Tony Stewart Qualifies on the Front Row in the No. 20 Home Depot Monte Carlo SS

Tony Stewart in the No. 20 Home Depot Chevrolet qualified second for Sunday's Aaron 499 at Talladega Superspeedway giving the Monte Carlo SS a front row starting spot for the race.

TONY STEWART, NO. 20 HOME DEPOT MONTE CARLO SS - Qualified 2nd:

"Qualifying is just a formality. This is where the teams get to shine and show off. This is where all the preparation at the shop and everything that the crews do here at the race track is more of a testimony of their hard work than it is us (the drivers). The hardest thing I've got to do is not miss a shift three times during the run. It's pretty easy for us to do. It really doesn't matter for tomorrow. They've got nice long pit boxes here at Talladega. So I'm looking forward to it. I get to run the Old Spice Chevy car in the Busch race and the Home Depot Chevy tomorrow. So I'm looking forward to two fun days.

"Like I said, the drivers don't do anything. All we do is make sure we shift it three times at the right rpm and then just ride it around there. It's a testimony to the Home Depot crew and what they've done. They did an awesome job getting ready for this race. Hopefully tomorrow will be as good, obviously. I was surprised. I didn't think we were going to run that quick -- especially with the way the wind is gusting right now. So I was very, very happy with the way it ran."

YOU'RE UP TO 5TH NOW IN THE POINTS. HOW CONFIDENT IS THIS RACE TEAM? "It's the best start to a season that we've ever had since I've been in the Cup Series. Obviously, the team is really excited. This is the first year that we haven't been trying to crawl back from outside the top 20 to get back in the top 20. So I'm really happy with our start to the season. We just take it one week at a time right now and keep trying to do what we've been doing the whole time. We've led a lap in every race so far. So that's something our team is really proud of right now."

HOW MUCH DID YOU LEARN RACING FROM DALE EARNHARDT SR.? "We always miss racing against him. The amount of stuff that we all learned racing against him, especially at these restrictor plate tracks, is where we miss him the most. Knowing how good he was, you don't miss having to race against him, but we miss him as a person. The two years I got to spend around him. he was a great friend and really nice to me. That's something I'll always remember and appreciate."

JOE NEMECHEK, NO. 01 U.S. ARMY MONTE CARLO SS - Qualified 6th

"It was a pretty good lap for our whole U.S. Army team. I'm proud of all these guys. I'm proud of who I represent out there. We just can't do enough for our men and women in uniform. Since we've unloaded our U.S. Army Chevy from practice yesterday (in) race trim, (it's) incredible. I think it's one of the best cars I've had here in Talladega in race trim. Qualifying trim we thought we were going to be a lot closer to the front guys than we were but that's just part of it. The wind has picked and I think it slowed some guys down. We were off a little bit on a couple of things on the car. We'll take it and I think we'll be great for the race."

HOW ANXIOUS ARE YOU FOR THE RACE WITH SUCH A GOOD CAR AFTER WHAT HAPPENED FOR YOU IN DAYTONA? "I'm definitely ready to get going. Our goal is just to finish the race. If we can finish it without having any issues, it will be a huge accomplishment for our team. It just seems like this year we've been caught up in wrecks and if debris will fly off somebody's car, it normally hits ours. It's been a crazy year for that but my team never gives up. We're strong, we're proud and we're here."

J.J. YELEY, NO. 18 GSK ASTHAMACONTROL.COM MONTE CARLO SS - Qualified 11th:

"It was definitely a good lap. The wind seemed like it picked up a little bit as we were making our run. That might have hurt us a little bit but we were flying blind in qualifying today. We didn't make any qualifying runs yesterday with the Cup car. Racing is more important to us than what qualifying was. Hopefully it hangs in there for a top 10 but most importantly it's going to be a good race car."

WHAT DOES A DRIVER DO HERE TO HELP THE QUALIFYING TIME? "The best thing you can do is make sure you hit your check points and try to keep the steering wheel as smooth as possible. The more you move the wheel the more the speed you're going to scratch. As along as you don't hit anything leaving or coming in pit road, that's about all you've got to do."

KYLE BUSCH, NO. 5 KELLOGG'S MONTE CARLO SS - Qualified 13th

ON THE EFFORT HENDRICK MOTORSPORTS PUTS INTO RESTRICTOR PLATE RACES: "I have the utmost confidence within these guys and the whole Hendrick organization and the way they go about doing things and the way they give us race cars. It's not a problem of mine to go out there and try to win the race. To try to make it to the end, that's what it's about. Basically trying to make sure that we can keep everything under ourselves until we get to that point and try to race them at the end."

