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News and Results | Point Standings | 2007 Schedule | 2007 Teams | 2006 Schedule and Results | 2005 Schedule and Results Coca-Cola 600 - Dodge Qualifying Quotes Dodge Sweeps Top 3 Qualifying Spots for Coca-Cola 600
“I knew there was some tough competition coming up. I didn’t think we had secured the pole when we qualified, but it was a good run for the alltell Dodge. The guys have done a good job the past four or five weeks. We didn’t do a qualifying run in practice, and I think that hurt us a little confidence-wise, but in watching guys struggle here in qualifying the past two weeks I think having too much confidence hurts you more than having too little.” “He’s only been trying here about 20 years, so yeah it would be special. How long has he (Penske) been at Indy, 40 something years? It’s definitely something that weighs on the drivers and the teams, but we can only try as hard as we can try and that’s what we do. We’ve been in this position before and haven’t followed through. Maybe the experience will pay off and we can follow through this weekend. I look forward to the opportunity to try to get the victory. “I wouldn’t refer to it as hitting our stride, but I think our team is doing well. Michael Nelson is doing a great job leading it. He’s done a great job building it or rebuilding it however you’d like to write that, but he is definitely a big part of what we’re doing and I look forward to working with him and Kurt Busch as well. We’re working good together. I don’t think we’re hitting our stride. I think we’re performing well. We haven’t been to victory lane in some time and that would be nice. I’d say if that happens we’re just pulling our sweat pants off. “I think we’ve been performing well the last three, four or five weeks, but I think we haven’t had the greatest finishes the four or five weeks before that. I think we’ve been running good and performing well. We just haven’t had the finishes with the exception of the last three or four weeks that we felt we deserved. It was just circumstances. We had some crazy things that happened to us like everybody does. We had a great car at Talladega. Got involved in that accident and knocked off the fender and came back to finish ninth. To be able to rebound and capitalize points wise is something we hadn’t been able to do in previous weeks. “The Hendrick organization is definitely strong. Their performance here at this racetrack is no different. Between the 48 and even the 24 they’re going to definitely be tough. We look forward to the challenge. We’ve been in position before to win this race. I don’t think they have a strong grip on anything. A lot of teams have their fingertips on it. It’s just a matter of pulling away on Sunday.”
“Today we were really excited with our draw (next to last) and it was fun to have a chance to go for the pole. Sitting up on the trailer watching other drivers struggling with the hot temperatures and watching the sun come in, and heading out there when it was nice and cool definitely takes a little weight off your shoulders. You feel like the car is going to be more underneath you and you can be more confident with the car. With the speed we ran last week I thought we had a good shot at it. It was good to see the Penske cars 1-2. This is a big achievement and we’re proud of doing that no matter what the order. If Newman is on the pole or if we’re on the pole, it just feels good we’re both on the front row. It gives us both a great starting spot obviously and a great pit selections. We know we’re going to be in the pits because of the hard tire whether we do two tires, four tires, none, gas only, you name it. This is a great start to our weekend and we’re happy to qualify second. “It’s our objective and our goal each and every time we go to the racetrack, not just Charlotte, to bring success to Penske Racing. For him to be able to do the double in one day, win both races, that would be an outstanding achievement. I had a glimmer of hope earlier this year that he won in Motegi and he flew back to Phoenix in time for our Cup race. How many other car owners have the opportunity to race half way around the world in one day and have a shot in victory lane? The guy is incredible. It’s a pleasure to work for him and long term I hope to being the championship to Roger Penske and to do it in NASCAR. “That’s always been the tough thing I’ve noticed since I moved from Ford to Dodge, to get this car, no matter if it’s the Dodge Avenger or Dodge Charger, it doesn’t seem to want to run for the full distance. We’re always trying to balance it out and make sure we’re using the four tires evenly. That’s always been a tough task no matter what car you drive. We had a good qualifying run tonight and we’ll just try to stay open minded and upbeat about what we have to do in Saturday’s practices to make the best out of our 400 laps. It’s tough starting in the daytime and ending at night. You can’t just have one setup that will do both. “It’s good to see a lot of hard work pay off. We’ve definitely had our nose buried in the books trying to bring up more ideas. It feels good that the two of us communicate and keep that open line going. Have him go earlier than us and have him tell us exactly what his car did it was great to have that confidence. Going out later, I thought we had a great shot at the pole. We’re on the front row and that’s just as good and it’s good to have that communication.”
