Pocono 500 - Dodge Qualifying Quotes

RUSTY WALLACE (No. 2 Miller Lite Dodge Charger)

“I was really loose yesterday. We made a chassis adjustment last night, spring rubbers, wedge, tire pressure adjustments. After I made my qualifying run last night I knew it was too loose and we needed to change some things. We made adjustments for today and it was great. It got off the corners good, didn’t spin the tires, got a lot of bite up off the corners. I did a banzai run yesterday, and I attempted to do a qualifying run and ran a 54.60 and just ran a 53.98 so that’s a big pickup.”

JAMIE McMURRAY (No. 42 Texaco/Havoline Dodge Charger)

“That was great. We weren’t that good yesterday, so we changed a lot of stuff and made a lot of improvements. The thing about the impound races is the guy who qualifies well usually races well. I’m pretty happy. I think that’ll be top 10 or top 15. Sterling was really good yesterday, so I sat down with Donnie (crew chief Wingo) last night and made some adjustments similar to his car. Donnie went off some past history he has here and I’m very excited about that lap. The biggest thing here is keeping grip in the car. The car never feels like it goes away. You just slow down a lot and can’t keep your momentum up as much. You can run a lot of places on this track. You can run right on the bottom, but I’ve been past many times on the outside here. You just have to wait and see where your car works good on Sunday.”

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

“That wasn’t what we wanted, but it wasn’t that bad, either. I don’t really know what to expect in the race, but we’ll try to get the car handling right and see how it plays out tomorrow.”

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

“We made some huge gains and picked up a lot from yesterday. It’s hotter today and we should have been freer. The track is good. It’s a lot freer than it was yesterday. I think we’re going to be in pretty good shape for the race.”

JEFF GREEN (No. 43 Betty Crocker/Cheerios Dodge Charger)

“Our car was really loose. I just about spun out in the middle of turn three, but we’ve got a starting spot. I’m just disappointed that we couldn’t do what we ran yesterday. Everybody else picked up from yesterday and we didn’t. I think we’ll be good in the race, but we’ll have to come from the back. It’s warmer today and the track sits so long between cars it’s probably letting the oil come out of the asphalt a little bit. Everybody’s got the same advantage. With the impound deal, it’s just hard to make everything good. I think we’ll be better in the race than we qualified.”

CASEY MEARS (No. 41 Target Dodge Charger)

“We were really loose. We’ve been fighting this new aero package all season, and we’ve just got to keep working on it until we figure it out.”

STERLING MARLIN (No. 40 Coors Light Dodge Charger)

“We picked up from practice. The car was still loose. It was pretty loose yesterday and it was free in qualifying. I think we’ll be OK in the race once we get it ready to race and get all the downforce off the front. The car was really good in race trim yesterday. It looks like Biffle’s got the best car so far. I hope we get it (Nashville Busch race in tonight). We’ve got a good car for the Busch race, too.”

TRAVIS KVAPIL (No. 77 Kodak/Jasper Dodge Charger)

“It was slippery. Michael went out a few cars in front of me and ran a fast lap, but my car felt like it really wasn’t in the racetrack at all. It felt really free and we were just riding it out. It didn’t feel very good at all.”

RYAN NEWMAN (No. 12 Alltel Dodge Charger)

“It was a little loose for sure, but it was a pretty good lap for the Alltel Dodge. I think we’ve got a good car for the race for sure. You never know what you’re going to get here with the weather with the qualifying lasting so long. We’re looking forward to the race. We didn’t get the balance exactly right. We wanted to start better, but we’ll see what we can do with what we’ve got. “

NOTE: Newman qualified 17th for Sunday’s race, breaking a streak of 20 straight races that he’s qualified in the top 10.

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

WHAT DOES DANICA PATRICK HAVE GOING FOR HER? “She’s good looking. She’s young. She’s a woman, and she’s doing a good job. There are a lot of things good about what she’s done so far. She’s got a lot of things going for her and then she drives and finishes fourth in the Indy 500. That’s pretty amazing.”

