Dale Earnhardt, Jr. Claims Hard-Fought Third Place Finish at Atlanta Motor Speedway and Climbs In NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Standings

Hampton, GA - Dale Earnhardt, Jr. (Junior), No. 88 AMP Energy/National Guard Impala SS, battled through an up and down day at Atlanta Motor Speedway to finish third in today's Kobalt Tools 500 for the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series (NSCS). Junior's finish jumped him up three spots in the standings to seventh with four races in the record books.

Starting on the outside of the front row, Junior led four-times for 60 laps.

"We had a real good car at the start of the race," said Junior. "But we went the wrong way on how we let our spring weight fall away out of the tires during the race. It is pretty complicated stuff. Tony, Jr. (Eury) did a hard job today just trying to get that car better for me. I was hard on him. He had a rough day today.

"I am proud to finish good and proud of my team and happy for our sponsors AMP Energy and National Guard. It was just a hard day, a lot of sliding around man."

A total of five Impala SS drivers scored top-10 finishes at Atlanta. Jeff Gordon, No. 24 DuPont Impala SS, finished fifth. Clint Bowyer, No. 07 DirecTV Impala SS, finished sixth, followed by Kevin Harvick, No. 29 Shell-Pennzoil Impala, in seventh. Jeff Burton, No. 31 AT&T Impala SS, finished 10th.

The 325-lap/500-mile race was won by Kyle Busch.

The next NSCS will be March 16 at Bristol Motor Speedway.

JEFF GORDON, NO. 24 DUPONT IMPALA SS – Finished 5th:

TALK ABOUT THE RACE: "That was the hardest day I have ever had at Atlanta especially for a top-five finish. The guys on this DuPont Chevrolet did an amazing job; there just wasn't a good setup out there. The No. 18 (race winner, Kyle Busch) was pretty darn good and the No. 99 (Carl Edwards) at times. But nobody was perfect, it was just one of the most challenging days that us as drivers and teams have ever had in and on a race car since I have been in this series. Got some work to do obviously and just have to see what we can do to make it better for the future.”

ON THE TIRE SITUATION: “I felt like I was going to crash every single lap. I’m exhausted right now. I feel like I’ve run a thousand miles here. There is just no reason for this. And it’s not any one person or group’s fault. It’s a combination. This car, this tire, at this race track was just terrible.”

DO YOU HAVE ANY SUGGESTIONS ON HOW TO FIX THIS PROBLEM? “I think right now Goodyear just overreacted. The initial thing would be to see, now that Goodyear has looked at the tire and the wear and didn’t have any problems with tire failure…. A tire is supposed to wear. It’s supposed to. And that’s a good performing tire. It’s not supposed to wear to the cords and blow. It’s not supposed to blow if you put a little tiny bit of camber or too little air. So they’re in a tough position. This car doesn’t help them any. It’s really, really hard on right sides. But they’ve been doing a good job the last three weeks with what we’ve had. So I’m going to try to go to Darlington and make sure that we have something good when we go back there and race.”

IF DRIVERS SPEAK UP, WILL THEY NOT GET TO GO TO THE TEST, OR IS THAT AN OLD ADAGE? “I think that’s an old adage. This is not just a tire problem. This is a combination. So I think that both parties need to take responsibility for this. Us, as a teams are going to do the best that we possibly can to try to work with them and make it better. I don’t know what the suggestion is right now. We’ll see.”

JEFF BURTON, NO. 31 AT&T IMPALA SS Finished 10th:

“For the majority of the race we were really, really loose. The AT&T Chevy was all over the place. We made adjustments throughout the race and nothing really seemed to work. We were tight for a little bit towards the end of the race, which we seemed to be our best. On the last restart we put on a set of tires that didn't help the handling of the car. It was a good points day for the AT&T Racing team and we'll keep digging and doing our homework.”

CLINT BOWYER, NO. 07 DIRECTV SS, Finished 6th:

"We just got behind on that one stop and stayed, wasn't the right thing to do. But we had a lot of fun out there; it was a good day for us. We got things turned around and I am happy.

"Me and (Jeff) Gordon there at the end, that is all I had. We were both out of control loose. We had a lot of fun out there racing with him. The DirecTV Chevrolet was good. We were really strong there in the middle of the case, for whatever reason, maybe the way the track conditions were. We just could never get it to back that up, the way the car handled. We learned a lot, gained a lot and that is what we need.

"It wasn't fun sliding around, it is fun when you are leading. It is fun when you are fast, when you aren't, it wasn't fun."

