Winn-Dixie 250 presented by PepsiCo. - Rookie Post-Race Quotes

Where the Raybestos Rookies finished at Daytona:
Hamlin 14th
Sorenson 20th
Davis 21st
Crosby 28th
Wood 29th
Edwards 36th
Jourdain Jr. 39th

RAYBESTOS® ROOKIE CONTENDER QUOTES FOR THE WINN-DIXIE 250 NASCAR BUSCH SERIES RACE AT DAYTONA INTERNATIONAL SPEEDWAY, JULY 1, 2004.

DENNY HAMLIN IN THE No. 20 ROCKWELL AUTOMATION CHEVROLET WAS THE RAYBESTOS ROOKIE OF THE RACE AT DAYTONA. Notes: Hamlin finished 14th and took top rookie honors for the second consecutive race and for the third time this season.

CHARLES BARRACLOUGH, CREW CHIEF, No. 20 ROCKWELL AUTOMATION CHEVROLET: “The car wasn’t all that great all weekend. I think we just missed it a little bit. We did what we could. There at the end we had the option to stick it on the 15-lap tires or put on a set that we really didn’t feel comfortable with. Everybody got some tires that were outdated and we made them up into one set and it came back to haunt us. You’ve just got to do the best you can every weekend. If you have bad luck or bad things to happen, you learn from them and pack up next weekend and forget about this weekend and go to Chicago and start all over.” WERE YOU SURPRISED THAT THE RACE WENT AS LONG AS IT DID BEFORE THE BIG ONE? “No, actually I had a gut feeling tonight that it was going to go pretty clean. I was surprised when that finally did come out.”

JAY GUY, CREW CHIEF, No. 47 PINE-SOL/WINN-DIXIE FORD: “It’s not really clear, it’s just one of the deals that happen at Daytona. From my vantage point it looked like the 34 car spotter cleared him to come low, but it could go either way. It’s a 50-50 deal. It looked like to me that the 34 came down, thought there was a hole there hit us and we got into the 20 and it just caused a big wreck. It’s one of those things that happen. I don’t blame LaJoie. I don’t know who is at fault. It’s kind of hard to tell. That’s just racing at Daytona. I don’t blame anybody. It’s one of those things that happen. You’re running 200 miles per hour inches apart, so what do you expect? These cars move around, they bobble, you can’t always control them and stuff happens.”

REED SORENSON, No. 41 DISCOUNT TIRE COMPANY DODGE: WHAT HAPPENED? “You can’t see out there. It’s white smoke and you are along for the ride.” IT LOOKED LIKE YOU RAN ABOUT 10TH-15TH ALL NIGHT LONG. “I guess that’s the place car that we had. We didn’t really have a decent car all night. It was wearing real bad on the right front and drove real tight all night. It was a tough night and we could have probably salvaged probably between 10th and 15th out of it and then that big wreck happened. It’s just restrictor plate racing, I guess.” YOU CAUGHT A BREAK WHEN YOU PITTED UNDER GREEN THEN THE CAUTION CAME OUT. “Somebody caused a caution there while we were leaving pit road. That was good luck and the next thing you know we’re in the wreck so it cancelled each other out.” ARE YOU GLAD TO GET AWAY FROM THE PLATE RACES? “Yeah, I’m glad this is the last one.”

KERTUS DAVIS, No. 0 RACEGIRL CHEVROLET: “We kept the fenders on it and kept in one piece. We couldn’t quite get it handling like we needed to. We mainly concentrated on solo runs here today in practice because we knew we had top race in like we did there at Talladega. With the temperature and all, the track got pretty slick. Our car was real, real tight and we kept getting it freed up and we kept inching up there. We had a little miscue in the pits. We run over the air hose and had to come in for a stop and go there at the end or I believe we would have wound up with a top-15.”

CARL EDWARDS, No. 60 CHARTER COMMUNICATIONS FORD: “Kyle Busch in the 5 car just got a little loose in the trioval and we nailed him. That’s the best car that I’ve had at a speedway since we won in our Superchips Ford truck here a couple years ago. The whole team did a great job. We were marching to the front from out 11th starting spot and Kyle Busch got sideways in the trioval. I should have known that Kyle was good enough that he wasn’t going to spin out. But instead I thought ‘He’s going to spin out and he’s going to slide up and hit the fence and I’m going to go right by him.’ Instead, he saved it. He did a great job and he came right across the track and we hit and went through the grass and tore up the fender a little bit and that just got us behind. We pitted and neglected to put fuel in the car because everyone was focused so much on the nose. We all just forgot so we had to pit earlier than the rest of the field and we went two laps down. Once you’re two laps down here, it’s all over but the crying. That last wreck, if we would have just cruised around in the back, and taken our finishing spot we wouldn’t have wrecked, but I figured we had too good of a racecar. We might as well go up to the front and help Greg Biffle or something and got caught in that wreck.” FROM WHAT YOU COULD SEE, HOW DID THE WRECK GET STARTED? “It looked like Randy LaJoie didn’t know Jon Wood was there or Jon pushed up into Randy. It’s Daytona, it’s a night race, and we’re all racing as hard as we can. I’m just glad I didn’t cause the wreck because I would have felt really bad because I was two laps down. I’ve got some new heroes tonight because I saw some guys save some cars that were pretty spectacular. Hopefully we’ll have a better night tomorrow.” ARE YOU GLAD PLATE RACING IS OVER? “No, I love this. I’m learning what not to do, that’s for sure. You can’t wreck, that’s for sure. You can’t run out of gas. It’s kind of just a crapshoot when you race these racetracks. Who knows, man? We could win the thing tomorrow. I feel real good about our team. It’s far from over.”

KIM CROSBY, No. 26 BMAR SUPPORT OUR TROOPS CHEVROLET: “I had an awesome car. I wish I could have put it in the field a little bit closer to the front, but our goal was to stay out of trouble and finish the race. This is my first race for Keith Coleman Racing and I want to thank him for the opportunity.”

MICHEL JOURDAIN JR., No. 10 ppc RACING FORD: “It’s terrible. We needed to finish so badly and I think we were doing well. We were doing everything that we needed to do. I don’t know what Kasey was thinking. I don’t know what people think sometimes. It’s just really, really disappointing for ppc racing. The guys did a fantastic job - great pit stops. The car felt like it was getting better there at the end. It’s just very, very disappointing.”