Dodge NNCS Teams Post-Pepsi 400 Race Recaps
Dodge Motorsports/Clear!Blue Press Release
KURT BUSCH (No. 2 Miller Lite Dodge Charger) – 3rd place
NOTE: Busch scored his second straight top five finish and third top-five finish in the past four races. He has four straight top 10s and has moved up from 19th to 13th in the series standings in those four events.
“All in all it was a good day to be able to run up front and have a good teammate like Ryan Newman to be able to draft with and be able to race with my little brother at the end. I was trying to tell him telepathically to drag the brake and slow down a little bit and maybe we could draft by Tony, but it was a solid 20 car. It was tough to pass him. We had a battery go dead halfway through the race. We had to make a pit stop, under yellow of course, and worked our way through that. We made adjustments on the car all night and to bring home our Dodge with a third-place finish, the best Dodge, that’s a great race for us. The Miller Lite team continues it momentum. I hope we get just as good a finish next week at Chicago.
WERE YOU SURPRISED THERE WASN’T A BIG ONE TONIGHT?
“With the temperatures and heat in July, the cars get spread out just a bit. There’s a lot more give and take. I think that’s a testament to the drivers. They did a great job tonight. The cars were just tight, they’re loose, they’re all over the place and people just can’t quite keep the throttle on the floor like they do in February. We were spread out a little more and I think that’s why it helped.”
COMMENT ON BORIS SAID
“I think he thought he was on a road course again tonight. He looked good out there.”
COMMENT ON THE LAST LAP
“I would have done anything that Kyle needed me to do to help him go to victory lane. He got position on me with less than 10 to go, and that’s a commitment I’d make. It takes two to pass Tony tonight, that’s for sure.”
WHAT DID YOU THINK ABOUT THE YELLOW ON THE LAST LAP?
“I heard it off turn two. At that point Kyle and I weren’t close enough to one another and far enough away from Tony to get a nice run at him. We needed a few more laps and a little bit slower 20 car if we wanted to do it. I thought the best chance for victory running third was to push the second-place car. More motivation came because my little brother was driving that second-place car. We’ll have more opportunities down the road for both of us to have a chance of winning at Daytona, which is a very prestigious title. I know with Kyle finishing second he knows what he learned tonight. I’ve finished second before, but tonight we just weren’t quite fast enough. We didn’t quite get to victory, but third place was very satisfying.”
COMMENT ON YOUR POSITION IN THE POINT STANDINGS
“It’s nice steady progress. That’s what we’re looking for, and I think that’s what we’ve found in the last few weeks, just turning that corner. A lot of things weren’t going our way in mid season. I say mid season, but the way you look at The Chase and the races you have leading up to that 26th race. We definitely feel like we’ve got things in our direction, but yet we still need some luck. There’s still plenty of time for things to go right and plenty of time for things to go wrong. We just hope that those things that go wrong are to some of the other guys.”
WHAT WERE YOU THINKING WITH 14 TO GO WHEN YOU WENT BELOW THE 48 AND 43?
“I looked up ahead and saw the 48 was side by side with the 43, but just before that it looked like he could have fallen in line. So we tried to pass him and with the big head of steam from the 38, I went to the yellow line. I was very clear of those two guys. I hate that he was in that position in the middle, but I was on the white line going around the corner with a push from behind, and I didn’t know what had happened behind me. I’m guessing Johnson got a little loose and got up into the 43. He must have felt like he was in a vulnerable spot and the car got loose underneath him.”
KASEY KAHNE (No. 9 Dodge Dealers/UAW Dodge Charger Featuring the Ask Dr. Z Paint Scheme)
“We were decent, just not great. We just didn’t have what we needed to run up front tonight.”
JEREMY MAYFIELD (No. 19 Dodge Dealers/UAW Dodge Charger Featuring the Ask Dr. Z Paint Scheme)
“The best thing we can say is that we brought Dr. Z back in one piece. There was hardly a dent in him. It’s tough on these impound races when you don’t qualify well. You don’t have any chance to fix your car so you really struggle during the race.
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CASEY MEARS (No. 42 Texaco/Havoline Dodge Charger)
“We were really tight the whole race. We could run with the pack for about 15 laps and then it was so tight we couldn’t run with them. The last time we came in they freed the car up a lot. We stayed out and got track position and that was the key. The team got it for us tonight. We wrecked our primary car, and this one was further off than we thought it was going to be. Really, Donnie made the call to stay out and got us track position and a good finish. I’m glad to we got some decent points and got back in the mix of things. Going to Chicago is a really good track for me. I hope we have a good car like we had at Michigan and get another good top 10 there.”
RYAN NEWMAN (No. 12 Alltel Dodge Charger)
“I think we had a top 10 car tonight, but we didn’t quite make it there in the end. I guess 11th place isn’t too bad, but we’ve got to step it up these next nine races if we’re going to make The Chase.”
BOBBY LABONTE (No. 43 Pillsbury/Cinnabon Dodge Charger)
“We were in single file there and they all came by. Nobody wanted to stick with me, so we went to the outside three wide and I guess we needed to move the wall a little further because I was up as high as I could go. I don’t know what happened. I knew the 48 was beside me, so I don’t know if somebody got into him or not. It was a tough break for our guys. We weren’t that fast, but the car drove good. It was fast and good and everything. We were sitting at the right place and then all that happened at the end, and it was very unfortunate. We had a good run go away from us. We had a top five car, there’s no doubt about it. If we could have made it through that stuff, but we ran good all night and now we’re sitting here in the garage. Nobody knows how tough it is out there except us, and it’s just heartbreaking.”
Dodge Post Race Interviews-Pepsi 400
That Cali race was a real snoozer.
One of the, if not the, most boring races I've ever seen!! And to think, they gave up a good track at Rockingham for it! Nascar is chasing the money not the racing with this move!
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