Dickies 500 - Rookie Qualifying Quotes

Where the Raybestos Rookies qualified at Texas:
K. Busch 24th
T. Kvapil 37th

KYLE BUSCH IN THE No. 5 CARQUEST CHEVROLET WAS THE TOP RAYBESTOS ROOKIE QUALIFIER AT TEXAS. YOU PICKED UP ABOUT TWO TENTHS FROM WHAT YOU RAN IN PRACTICE. “I’m pretty happy with that. I think we could have been just a little bit better but that was all she wrote for the first lap. For some reason, we’re excellent through one and two. We are money through there and then going through three and four, the thing gets into turn 3 good and then as soon as I get it down to the bottom it just wants to start four-wheel drifting back up the racetrack and we haven’t been able to fix that all day today. Overall, it was a good run for the CARQUEST Chevy. We’ll just see where it lines us up but tomorrow is the big project. We’ve got to work on that for race trim and just get better there.” YOU HAVE HAD A LOT OF SUCCESS ON THESE 1.5-MILE TRACKS, SO YOU MUST BE LOOKING FORWARD TO SUNDAY’S RACE. “I’m looking forward to it. Texas definitely hasn’t been one of my favorites. I just don’t enjoy this place. For some unknown reason, I think it has to do with the banking and the corners, the transitions from getting into the corner and coming off the corner, is just not very fun for me. We’ll just have to do what we need to do in order to work on those situations and get my car better.” HOW WAS YOUR LAP? “It was a good run. I think we’ll end up about a top-15 or so. It’s not going to be up front as far as we’d like but we definitely have a project for us in order to get ready for the weekend. Every time I get down into turn 3 and get it down to the bottom of the racetrack we just have a four-wheel drift situation that takes us straight up the racetrack. We’re not sure how to fix that. We’ve been trying everything in the book so far today but hopefully tomorrow we can find something that will help that. It’s going to take a little bit of work. Race trim is better for us here than qualifying trim and has always been that way. It’s just something that we’ve got to work on which is that problem that I had over there. Hopefully we can lineup somewhere in the top-15 and we can race our way to the front.”

ALAN GUSTAFSON, CREW CHIEF, No. 5 CARQUEST CHEVROLET: “We’re definitely the best that we’ve been all day today [in qualifying]. We struggled a little more than I’d like to. It was just one of those days where nothing seemed to go right for us but we all stuck in there and kept going. That’s not a bad qualifying position. I think we’ll be top-20, top-15 there and get a decent starting spot there. We weren’t very good here in the spring and we need to get a good run. But we feel good about race trim. We made it through qualifying and I think we’ll be all right there.” THERE DOESN’T SEEM TO BE ANY TIRE ISSUES THIS WEEKEND. ANY REASON WHY WE SAW SO MANY PROBLEMS AT CHARLOTTE AND NONE HERE THIS WEEKEND? “I think this place is a little wore out now. You slide around, the sun comes out and you lose grip and it’s a little rougher. It’s a little bumpier, a little less abrasive, a little more sliding around. I really think this is going to be a good race. This is a good place to race. When we first came here it was scary fast, hurt tires, and now it’s good. It’s a great place to race. You slide around like Atlanta was.” THIS RACE WILL START IN MID-AFTERNOON AND END IN EARLY EVENING. AS A CREW CHIEF, ARE YOU GOING TO HAVE TO BE ON TOP OF YOUR GAME TO MAKE THE CORRECT CHANGES DURING THE RACE? “We’re definitely going to have to keep up with changes because you’re going to run a lot faster in the evening and your car balance is going to shift. We tested and we got to see the differences. We were real happy with our race trim when we tested and we weren’t happy with out qualifying trim. We couldn’t get it right. I think we got qualifying a little better, if we get our race a little better we should be good.” UNDER THE RIGHT CIRCUMSTANCES, WILL A TWO-TIRE STOP WORK HERE? “It’s going to be tough but I wouldn’t say that you can’t make it work. I think in the right situation you could but it’s going to have to be the right situation. I don’t think you’re just going to give it a shot and get it. The starts are going to have to align for you [smiles].”

TRAVIS KVAPIL, No. 77 KODAK/JASPER ENGINES AND TRANSMISSIONS DODGE: YOU PICKED UP THREE TENTHS FROM WHAT YOU RAN IN PRACTICE. “Another three would have been pretty good. We were terrible in testing here last week, we were terrible at Atlanta last week, and we’ve been terrible all through today. I really think we kind of hit on something just kind of talking in the truck about what we needed to do to get better and I really feel like we hit on something. Obviously that’s the first time that we got to try it and we picked up a couple of tenths there. The car drove a lot better. My comments were that it kind of drives normal; it feels good. Everybody is in qualifying trim but hopefully what we learned there is something that we can apply to the race because it’s definitely a similar feel I had last week in Atlanta that we were fighting. Hopefully we learned something there and we can put a decent race setup in and go for tomorrow.” IF YOU FOUND SOMETHING TO MAKE THE CAR BETTER, YOU HAVE TWO PRACTICE SESSIONS TOMMOROW TO MAKE IT EVEN BETTER. “We’re going to be back there in the qualifying order but I’ve got a smile on my face because I know we made some gains there. I’m looking forward to it. I was dreading all of practice today because we were struggling so bad. We didn’t seem like we could find anything to work but I feel like we’ve got a direction now and hopefully that will be what we need.” HOW DIFFICULT IS IT TO PASS HERE? “This is going to be harder than Atlanta, for sure. It will get better just because the track is getting older and the Busch race and truck race will help widen the groove out. Tires do wear out here pretty fast so hopefully guys start sliding around a little bit. Hopefully guys will start sliding around a little bit and we’ve got a decent handle on our car and we’ll be able to make some gains. The biggest thing is to stay on the lead lap if we can and just keep working on it all day and be there at the end.”