Cracker Barrel 500
Atlanta Motor Speedway

Elliott Recovers for a Top-Ten at Atlanta
March 12, 2000 - You can knock Bill Elliott and the Drive-Thru Crew down but you can't knock 'em out! Elliott and crew overcame early adversity to finish tenth in the Cracker Barrel 500 at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

Elliott started the event in the tenth position and the McDonald's Ford was running well. Elliott eventually worked his way into the top five, looking very strong in the process.

Then came a very questionable call, during yellow-flag pit stops, the crew opted to change only right-side tires. With Elliott running in the top five, this move for two tires couldn't have been for track position, nonetheless, it was the call. With the fast two-tire stop, Elliott was leaving his pit just as Scott Pruett was trying to enter his. The two cars collided and caused damage to the right-front fender of Elliott's machine.

Elliott would be first out of the pits, but with the aerodynamics of the 94 Taurus messed up and only two fresh tires, he was a sitting duck. Elliott quickly dropped back into the field, hoping for a caution.

The caution flag eventually came and gave the crew an opportuninty to repair the damage on the 94. Elliott would have to pit twice under the yellow in order to complete all of the work.

Now Elliott found himself as the last car on the lead lap, with the majority of the field ahead of him. Elliott then fought a loose condition and lost a lap to leader Mike Skinner. The crew got the car tightened up and Elliott picked his way back into the top ten, running as high as eighth.

"I wasn't as good as the 3 and the 31," said Elliott. "I was pretty good there at the first and I drove out when a car coming in on pit road knocked the front fender off of it. Boy, we fought it the rest of the day. We got in the back and just never could overcome that. I got really bad loose there in one section and finally got the thing tightened up, we just need a little bit more. We'll keep digging at it. These cars are so temperamental, I mean it don't take anything to mess them up aerodynamically. We'll give it our best shot and see what happens next week."

"I was totally amazed. The guys never gave up and that's what we keep trying to strive for. After we had the problem I said, 'Boy, I'll be lucky if I get in the top 15' and to be in the top 10 that was pretty amazing."

"I'm having a lot of fun. The first part of the race was really a lot of fun, but the last part was a little bit less. Still, it was a good day."

With Elliott's tenth place finish, he now sits fourth in the Winston Cup point standings with 552 points, 113 points behind point leader Bobby Labonte.

Elliott Qualifying Quotes
"I wish we would have gotten a little more out of it, but I'm very pleased. It's hard to out-guess what the weather's gonna do today and we just want to get a good, solid run in and see where we end up. There are a lot of good cars left to go and we'll just hope for the best."