Race 2 Win: Sam's Town 300 - Rookie Post-Race Quotes

NASCAR Busch Series

Sam's Town 300 - Rookie Post-Race Quotes

Where the Raybestos Rookies finished at Las Vegas
Kluever 21st
Danny O’Quinn 25th
Lamar 26th
McFarland 27th
Foyt IV 37th
Hines 38th
Andretti 42nd
Kauffman 43rd

UNOFFICIAL Raybestos Rookie standings after Las Vegas:
Lamar 48
Kluever 42
McFarland 33
O’Quinn 32
Andretti 29
Foyt IV 25
Hines 19
Kauffman 17
Wimmer 4

JOEL KAUFFMAN, No. 12 SUPERCUTS DODGE: “We had something wrong on the driveline, something in the driveline or the engine. We’re still searching. The rpms really fell down in the car and it started to get a pretty bad vibration. We went behind the wall for a while and for the amount of laps that we went behind there really wasn’t any positions to be gained so instead of taking a chance of breaking something or wrecking it we decided to come in and see what the problem was. We need to get a good run in. This is a car for us and we had a good test out here. For some reason we couldn’t get the thing to do good on sticker tires. We had a real good car on old tires and we were looking to make our way up to the front there throughout the race. We can’t have these kind of problems. I guess we’ll have to go to Atlanta and do it again.”

JOHN ANDRETTI, No. 10 FREEDOM ROADS/CAMPING WORLD FORD: “Unfortunately, we were trying to get back in sequence. Early on we had a lug nut where we didn’t get all of them all on the rear. That put us back so we started taking different strategy and both times we came out after changing tires. The first time we got one lap and the next time we got like four laps. I wasn’t trying to race anybody hard. I was trying to give them the outside lane. Unfortunately, one guy can’t see the outside lane and just drove right into the back of me and crashes you going down the back straightaway. It makes no sense to me. It’s real unfortunate. Maybe he should come pay for the racecar. Early on we came in and pitted early and then we missed a lug nut on the rear and had to come back in and that put us behind. We just started taking different strategy of trying to short pit, trying to get something going. I pitted one time and the caution came right away and the next time it was like four laps in. We were just trying to hold a position, letting guys go and not really making it hard on anybody. Unfortunately somebody decided they were just going to run me over and tore up our racecar. I don’t understand it. You don’t need to race like that.” HOW HARD DID YOU HIT? “That was a pretty hard hit. When you come out and you’re not really moving and somebody hits you, especially where they’re hitting you near the front on your side, yeah, you feel it. I was worried about him too because it’s a big stop for him. When you hit somebody it’s worse that hitting a wall, especially when it’s like that. I’m okay and it looks like he’s okay too. That’s the main thing. We’ll be back to race another day.”

TODD KLUEVER IN THE No. 06 3M FORD WAS THE RAYBESTOS ROOKIE OF THE RACE AT LAS VEGAS.
Notes:

Kluever finished 21st and took top rookie honors for the second time in four races this season. He is the first driver to claim Raybestos Rookie of the Race honors in more than one race this season.

Burney Lamar unofficially holds a six-point lead (48-42) over Kluever in the Raybestos Rookie standings.

KLUEVER: “It was a good learning experience for us. I thought after California that I had learned enough to get myself in the right position at the start of the race. Obviously, I proved again tonight that that’s my struggle. You give up everything at the beginning of the race and then make the car pretty good. I think we had, after while, a top-10 car. When you give it all away at the beginning you can’t get back that far.” IS THAT A PRODUCT OF HAVING TO QUALIFYING ON SPEED FOR THE RACE? “No not really because at here and California we’ve been pretty much on our race setups. Our race setups have been fast enough not to worry about qualifying issues. I need to do my homework on that a little bit. I was never really happy with the car this weekend. I think we can be a lot better. I didn’t think we were that bad, though, like we were at the beginning of that race. Once again, Mike Kelly, my crew chief, did a really good job getting aggressive and making big adjustments right away so we weren’t messing around all race. He did a great job. We’re going to get it and we’re going to get it figured out so we don’t go from 18th to 40th at the first run and work our way back up.” YOU HAD A GOOD RUN AT ATLANTA IN THE TRUCK LAST FALL. “I’m excited about going back to Atlanta. We actually have a brand new car that we’re taking, which is the one that Greg [Biffle] won with at California. I’m excited to take a new car that’s one of the latest and greatest Roush cars that we can build. That’s what Greg and those guys have been running so far this year, not to say that we’re going to go out and run as good as they are right now but if there is any little bit of help there, that’d be great.” WERE YOU GLAD THAT QUALIFYING WASN’T RAINED OUT TODAY? “We had talked to Joe Balash [NASCAR Busch Series Director] and I knew we were going to be locked in so it wasn’t really an issue for me. I tell you what though, if there’s one place that you’d want to have a race postponed for rain or snow, Las Vegas is it. But I’m kind of glad that we got it in and we can go home.”

DANNY O’QUINN JR., No. 50 WORLD FINANCIAL GROUP FORD: “We had an awesome car. We messed up on a couple of pit stops. We had a top-15 car easy. We had a really good racecar. There at the end we pitted and I needed a couple more laps to get on top of the two lap down line. We tried to gamble a little bit there when we thought it might rain and we lost a lot of ground because we were running probably 15th at that time. We just gambled a little bit and I messed up on a call in the pits. I told them what the car was doing a little wrong there and it’s going to happen. But we’re getting better every week and we’ll get that top Raybestos Rookie here one of these days.” ARE YOU GETTING MORE USED TO THE RACING IN THE BUSCH SERIES? “This is race number four. It’s going to get better. We’re getting better each week. We didn’t finish where we wanted to but we showed that we had a better car than that tonight. We’ll learn from this. We’re learning every week. You give us three or four more races and we’ll be up there.”

MARK MCFARLAND, No. 88 NAVY CHEVROLET: “We learned a good bit, about the car and what we need for these big tracks. I think something in our front end is off compared to everybody else. But we’ll get it figured out. We’ll probably take this same car to Atlanta and we’ll make a bunch of changes to it and hopefully we’ll run good down there.” YOU CAME TO THE LAS VEGAS RACE STRAIGHT FROM MEXICO CITY. WHEN IS THE LAST TIME THAT YOU’VE BEEN HOME? “A couple of weeks ago, before Mexico [laughs]. I came straight out here. I went home from California and then went to Mexico and then here. I’ll sleep in my own bed tonight.”