JEFF GORDON, NO. 24 DUPONT/PEPSI MONTE CARLO SS - Qualified 14th

ARE YOU SATISFIED WITH YOUR QUALIFYING TIME? "No, not really. We certainly would like to qualify a little bit better than that this early in the qualifying session. We feel like we could be up there towards the top. We didn't focus a lot on qualifying yesterday. We had a great car in the draft so I'm really excited about the DuPont/Pepsi car and this special paint scheme for this weekend's race and hopefully we can have the type of success we've had here in the past with it."

JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 LOWE'S MONTE CARLO SS - Qualified 16th

"It was a good lap for us. The car did a good job. The guys did a great job. (It's) a brand new race car with no time on it before we came and it looks like all the Hendrick cars are right there around one another in speed. That's kind of all we can ask. We wish we were a little bit better. It was an impound race so I really feel like we've done the right thing so we have a good race on Sunday but not really the speed for today."

ON THE EFFORT OF YOUR TEAM TO PUT YOUR RACE CAR TOGETHER: "I do have to thank our entire organization at Hendrick Motorsports. We have some guys that are dedicated just to do speedway stuff at the 24/48 shop and they've done an amazing job as well. It's just been a lot of work. We've worked so hard to get two of our cars ready for the (Daytona) 500. Fortunately we lost one of them and it's in Daytona USA. We had to get to work and build another car along with all of downforce stuff that was coming along. The guys definitely have been working a lot of hours at the shop to get everything ready and they've done a great job."

ROBBY GORDON, NO. 7 MENARDS MONTE CARLO SS - Qualified 19th

ON BEING ABLE TO LAY DOWN A LAP WITHOUT HAVING TO QUALIFY ON TIME: "I think if we were in a position where we were outside of the top 35 and we really had to get in the show, I think we could have been quite a bit quicker than we were. We were very quick in drafting practice yesterday. The car seems to suck up pretty good. We didn't spend a lot of time in qualifying mode. Being inside the top 35, that's one of the opportunities you don't really have to focus so hard on. If you really had to go and lay down a number for qualifying to get in the show obviously you could do a lot of different things to get yourself in the show but you're probably going to pay the price once you got in."

DALE EARNHARDT JR., NO. 8 BUDWEISER MONTE CARLO SS - Qualified 27th

TODAY WOULD HAVE BEEN YOUR DAD'S 55TH BIRTHDAY. HOW DO YOU LIKE THIS SPECIAL BLACK & SILVER PAINT SCHEME? "Yeah, I like it. It's been a lot of fun building the race car. A lot of the fans enjoy it, and a lot of the guys at DEI take a lot of pride in it and the guys at RCR too. We're just having some fun. It's been a good weekend for Dale Earnhardt and Dale Earnhardt fans and everybody in relation."

YOU HAVE 5 WINS HERE. IT SEEMS LIKE YOU MAKE GOOD DECISIONS DURING THE RACE. WHY ARE YOU SO SUCCESSFUL ON THIS TRACK? "Well if I ain't in the front, I just try to get there. You got to keep the car moving and know exactly where you need to be going to get to the front. I just have a way of getting there. We've struggled here lately, but we've worked real hard to try to make some improvements. The guys in the engine shop have made some improvements. So we've got a little bit better car and a good package -- a better package than we had in Daytona. I'm real happy with how we practiced."

YOU DIDN'T QUALIFY PARTICULARLY WELL HERE, BUT THAT DOESN'T MATTER. YOU'VE WON HERE 5 TIMES. IS THERE ANY REASON TO BELIEVE YOU CAN'T WIN HERE AGAIN ON SUNDAY? "We got a good car. I don't know why we qualified so slow. We ran about three-tenths faster than that yesterday when we made our run. You just can't never tell what you're going to get here in qualifying. I ain't really worried about it. The car will be fine and we'll have a lot of fun on Sunday."

SCOTT WIMMER, NO. 4 AERO EXHAUST MONTE CARLO SS - Qualified 35th

"As far as driving the car, it feels real good but we didn't have very much speed there. I don't know, that doesn't look too good. It's a shame. These guys have worked real hard since Daytona. We missed that speedway race and that's going to be real tough. Hopefully the wind is hurting everybody else too. It's going to be a long wait now."

HOW TOUGH IS IT TO GET IN THESE RACES IN THE NEXTEL CUP SERIES? "It's real tight especially just trying to get into the race. It's going to be tight today. Like I said, hopefully the wind hurts everybody else. These guys did an awesome job getting this car ready. They worked real hard. If we don't make it here, we'll be back at Daytona."

KEVIN HARVICK, NO. 29 REESES MONTE CARLO SS - Qualified 42nd

ON NOT PRACTICING IN THE SECOND PRACTICE SESSION YESTERDAY: "We practiced in the first practice. We did everything we needed to do. And there's no reason to practice if there is nothing else you have to try. It pretty much is what it is. The Reeses Chevrolet should race good. We didn't do any qualifying runs or anything so we'll go from wherever we start and have a good day."