Aaron’s 499 - Rookie Qualifying Quotes

TONY RAINES, NO. 74 BACE MOTORSPORTS CHEVROLET:

WHAT HAPPENED ON THE SECOND LAP? "Something under the hood. I don't know if it was the carburetor or fuel. I have no idea. It's pretty discouraging because we're on the edge of missing this one and that's not supposed to happen here. WAS THE CAR DECENT IN PRACTICE? "Yeah, I mean our first lap was two tenths better so if we had run a 51.80, which is what we thought we could run, that would have put us in the field pretty solid, I think. When you have problems like this it could bit you and it just may happen to us, who knows." DID THE WEATHER CONDITIONS THROW YOU FOR A CURVE? "The rack's fine and the weather was about like what it's been all day, hit or miss. That didn't cause us any trouble. It's just probably something that we did to ourself."

JACK SPRAGUE, NO. 0 NETZERO PONTIAC:

"I thought it would run about a .70 or .65. We were six tenths off the pole at Daytona with that car and we'll end up farther than that by the time that Little E goes, I believe. The car raced really good, and hopefully that will get me in the top-36 which it should. I don't know where they find it around these places. You just hold it wide open and go. These guys are working hard and we'll get the NetZero Pontiac on track. We had a good run at Texas and if we can do like we did at Daytona we'll have a good run here. We've got to find speed somewhere." WHAT ARE YOU THOUGHTS ON TONY FURR JOINING THE TEAM THIS WEEK? "I think it's going to help us tremendously. He was there three or four days and we went to Martinsville Tuesday and Wednesday and tested with him and Dennis (Connor, crew chief) and they compliment each other a lot. What one didn't think of the other one would. We came off the truck fast and we were really fast for both days of testing. I really didn't think a Cup car could drive like that because my experience this year is not too pleasant. We had a really good car there and that's one of my worst racetracks. I don't like the place but I had a lot of fun testing there. I think it will only get better as time goes on with Tony. He really hasn't had a lot to do with this car. This is the one that we ran at Daytona, like I said. I think it's something that we needed to get on track. He and Dennis seem to be working really well together and that's what we need. Everybody needs to work well together and fight back out of this hole we're in and run good. We are all capable of running good. I think everybody knows that. We don't win the races that we've won and the championships we've won in the series that we've won them and not be able to do this. We just have to get our cars better and we're heading that way."

JAMIE MCMURRAY, NO.42 HAVOLINE DODGE:

"I would have thought that we would have picked up. Generally when you do all the qualifying fluids and everything you gain a couple of tenths. We slowed down a little bit. We changed some spring and some other stuff that Sterling (Marlin) had done in practice and it seemed to help his car and I don't know if hurt us or it could have been wind. It's so hard to tell. Not a bad day for the Havoline Dodge. We're going to have a good car. It's the same car that we took to Daytona. The car was really fast and would suck up on the draft and it didn't handle very well. Hopefully handling is not going to be a big issue or as big as it is at Daytona on Sunday and the Havoline Dodge will be up front." HOW DIFFICULT IS IT TO BE AT A TRACK WHERE THE DRIVER DOES NOT PLAY A BIG ROLE? "In qualifying obviously it's just car. That's it, there's maybe a little bit of driver. It's probably one of the least stressful weekends that you have because if you're not fast, it's not your fault." WHAT'S THE ONE THING YOU LEARNED AT DAYTONA THAT WILL HELP YOU HERE THIS WEEKEND? "I don't know. I mean, Daytona was shorter than a Busch race. I don't know that we ever really got in a situation to do anything because at Daytona, really, we rode around. I mean all day long, literally, and not because I wanted to it's just all I could do. It was all I could do to hang on to the draft and the car was so tight. I don't know that I got to really take a lot from there." IS THERE ANYTHING YOU CAN DO AS A DRIVER TO AVOID THE BIG CRASH HERE? "I watched the Busch race here last year on TV, I watched it the other day, and Johnny Sauter was running second and got hit and didn't even know it was coming. Shane Hmiel came across the track and got into him and ended up flipping. You just have to have luck. I don't think you can do it on your own."

