dodge charger driver quotes from bristol qualifying

April 1, 2005
Bristol Motor Speedway
Food City 500 Qualifying.


 

RUSTY WALLACE (No. 2 Miller Lite Dodge Charger) - Qualified Third

"I feel good about it. That was a good qualifying run. We ran an .08 in
practice and that was a .10. We backed up just a little bit, but Elliott
Sadler and Dave Blaney had real good qualifying laps. I congratulate
both of them with runs that strong. That's a good starting position.
It's an inside row, and that's a great starting place here at Bristol,
good pit selections and all that stuff. I feel real good about my car.
We had a real good test, although when we came back for practice we
changed a lot. The track got a lot tighter and we did a lot of
adjusting. It's a new car and it's driving great. I'm real confident and
I'm ready for Sunday's race. Any time you qualify in the top three with
all the great drivers they've got these days you've got to feel good.

 

"I've got a little more step in me when we come to Bristol. There's no
doubt about that. When I was first and beat Gordon just a little bit I
thought I could hold on to it, I really did. I can't be complaining
about third.

 

"I think the Dodge has been a great car all year long. The body rules
are so equal right now. The downforce is almost identical. I believe the
engines and horsepower are similar. I don't think you can say this car
or that car is better in this sport nowadays. I think it's the teams and
coincidences that happen.

 

"I think the key is a lot of guys can run real fast at all racetracks,
but I think the ones that are more accustomed to winning at short tracks
know what they need their car to do. It's not how fast it runs. In order
to pass cars and make it handle right you're going to have to get your
car to maneuver on certain spots of the racetrack. A lot of times I just
work in certain corners, knowing that's where I've got to pass a car. If
I can't get the car to do what I need it to do in this part of the
corner, I'm not successful even if I run a fast lap. I just work real
hard making my car do what I need it to do on a certain part of the
racetrack. Bristol and the road courses and Richmond and Martinsville
are tracks where I try to get my car to do that.

 

"I absolutely do (see myself qualifying for The Chase). I understand why
they think that based on last year's points and what happened, but I
know what happened last year and how our car is running this year. I
expect myself to be in the top five, top eight at least. I feel that
good about our cars. That's a disturbing statement you just said, but
hopefully we can change some people's minds. A lot of people have a lot
of opinions.

 

"It's the racing (here), the real side by side action, the bumping and
banging and 160,000 people lined up around this racetrack and the bowl
effect the way this racetrack is aligned. Everybody can look down at it
and see it. A lot of tracks you can't see the back straightaway, you
can't see this corner or that corner. Everything is obstructed, but you
can basically see everything around this track. The design of the track
makes it so unique. The noise it creates, the thunder, the excitement
and as fast as you're running a half mile and all those people.... All
those things are definitely what make it that exciting. No other track
can come close to that except maybe Richmond. Richmond creates that same
kind of bowl effect. The cars are down, the grandstands are up and the
people get good visual effects and really enjoy it.

 

"Once I started the Busch team I own, this time off people have on
Saturdays, I'm unable to use that. I'm at the track every week. I'll be
here tomorrow at 11:30 watching the Busch car qualify, and then I'll
watch the race and after the race I'm going to fly down to Greensville,
S.C., and watch Stephen run in the Hooter's Cup race. He's real prepared
for that race, and that's what I've got my eye on this year. When I put
him in the second Busch car and ARCA car this year, he'll be ready, but
I'm not going to have many Saturdays off this year. I hear people firing
their airplanes up and going home and coming back. I don't much
understand why they do that. They're going to get caught in fog and not
get back one Sunday. That'll make 'em nervous.

 

"To tell you the truth I didn't know he (Carl Edwards) wrecked. I was in
the truck watching on TV eating a piece of pizza. He's a good driver.
He's got a good team. The bad thing about that is you get a bad pit
selection. Starting in the back if you've got a good pit selection here
at Bristol it's not a big deal. He's a quality driver and he's been
doing real well all year long. I think with the persistence he has,
he'll be fine.

 

"I was rejuvenated. I was just trying to get that car to do what I
wanted it to do. I feel good about it. We've got great cars all year
long. Travis and I are working well together, sharing a lot of setups.
The test we had here went good for us. The track tightened up when we
got back, and we couldn't do some of the things we learned in the test.
I wasn't ready for Atlanta, but we ran good in California and we ran
good at Daytona and obviously we ran good here today. We're going to
test at Texas. That's another fast track, and I don't want to get myself
in trouble like I did in Atlanta. I think all the early testing
established what the spoiler and tires needed."

 

CASEY MEARS (No. 41 Target Dodge Charger)

"We got held up both times in practice. We should have run a lot faster,
but it was really slick and loose compared to the way it was in
practice. It was totally different."

 

RYAN NEWMAN (No. 12 ALLTEL Dodge Charger)

"We got better. Jeremy was third in practice and we tied him. We made
some improvements. We were struggling for some time in practice. I
wouldn't say I'm satisfied with it, but we were better. I didn't think
it would be the time to beat. I knew the 2 and 24 had shots at beating
it."

 

JEREMY MAYFIELD (No. 19 Dodge Dealers/UAW Dodge Charger)

"The car was great all day. I got pretty loose I just stayed in the gas
and I got pretty loose. I think the track slowed up a little bit, but
that was a good run for us. It's pretty awesome that we ran the exact
same time as Newman. We'll get a good spot, and I think we'll be good in
the race."

 

KYLE PETTY (No. 45 Georgia-Pacific/Brawny Dodge Charger)

"That was OK. We were good while it was hot. Now it's cold and loose. I
just didn't have any grip, but that's OK."

 

KASEY KAHNE (No. 9 Dodge Dealers/UAW Dodge Charger)

"We were pretty loose. I think if we could have tightened it up we would
have been a little better. We were a little bit loose in practice. I
think we're good enough for the top 15, but not the top five."

 

JEFF GREEN (No. 43 Cheerios/Betty Crocker Dodge Charger)

"The first lap I locked the brakes up getting into turn one. I had been
driving the Busch car and I had to push the brakes real hard to get it
to stop. I was off on the brakes a little bit. We made up for that lap.
It might have helped us a little bit going later here. I think the car
will be better in the race than it was in qualifying. I'm a little
surprised we qualified that fast, but I put my foot in it and it stuck
real well. Kyle going earlier gave us some different things to do with
tire pressure. This is a lot better start than the last few times I've
been here, and it should give us a better race. Hopefully it'll help us
stay out of some of the messes."

 

STERLING MARLIN (No. 40 Coors Light Dodge Charger)

"We picked up, but it was a little bit too loose to stay with it. I
didn't know how we'd stack up, but it turned out all right I guess."

 

 

JAMIE McMURRAY (No. 42 Texaco/Havoline Autism Society of America Dodge
Charger)

"I'm a little disappointed, but the car felt really good. We've always
run pretty well in the race here, so we'll see how we stack up on
Sunday."

 

TRAVIS KVAPIL (No. 77 Kodak/Jasper Dodge Charger)

"We thought we had a top 10 car after practice. I'm really excited. We
made some changes to make the car better for the race after qualifying.
I thought it might hurt us a little bit in qualifying, but we ran really
fast and we picked up a little bit. I'm tickled. I think we're going to
have a great car on Sunday, too."