Sam’s Town 300 - Rookie Qualifying Quotes

BILLY PARKER, #66 DURAFLAME DODGE. Note: Parker is attempting to make his first career Busch Series start in Saturday's race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. He posted the second best time in Busch Series practice Friday morning.

DID YOU MAKE CHANGES ON THE CAR FROM PRACTICE TO QUALIFYING? "Yeah, we did. I don't know exactly what because I told the guys what the car was doing and the guys felt they could adjust some things, make it a little better, tweak on it. I don't think they hurt it. It was just wicked loose. I had to spend a lot of time off the gas to keep from spinning out. It [the track] is probably a little bit slower from practice this morning. Coming up to speed even I was loose, just all over the place. The first lap in one and two I just about spun out and then the last lap coming out of three and four it got real loose. I had to check-up, get off the gas real bad. It hurt us on our time but we'll turn it around and put it in race trim. We'll have a good car for the race, I know we will." THIS IS YOUR FIRST BUSCH SERIES START AND YOU WERE THE FIRST CAR OUT TO QUALIFY. HOW BIG OF A RELIEF IS IT TO GET PAST QUALIFYING? "It's a big relief, but when you get relief you start stepping up your goals a little higher. Now we have the same amount of pressure on us now to go out here and do good in the race. We come here to win, but realistically it would be really neat to come out here and finish on the lead lap without having a mark on the car and go home and get the cars ready to go test Texas and then go out there and have a good showing. We'll progressively work our way up and start running in the top-five, hopefully, and then be in contention to win." ARE YOU SATISFIED WITH THE LAP? "For what the car had, I thought I put it all out there. Any more and I think I would have thrown it up in the fence. It was so loose there wasn't a whole lot that you could do. I had to spend a whole lot of time off the gas. That's about all the car had."

KYLE BUSCH, #5 LOWE'S/PELLA CHEVROLET:

ARE YOU HAPPY WITH THAT LAP? "Yes and no. Overall, the run was pretty good. The Lowe's/Pella Chevrolet was awesome in practice. We made a few changes for the qualifying here and tired to loosen it up just a little bit off the corner so I could just kind of help turn it a little bit with the rear. Somehow we got it loosened up in and through the center so I don't know what we did wrong but nonetheless we had a great one and two. Three and four was just a little bit off but the thing was just so twitchy all around that it was a pretty slow lap. I wish we could have ran about a .65 or a .60, but we're pretty happy with that." ARE TURNS THREE AND FOUR RADICALLY DIFFERENT THAN ONE AND TWO? "One you can hang the car out there forever. You can hold it out and hold it out and 'Okay, we'll make the corner now.' That's kind of how you take it. Going down into three it's like I'm having to hold it out. It's not really where it's easy to hold it out. You're having to hold it out. It's like you are turning right getting in there to hold it against the wall and then you bring it back down into the corner. And turn three, it's an easy, easy, easy corner and then it tightens up right there getting towards the center of three and four so you've got to get it to go around that point without getting loose on you." HOW BIG OF A FACTOR IS THE EXTRA TRACK TIME YOU ARE GETTING HERE THIS WEEKEND? "Being able to run the Busch race first and then getting into the Nextel Cup car will definitely help me out. I wish it was reverse because we are going for the championship in the Busch car and of course Raybestos Rookie of the Year. We're going to try to compensate a little bit and see what we can run on the Busch car here and make those changes to our Cup car and get it better, too." CAN YOU TRANSFER SETUP INFO BETWEEN THE BUSCH CAR AND THE CUP CAR? "You can definitely try it. I haven't had enough experience between the two at the same racetrack. Michael Waltrip, he'll tell you that, easy. It's hard to say but they're close enough, as far as the body goes and maybe the chassis goes so you can definitely put something towards it." WHAT WOULD BE A GOOD DAY FOR YOU IN THE BUSCH CAR HERE ON SATURDAY? "We're at the top right now and I hope we can stay there all day. That would be pretty sweet. If we don't, we'll have a great starting position for the race and come Saturday, tomorrow, we'll definitely have a good run. This weekend in the Cup car, maybe we can qualify in the top-15 and maybe we can race it up there as well. We had a 14th place practice qualifying effort today [in the Cup car] so maybe we can make it a little bit better than that for the race." HOW SPECIAL WOULD IT BE TO RUN WELL HERE AT YOUR HOME TRACK? "It will definitely be great. Everybody out here wants to see me do well, I hope. There might be a few that don't, that don't care [smiles]. We're out here to do the best job that we can and the CarQuest folks are out here. They're excited about the whole deal so we definitely want to give them a good show for their first Nextel Cup sponsorship race as well."

