Golden Corral 500 - Dodge Qualifying Quotes

RYAN NEWMAN (No. 12 ALLTEL Dodge) – On the pole again. Newman wins third straight Atlanta pole, second of season and 20th of his career.

“We gave them something to shoot for for sure. It’s pretty close to what we ran here last year. We’ll have to see what happens. Some good cars are coming out later, and we weren’t the fastest on the speed chart in practice. It’s not the most fun thing going out first, but at least my job is done for the day. It wasn’t a perfect lap, but I’m not going to complain. I’d be really, really picky if I said it wasn’t perfect.

“You run 200 here and it feels like it’s 400. It’s not me. I’m just the lucky nut behind the wheel. It’s a team sport, and qualifying is no different than the race. It’s just how you get it matched up. We’re learning. We got our butts spanked last weekend, so we’ll see what we can do to come back this weekend.

“I wouldn’t say the track picked up speed. We picked up a little bit. It was a good run for the ALLTEL Dodge. I really like qualifying here, and I know some other guys do, too. Labonte is always good here, and so is Brian Vickers. Harvick was fast in practice, but it was a good lap for the ALLTEL Dodge.

“You don’t really realize how fast you’re going until you hit something, and that’s pretty much from 140 on. When the car jumps loose here, it’s like hitting something. You can deal with tight here. You just don’t want to deal with loose. In qualifying it’s pretty fast. When Bodine ran that 197 or whatever here, I’m sure he was thinking about it the next couple of days.”

“It’s good and bad at the same time going out first, but it doesn’t really matter when it comes down to it. The ALLTEL Dodge was fast, faster than when we unloaded. It was just a good lap for us, a lot of speed. It’s definitely fast here.

“We were slower than we qualified here last fall. I don’t think it felt much different. I think it was a 10th slower. We had a .54 last fall, and I think we had a .64 today. One was at night and one was in the day. The true test of the tires will be in the race when the tires fall off and the track gets a little greasier.

“NASCAR has a minimum speed, and I’ll let them police the slower cars. There is a definite worry there, but the bottom line is it’s up to them to control that. I’m sure they won’t have a car out there that’s slower than the minimum speed.

“There’s a different tire here than the one we had at Vegas, and the one we had at Vegas was different than the one we had there last year. We missed the boat pretty big, and when we got two laps down that was pretty much the end of our day. We never did make up a lap so we could benefit from the Lucky Dog rule. Our car was OK for about five laps and then it seemed like someone threw it in reverse. We just missed it. That was basically it. It was a combination of everything.

“You’re not going to see a tight field here, I can tell you that. The rule changes aren’t going to make a tighter field. It might make the race a little better as far as aerodynamics or whatnot because the cars are going to have a smaller hole. There won’t be a night and day difference from what you saw last week. I was a little disappointed in the fact that the track got a lot of marbles on it last week. The track wasn’t as wide as it had been in the past, and that won’t be good for the rest of the year.

“I’ve always said a good racecar driver can adapt to anything. He (Kasey Kahne) has proven that he’s a good racecar driver.

“We struggled with the balance at Rockingham, and we struggled with it last week at Vegas. We just haven’t hit the setup quite right, but it’s coming around. Part of it is from the tires and part of it is from other things. You’ve just got to learn how to stay ahead of the game.”

KASEY KAHNE (No. 9 Dodge Dealers/UAW Dodge)

“We gained a lot from this morning when we unloaded. We got too tight in the center of the corner, and that killed a lot of our lap. The guys made a lot of good changes. We had the fastest car last week, and we’re back in the pack this week, so it’s going to be a different view that’s for sure. I think our car is going to be better in race trim. I like having to race people. It’ll be fun. Tommy Baldwin has always run good here, so I’m excited to get to drive one of this cars. It’ll be just like Vegas as the race progresses. We’ll start sliding around.”

BRENDAN GAUGHAN (No. 77 Kodak Easy Share Dodge)

“We qualified eighth at Vegas, but it wasn’t a very good eighth. We had to just hold on to it. This week, the car felt great. We’re bringing a new Dodge each week, and the cars are getting better and better. We got rid of a bunch of problems we’ve been having all year. We’ve still got a few things to work on, but the big problems are going away. I’ll take that. I hit the lines that Buddy Baker wanted me to hit, and I did it consistently. I think we’re going to be all right.”

RUSTY WALLACE (No. 2 Miller Lite Dodge)

“I thought I did pretty good. If it had turned in three and four like it did in one and two I would have been fast. I don’t think I could have beat Ryan, but I believe I could have qualified second. We’ve got our pit crew fixed, so we’re ready to race. Billy Wilburn is going to change tires. He attacked the tires in the first pit practice and on the first stop we knocked out a 12.67. We could have won at Rockingham if we hadn’t had that bad stop. I don’t know if we could have won last week, but we could have finished second. We had three bad pit stops. You can’t have 17 and 18-second pit stops. One time I lost 17 positions. The car has been strong, and I like the shorter spoiler and softer tires. I really think that’s better.”

JAMIE McMURRAY (No. 42 Texaco/Havoline Dodge)

“I’m not very good at this racetrack. Hopefully we’ll get our car a little better tomorrow and I hope that ends up in the top 20. I’m not sure it will. I wish we had qualified better, but we’ve got to get it good in race trim. We struggled here last year. I’d say if we can come out of here with a top 10, I’ll be pretty happy.”

STERLING MARLIN (No. 40 Coors Light Dodge)

“We were sideways on both laps. We almost spun out. I don’t quite understand it. The tires are going to wear out quick. It’s going to be a handling track on Sunday, and I’d say they’re going to be up against the fence.”

JEREMY MAYFIELD (No. 19 Dodge Dealers/UAW Dodge)

“This team has done a great job, and our Dodge is running great. We picked up from practice, and that’s the biggest thing. If we can get the balance worked out on the car for Sunday, I think we’re going to be in real good shape.”

CASEY MEARS (No. 41 Target Dodge) – Celebrating 26th birthday

“I was hoping to go a little faster, but we ended up really loose at the end of practice. When we first went out this morning, the car felt great. We tightened it up for qualifying. The guys did a good job of getting the car ready, so I feel good about where we are. I feel better after getting a year under my belt and having some good runs on top of that. We’ll have to see how we are in Happy Hour. This track is a good bit different than Vegas, but I think we can improve on that seventh-place finish last week. We’ve got a good car, good motor and good team. The car that has the best balance and doesn’t wear out one end quicker than the other is going to be in good shape.”

KYLE PETTY (No. 45 Georgia-Pacific/Brawny Dodge)

“We haven’t worked on qualifying. We’ve spent all our time on race stuff. We just don’t have a good race package right now. The guys have been working hard on our race cars. We call them race cars, not qualifying cars. That was a couple tenths faster than we practiced, so that’s fast enough for me. We had a good run last week. We weren’t as good as everybody on new tires for about 10 laps. Then we were a lot better on old tires than most people for about the last 10 laps. Jeff ran good and cut a tire, but we had two cars at Vegas that were pretty good, and I was really pleased. I thought we had two good cars at Rockingham, too. I’m optimistic about the season. Coming from 42nd in points, there’s got to be a way up. That’s the way we look at it. I think we’re going to be a lot better this year.”