Daytona 500 - Rookie Post-Race Quotes

Where the Raybestos Rookies finished in the Daytona 500:
Kvapil, 19th
Busch, 38th

UNOFFICIAL Raybestos Rookie point standings:
Kvapil, 11
Busch, 10
McClure, 0

RAYBESTOS® ROOKIE CONTENDER QUOTES FOR DAYTONA 500 NASCAR NEXTEL CUP SERIES RACE AT DAYTONA INTERNATIONAL SPEEDWAY, FEBRUARY 20, 2005.

TRAVIS KVAPIL IN THE No. 77 KODAK/JASPER ENGINES AND TRANSMISSIONS DODGE WAS THE RAYBESTOS ROOKIE OF THE RACE IN THE DAYTONA 500. Notes: Kvapil finished 19th his first Daytona 500 start and his first in a restrictor plate race. This is his best finish in four career NEXTEL Cup Series starts. His best finish prior to today was 21st at Martinsville Speedway in October 2004. “We had a great car all day and in long run I was able to drive my way to the front or into the top-15. I screwed up on one of the earlier pit stops and got caught speeding on pit road and that cost us a bunch of positions. We were able to fight our way back from that and get ourselves 10th, 11th, 12th, right in there. We restarted with 15 to go or so and I thought man, we’re really in good position and it was the best that my car was driving and it was really handling good, anywhere that I wanted to put it. All I know is that I was full throttle and the next thing that I know Mike Skinner was right in front of me and he was slamming on his brakes. It’s hard to tell what happened. I didn’t see it and Rusty was up my tailpipes pushing me into it because he was ready to go to. It’s just unfortunate. I feel terrible for Mike. I don’t even think he finished the race but it’s just one of those deals. Somebody must have missed a shift or just got jacked up there and checked up a little bit. It’s all right. We had a great car; we had a top-10 car, I really think. It’s just too bad that we couldn’t show it. We still got a decent finish out of it after we tore the racecar up I was surprised we ran as good as we did.” DID YOU HAVE A LOT OF TROUBLE GETTING PEOPLE TO DRAFT WITH YOU? “Not really. I actually noticed that once we got the car good midway through the race, I was able to make moves on my own. Run through the center, run way up by the wall and make some good passes on guys. If we had a fast racecar guys were going with us and a lot of guys hooked up with us and pushed us through quite a bit. I was pretty happy to see that.” HOW DIFFICULT IS IT TO PIT HERE? “I was really trying to be conscious of not speeding on pit road because I knew they had that electronic deal. I must have just been barely over it because I know I was right on my tach reading. I think it’s the right thing to do. I’m glad we didn’t loose a lap because of it. We were able to battle our way back up to the top-15 after that but this place is tough. It’s hard to get yourself slowed down and actually stop. It’s easy to slide through [the pit stall]. That’s the first time in my whole career that I’ve been busted on pit road. I guess it’s bad to do, being my first Daytona 500 is kind of bad timing. Like I said, we were able to battle our way back through and overcome.” WERE YOU SURPRISE TO NOT HAVE MORE DAMAGE IN THE ACCIDENT ON THE RESTART? “I saw the hood bowed way up and I thought for sure our day was over. Fortunately I think it just crunched everything up a little bit and it didn’t hurt anything too major. They were able to pound it back out and get it pretty close.” WERE YOU PLEASED WITH THE WAY THE CAR RAN? “I was happy as heck. The first part of the race we kind of rode it out. The guys made some great adjustments but came back to it. The last 50 or 60 laps of the race I think we had one of the cars that could contend. It’s just unfortunate that we got tore up a little bit.”

KYLE BUSCH, No. 5 KELLOGG’S CHEVROLET (finished 38th): “I don’t know exactly what happened. I obviously haven’t seen any tapes yet but I look forward to see what happened. I don’t know if it was bump drafting in the middle of the corner again or if a tire went down. It was just a shame. We were just kind of hanging out there in the beginning, of course nobody working with us. I was just kind of going to ride around and wait until the end or wait until at least the middle of the race to start getting busy but they decided that they needed to wreck earlier.” IT LOOKED LIKE YOU HAD NOWHERE TO GO. “I was trying to slow down and it didn’t matter if you got to 0 miles per hour, somebody was going to wreck you either from behind or from the front. It’s just a shame that we got caught up in it but there’s nothing else that we can do except go on to next week and hopefully wear them out at the downforce tracks.” YOUR HENDRICK MOTORSPORTS TEAMMATE JEFF GORDON WON THE DAYTONA 500. “It’s awesome. Congratulations to those guys. They did great and it’s good for those guys to win. Of course, Kurt finished second. I’m happy overall for Jeff and their team and Kurt as well. I wish we could have had a little better day.” HOW DIFFICULT WAS IT TO DRIVE A CAR WITH SO MUCH DAMAGE? “It was no fun at all. We kind of went out there riding around, just doopty-doo.”

