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Silly Season | Newsletter | Racefan's Rave | In the Pits | Fire and Ice News and Results | Point Standings | 2003 Schedule | 2003 Teams | 2002 Schedule and Results
Samsung/Radio Shack 500 - GM Post-Race Quotes
(WHAT HAPPENED?) "I don't know if somebody got into the '1,' but he got
loose and there really wasn't any place to go. We were in a pack right there
and I tried to get up on the high side. I think we just barely got clipped.
We almost missed it.
"It's a shame. I hate it for our Kodak Racing team. Our car was pretty
good today. It wasn't the best, but it was a lot better than a lot of cars
in front of us. It's just a tough, tough deal. But, we'll go back to
Talladega. We had our career best finish at Talladega and maybe we can back
that up this week or do a little bit better.
"I like Texas. I still like this racetrack, but I hate this. We'll
just keep on digging. We'll be in Talladega. We'll get 'em."
"It just wasn't our day. We got a couple laps down after getting together
with the '2' car. We got one of them back and then lost it off of turn two.
It just wasn't our day."
(WHAT HAPPENED TO PUT YOU OUT?) "It just broke, I guess. The Valvoline
Pontiac was pretty good most of the day. We broke a valve or something. I'm
not sure what it really was.
"We had a good car. We had a good car all weekend, ever since we unloaded.
The guys did a good job.
"If people have been watching the last four weeks, we've been a top
five car. Unfortunately, we weren't able to get to the end, but this week we
were. I'm proud of my team. They had great pit stops. We worked on the car
all day long. We'd been tight all day long. I was good on really short runs.
That's why I got by Jeff [Gordon] there with about 40 to go. Then, I got too
tight. But, I'm happy for my U.S. Army team, Pontiac, MB2 Motorsports. It's
been a good weekend for us.
"This is the first car we built in-house. It's name is 'Buffy.' Hopefully,
Michael [Waltrip] doesn't get mad about that. But, Buffy did good this
weekend."
"It was pretty uneventful. We really didn't have any close calls. The guys
on pit road did it. They kept me up front. We had a decent car, but we just
never could hit to where we could run with the first two or three. We had
about a seventh place car, where we finished. But, it was a good day for us.
We needed that really bad. We've been running close to this all year. We
just never could put a finish together. This is a good day for our AOL
Chevy."
(CAN THIS KIND OF RUN BREAK YOUR TEAM OUT OF ITS SLUMP?) "You're only as
good as your next race, so we can't really think about that. We've just got
to do things that we know to do.
"This is a brand new car. It's a little bit different body configuration and
I think that's what we've been needing all year."
"We had a great qualifying effort. The car was great right out of the box.
Unfortunately, we had a small engine problem yesterday and had to start at
the back of the pack. With the work that Jimmie and our pit crew did, we got
it up to the front very quickly. I think we were running seventh by lap 45.
It was just awesome. It was a great team effort. Unfortunately, we had a
little bit of an engine problem there at the end of the race, but brought it
home eighth. We're lucky we were able to nurse it home and get a top 10."
"Once again, we had a good car and the result doesn't show it. We were a
little tight early, fixed that with air pressure adjustments and really had
it pretty good about halfway through the race. But then, we got caught a
lap down after pitting just before that caution and we never got it back. I
had to run through the grass to keep from wrecking when the '7' and '20' got
together, and bent the front end a little bouncing through the infield.
We'll keep at it. We've got good cars and the guys are doing a great job on
pit road, so we'll keep working at it."
(ON THE LAST LAP) "Yeah, it was pretty exciting. My car was total (crap)
there at the end. I couldn't run with a 12, couldn't even hold him off. He
was -- you know, that was a thing about this track or it was the thing about
today's race is when if you was in front of somebody even if they was better
than you, you could hold them back there because they would get aero tight.