KEVIN HARVICK, NO. 29 SHELL-PENNZOIL IMPALA SS – Finished 7th:

"It was a good day for us today with our Shell-Pennzoil Chevrolet. We just need to get a little more consistent in the pits. But, it was a good day for us, we got another solid finish and had a good points day. Like everybody else, we went from tight to loose and there that last run at the end, we just got so loose and couldn't do anything with the guys in front of us."

DALE EARNHARDT, JR., NO. 88 AMP ENERGY/NATIONAL GUARD IMPALA SS, FINISHED 3RD:

"We had a real good car at the start of the race, but we went the wrong way on how we let our spring weight fall away out of the tires during the race. It is pretty complicated stuff. Tony, Jr. (Eury) did a hard job today just trying to get that car better for me. I was hard on him. He had a rough day today.

"I am proud to finish good and proud of my team and happy for our sponsors AMP Energy and National Guard. It was just a hard day, a lot of sliding around man."

DALE EARNHARDT JR., NO. 88 AMP ENERGY / NATIONAL GUARD IMPALA SS – Finished 3rd
POST RACE PRESS CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPT:

THE MODERATOR: We are pleased to be joined by our third?place finisher in today's Kobalt Tools 500. That is Dale Earnhardt, Jr. He drives the No. 88 AMP Energy National Guard Chevrolet. I believe he's sixth in the points right now. Off to a good start this season, Dale. Your thoughts about your race out there this afternoon.

DALE EARNHARDT, JR.: Well, we started off awesome. The car was real fast. The tires, you know, have spring rates. We went softer and softer as the day went. That was the wrong thing to do. We had to keep adjusting on the car to tighten it up. The thing was just out of control after a few laps. I wasn't as bad as most of them, I don't reckon.

That was interesting today to be out there. I do say that. I'm glad that's over with.

Q. Dale, is the tire beyond drivable? Do you understand the predicament Goodyear is in or was it beyond drivable?

DALE EARNHARDT, JR.: Well, I'll say that Goodyear Tire Company makes good racing tires. They make a safe tire. You know, there's a lot of technology goes into making them tires and I give them a lot of credit. I mean, you know, it's a reputation risk just to be in this sport as a company like that. They can be the quarterback sometimes on Sunday as far as criticism goes.

But they do a good job. This was just a bad combination, this tire at this track. Just a poor combination. I know the tire we used to run would wear into the cords, but you could still run hard on it. It wasn't dangerous. You would run into the cords and run like that for 10 laps. That was a pretty good tire. Even though it was on a cord, you could still run it for a while, get to the next pit stop.

I'll tell you, I'm still seeing the center line in my tires, the mold line in my tire after 30 laps. So I went from running a tire that would wear to the cord to a tire that I still see the center cord after 30 laps. There's got to be several combinations in between that. I mean, Lord, that can't be the next step.

So great racing tire, it's safe and everything, but it's a poor choice for this track.

Q. We heard in your post?race comments a few minutes ago before you came in here talking about it sounded like you and (crew chief) Tony (Eury Jr.) weren't on the same page during the race. Y'all have been obviously together for a long time. Was it a communication breakdown? Did you want to do something that he didn't?

DALE EARNHARDT, JR.: No, you know, the tires have spring rates. You sort of figure what your game plan is as far as you want to go stiffer on the right front or let the right front fall out from under it as the race goes. They don't make a tire that's exactly the same as every other tire, so you can't have the same exact set every set. They're going to change some.

So what the crew chiefs do is they put them in a sequence, which they'll go a certain way until the driver complains, then they make them flip it around. But it's got to go one way or the other. We went the wrong way at the start of the race.

I just made it really hard on him. You know, just in his ear all the time about trying to get on his A game, help me out, help me out, because the car was just out of control. And you just don't like driving cars like that.

But he's my cousin. He's tough. That's why I guess more than anything, besides his talent, I guess that's why I got him, because he's the only one that would put up with me.

Q. Junior, is it time for Mike Helton and Brian France and somebody to go to Goodyear and say, We got to do better than this? Is it to that point? You can bitch all you want to, but nothing seems to change. Is it time for NASCAR to step into this and do something?

DALE EARNHARDT, JR.: There's a big difference between complaining and stating the obvious. You know, it is what it is. It's not a complaint. It is what it is.

So I'm sure that Mike Helton or France, I'm sure they'll say what their opinion is. They probably wouldn't like this any more than the drivers did. I don't think for one the race was all that exciting. We couldn't run side by side. We'd wreck, you know. We had to let each other go by. Every time you got beside a guy, you were just like, Take it. I can't go in the corner side by side. No one else out there really could either.

But, you know, they said they'd give us the data earlier in the year, around Daytona or before. But no amount of time would have prepared you for that. You weren't going to hook that tire up. It was way too hard.

