Subway 400 - Rookie Qualifying Quotes

Notes: Kasey Kahne was the top Raybestos Rookie qualifier at The Rock, earning the third starting position for Sunday's race. He was the only first-year driver to claim a starting position in the top-10. The rest of the Raybestos Rookie class: Brendan Gaughan (15th), Scott Riggs (19th), Brian Vickers (20th), Scott Wimmer (22nd), and Johnny Sauter (30th)

KASEY KAHNE IN THE #9 DODGE DEALERS/UAW DODGE WAS THE TOP RAYBESTOS ROOKIE AT ROCKINGHAM.

WAS THAT A PERFECT LAP? "No, not perfect. I went back to the draw real quick to carry speed and it pushed a little bit then I gave it a little more wheel and I got loose off because of that. Not a perfect lap but a darn good lap for our Dodge Dealers car." DID YOU HAVE ANYTHING FOR RYAN NEWMAN? "Where we were I needed to get back to the throttle where I did in order to go as fast as Ryan. I tried doing it and we just pushed a little bit but that's a great lap for us." DOES THIS EASE THE FRUSTRATION FROM LAST WEEKEND? 'Oh yeah. Now we have to get to the race. We qualified pretty good last week too. We had two really good racecars. I backed it up a little bit in practice there. We were second and third and ended up qualifying third and fourth. We lost a spot. We needed to go the other way and go first and second. We're real happy with that." HOW SATISFIED ARE YOU WITH THAT RUN? "Very satisfied. We're starting third in a NEXTEL Cup Series race and that's pretty cool. I'm real excited. The Dodge Dealers team did an awesome job. Tommy Baldwin and whole team are doing an outstanding job." WHAT IS IT LIKE COMING OUT OF THE BOX SO STRONG? 'It's good. We have Evernham engines, which always helps and they're running great. We should be able to qualify well at a lot of races this year so it's going to be a lot of fun doing that." WHAT ARE YOUR CHANCES HERE ON SUNDAY? "We came in here talking about a great test. Bill Elliott came down here with us and I felt our race runs were as good or better than qualifying. We didn't even test qualifying runs. I think we will have a great car Sunday and we'll see what we can do." JEREMY AND BILL HAVE QUALIFIED WELL HERE THROUGH THE YEARS. HOW MUCH DID THEY TEACH YOU? "Jeremy ran some race runs this morning and then went to qualifying and we worked on qualifying the whole time. We went back and forth and learned a little bit from each side and that definitely paid off. That definitely helped us qualifying." HOW IMPORTANT ARE THE EXTRA LAPS YOU GET HERE IN THE BUSCH CAR? "Very important. That helps our Busch deal, now that I've got laps over here. We'll have final practice in the Busch car and that will help there. But the Busch practice definitely helps me on the NEXTEL Cup side and helps us with our qualifying for sure." ARE YOU BACK ON TRACK AFTER A TOUGH DAY IN THE DAYTONA 500? "We had a couple bad days in Daytona but that's just Daytona. Maybe next year we'll go down there and have two great days. It's up and down but we put that behind us and we're looking forward to this week and IO think we have a great racecar here at The Rock."

TOMMY BALDWIN, CREW CHIEF, #9 DODGE DEALERS/UAW DODGE:

"That was pretty good. We came here and tested a couple weeks ago and we learned a lot. Kasey had a lot of seat time and getting in that Busch car this morning helped getting him some laps. It was a good day." WHAT DO YOU TELL A YOUNG DRIVER WHEN THEY RACE HERE? "This whole deal is going to be tire management from here on out, Saturday and Sunday, so we've got to work on it. Like I said we had a real good test. Today is the first day with Kasey that we've ever worked in qualifying so I'm pretty pleased with that."

SCOTT WIMMER, #22 CATERPILLAR DODGE:

"It was good to pick up. The Caterpillar guys did a great job getting the car better. We unloaded all right and then we got real loose and could get it back. I think we got a set of tires that didn't match up right and weren't quite sure what to do and we ended up tightening the car up too much. We were just way too tight there. It was good to learn that and I think we'll make it by time and not have to take a provisional or anything and that was really our main goal anyway. We came down here and tested right before we went down to Daytona and didn't get a lot of runs in. We're going to work on getting our car comfortable for 400 miles here. It's a long race, a lot of pit stops, and things like that. You really have to have your car balanced real well and driving real good. We learned an awful lot today. We kind of chased it and made the car a little too tight but at least we know what to go back to now."

BRIAN VICKERS, #25 GMAC FINANCIAL SERVICES CHEVROLET:

It must have been loose. It changed a little bit on us from practice to qualifying. It was real loose on exit and it was probably hard to see that on the racetrack. The GMAC guys did a real good job. We'll still have a pretty good staring spot. My main focus right now is getting this car better for the race and that's what counts."

JOHNNY SAUTER, #30 AOL CHEVROLET:

HOW DIFFICULT IS IT TO QUALIFY HERE? "I don't know, you're asking the wrong guy [smiles]. It's not bad. Stickers make you feel like Superman. It's pretty hard because I'm almost dead last [laughs]." IS THE TRACK REAL ROUGH? "It's not that bad. It's more rough coming off turn four that anywhere else. The rest of the racetrack is pretty smooth. It's just a fast racetrack."

BRENDAN GAUGHAN, #77 KODAK EASY SHARE DODGE:

"I want to see where that puts us with the Raybestos Rookies. I don't think we're going to be the quickest, I don't know. What's great about this team is that we have teammates. After practice we sat down with Newman's guys and Rusty's guys and said 'Okay, we don't feel great yet' and they gave us some tips and we went out there and picked up and we made the front-end of the Kodak Dodge work. That's the benefit of being with the Penske-Jasper team: you've got teammates that kick butt." YOU PICKED UP ON YOUR SECOND LAP. "It got loose for the first time all day coming out of turn four to take the green flag so I went easy. I took the whole first lap and tried to save a lot of that tire because I knew that it was going to be no good and prepared it for the second lap. I may be a Raybestos Rookie but I've been around a few NASCAR tracks and when you know a first lap is not going to be good, save the tire, especially at a place like Rockingham. I saved the tire for a lap so I could have a little left for the second and we got luck and it worked." THIS IS YOUR FIRST RACE AT ROCKINGHAM. 'This is a fun place. This is like a Darlington or Dover. These are driver's racetracks and I like these places. Having Rusty and Ryan helping me out is a big deal and Kodak has a lot of history around this place also, so I'd like to etch our name a little bit in that history. Plus being the Raybestos Rookie of the Race here wouldn't be bad, either."

SCOTT RIGGS, #10 VALVOLINE CHEVROLET:

"It's bad. All the guys did a great job; it's just frustrating for me because I knew we had a car capable of being in the top-five. With the weather change we just didn't anticipate how big of a swing the balance was going to go on the tight side being so much cooler. The car was really tight and really killed our speed. We should have been in the top-five but it's not where you start, it's where you finish."