GREG BIFFLE IN NO. 16 GRAINGER FORD:

"It is what it is. It's restrictor plate racing at it's best. We pushed our car in the corner, covered it up, blew the dust off it, and brought it down here. This is what you've got. Other teams have had time to work on their cars. We've tried to build cars and get to the racetrack and it's a product of how hard we have worked. YOU RAN WELL AT DAYTONA IN THE RACE. DOES THAT GIVE YOU HOPE FOR SUNDAY? "Not as much here at Talladega. Here at Talladega it's true speed because it's flatter and smoother. Daytona is a little bit of handling and a little know-how. Here it's more speed of the car so I think you are going to see the cars that qualify well are the ones that are going to run well."

CASEY MEARS IN THE NO. 41 TARGET DODGE WAS THE HIGHEST QUALIFYING RAYBESTOS® ROOKIE AT TALLADEGA. HE TOOK THE HONOR FOR THE FIRST TIME THIS SEASON.

"That's a good feeling. When you come to a place like Talladega or Daytona, you really have to thank the crew and a lot of the guys back at the shop building the bodies and the engine shop just did a great job. After Daytona, we qualified I think, we were like 27th or so and the guys really worked hard to pick it up to come back here and they just did an excellent job with the Target Dodge." AS A RAYBESTOS® ROOKIE, IS THIS A DIFFICULT TRACK TO ADAPT TO? "As a rookie, everything is difficult to adapt to. Everything is brand new and everything is a new challenge, especially for me just having one year of Busch under my belt last year I'm still learning a lot about stock cars. But it feels good to come here and run well and like I said the guys just did an excellent job back at the shop and the engine shop did a good job. The guys here did a just did a great job preparing it. I just go around there and hold it wide open and try to run the best line I can and they do all the rest. I appreciate all their help." YOU HAVE A REALLY GOOD SHOT TO FINISH IN THE TOP-10 HERE SUNDAY. "We have a really good car and I'm very happy with where we ended up. It just feels good to qualify good at one of these places finally. All year last year we were in the late 20s and stuff like that. After qualifying in the late 20s again at Daytona the guys really made it a big challenge for them to do the best job they could on the bodies and engine to come back here and do well and we did. It's a big testament to them." WHAT WAS THE ONE THING THAT YOU LEARNED AT DAYTONA THAT WILL HELP YOU IN THE RACE? "I think that the number one thing that's going to help me more here is the fact that I got to race with these guys for the first half of this year now and I think I've gotten a little bit of respect from a lot of these guys and I think they will be more apt to work with me now that they've seen how I can run around them. That's probably the number one thing. There's a ton of things that I've learned that I'm going to be able to apply here and it's going to be that way throughout this whole year, I bet." HOW IMPORTANT WOULD A GOOD RUN IN THE RACE BE TO YOUR TEAM? "It would be huge. We have ran so good all year long, we really have. We have had a competitive race car. We were running sixth at Darlington and dropped back a little bit and ended up pitting and the caution came out. Stuff like that has happened to us all year long. We should have been finishing a lot better, given the cars that we had. We're just going to get better. I we could have a good finish here, it will give us a lot of momentum and at least show everybody that hey, we can run up here and do well." HAS IT BEEN HARD TO KEEP YOU HEAD UP? "Not at all because we know that we can do it. We're not one of those teams out there going 'I hope we can do this. We haven't had a result yet man I hope we can do it.' We all know. I know I can do it. The team knows that they can do it. We just know that we're going to do it one of these days and we are go ing to shine. We still don't know when that day is going to be yet." WHAT WOULD BE A GOOD FINISH FOR YOU SUNDAY? "At a place like this it could realistically be fifth or realistically be 30th. You just don't know because you can get shuffled around so much. Hopefully we get to working with guys a little bit. I'm hoping that in 'Happy Hour' we'll find some partners that we will be able to work with a little bit. Obviously I've got my teammates and we'll have to see where we end up."

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