KYLE BUSCH AND DALE EARNHARDT JR. GIVE MONTE CARLO SS 2ND AND 3RD PLACE FINISHES

BRISTOL, TN - Kyle Busch, No. 5 Kellogg's Monte Carlo SS, overcame a pit road mishap to finish a strong second in the Sharpie 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway. Busch dropped to 31st early in the 500-lap event but battled his way back through the field to finish within 0.591 seconds of race winner Matt Kenseth (Ford).

Dale Earnhardt, Jr., No. 8 Budweiser Monte Carlo SS, finished third in a strong run from his 40th provisional starting position.

A total of six Monte Carlo SS drivers grabbed top-10 finishing postions in the annual night race at the famed Tennessee half-mile, high-banked track.

Jeff Gordon, No. 24 DuPont Monte Carlo SS finished fifth followed by Raybestos Rookie contender Denny Hamlin, No. 11 FedEx Freight Monte Carlo SS.

Jeff Burton, No. 31 Cingular Wireless Monte Carlo SS who started outside of the front row, finished ninth. Current NASCAR Nextel Cup points leader Jimmie Johnson, No. 48 Lowe's Monte Carlo SS finished tenth to maintain the points lead and secure a place in the final Chase for the Nextel Cup.

Chevrolet continues to lead the Manufacturers' Cup standings with 180 points, 14 wins. Ford has 143 points with 5 wins and Dodge has 133 points with five wins.

The series moves to California Speedway for the September 3rd for Round 25, the Sony HD 500.

KYLE BUSCH, NO. 5 KELLOGG'S MONTE CARLO SS Finished 2nd, and DALE EARNHARDT JR., NO. 8 BUDWEISER MONTE CARLO Finished 3rd

KYLE BUSCH, NO. 5 KELLOGG'S MONTE CARLO SS - Finished 2nd

"It was a good run for us, we are proud of that effort. It was a good strong effort by the entire Kellogg's Chevrolet team. To be able to come out second here at Bristol, it was definitely a great effort. Everybody who is on this team did an awesome job for me and we were able to come out of here with a second. You can't ask for more than that especially out of Bristol. We had a mishap there toward the middle part of the race, on a pit road incident. But we had a strong enough race car where I realized I just needed to settle in a sit back, and let the race play out and let it come to me. We were able to drive up through there and get some positions. When we came down pit road, the guys were flawless the rest of the night and we were able to get good stops. That was all good. Then battling this cat here (Dale Earnhardt, Jr), it was pretty cool to me; he let me go. That was awesome of him, so I didn't have to waste much time on him or use a front bumper so I could go challenge the 17, but could never get to him."

YOU ARE 48 POINTS OUT OF 10TH PLACE. HOW COMPETITIVE MIGHT THE NEXT TWO RACES BE AS THE DRIVERS JOCKEY FOR POSITION LEADING INTO THE CHASE WITH THAT 5-POINT DIFFERENTIAL BETWEEN EACH POSTION? "That's pretty tough - especially knowing that there are only 11 guys capable of getting in right now. That's probably the biggest deal right there. From third place all the way back to 10th place is pretty tight. Kasey (Kahne) is the only guy who is outside that we have to battle with to get in. You always want to position yourself as high as you can in the Chase because those five points may come down to make the difference at the end of the year. But we feel we are enough of a caliber team where we can stay up there and challenge for the top 10 spot and solidify, hopefully, come Richmond."

HOW MUCH OF A RELIEF IS IT TO COME OUT OF BRISTOL STILL IN PRETTY GOOD POSITION? "It's very nerve-wracking coming into this place and having 43 cars jumbled up on top of each other and anything can happen. Especially last night, I was running around minding my own business (in the Busch race) and a few guys in front of me got together and I got trumped from behind and spun out. So the biggest thing for us is to just try to stay out of trouble and do the best you can. Definitely when you're done and you finish this well, it's a relief to get out of here. If you would have asked me this question if I had finished 32nd or 30th, or 25th, or whatever just running around all day, I would probably be more frustrated."

IS IT MORE SATISIFYING TO RUN SO WELL HERE - A PLACE WHERE YOUR BROTHER HAS DONE SO WELL AT? 'I was hoping I was going to be able to win because I wanted to hear everybody go, 'Boo', you now - that would have been awesome. But I wasn't quite able to get there. But for as successful as Kurt (Busch) has been here, that's pretty cool. I don't know for what reason it is that he always runs well here, I can't answer that. I don't know. Why I ran well this time, we've been getting better cars every time we've come here. We finished eighth here in the Spring and second here this time. We don't even want to mention last year. But we just tried to come into here having a good mindset that we could run well and that we could do well. That was probably the biggest thing. So all in all, it was just cool to run as well as we did."

