NASCAR NEXTEL CUP SERIES SAMSUNG/RADIO SHACK 500 RACE NOTES

      

 

CHEVROLET NOTES & QUOTES

NASCAR NEXTEL CUP SERIES 

SAMSUNG/RADIO SHACK 500 RACE NOTES

TEXAS MOTOR SPEEDWAY

April 4, 2004

 

JEFF GORDON, #24 DUPONT CHEVROLET - finished 3rd 

ON HIS PERFORMANCE:

"If you would have asked me how happy I would have been with a 3rd in the beginning, I would have said I'd be ecstatic.  When you've got that shock to see that win there in your grasp you really want it."

 

"I've been saying that top tens are OK, but we need to put some top fives together.  Texas is turning into a track that's pretty good for us.  It used to be the one we didn't want to come to because we'd either crashed or had some kind of problems.  Until recently it's been one of our best tracks, top five in the past four times.  This is a great way to carry some momentum and get the critics off our back a little bit.  We'll go to Martinsville and hopefully put it to these guys.  I love going there, it's a little bit different tire. We're gonna be set until we get there to do the qualifying run together and set me up front like we've done in the past."  

 

"We're a team that works hard.  We know what we are capable of.  We haven't shown the full potential lately.  It was nice to show that today.  They all know we were here.  You got to finish it all the way to the end.  We ended up coming home 3rd and I'm happy with that."

 

ON THE TRACK:

"We don't really see the type of race we really like to see here.  When you get that car up front it's amazing how it reacts.  I had a chance to have that car up front here.  What a difference it made.  The car drove unbelievably."  

 

ON HIS ALTERNATOR PROBLEMS:

"At first, I thought it was the ignition box, I flipped that and that didn't do it.  I thought it was an engine.  I ended up flipping batteries and man that thing came back to life.  Unfortunately I couldn't get to it soon enough." 

 

WHEN THE ALTERNATOR CUT OUT:

"Just figure out how far behind Dale Jr. was.  I fell right in behind him.  It was a lap and a half, maybe two laps. I was shocked actually at first when it started happening." 

 

ON A BACK UP BATTERY:

"I don't know if everyone runs a backup battery but we do.  I am very thankful we do.  Right now I'm happy to be in third.  That could have been a disaster."

 

ON THE INCIDENT WITH CASEY MEARS:

"I had a run off turn two.  He lost me.  I didn't know which way he was going cuz at first it looked like he would give me room on the outside so I started going on the outside and then he started going on the inside.  I got in the back of him.  You fight for your position extremely hard.  I had some confusion with the way he was going to go.  It looked like he was giving me a little bit of space to make a move and give me some momentum and then he changed his mind."

 

ON HIS PERFORMANCE IN TEXAS:

"I haven't had a whole lot of bad luck here lately. I'm kind of looking forward to coming back here.  When we first came here, from a crash in the front straight away running first or second, to a crash in the first lap, we've had some crazy things happen here in Texas.  The last three or four races have been phenomenal for us.  We've come close to winning here a couple of times now.  We've always have fast race cars here, we just haven't always been able to make it more than about twenty or thirty laps until about three or four years ago"

 

ON HOW CAUTIONS AFFECTED HIM LAST YEAR VS. THIS YEAR:

After Rockingham getting caught in the pits twice when the cars came out, we pretty much told ourselves right then we're not going to pit row until everyone comes. That's a great call by Robby and them guys to stretch it. The car was good at that point.  We weren't the best car but we were definitely one of them.  

We' just stayed out as long as we could until we were gonna run out of fuel."

 

"At that point I was watching the fuel gauge and it was coming.  That lap was when the caution came out and I was worried I was gonna run out of gas under caution.  Sometimes those things work for you and sometimes they don't.  But they'll never work for you if you aren't out there on the track."

 

DALE EARNHARDT JR., #8 BUDWEISER CHEVROLET - finished 4th

"We've been coming to race with good race cars since Vegas.  It's been good getting these kind of finishes even when the car ain't that good.  We didn't have a good car.  We really didn't have a whole lot going for us today.  A lot of mistakes were made on pit road.  I couldn't tell them the information they needed to get the car right.  We're really lucky to be in the top five today.  It was a good run and that's what it takes.  Just adding the points every week and try not to take away too many."

 

TONY STEWART, #20 HOME DEPOT CHEVROLET - finished 8th 

"That was one of the hardest eighth-place finishes I've ever had to work for.  We went from being really tight to being way too loose and we just kept going back and forth like that all day.  It wasn't a good day by any means but we made the best of it."

 

KEVIN HARVICK, #29 GM GOODWRENCH/ICEBREAKERS CHEVROLET - finished 13th

"It's not the best we could've done, but we'll take it.  The GM Goodwrench Chevy was tight right off the bit.  We tried sticker tires and it just killed us.  We lost a lap, then another one in the pits.  Those cautions towards the end helped get a lap back, but that's all we had.  The car was much better on scuffed tires.  That last run was probably our best."

 

"This team does a great job of not giving up and I'm proud of them for that.  This is three weeks in a row that we've fought our way out of a hole.  We just have to keep working at it."

 

JOE NEMECHEK, #01 U.S. ARMY CHEVROLET - finished 14th 

"We were running great and had a good shot at a top-five finish.  But then, all of a sudden, the car lost power.  We don't know why.  I came into the pits running third and when I left the pits the car just started to sputter and miss.  It did that for the remainder of the race and there was nothing you could do about it."

 

"The Hendrick motor guys have been making killer power all year.  The motor was also awesome today, but something happened late in the race.  The loss of power could either be electrical or in the carburetor.  We just don't know, we'll 

diagnose it this week.  But overall I feel the Army team took a big step this weekend.  Our qualifying effort was strong (fifth) and the race performance was equally as strong."

 

BOBBY LABONTE, #18 INTERSTATE BATTERIES CHEVROLET - finished 25th (from pole)

"You bet I'm disappointed.  The car was good enough to run with the leaders which we showed when we led those laps."

 

WHAT HAPPENED?

"The alternator broke, perhaps because of a shorted wire somewhere.  We lost laps changing the battery."

 

 

WITH THE POLE DID YOU THINK THIS WAS GOING TO BE YOUR CHANCE TO WIN IT HERE IN TEXAS?

 "You know, I thought that last year so you can't count your chickens before they've hatched. We've got to keep on doing it. We can't say a pole stinks, because it didn't.  But we've got to do the best we can and maybe next time something won't happen to us and we'll get the win instead of being a lapped car."

 

"It's been a great year so far but we're not as far up in the points like we want to be and doggone it we'll have to get them next week."