WHAT KIND OF RACE ARE YOU LOOKING FOR ON SUNDAY? “I’m looking for a different race. Who knows what’s going to happen? I’ve heard a lot of people are struggling. Some people are good at times and struggling at other times. That’s how we were, too. I felt like we were decent at times and bad at other times, so it’s just different. No shifting, different tires, different spoiler, different Dodge Charger, everything is different and it’s a different racetrack. Who knows what will happen tomorrow? It could be really interesting.”

COMMENT ON PRESSURES THE YOUNGER DRIVERS ARE UNDER RIGHT NOW “There are a lot of them. When you’re not running good there’s even more. It’s a lot easier when you’re racing well and you’re doing everything on the high side on the good side. When you’re not racing good there’s tons of pressures from sponsors and owners and drivers, crews. Everything has to go together. It’s tough, and when you get off track it’s tough to get back on track.”

WHAT DID IT MEAN TO FINALLY GET THE FIRST WIN? “The first win was great. It was awesome to get. It was awesome to know we could do it as a team. We’d come so close for so long and finally got it at Richmond. It was great. We were all excited and thought it would carry over to some races after that and keep running well. We haven’t been able to do that. We’ve had some different things going on and then last week at Dover showed how off we were. Hopefully this week starting today in qualifying we’ll get back on track.”

COMMENT ON ERIN CROCKER’S PROGRESS “I think she’s done a really good job in sprint car racing and what she’s done so far in the ARCA Series. She’s going to do some Busch stuff for Ray and Busch testing. It takes time, but I think she’s definitely done a good job. She needs as much pavement experience as she can get because she’s done a lot of dirt racing. She’s a good enough driver if she gets that experience I think she can do well. It’s a tough transition, but if you have the right people working with you and get to do enough of it, it can be done. Bill’s the best guy you can have working with you, the best guy on her side right now would be Bill. If she listens she’ll learn from him. I was able to learn a lot and still do call Bill when we struggle or when we do good to thank him, but when we struggle I call him to get advice.”

HOW HARD IS IT TO MAINTAIN BALANCE? “It’s tough for me. I’ve struggled this year going up and down like that and trying to get better at it. You’re not going to have great races every weekend. It definitely hasn’t been a perfect season by any means for us. It’s been really up and down. It’s tough. I’m trying to get better at it, just doing what we can. If we can’t do it, that’s the way it is.”

WHAT’S THE GOAL FOR THE SECOND HALF OF THE SEASON? “Just to get consistent. If we can get consistent we can get in The Chase. There’s no saying we can’t, but to get consistent is what we’re looking for right now.”

YOU’RE ONE OF THE GUYS WHO HAS WON IN ALL THREE SERIES NOW “At the time all I thought about was winning the Cup race. Later that week it dawned on me that we had won in all three series. It was cool. We’ve got two truck wins, two Busch wins and one Cup win. We need to keep getting more of all those. I’d like to go three for three in the trucks some time this year, too. I’d like to get in another good Dodge truck and try to win again. I don’t know where, but somewhere later this season I’d like to do that.”

WHEN WILL YOU GET TO SEE YOUR SPRINT CAR RUN? “I was hoping to go down last night and I wasn’t able to. I wanted to go down tonight and drive it myself, but that’s not going to happen, either. I don’t know when I’ll get to watch it or drive it. It could be a long time.”

COMMENT ON RACING AT MICHIGAN NEXT WEEK “It’s a good track. The track gets wide. You can race from top to bottom. It’s a fun track. I like racing there. We raced well there last year. Everything changes so much, but we’ll go up there next week and hopefully have a real good starting point and see what happens. You can go anywhere you want on the track at Michigan if your car is working well. You can be as fast on top as on the bottom. If your car is not working well you have to find where your car works well, and it’s a track where you can look around and make up time if you do move your line.”

WHAT HAS THE WIN MEANT TO YOU MENTALLY? “It was nice to get it off our backs and get in the winner’s circle and you don’t have to put up with questions anymore like ‘why haven’t you?’ or ‘when are you going to win?’ It’s nice to get all that behind us and look forward to the next one.”