WITH MATT KENSETH WINNING THE PAST TWO WEEKS, AND ONLY BEING 7 POINTS BEHIND POINT-LEADER, JIMMIE JOHNSON, IS HE STARTING TO LOOK LIKE THE CHAMPIONSHIP FAVORITE ON THE CHASE? "I think anybody is, really. You never know when somebody can hit on a stride. We saw Tony (Stewart) do it in the middle of last year. You saw the Roush gang do it two years ago. Last year, early, they were really strong. Sometimes they run well, but (Greg) Biffle has had terrible luck. He just hasn't had any luck whatsoever. So you might see Junior go to California and win and go to Richmond and win and be third in the points. So you never know. The biggest thing is just to keep in mind what you're doing and try to keep on task with it."

DALE EARNHARDT JR., NO. 8 BUDWEISER MONTE CARLO SS - Finished 3rd:

ON RUN IN TONIGHT'S RACE: "It was pretty uneventful, the car was handling different every time we put tires on it. Sometimes it was real difficult to drive, other times it was pretty easy. Matt (Kenseth) just had a faster car than we did all night. That was pretty evident. I tried really hard to make a run at him but it was all for nothing. The No. 5 car was coming there at the end. I just thought, you know, we are having a good points night, lets just do what we can to maintain that so I didn't want to hold him up and have him get in the back of us and cause us a lot of trouble. No. One, we had really great pit stops. We beat people off pit road all night long, I was really happy with that. Our pit crew has been tweaked a little bit all year long. Tony (Eury), Jr., has made a lot of adjustments with it as he has with the car itself. Tonight it really worked to perfection and I was really excited about that. That is something good going in to the next couple of races trying to make the Chase."

ON BEING 92 POINTS AHEAD OF 11TH AND FEELING COMFORTABLE WITH TOP-15 FINISHES NEXT TWO RACES: "I hope so. Make me feel a whole lot better going in to California where we have struggled. We are optimistic about how we ran at Michigan and are taking that setup out there, but that doesn't always work. I feel confident at Richmond that I can run in the top-10 there. I feel a whole lot better now about trying to get in. I mean, from me and Kyle (Busch) on back, it is 40 some points, pretty tight, you know. So I think all of us are just really have got to watch what we are doing, minimize mistakes and utilize every once of practice that you get to tune on your car to try and get yourself the best opportunity in these next couple of race. I think we have a really good shot at it now. Before, it was 50-50 up for grabs between me and Kasey Kahne. But I feel like we are in a better position, obviously."

ON CALL BY TONY, JR TO NOT PIT WITH LEADERS ON ABOUT LAP 116: "This is the deal, when you qualify in the back, you try to pit under the early cautions within the first 40 laps. The leaders are obviously not going to come down pit road. We tried to do that. When the leaders pit when there is a caution around lap 80 or 100, we might have an opportunity to stay out and gain track position. It was just a track position deal and that is what did we won here. We qualified 29th and did the same thing. It was a quick and easy way to get toward the front. If your car is good enough, you can maintain on those guys with new tires and we tried our best, we weren't quite as good as we needed to be. We fell back to like eighth then finally the caution came out again and saved us. My pit crew was so good, we gained four spot on the next stop and then we were in the lead on the next stop."

ON GUYS BEING ON THEIR BEST BEHAVIOR TONIGHT TO MAKE RACE A LITTLE LESS EVENTFUL THAN USUAL: "I don't know if anybody is on any better behavior, I guess opportunities didn't arise for some of those guys to get into trouble. There was a hell of a mess going on inside my car. But outside my car, it was pretty uneventful. Aside from the No. 19 blowing up and having to miss him, I just pretty much tried to get a little gap between me and the next guy and the guy behind me and sit there and wait until the race ended. And see where I was and if I could make a run on Matt. He was just too strong, Matt was awesome. Kyle was better than Matt at the end, but just didn't have enough time to get to him. Those two had great cars when it counted and we were just sort of maintaining, trying to hold our own. We were very fortunate to finish in the top-five."