I was trying to drive in his tracks, actually watch in the mirror and trying
to see the line he was running, trying to run where he ran and keep the air
off his nose so he couldn't get the run on me, get by he. And I went down
in the three and my right front just give up, and I couldn't hold him off. I
mean, Jeff come on right up through there and we got to moving each other
around, but it was clean racing. I mean, that's pretty clean compared to
most people I hear. He kind of gave me a bump in the center of three and
four, but I was ready for it. He kind of knew I was slowing up trying to
keep it on the bottom and he eased it up out of the way and got on the
inside, but I knew he would have a difficult time on the inside, rather than
the outside. He probably would have had better luck pinching me down on the
bottom like I did him, and I just pinched him down and give him no room to
get on the gas, no room to really accelerate off the corner. It was either,
you know, drive up in the side of me or back off, and he backed off, so we
got his position."
(DID YOU CONSIDER TAKING TWO TIRES ON THE LAST PIT STOP?) "No, really not.
I as sitting there thinking that the 12 had made a mistake, but
he had a pretty good car regardless of what tires he had on there. We were
in a good car all day long and we were fortunate to be up there. We were
struggling back in about 10th place most of the day. The handling was going
away on the car. Stop after stop we couldn't seem to make an adjustment
that would help. We finally struck rubber in the right rear and that's where
we also got the track position at that point. That was with about 90 laps to
go. I told them we got a good track position. If I can get the nose in
some clean air, we can probably stay up here in the top five and be
fortunate to get that finish and we did, so I was really excited.
(IS THERE SOMETHING THAT CLICKS WHEN YOU COME TO TEXAS?) "I think we can
write that off. After that first win we haven't gotten the success since.
I know, we are just -- we are good at these type of race tracks, like
Atlanta, Charlotte and here. We run good. We don't always win or get the
great finishes, we always are a competitive car each time we go to them, and
I like these tracks. It's a real easy track to drive. These tracks here
are probably the most easy from the driver's standpoint to turn the car
around in the corner an accelerate off the corner. It's the least amount
challenging-wise compared to other tracks we go to, so it's an easy day's
work for me."
(YOU SOUND TIRED. ARE YOU TIRED FROM RACING OR JUST TIRED?) "You know, it's
not really that I'm tired. I was kind of ready to get it over
with. It's a long day and we struggled with the car and I was really
getting frustrated with the car not turning and I was tired of driving it,
so I'm really glad to be out of it. I feel fortunate to get second, but I'm
telling you, man, when you make six, seven stops in a day and you don't make
an adjustment -- you make every adjustment available to you and
it doesn't make a difference, you get frustrated and you feel like I'm
probably stuck with this the rest of the day. We
made a change there at the end that helped it. We stayed out clean air,
too. We're so lucky to get a second place finish, because we had about
probably a 13th place race car. But battles like that with Jeff in the 12,
that's really mentally hard to do, because you're thinking so much about
getting down in the corner, got to ease it up here so it doesn't
push off, he don't get a run on me here, I've got to keep the car down here
to keep the tight up off. I mean you're always thinking and having to do it
as soon as you think about it. It's just split second decision every five
feet and it's mentally tough. I mean, I raced 50 lap IROC race with my dad
and we run second to him in Michigan and it was just 50 laps and I had never
been so tired in my life. I had never felt like that and I haven't since.
I mean, it's just when you get in those mental type of wars with another
driver or a battle with yourself mentally on the race track, it can be
worse, I think, than anything physical.
(Did you think that the end of the race with you and Jeff was the best part
of that race, the whole thing, and also would you guys have done anything
different if you had been racing for the lead?) "I think Jeff would have
done something different. Jeff, he knows exactly, like a lot of drivers do
and they're fortunate, he knows exactly enough -- how much bumper to give
somebody to move them out of the way without spinning them out.
I didn't even have to get off the gas. I felt him touch me and lift the
tires off the ground enough to move the car. I didn't have to lift. He
done it so perfectly like he had done it a million times and knew exactly
how do to it. Some drivers can do that. Some drivers rare back and knock
the hell out of you no matter where you land, you know. He wanted -- I
mean, when you're racing somebody he knows good and well if he had wrecked
me, he would have had to deal with the consequences and that's
not a fun thing to have to go through a year watching your back all the
time. We raced hard and, you know, he may have gotten -- we could do it 100
times and he might have gotten the spot. I might have gotten the spot. I
made the right decision to get down in the three once he got under me to
pinch him down and keep him down there. I stayed within an inch or two of
his fender. I could watch my fender and keep him right there where he
couldn't throttle up. He would have drove into the side of me and both of
us would have been in the wall then. Didn't get much choice on the fourth
corner on the flag.
