The Winston - Dodge Qualifying Quotes

BILL ELLIOTT (No. 9 Dodge Dealers/UAW Dodge Intrepid) - The Winston Pole Winner. Won The Winston in 1986 in Atlanta. Most recent Winston Pole came in 2000. Has won four of last seven poles for The Winston.

"Qualifying hasn't been bad. It all came together tonight. Some nights everything goes your way, and some nights it don't. Tonight, everything went our way. We treated it like it was just another Saturday night under the lights. The team did a great job. They've been working real hard on pit stops and it paid off tonight. Ray has done a great job with this team, and we'll get ready and see if we can win that million dollars tomorrow night. We put it all together tonight, so we'll try to make it two for two."

"Sometimes I don't agree with the format as far as qualifying goes, but it seems to play into my hands. I've always been sensitive to the issue on pit road because I had my guys hurt several years ago in an incident on pit road. Pit road has always been a sensitive issue. The last couple of years, we did it from a stop on pit road and then we went to our pit stop and started out. Before that we came down pit road pretty much wide open. I didn't know if I really agreed with that, but I still won the pole for it several times. Tonight, when I came in, I asked Mike Ford what we were going to do tonight. He said we were going to have to pick up pit road speed at the end of pit road. I thought that would be interesting, but it worked out. I was pleasantly surprised at the end of qualifying. I felt like we had a pretty good race car. I felt like we ran a pretty good first lap, and then we tied it all together. I got down pit road, got in my stall good and the guys did an awesome job on the pit stop. They dropped the jack and I got out good and it all came together. Ray's done such a good job putting this Dodge/UAW race team together. It's just unreal.

"When I got my guys hurt and Mike Rich ended up getting killed in Atlanta, that's when we came down pit road wide open. Back several years ago, there were no guys on pit road when we ran down pit road. The last couple of years were pretty good where you just started from pit road and drove into your pit and left on pit road. Tonight it worked out pretty well. It's always been just a little bit of an issue because I've always had that in the back of my mind. The circumstances happened to be twice, at Riverside and Atlanta.

"The key word is if you make it to the last segment. That's what makes it interesting. I made a comment out there earlier, sometimes the guy coming out of the Winston Open has an advantage on the guys in The Winston. For me, looking at the guy who wins the Winston Open, he's probably going to have a better handle on how the race track is going to be than the rest of us. It'll give him an opportunity to run The Open, then run the segments to get to the end.

"I think the last several races we've been going in the right direction. California was definitely a step up. It was actually the first 500-mile race we finished. Daytona got rain shortened and the other two we fell out of. We've been on that roller-coaster ride, but I think now we're going in the right direction. I think Ray's got things turned around very well, and I feel like from this point on we're going to race tracks that fit my style very well. Hopefully we can put some good things together the next several weeks."

JAMIE McMURRAY (No. 42 Havoline Dodge Intrepid) "The rear end broke. We put a new gear in right before qualifying. I think a pinion broke, but I'm not sure. The Winston is a cool deal. It's a lot of fun. We brought our best stuff. It's unreal to race for that much money, but it won't make any difference when the race starts."

WARD BURTON (No. 22 Cat Truck Engines Dodge Intrepid) "We made a gear change and I had to be a little bit conservative coming down pit road. It was pretty good, but we were a little too conservative coming in and I got sideways going out. I think the driver lost a little time there. The team made a great pit stop. I know they can do it. We just want to be there for the last segment to have a shot."

STERLING MARLIN (No. 40 Coors Light Dodge Intrepid) "We weren't good in practice, but we made some changes and got better. If you get down to it, you need to be in the top five for the last segment, but if you get trapped back there it's tough to do much. I wish it was a longer run. We seem to do better on longer runs."

RUSTY WALLACE (No. 2 Miller Lite Dodge Intrepid) "The car was really good. Man I thought we had it. I never thought we'd have a loose lugnut. It's a team thing. This is the like the Union 76 pit stop contest. If you make one mistake, they look bad, but we know we've got great guys. I kind of like the format and I kind of don't. The car is really good. The lugnut in the left rear was about a sixteenth of an inch loose, and that's all it takes."

RYAN NEWMAN (No. 12 ALLTEL Dodge Intrepid) "I think we've got a good car for The Winston. We're starting in the middle, but that's OK. We didn't even have a starting spot for The Winston on Friday night last year. It'd be nice to win that million, but I'd race just as hard without the million."

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