ON "MESS GOING ON INSIDE MY CAR": "Man we have had some really good cars here before and we were ok in practice. The track just seemed slicker to me. If you had a push, it was more difficult to control, if you were loose it was more difficult than in the past races here. At least for my car, maybe we had something different in the shocks or something that was a little more aggressive. The car was just sliding around all night long, I was in front of Matt and I almost wrecked it coming off of two. I almost wrecked there in the middle a bunch of times. Getting in the corner, I was spinning out, it was just all over the place. It was that we ran third, but it wasn't the best race car we have had here."

ON BRISTOL BEING THE WILD CARD IN THESE RACES LEADING UP TO THE CHASE AND NOW THE RELIEF THAT IT IS OVER: "I feel really relieved about it. It has given me a lot of nerve troubles. I have been about as bad as I get about being a jerk to be around. I have been a jerk all week coming in to Bristol. I like the racing here and I have fun when I am doing it. Practice the other day, it was so darn hot, I just didn't want to be doing that because it was so darn hot. I would rather be back at the house. So I flew home, I didn't get here until 3:30 today. I quit drinking Sun Drop and started drinking water so I should be good to go. I haven't had a Sun Drop since Pocono. It doesn't wear me out, I feel good but it is so mentally tough. You try not to spin your own car out. You are trying not to get spun out. You are hoping that nothing doesn't break or blow out. All kinds of happen. I am just glad it is over."

ON THIS NIGHT RACE BEING SO CLOSE TO THE CHASE, WHY IT SEEMED TO CALM DOWN A LITTLE BIT: :"Maybe so. I am always relieved to come out of here with a good run. It is so hard to get a good run here a lot of things can happened, that hasn't changed. But with the Chase and everybody being so close, there was a lot more respect out there on the track tonight, a lot more than you have seen in the past. A lot more respect being shown. When I caught guys, they moved over, and I did the same for others. You don't normally see that here. You make people work for every spot. It seemed tonight like everyone was being very respectful."

ON KENSETH BEING CHAMPIONSHIP FAVORITE HEADING IN TO THE CHASE: "Matt has come on here really strong. Just hopefully he hasn't peaked to soon. It is tough in this business to stay on top over a span of races like that. There is no real way to know how to do it. They seem to have found some things that making their cars work and handle good and these are a couple of tracks where he always runs pretty good at. It is a good little span of racing for him where he can make up a lot of ground. The obviously have to feel pretty good going in to the Chase the way their cars have been running."

JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 LOWE'S MONTE CARLO SS - Finished 10th, maintains point lead, and secures a place in the Chase ON SECURING A PLACE IN THE CHASE:

"That's great news. We took care of business tonight. It wasn't anything pretty and it wasn't anything really racey. We weren't up there fighting for the win, but we stayed out of trouble and took care of the race car and we did what we needed to do tonight. I'm proud of this Lowe's team. It was a good effort for us and we'll go on to Fontana and I think it'll be a good race for us. It was a long day for us, but a good day for us. Getting out of here with a top 10 is definitely a good day."

TRAVIS KVAPIL, NO. 32 TIDE / DOWNEY MONTE CARLO SS - Finished 20th:

"The only thing we were missing tonight was track position. Qualifying hurt us. The car was good, really good; we just needed better track position. This was certainly a better finish for the Tide Ride compared to earlier this year so we really were able to accomplish something. That's another top-25 for us so that's awesome."

KEVIN HARVICK, NO. 29 REESE'S / GM GOODWRENCH MONTE CARLO SS - Finished 11th:

"We had a great car, we just blew a right front tire and lost a lot of track position. It was a good night for our Reese's Chevrolet to get back 11th. It was tough to get back through traffic because the car wasn't quite as good as it was before we wrecked. It was hot out there and I am pretty whipped but it was a pretty good night all in all."

JEFF GORDON, NO. 24 DUPONT MONTE CARLO SS - Finished 5th:

ON YOUR CONVERSATION JUST NOW SCOTT RIGGS. IT STARTED WITH A SMILE, BUT WASN'T SO GOOD IN THE MIDDLE THERE, WHAT WAS THAT ALL ABOUT? "I was definitely holding him up. There was no doubt about it. There are ways to pass and hey, I've been there before and moved guys. I was more concerned that he was going to spin me out, so I was just telling him I would like him to pass me on the straightaway and get a run on me. He had such a good car. We had a great car there at times. We just lost the handling on it there at the end. We just got way too tight. I'm probably just more frustrated that we weren't able to keep up with those front guys more than anything else."

"Well, the thing is, it's a top five for him. And that's a great job for him. I mean he had a top five. It's just when you get more experience racing with the guys up front you do things a little bit different. I saw him in my mirror and he was all over the place. If he would have just calmed down and been smooth, he would have had me -- no problem.