J.J. YELEY IN THE #18 VIGORO/THE HOME DEPOT CHEVROLET WAS THE TOP RAYBESTOS® ROOKIE QUALIFIER AT LAS VEGAS. HE WILL START SEVENTH IN SATURDAY'S RACE, HIS FIRST CAREER START IN THE NASCAR BUSCH SERIES.

YOU MUST BE HAPPY WITH THAT RUN. "I'm real happy with it. We fought being loose in the all the practice and because of a blown engine and a couple of other things we didn't quite as many laps as we would have liked. We tried one qualifying run there and the car was still pretty free. We were almost out in time to get another run but they closed off the line for qualifying [practice]. We kind of guessed on it a little bit. Doug [Hewitt, crew chief] and all the guys did an awesome job. The car was comfortable. It's the most comfortable that it's been so far today. The second lap I was going to try to go a little bit quicker but fortunately I think I used up the first one." HOW DIFFERENT ARE THESE CARS VERSUS OTHER CARS THAT YOU HAVE DRIVEN? "They are totally different and I think that's what make it easy for me, being with a great team like Joe Gibbs and this organization. When I go on the racetrack the cars are always pretty close and that makes it easier to learn how to drive them. As a rookie, when you get into a car that's way off balance it's tough to get a handle on it. I'm just happy to be here and looking forward to the future." WHAT WOULD YOU LIKE TO ACCOMPLISH HERE IN THE RACE? "Realistically, I'd be really satisfied with a top-10 finish. We're shooting for a top-five. If we get a couple of those under our belt then we can go after top-threes and wins. We're going to start at a gradual pace but we definitely have a game plan." ARE YOU GOING TO BE RACING WITH THE OUTLAW SERIES HERE THIS WEEKEND? "They're here but all of my dirt racing was without a wing. I might go over and watch them but they're always the most exciting of the sprint cars to watch. It's nice to be able to go watch a dirt race whenever I can get one in." YOU ARE THE TOP QUALIFYING RAYBESTOS® ROOKIE. "I'm real happy about it. I know Billy Parker was real fast in practice. To come out and be sixth quick, I'm real happy about it." WILL YOU HAVE BUTTERFLIES BEFORE THE START OF THE RACE TOMMOROW? "It's a great opportunity for me. I don't really get nervous and a lot of people don't believe me. This is my job and when I show up I'm ready to go. I didn't get nervous at the Indianapolis 500 so I think I can stomach the once for tomorrow."

YELEY RAYBESTOS ROOKIE POST RACE PRESS CONFERENCE

TODAY WAS A GOOD DAY FOR THE JOE GIBBS TEAMS. YOU QUALIFIED SEVENTH AND YOUR TEAMMATE, MIKE BLISS, WILL START ON THE POLE. "It definitely shows that it's a team effort. We tried to learn some things from what Mike was going to do in practice. My car was extremely loose and he was fighting tight. We didn't quite get the time that we would have liked to on the racetrack. Mike made a couple of adjustments and made his car a lot better so we kind of went his way. That's the best part of being here when you've got a good teammate like Mike. He's helped me out quite a bit so much so far. The longer we run the more experience I get and hopefully I can help out his team as much as he's helping out me." HAVE YOU RACED HERE ON SOME OF THE SHORT TRACKS? 'I've actually been on my head over at the dirt track leading the race and I think I finished second or third last year at the Bull Ring. It's just a fun place to come. I've come and looked at this racetrack before and had a lot of fun at the test. I'm looking forward the race. It looks like a big wide place. I know passing is going to be tough, but so far it s a good place to start out as a Raybestos rookie."