SHANE WILSON, CREW CHIEF, No. 77 KODAK/JASPER ENGINES AND TRANSMISSIONS DODGE: ARE YOU SURPRISED THAT THE CAR WAS NOT MORE HEAVILY DAMAGED IN THE ACCIDENT? “In racing it’s always good to be a little lucky [smiles] and today we were a little lucky to come out of there with a finish. We could have been behind the wall with like 15 laps to go there. I’m pretty happy. A top-20 is always good and they are hard to get.” ARE YOU GLAD TO BE GOING TO CALIFORNIA SPEEDWAY NEXT WEEK? “I’m excited. We were decent there and I think we made some improvements to the car. We’re excited to go there with Travis and the guys are pumped up. We’re ready to go.” DO YOU HAVE ANY STRATEGY NEXT WEEK WITH THE IMPOUND RULE? “It’s a little more like the truck series so I guess we’re not as worried about it as some. I’m just not that worried about it because even if you qualified 40th you’ve got to have a good race setup and probably a good racecar isn’t going to qualify that good. We’ll see how it all plays out next week.” A FEW GOOD TEAMS FINISHED OUTSIDE THE TOP-35 TODAY. DO YOU THINK THERE IS A LOT OF PRESSURE ON THOSE TEAMS ALREADY? “Yeah. That deal is going to be big and that finish there today is going to help us. We’ve got to go to Fontana and finish. We’ve got to finish some races and the points will take care of themselves. But boy, I’d be nervous to have a couple bad races. We’ve only got one. We’ve got to do three or four to make sure that we get ourselves good and solid in that top 35 because that’s going to be big this year. There’s probably 40 good teams this year that car run up front and finish races and get some good finishes. It doesn’t matter how good a team is if they don’t finish a couple of races in the first five races, it’s going to be kind of nervous, especially going to an impound race.”

ALAN GUSTAFSON, CREW CHIEF, No. 5 KELLOGG’S CHEVROLET: THIS TEAM DID A LOT OF WORK TO GET KYLE BACK ON THE TRACK. “That’s kind of our motto. We’re going to do what it takes at all costs. We raced 40 laps for 38th position. We gained one spot. We don’t want any DNFs and we want to get all we can get. We know we’re going to have rough times like this, the situation out of our control and we’re kind of sending the message that’s not going to beat us down. We’re going to do all we can do even though we get in situations like that. We put on a new center section of the nose. These cars are so sensitive. We knocked the radiator inlet off and that really hurt us. The damage wasn’t terrible; it didn’t hurt the radiator or any other components but you can’t get any air to the radiator and you overheat so we had to fix that whole center section of the nose and get the radiator inlet right so we could run. We were at the wrong place, wrong time. Restrictor plate racing, you know. You love it and you hate it but what do you do.” DID YOU LEARN ANYTHING AT DAYTONA THAT WILL HELP YOU AT TALLADEGA? “I think we did. I think we learned we can do this. It didn’t end the way that we wanted it to but we came down here and ran well. We ran well in the 150, qualified well, and practiced well. We were just in the wrong place at the wrong time on lap 30 or whatever it was. It’s a shame but that’s the way it goes.” COMMENT ON JEFF GORDON’S WIN TODAY AND THE FACT THEY LOSE THAT CAR. “Everybody at Hendrick Motorsports worked so hard to win the Daytona 500 I’m just glad that Jeff did or one of our teammates. That trophy belongs at Hendrick Motorsports and it’s going to be there now. We wish that we could have got it for them but if we couldn’t I’m glad that Jeff did.” IS THERE A SENSE OF RELIEF GOING TO CALIFORNIA NEXT WEEK? “Yeah, yeah, yeah [smiles]. It’s just more in your control. The impound race is going to make it a little weird. We don’t really understand that just yet but we can race there. That’s more of a track that we feel like we’re better suited for and Kyle’s lack of experience may not show up as bad there. Not that it did today, but I guess that he’d be more comfortable there. I think we all are.” SOME TEAMS HAD PROBLEMS TODAY AND FINISHED OUTSIDE THE TOP-35. DO YOU THINK THEY MIGHT GAMBLE IN QUALIFYING NEXT WEEK? “These drivers are so good that if you’ve got a good car you can start 43rd and they’d be up there in a hurry. California is a place where you can pass. It will fan out and you can run the bottom or the top, wherever you want to run and if you’re good you can go to the front. I think it will be more race stuff and more predictable [laughs]. Hopefully no lap 30 crashes. It should be a little better for us.”