(YOU LOOK LIKE THE MOST FRUSTRATED SECOND/THIRD PLACE FINISHER THIS YEAR.)
"Am I giving you the Mark Martin?"
(What's it going to take to get you to smile?) "The championship. I want to
finish in the top five. I want to get something that we didn't get last
year, and I'm just, you know, really -- we should have got a good run last
week. We didn't have the car to do it. We got pulled when I ran out of
gas. I might be the only car in the history of NASCAR to run out of gas in
Bristol. I think that's probably a first. We keep beating
ourselves. I'm frustrated we should have ran good at Daytona. That still
bothers me. It's hard to get over races like that. I sit there and watch
Vickers yesterday having the trouble he had. He seemed so upset, it makes
everything that happened to me seem so small, because he's going for his
first win ever. You remember how that shit plays out. You just take it one
week at a time and we will see where we are at the end of this thing, but I
want to win the championship so bad I can't really enjoy these second place
finishes just yet.
(ARE WE SEEING SOMETHING DIFFERENT WITH THE BODIES ON THESE CARS, AS FAR AS
AERO-TIGHT VERSUS AERO-LOOSE?) "I didn't know what aero tight
was until I went to Japan and raced my first cup race and it was
like, you know, it was like pop quiz, you know, big exam Sunday,
and I didn't know how to get around it. I mean, I had a pretty
good car when we was racing there in Japan, but I didn't know
what the hell aero push was and why it kept happening, and we
have fought it ever since. You'll always fight it, as long as
there's a car in front you punching a hole, you're going to have
trouble getting around him. There's probably
something that will make it not as bad, but I don't think
they'll ever get rid of it totally unless they to the totally
took the front air dams off and the spoilers off. I don't know
if we need to drive '79 Monte Carlos or whatever. It's always
going to be there. I mean, Jeff when he got up
behind me he would get me loose getting in the corner, but I
knew as soon as I got in the center I would be so tight I
couldn't turn. You can make somebody loose, but normally you're
fighting push. You saw it all day long, guys would run all the
way up to somebody, driving the straightaway, run them down get
to them and it was the same way with lap cars, you would come
in, change tires, go back out. You couldn't pass the slowest
car in the field for ten lapse until he wore his tires out or
his set up went away, but it was tough.
(ON THE BATTLE WITH JUNIOR AT THE END) " His car went away. My car
was pretty I tight. I saw, Junior, struggling there
when Newman was trying to get by him and I was hoping I
could get up there to him and those two could get
side-by-side racing, because I knew I couldn't pass both
of them. As soon as I got up ten car lengths from them,
I just -- the car was done, and I couldn't do anything
else. So, you know, got up there to, Junior, he really
started pushing and got a run -- a couple of runs on him
and got underneath him actually one time, and just, you
know, kind of stalled the car out so much coming off the
corner that he got back by me, and then there at the end
I tried to get a run and get as loose as I possibly
could and I did and I got underneath him, but he just
ran me down low and we slid around and bumped and
banged. It was fun, you know. If it had been for
first, it would have been a lot different deal, but
since it was to second and I'd like to get some points,
I just figured we could come out there at the start
finish line wherever we were supposed to.
(Were you surprised that Newman was able to do what he's able to do with two
tires or is it the case of having a good car being more important than
having four fresh tires?) "Yes, I guess I'm somewhat
surprised. I mean, this is one of those places where
tires don't do as much as what you think. And I think
his car was balanced pretty good and maybe they did some
things to free the car up or, you know, after we ran a
while actually having the right side versus the left
side was better balance for him. It's hard to say, but
his car looked like it was about the best it had been
all day long so those two tires obviously did something
to help him there.
You know, Junior, took off on four tires
got up underneath him and went by him. I know how my
car was all day and my car was just super good on the
long runs and that just wasn't maybe a long enough run
there and even when I got up there to him, I was more
tired at the end than I had been all day. I've seen it
before and I was surprised, I guess, when he lost the
lead that he was able to maybe get back by him. That
was probably the bigger surprise, but Junior's car went
away pretty bad there at the end. He was really pushing
it.
