Sam's Town 300 - Rookie Qualifying Quotes

Where the Raybestos Rookie qualified at Las Vegas:
C. Edwards, POLE!!!!
R. Sorenson, 7th
P. Wolfe, 15th
D. Hamlin, 18th
J. Wood, 22nd
M. Jourdain, 31st
B. Sherman, 35th
K. Davis, 39th
R. Hemphill, 43rd
K. Crosby, 51st

RAYBESTOS® ROOKIE CONTENDER QUALIFYING QUOTES FOR THE SAM’S TOWN 300 NASCAR BUSCH SERIES RACE AT LAS VEGAS MOTOR SPEEDWAY, MARCH 11, 2005.

CARL EDWARDS IN THE No. 60 CHARTER COMMUNICATIONS FORD WON THE BUSCH POLE FOR THE SAM’S TOWN 300. Notes: Edwards won his first pole in his sixth career start. He is the first Raybestos Rookie to win a pole position at Las Vegas. The previous best qualifying effort by a freshman driver was Shane Hmiel, who started second in 2002. Edwards' previous best start came just one week ago at Mexico City where he grabbed the 9th starting position. HOW WAS THE LAP? “That was pretty amazing considering practice was terrible. We kind of took a stab in the dark. Brad [Parrott, crew chief] changed just about everything on the car and the guys did a great job. They kept their heads up just like they did last week with the backup car. I just feel like this is a good solid championship effort and if we end up in the top three or four here in qualifying I’ll be really happy. We went out 10th and the sun was still shining.” COULD YOU TELL A BIG DIFFERENCE FROM PRACTICE TO QUALIFYING? “You could tell a really big difference between turn 1 and 2 and turns 3 and 4. One and two when I went were still in the shade and 3 and 4 wasn’t. If we would have had shade in 3 and 4 it would have been an awesome lap. But I’m really happy. That was a shot in the dark and it turned out to be a good lap.” YOUR THOUGHTS ON THE RACE. “I feel pretty good about it. I’m a little nervous that if we pull the tape off and everything the thing is not going to turn at all. We’re going to have to go back and do a little homework and make sure we have a good plan for the race. We’ve got World Financial Group on board and at least in the Cup car that’s been very good luck for us and knock on wood, that’s been a good thing. Hopefully we’ll carry that over to tomorrow.”

BRENT SHERMAN, No. 58 SEA WATCH INTERNATIONAL DODGE: “It was another tense one for us. The car wasn’t right in practice. We made lots of changes and it was much better on those two laps. This waiting until the last minute is getting pretty old. I can’t wait until after Atlanta.”

DENNY HAMLIN, No. 20 ROCKWELL AUTOMATION CHEVROLET: “It wasn’t too bad. I messed up qualifying the last two weeks so I just decided to take it easy and run it like a practice lap. The car probably had a whole lot more than that in it but it looks like we’re going to be inside the top-20. That was our goal. The track was definitely better [at night for qualifying]. Like I said, you could get after it a whole lot more but it was time to take it easy. Next to Daytona, it will be our best qualifying effort so far so we’re happy with that.” ARE YOU GLAD TO BE BACK ON AN OVAL? “Definitely, ready for the short tracks.”

REED SORENSON, No. 41 DISCOUNT TIRE COMPANY DODGE: “That should be in the top-10. It was pretty loose out there. I kind of watched a couple other cars and stuff and saw that they were loose when they went out and we were loose. We really didn’t know where we’d be and we’re sitting sixth right now. One more of these to go and we won’t have to worry about it no more. I don’t know if it was an advantage to qualify at night. I think it was kind of there. I think the car was going to be loose whether we were in the sun or at night. I actually thought the track would pick up but people aren’t really picking up.” DOES THAT SURPRISE YOU? “Yeah a little bit. I figured we’d be a lot faster at night it really wasn’t that much faster at all.” WILL QUALIFYING AT NIGHT THROW YOU OFF FOR THE RACE? “We didn’t really change our car from what it was today in practice. After qualifying, realizing how loose it was, we’re going to go try to get more on the tight side for the race. That way if it’s tight in the race we can always go back to where we were. They [NASCAR] let you do a round and a half of wedge on both sides of the car on the rear and I don’t know if we’re going to go the full round and a half out. We’re going to wait and see. We’ve got a good starting position and plenty of time during the race. You’ve got 300 miles to get up there and win so we’re pretty happy where we’re at.” DO YOU EXPECT THE TRACK TO GET GREASY IN THE RACE? “It got greasy today in practice. After we got like 25 laps on the tires it was getting greasy out there. It was a lot different than when we tested.” ARE YOU GOING TO HAVE TO REALLY TAKE CARE OF YOUR TIRES HERE IN THE RACE? “These type places you usually have to be careful and not burn the right front up because usually you’re fighting a pushing condition. But we haven’t been tight since we’ve been here. I don’t think we’ll have a problem with the right front. We’ve just got to save all four of them.”

KERTUS DAVIS, No. 0 RACEGIRL CHEVROLET: “It was decent. We didn’t get many laps of practice. We broke a fuel pump and we fought that pretty much the whole practice because we didn’t know that was what the problem was. We thought the engine blew up and we was in the process of taking it out and then we seen that the fuel pump was broke. We got about seven or eight laps of practice. We posted a decent time. I figured we could have run a .50, about four-tenths quicker than what we ran but it is what it is. We’ll take it and see what it gives us tomorrow. I feel like in the race when the conditions are the same for everybody I feel like we’ll be pretty decent. Hopefully we’ll come out with a top-20 finish. That’s what I’m looking forward to. We’ve got a decent car, decent power. I’ve got to thank RACEGIRL for their sponsorship and Raybestos for supporting the rookie of the year program.” DID QUALIFYING AT NIGHT HELP OR HURT YOU? “It’s helping those guys going out later. I went out when the sun was beaming down on the racetrack pretty hard and I feel like it’s going to help those guys that are going out later.”

MICHEL JOURDAIN, No. 10 ppc RACING FORD: “I think we picked up pretty good time so we’re pretty happy about that. After practice, we were not sure where we were at. Todd Gordon [crew chief] made some amazing changes to the car and we picked up a lot of time. That was very good.” YOU WERE ONE OF THE DRIVERS WHO QUALIFIED AT NIGHT. DID THAT HELP YOU? “It helped everybody else but me. In Mexico, we don’t drive at night so this is my first time [smiles].”