DHL 400 - Rookie Post-Race Quotes

KASEY KAHNE IN THE #9 DODGE DEALERS/UAW DODGE WAS THE RAYBESTOS ROOKIE OF THE RACE AT MICHIGAN. Notes: Kahne finished second, his fourth second place finish of the 2004 season. This is Kahne's fifth top-five and fifth top-10 finish this season. He took Raybestos Rookie of the Race honors for the seventh time in 15 races. Kahne is just the fourth Raybestos Rookie to score a top-five finish in the June race at Michigan since1975. The others: Joe Millikan (fourth in 1979), Jeff Gordon (second in 1993) and Ryan Newman (third in 2002). The DHL 400 is just the second race this season where two or more Raybestos® Rookies finished in the top-10 (Brian Vickers finished ninth).

DO YOU THINK IF THE YELLOW HADN'T COME OUT ON THE LAST LAP YOU MIGHT HAVE WON? "I think it would have been another close second. I think we would have lost by a car length or something. Ryan got a little loose through two. I don't know if there was oil or if he just got loose or what the cause of it was but he got loose and I had a good run on him but we would have still run second. He and that whole Dodge team did a great job today but it was fun to do that in the Mountain Dew Dodge." IS FINISHING SECOND STARTING TO GET FRUSTRATING? "It's been a while since we've been second so it's real nice to get back up in the top-five. It's nice to do it. We've been struggling back and forth and still having good runs but not where we want to be and not where we feel we can be. It was a great run for our Dodge Dealers/UAW Dodge today." BEFORE THE YELLOW ON THE LAST LAP, YOU HAD AN OPPORTUNITY TO WIN. "On the restart our Evernham engine ran great. I spun the tires a little bit and got going coming off turn two so that kind of held us up. But every time I got to a car I could get to the outside of him. I think getting around that final Ford there; right there at the end it was great to have a one-two finish for Dodge." DID YOU NEED MORE LAPS? "I would have needed probably three or four more laps. It was one of those races that if it had went to the checkered flag we probably would have lost by a car length or so. Ryan did a great job and we got our Dodge Dealers car real close to another win." DID YOU MAKE A LOT OF CHANGES TO GET THE CAR BETTER? "They made tons of changes [smiles]. Tommy Baldwin [crew chief] and our whole team they made changes all day long. We were terrible at the start of the race. We made some changes overnight and we had to catch back up and get the car back in the racetrack. One they did that, we started going back toward the front." IT LOOKED LIKE YOU CAME THROUGH TRAFFIC WELL DESPIT THE "AERO PUSH." "It was really bad back there. If your car is not perfect, that aero push is terrible. It's really bad, but once you get a really good car where you can move all over and it stays where you want it, the aero push isn't quite as bad and you can pass cars and that's what we had at the end of the race." WAS THERE ANY DRAFTING OUT THERE TODAY? "Down the straightaways there is a lot of that going on, a little bump drafting. I was bumping anybody; I got bumped a couple of times. It's pretty fun. It's a long racetrack so there's definitely some drafting." COULD THINGS HAVE PLAYED OUT ANY DIFFERENTLY FOR YOU TO WIN THE RACE? "This was about as good as we could have hoped for. We spun the tires a little bit on takeoff on that final green and got behind him a little bit too much. Once we got going we got our momentum rolling again and got the Mountain Dew car back up to second." WOULD YOU LIKE FOR NASCAR TO LET YOU GUYS RACE BACK TO THE CHECKERED FLAG? "I would have ran second either way. It would have been more enjoyable to run back to the checkered and at least throw it into turn three and see if we could catch him but I think we still would have run second. I don't think it mattered today." WHAT LOOKED LIKE A BAD DAY TURNED OUT TO BE PRETTY GOOD IN THE END. "Just a lot of hard work from these guys. Tommy Baldwin made a lot of good changes. The first change was the wrong way, the second change was the right direction and the third change got better and the fourth change got better. It was just a matter of getting enough shots to get our Mountain Dew Dodge better. At the end we had newer tires than those cars in front of us, other than the 48 and that helped a lot and we got the car the best that it had been all day and we got a bunch of momentum rolling around the top."

TOMMY BALDWIN, CREW CHIEF, #9 DODGE DEALERS/UAW DODGE: HOW DID YOU GET BACK IN CONTENTION AFTER STRUGGLING FOR MUCH OF THE RACE? "We didn't give up. We know the kid behind the wheel won't give up and we just kept adjusting on it all day. We started out way too loose and we just kept tightening up all day until we got comfortable and we started playing around on normal stuff with air pressure trying to get it to his liking there. We got it where it was the best there at the end and that was where it was important. I wish we had about five more laps left [smiles] but I've probably wished that a lot this year. We'll take it." HOW CLOSE DID YOU COME TO WINNING THE RACE? "I think we were there. We just needed three, four more laps I think we would have been real close. It was a good race, good day for the Mountain Dew/Dodge Dealers/UAW Dodge."

BRIAN VICKERS, #25 GMAC CHEVROLET: (Notes: Vickers finished ninth, scoring his second top-10 of the 2004 season and second of his 20-race NEXTEL Cup Series career.) "It was a good day in the long run. We've been trying some new stuff and it got really loose on us there for a long time and we fought it. But there at the end we found some things. Peter [Sospenzo, crew chief] made some good calls and we got the car fixed and we went from 22nd to ninth right there at the very end. I was happy with that. I think we could have got more if we had time but that's how it goes. We learned from it and we'll take it to next week." IT WAS A LOT WARMER TODAY THAN YESTERDAY DURING HAPPY HOUR. WAS THE CHANGE IN TEMPERATURE THROW YOU FOR A CURVE WHEN THE RACE STARTED? "Probably didn't help any. It definitely didn't help us any. We still rebounded there at the end. There were points in the race where we were way off the pace but we got back going good there at the end." THIS IS ANOTHER EXAMPLE OF YOUR TEAM PUTTING A FULL RACE TOGETHER. "We had a good qualifying run. We had a good finish and that's what is important. The car ran good all day, the engine was awesome, and the body seemed to be pretty good. We've just got to figure out a couple things here and there and get it all worked out." WHAT IS THE MAIN THING THAT YOU LEARNED THIS WEEKEND THAT WILL HELP YOU HERE IN AUGUST? "Just time. Time on the racetrack, time with these cars, stuff that we learned with the car and with the racetrack, too."

SCOTT RIGGS, #10 VALVOLINE CHEVROLET: "It was all right. I don't know what else we have to do here. We work hard to work on our car in happy hour and make sure that we get it right and felt like we were in good shape. They drop the green flag and man that thing was so tight I couldn't drive it. We kept freeing it up all day long and all the leaders were steadily getting away from us. That green flag stop somehow cycled through and got a lap down because those guys made so much time up on those new tires before us because we pitted a little later. We kept working and finally got it free there at the end and when we finally got it free it was too free so we had to come back in and make a late stop when Stewart got into the wall and tighten it up a little bit and put two tires on. We got track position on a lot of guys but it wasn't tight enough for me to go ahead and move to the front. I'm a little disappointed because I thought we had a lot better car than that and it didn't quite work out but we're going to keep digging."

NOTE: Raybestos Rookie Brendan Gaughan led the DHL 400 once for 13 laps and was the only first-year driver to lead a lap at Michigan. This is the third consecutive June race at Michigan where at Raybestos Rookie has led at least one lap. The others: Jimmie Johnson (25 laps in 2002), Ryan Newman (10 laps in 2002), and Greg Biffle (one lap in 2003).