"Scott Riggs had to race me really hard there to get that position. He was definitely lot better. I am just not sure why we didn't have a better car there. We were really good at one time with the DuPont Chevrolet, we drove up there and took the lead, we got tight and just could never get freed up enough. It was a great job and a great run for Scott, I think if he had a little more experience, there would have been a little bit cleaner way to pass me. I was definitely holding him up, so I don't blame him. It was definitely a good night. Anytime you come out of Bristol with a car in one piece and in the top five, obviously, you had a good night. I think the guys that are racing the points were right there with us or just ahead of us, so it was nothing where we could gain a lot of points. We did a little on a few guys, but all and all a great effort by the DuPont Chevrolet team."

DALE EARNHARDT JR., NO. 8 BUDWEISER MONTE CARLO SS - Finished 3rd:

YOU WERE PATTING YOUR CAR THERE: "I was actually telling my guys, thanks. They worked so hard. Friday it was really, really hot here and my car was not very fast. And it's hard to work in the heat like that. I just told them, man, that's a motivation for me. I tried to do what I could on the race track. Our pit stops tonight were the best they'd ever been. And I mean that. That's obvious. I gained spots every spot. Tony Jr. made some great calls as far as when to pit and when not to pit and that got us up toward the front. I'd like to thank DEI and our engine shop for our great motor and Tony Jr. and our whole team and everybody worked back home; and everybody building the cars that was a great race car. Those boys came to Bristol and they worked really hard and turned a pile of crap into a pretty decent race car. But I don't know. It wasn't that good Friday but today it was great and I owe it all to Tony Jr. and the whole team. They did everything.

"The car wasn't fantastic, but it was pretty good. I have got to thank everyone at DEI, all the guys on my team, the road crew. When we got here, we weren't very good at all and they worked really really really hard. For us to come back and finish where we did was because of all the hard work. I have never seen guys work so hard in the heat like they did on Friday. It was so hot out here. They worked their guts out. We got the car driving better, Tony, Jr. made some great calls on our pit stops. It was great, it was awesome, I mean it was awesome. We are just trying to do what we can do. I love Bristol, I love racing here. I love everything about this place. I try to run good here, I love running good here because my Old Man did."

KYLE BUSCH, NO. 5 KELLOGG'S MONTE CARLO SS - Finished 2nd:

"Not enough laps for our Kellogg's Chevrolet to be best tonight but Matt Kenseth had a very strong car, congratulations to those guys, the deserve it. I mean they were on their own almost. It was a tough race for us to try and get back to where we did. I am proud of the whole team. We had a mishap on pit road early but we were able to rebound from that and come back to finish where we did for a strong race run."

THIS IS A TOUGH PLACE TO HAVE AN EARLY PROBLEM THAT PUTS YOU BACK TO 31ST: "Yeah, it was kind of an issue for us, but it wasn't too bad that we couldn't overcome it. That was a great run by our whole Kellogg's Chevrolet team. They did a great job for me. To rebound from that and come back with a strong run and finish second, that was good. That was cool. I wish we could have gotten Kenseth there at the end. That would have been a heck of a show probably. I've got plenty of door dings and everything else out there and I'm not sure I could have done it clean. So I'm probably glad I didn't get there really. Congratulations to those guys. They had an awesome car and were the class of the field. What more could you really ask for?"

JEFF BURTON, NO. 31 CINGULAR WIRELESS MONTE CARLO SS - Finished 9th:

There is something to be said for big picture racing but we can't say that is why we finished where we finished. We gained two positions back in the points, it beats the heck out of losing them, that is the silver lining in this. We are a little disgusted with ourselves at the moment. We will be over it tomorrow. We have fast race cars, it just seems like at the end of these races we don't have as good as we need it to be. We are all in this together, and it is as much my fault as it is anybodies. We will keep working and keep pushing. I am proud of my guys but disappointed in it at the same time. We lost quite a few spots on that last stops but our team was flying. If you look at the tape, the guys were flying. I don't know what happened, I honestly don't know. I got busted for speeding last night on pit road so I wasn't going to do that tonight. We had a 13 second pit stop and got beat. It is right after the race so I am disappointed but by Monday I will realize things aren't as bad as I feel like they are right now. So we will keep digging and keep trying to be better and keep trying to improve. I feel good about our team and I just think we have to be better in some areas and when I say we, I am including myself."