Nextel All-Star Challenge - Ford Post-Race Quotes

MARK MARTIN – No. 6 AAA Ford Fusion (Finished 15th) – IN THE 600 WITH COLD TIRES WILL IT BE A CONCERN? “You don’t have to have cold tires to wreck like that. All you’ve got to do is just give it too much gas.” WHAT HAPPENED WITH THE WRECK? “It looks like it got away from Kasey there. I came here to race and that’s what I was doing. I had me a great AAA Fusion and the fans are getting a great show. It’s an honor to be driving this stuff. I had another car that could contend for it. I got a little help with the inversion there and overcoming our start. If I had to do it over again, I’d have to do exactly what I did. I was in the wrong place and got collected.” JAMIE SAID YOU TALKED TO HIM ABOUT THE INCIDENT EARLY. WHAT HAPPENED? “I made a couple of runs at him and he didn’t give it up, and I made another run at him down there and got real close to him and he wiggled and I got into him. Stuff like that happens when you don’t yield to a faster car I guess. That’s why I usually get out of the way if somebody is all over me.”

GREG BIFFLE – No. 16 National Guard Ford Fusion (Finished 13th) – WHAT DID YOU SEE FROM YOUR VIEWPOINT? “Just guys getting in the wall wrecking. It’s unfortunate that we didn’t get a chance for a million bucks, but the fans and media and everybody got to see what they wanted to see – basically to come out here and wreck and crash in a big pile.” WHAT WAS THE TRACK SURFACE LIKE? “It wasn’t bad. It was hard at the beginning when the tires were a little cold and it’s a little tough to get going, and that may have been what happened. I doubt whether it was somebody getting impatient, it was probably that somebody just slipped or slid up into another guy and started a chain reaction. That will happen anytime you’re bunched up in a field like that, but beating and banging, that’s what everybody wanted to come out and see tonight. That’s what everybody has been selling is that we’re gonna come out here and wreck a bunch of cars and, unfortunately, that’s what we did. We’ll just come back for the 600 and see how we do.”

JAMIE MCMURRAY – No. 26 Irwin Ford Fusion (Finished 18th) – DID YOU LEARN ANYTHING FOR NEXT WEEK? “It’s not a big secret that we’ve struggled, especially on mile and a halves this season, but we actually felt like – the first run we weren’t that good and Bob adjusted on the car and we did learn some stuff to bring back to the 600 so that’s somewhat encouraging. The cars have been very tough for me to drive this year and we haven’t really been able to hit on what we need, but I think we might have found something today so that’s encouraging.” DID MARK TALK TO YOU ABOUT WHAT HAPPENED IN THE FIRST SEGMENT? “Yeah, he said, ‘I’ll take the blame for that.’ I said, ‘What happened?’ And he said that I just got underneath you and I saw you wiggle and that was kind of it. It’s the all-star race and I know Mark’s side of that. He was racing me pretty hard. You want to let guys go, but I didn’t ever really feel like he was far enough underneath me to let him go and then I got spun out. It’s very unfortunate to have one of your teammates do that, but Mark and me, even when I wasn’t with Roush Racing, always had a good relationship and it’ll stop here. You can’t let something like that go on. He didn’t mean to do it, he’s just racing hard.” WHAT HAPPENED ON THE BIG WRECK? “I don’t know. It looks like a Talladega wreck when all that happens. It happens so fast and there are only like six cars in front of you that the spotter just barely mumbled something and then he didn’t say anything so I knew what was happening. It’s just a big wreck and you hope you make it through and we didn’t.”

MATT KENSETH – No. 17 DeWalt Ford Fusion (Finished 11th) – WHAT HAPPENED? “I don’t know. At the finish line I could see that Tony was getting a run and I was gonna try to stay on the bottom. I came across the second part of the tri-oval, I thought on the grass, and right before we got to the corner Bob told me he was looking inside and as soon as he said that I moved up but we made contact and I got turned around, so I don’t know. Maybe he was a way in the there and I squeezed him off, I don’t really know. I didn’t think he could have got in there that good to have that good of a run, but he must have.” TONY HAD SOME WORDS WITH ROBBIE REISER. ANY CARRYOVER FROM PREVIOUS PROBLEMS? “No, Tony is always mad at somebody. I’m not gonna go out there and do the name calling like he does every week. He’s always mad at somebody. If he was under there and I cut him off and made a mistake, then I made a mistake. There’s nothing else I can do about that right now.”

DALE JARRETT – No. 88 UPS Ford Fusion (Finished 7th) – “It’s the same thing we’ve been fighting. We can’t get through the center of the corner. We’d run a few laps and then just start sliding the nose and it gets progressively worse as we go on. We’ve got some work to do. It’s the same thing we’ve fought here for quite a while and we’ve got to make that better.” IS TURN FOUR AN ISSUE? IS IT THE TOUGHEST PART OF THIS TRACK? “Yeah, it’s probably the toughest part right now. You’re just carrying so much speed off of there and then you flatten out really quick. There’s not a lot of grip there or anything that you can lean on, so that’s gonna be tough for 600 miles.”

CARL EDWARDS – No. 99 Office Depot Ford Fusion (Finished 4th) – “Man, I feel terrible for my guys and the whole Office Depot crew. That’s a good race car. I was just trying to hold onto track position on the outside of Tony there and I got real loose off of four. I drove it all the way to the wall and just hit it. I hate to say it, but if we hadn’t done that, that thing was a rocket. That’s a fast race car. We still made good time, but I want to win this thing.” YOU’RE STILL IN ONE PIECE, THOUGH. “Oh yeah, that’s the tough part of racing. When you make that mistake that costs you a lot, but that’s how you learn. I’m doing the best I can out there. It’s crazy. The track is slippery, but we learned a lot and we’re gonna be great for the Coke 600.” WHAT WILL YOU CHANGE FOR NEXT WEEK? “We’re gonna beat that fender out. That’s about all we’re gonna change. That’s a good race car right there. The Office Depot team did a great job, so we’ll be alright.” HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT THE TIRES AND ALL FOR NEXT WEEKEND? “That’s great experience. That’s worth a lot there. I feel real good going into the Coke 600. The car was awesome. I got real loose up there trying to hold onto track position on a restart. I was so loose at the beginning of that run and I hit the wall. If it wasn’t for that, this team might be celebrating right now. The car was that good, but we’ll move on.”