“My run was kind of a bittersweet run. My guys gave me a car that was capable of winning the pole. We had been fastest all day long, faster in practice. I just drove it into turn one way too hard. I saw the shade and thought I would go after it. I just kind of lost a lot of time in one and two and it’s a shame we lost by four hundredths. I’m proud of my guys. It was a great run for us. We needed some momentum. I can’t think of a better place to run than here at Lowe’s where we’ve had some success here in the past. I love the Coca-Cola 600. We’ve got a pretty cool paint scheme with the Fantastic Four movie coming out. I’m proud of my guys. We needed this little momentum booster. This is a track we’ve been happy with in the past. This is a good way to get the weekend started.” “I’m glad there is a 600-mile race on the schedule. It kind of stands alone by itself. This is one of the biggest three or four races we have each year, and to have it here in your backyard and everybody brings their best stuff to this racetrack. It used to be the World 600. Now it’s the Coca-Cola 600. I think it’s a great race. I think it needs to stay 600 miles. This is a hard track on motors. It puts those guys through it, but if you survive and win this race you definitely have accomplished something – not just you as a driver but the crew members, the pit stops, the engine guys. A lot of effort goes into this race because it’s close to home and because it’s 600 miles. It’s a great race. I hope we keep it at that.” “I don’t think you can say the 48, just because of one lap, I think with 600 miles he’s got a lot of time to come from what ever position he’s at. They’re still going to be the team to beat. They’ve got this place figured out. They’re always real good on adjustments. It seems like every time they pit they make the car better as it gets into the nighttime. I don’t think you can define them as not being the guardian of the gate by just one lap of qualifying. They’re still the team to beat and that’s who we’re going to be shooting for. “We’ve struggled at two things this year at Evernham’s – the COT cars and we haven’t got the balance on this new nose. We do not know what it wants yet, and we’ve tried every different body configuration under the sun. Pretty much Kasey and myself came here this weekend with the same stuff we had last year and didn’t try to mess with it. We kinda went back to basics, the same configuration that Kasey won all his races with last year. We put them on both of our cars. He was happy with his car in practice and in race trim especially. I’ve been happy with my car right off the truck. Maybe we kinda over analyzed everything this winter and we’re getting back to the way things were last year and I’m looking forward to seeing it in race conditions Sunday.”
“I think we should be pretty good in the race. It’s a new car and it showed a lot of potential in the test. I’m looking forward to it. You’ve really got to take your time. We ran early today and in 20 more cars they’re going to be running faster just because the track is faster. This is the luck of the draw. It’s a long race. We’ve got a good car. We’ve just got to be patient. I think the most important thing is to stay on the lead lap if you can and work on the car all night. If you can keep up with the racetrack you’ll be looking good.”
“It wasn’t bad. For going out early we’re pretty happy with it. You can still tell the track doesn’t have a lot of grip. We didn’t test this car here, but it’s a sister car to the one we wrecked here last week. I’m real proud of all my guys. You can tell right now it’s getting cooler and cooler out and in both corners it’s gaining more grip even in the Busch practice I was in until now. I could have probably run a little harder, but the main thing is these guys going out later will be better. If we can get in the top 15 with this I’ll be pretty happy.”
“We felt like last week we came out and had some struggles, but we I think everybody did a great job working together this week and coming together with some solutions to our problems. As you saw in practice all three of our cars were right there in the top 10. We feel good about our chances to come here and not only qualify well, but I think we’ve got a good shot at running well. We had a problem in practice. We were really free on entry. We finally figured that out late in practice and we went out there and got a run and we were still way too tight in the center. We came in and made some adjustments and didn’t get a chance to get back out because they had that caution late in practice. I wish we could have had another run at it, but time was out. We’re used to sitting on poles. When you go out 16th we should have been on the top of the board so other people could try to knock us off and we didn’t get that.”
“I left a lot on the table. The track is going to get faster, and that definitely won’t be the pole. It’ll be in the top five or six. I made a few mistakes out there. All in all my guys did a great job. They gave me a car perfect enough to get on the pole. I just messed it up a little bit. I was so overanxious getting into the corner I just drove it in too deep and slid up a little bit. All in all it was a pretty good lap. It’ll give us a good starting spot for the Coca-Cola 600. I really do love racing here at Lowe’s Motor Speedway. It suits my driving style. Last year the guys brought me a great car here, and they brought me another great one this weekend. This Dodge Charger has been great all day.”
“I didn’t think we’d pick up that much speed, but the car felt really good coming to the green and that’s where I got a lot of speed out of it. One and two was good. I lost a little bit in three and four coming back to the white flag. The guys did a great job and Charlotte is a great place to race. I feel like we learned a little bit last weekend. I feel like we’ve got some good things happening, and I feel like we can make it better on Saturday for the race.”
“It was a good lap for us. We didn’t do a full qualifying lap in in practice. We got about half a lap in and those cautions at the end slowed us down. We’ve got great Penske-Jasper Engine horsepower. It wasn’t a perfect lap, but it was good enough at this point. We’ll see what the track does for somebody else. I knew Kurt was going to be pretty tough. He didn’t do a qualifying run in practice, either. That was a good run for the alltel Dodge. We weren’t perfect at the end of practice, so that says a lot about what we’ve picked up at Penske Racing.”
“It was better than it was the other night, but that’s about it.”
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