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Chevrolet Motorsports - Rockingham Race Quotes

Rockingham, NC

RICKY CRAVEN -41- Kodiak (3rd)

"I owe it all to the guys. This is the best group I've been around in a long time. Daytona was for real. We ran good down there and led some laps. I was concerned coming into the season. These guys have worked hard all winter long, but I was concerned about where we were. They deserve all the credit. When the car drives good, it runs good, and it drove good today.

"I've got a lot of respect for Earnhardt. He's had a great start to his season, but, believe me, if I could beat him, I sure would try. I've got plenty of time. I've got to take a few lessons, and I got some today.

"Our brakes were gone toward the end of the race. The master cylinder was leaking. Then we came in and kind of got 'em fixed, but it was killing us in the middle of the race. I just wanted to get into position to have some car under me at the end of the race. We finished third, and that's our best finish ever. It's not a win, but it's not too bad. Richmond hasn't been one of my best tracks, but we're smokin' now. We've got to prove that Daytona wasn't a fluke."

"I expect a lot of my guys, and I expect a lot out of myself. I take this serious. Nobody in the garage area takes it any more serious than I do. I'm not surprised by our success. I knew all along that the secret to this deal is how well the car works. We're becoming a good team, and we're going to stayed focused."

"It seemed like something was going on out there every lap. About the time you'd get going, something else would happen. We were good enough to stay on the lead lap. We had a couple of cautions that saved us. We kept digging, and now we've got something to build on. We didn't go but eight laps last week, and we got 400 miles in today. We're ready to go to Richmond.

"We finished sixth last year, and this car was probably a little better than last year's- but everybody else got a lot better, too. Bill Ingle really kept me calmed down today. He kept telling me to stay patient and drive hard. He told me not to get frustrated. It would have been easy to get frustrated out there today.

"We want to win races, and so does everybody else. The main thing for us right now is consistency. We want to get more top five and top ten finishes, and if we do that, we'll eventually win. We could have won today, but when you're finishing 25th, it's impossible to win. We didn't get it done today, but we'll go to Richmond and try to capitalize on this momentum."

"We started out and we were a little off on the chassis. We kept working on it and got it like it needed to be and then the slow cars started holding us up. Some of them just wouldn't get out of the way. We had a car that could have probably finished third or fourth, but we couldn't get all of those lapped cars out of the way. Some of the guys that held me up have been around awhile, and some of them haven't. It's hard to run with the leaders when you've got the same two or three cars holding you up for 20 laps."

"We guessed a little bit this morning and changed three springs and a couple of shocks. We were trying to adjust the car for what the conditions where yesterday. We were pretty close. We were off a little bit on the first set of tires, but once we adjusted a little more, we had a pretty decent car. We lost a lap early, and that hurt us. We had a lot of close calls, and my car got beat up a little bit, but it's on the truck in one piece and ready to go to Atlanta. We tried to test at Richmond, but we got snowed out and rained out. We ran our Busch car there a few laps. We're just going to have to guess up there and see what we can do."

"We cracked a cylinder head or something and it started running hot. We couldn't put any water in it. It started coming out the tailpipe. It was really a tough break. We were awful strong. The guys at Hendrick Motorsports, and it's a shame this happened two weeks in a row. We had a fantastic car. It drove great and handled great.

On all three Hendrick cars having problems: "That doesn't happen often and I'll guarantee you it won't happen very often, either. If there's any problems we'll get them solved and be ready to go next week st Richmond."

"It's hard to smile. The effort is there. These guys are working hard. I really feel for them because they don't deserve this. We're being humbled right now. We realize how well things went for us last year. This is frustrating, but we're going to bounce back. We're going to win some races this year. Now we're just looking forward to going to Richmond."

"We burned a right outer wheel bearing and then a left outer. How and why, I don't know. That's unusual stuff, but it was me driving. I started 20th, and on lap 50-something I had problems, but I could see Jeff (Gordon). We fixed it and went back out. Cars that were a half-straightaway behind us were a full straight back when we broke again."

"This kind of humbles you a bit. Two weeks in a row, I think Terry had the car to beat. Terry had a problem today, and so did Jeff and Kenny. Maybe, if we're going to have bad luck, it's good to have it now and get it out of the way. There's another race next week. That's the only way to look at it.

"We've been in position to win two weeks in a row. Terry had the dominant car here today. We had some awful good luck last year, but when it's your day to have bad luck, ther's nothing you can do to stop it. All the cars ran good at Daytona. They did the same thing here today. We just had problems. We've got motors out here in other cars that ran just fine. Pieces and parts are going to break. I've got an old saying, 'It ain't life threatening, and there's another race next week.'"

"We had been running in the top ten all day. The car was a little tight, but we were just biding our time. We got to racing with those guys. I probably should have let 'em go, but I didn't. A car blew up in front of us, I slowed up and got hit from behind. Come to think of it, that's the same car that hit me here last spring."

"We came with the same setup that we ran here last fall and felt it would get us up front. We were really confident with the car after we tested it here. We knew we were going in the right direction. When we got here, they came back with a different tire and we just didn't compensate enough. We made some adjustments during the race that seemed to help. I was able to pick off people on long runs, but cautions stopped that. Then we got caught in the pit stop-caution trap. We needed to take on new tires and made a green flag stop, then one lap later the yellow flag came out. It's frustrating, but you can't do anything about it."