hopefully,
as hard as we¹re working, we¹ll get all them things at the same time every
week and have good runs like this. I¹m just real proud of my team. Me and
Tony (Eury) Jr. really ain¹t never got along this good since the Busch days.
When you do good you don¹t have that many problems. But we still know we¹ve
got problems and we¹re trying to solve them."