(What's your frustration level at not yet having won at this race track?)
"It's -- the only thing that
was frustrating for me was that the caution fell when it
did, you know, and it seems to be doing that a lot for
us here lately, so I think that we had the car to beat
today.
I mean, we were in position, we were
leading the race, came in the pit, came out and the
caution came out. I mean, there was a wreck, but
caution came out and, I mean, we basically went from
leading the race to, you know, down a lap, and had to
work our way back. And so to work our way back up to
third, I'm happy. We are doing everything that we can.
I mean, the cars are awesome, the pit crew has been
phenomenal. You know, I've made a couple of mistakes
that, you know, I want to make up to the guys on, and
today we were flawless. Absolutely flawless. It's just
that the caution fell when it did and put us, you know,
back there, so to come back to third I think says a lot.
You know, I would like to win here and I
think I've had cars capable of winning here. When we're
ready to win -- or when somebody else is ready for us to
win, it will happen. I thought that was today. I
really thought we had this one today.
(What's your reaction to NASCAR keeping back the lead after you passed him
coming out of the caution mid way through?) "Somebody is going to have
to explain that one to me. It's frustrating. I don't
think that just because the leader wants to let the guys
have a lap back, doesn't mean that everybody else behind
him has to let them have a lap back. I think it's his
choice whether he wants to let them have a lap back or
not. If he doesn't, then the next guy in line can
choose. I did. I was the leader when I crossed the
line. I didn't think there was any reason to let those
guys have the lap back. We are racing those guys not
only for a win but for a championship and I just didn't
think there was any reason for me to let them have a lap
back.
If he wanted to choose it, fine. Then
for NASCAR to, you know, put those guys back on the lead
lap or whatever lap it was that we were on, that just
blows me away, and I don't understand it. Somebody is
going to have to explain it to me from here on out and
as soon as they explain it to me, I'll know what the
rule is.
(IS THERE A GENTLEMEN'S AGREEMENT?) "There is a gentleman's
agreement to pass for position, but we are talking about
keeping cars down a lap and I don't know of any
gentleman's agreement that says that I have to let cars
have their lap back, even if I'm not the leader. It's
always been the case where, you know, the leader --
you're trying to pass the leader, okay, and you know --
which I think to the whole giving a lap back thing is
crazy anyway, but because we have teammates, we do kind
of stretch that a little bit, but I think that if he
chooses to let -- to try to let those guys have a lap
back, then the gentleman's agreement is out the door,
out the window. If there's guys back there that we are
battling for a win and a championship with. I wasn't
trying to pass Matt. That's why I gave him his position
back. As soon as we crossed the line, I said, Matt, go
ahead and have your position back, but as far as I'm
concerned, I'm not get letting those guys have a lap
back and basically NASCAR came in and said they changed
it and we went on racing the rest of the day and didn't
worry about that from then on.
(ON THE BALANCE OF THE COMPETITION TODAY) "I thought it was pretty
balanced today. You look, early on the nine car was
really going and then the 12, the 38, the 17 were really
good Fords. You had the 8, the 48 and 24 were good
Chevrolets and you had 01 and 10 Pontiacs. I think if
you get the right combination underneath it, it seems
like everybody can make their cars work.
(Should NASCAR being racing back to the caution in the first place?) "I
don't know why we don't
invert back to the last lap anyway. It's dangerous, you
know, they -- it -- you know, I don't agree with it to
begin with, but who am I to say how that should be
handled? I've done racing where the caution comes out,
you stop races. If you invert back to the last lap and
start scoring from there, but that was when cautions
didn't count, so it's not my rule. It's their rule and
I'm going to race it, but that doesn't mean I'm going to
like it, you know, and I don't like it, because, you
know, I've seen situations that were very dangerous and
plus you see these guys sometimes that are a lap down
doing things that, you know, are very questionable, you
know, where -- the positions they're putting the race
car in, putting a lot of people in jeopardy just to get
the lap back to get it back, and as long as that's the
rule you're going to see that happen.
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