Q. Tony Stewart made reference in your radio interview that Goodyear doesn't have enough people. Do you feel like that would help solve the problem, if they upped their investment? Two, if you could both answer, is the new car perhaps causing some of this problem with them not being able to get a handle on the tire?

DALE EARNHARDT, JR.: I guess the big thing is, is don't do this at Darlington. That's the main thing. I think the COT is part of it. They're putting a lot of load on the right front tire with the bump stop. Puts a lot of load on the tires. So Goodyear thinks the tire is going to wear out worse, they're going to have more right front tire failures. Every time they have a tire failure, they think of it as their product is getting lambasted on national television, that it's bad news for them when the consumer sees it.

But everybody knows that watches the race, you know, there's a reason for a tire blowing. It's not 'cause it's a bad tire. We've never had a tire blow because it was defective. I mean, you know, they wear out and you wear them down to the air. But you just need to slow down if you're wearing tires out that bad.

But don't do this to us at Darlington 'cause that--yeah, that will definitely be--that might be able to top how horrible today was or how frustrating it was to run today if this is the case.

Q. Dale, first four races, third time you've been the top Hendrick driver. Coming off of last week's finish, too. What has it meant for you to get off to this type of start in your situation?

DALE EARNHARDT, JR.: Yeah, I'm desperate, you know, just to get in the top five and the top 10 every week when the car's capable of doing it. There's a real sense of desperation there the last half of the race not to mess it up. We had a good finish going. So I don't want to miss the Chase. The sky might fall.

We'll just keep working like we're working. Everything's good. Tony, Jr. is going good. Today again was frustrating for me and him. But we're past it, looking on to the future.

You know, everything seems to be working out really good. I just want to keep it going. You know what I mean? I'm just trying not to make any mistakes myself. They gave me great, great racecars. They're really good?looking cars. They do a good job building them. They're pretty confident in their ability, so hopefully I can do my end of the job.

Q. With a tire like this, how deep do you have to go into the adjustment playbook? You're trying anything you can find to make it better?

DALE EARNHARDT, JR.: I was just trying to get it to where I could put up with it. I was just trying to get it tolerable. There were a couple times in the race where I had it there, but we'd go...we wouldn't really even make changes. A half pound of air pressure in the left rear just spun me right out.

It was really frustrating. I'm glad we're past it. Hopefully there was a good lesson learned. Hopefully, you know, Goodyear doesn't like to hear people bashing them tires, and I don't like doing it, but I ain't going to sit here and put up with this. I don't think any of the other drivers or anybody, you know, is going to do it.

So hopefully we can all get along and come up with something better than this. They got a tire test tomorrow at Darlington, and I'm going to go down there. I'd just like to know how that process goes. I went to Texas and tire tested, but they didn't ask me much, what I thought. So I just sit there and, you know, they got these other guys doing the testing. But the times that I've done it, I didn't feel like my input was observed or looked over too well.

I'm going to go tomorrow and just kind of watch and see what drivers are saying and see what they're thinking.

Q. Was there a sense of relief at the end? I know you'd liked to have gotten the win, but you both finished in the top five, no one got hurt, the race was over.

DALE EARNHARDT, JR.: I was glad it was over. I was counting the laps.

Q. Kyle Busch led over 300 laps this weekend in the various divisions. A lot of them were sideways. Is he able to go faster just 'cause he's throwing caution to the wind and driving sideways?

DALE EARNHARDT, JR.: I mean, he's a good talent. I think that everybody... I never really worked with him as closely as Tony and my teammates that have now. But they all say he's an amazing talent. And he's just got great, you know, seat?of?the?pants feel for a car, and he can drive 'em pretty sideways.

We get sideways, too, but we just ain't never leading when we're doing it. We've hit harder. That will slow you down a little bit.

Q. If this tire made it so hard to drive out there, why do you think there weren't more wrecks, more cautions? Could you expound on that a little bit, please?

DALE EARNHARDT, JR.: Yeah, I mean, just look at the lap times we were running. What were they, 34?second laps at the end of the tire run, 33.70s. That's why. We were all trying not to wreck.

Q. When you guys say you don't want to work that hard, it will come across that way. Can you define how hard it is in the racecar as how hard it would be before and where the line is? I know people will tear that apart. I'm truthfully asking for you to define it, if you would.

DALE EARNHARDT, JR.: Yeah, I'll say that I think what Tony (Stewart) means is that we'd rather be working trying to accomplish other things, like changing my line to get more speed to gain on somebody, to be able to turn the wheel and drive the car.

Today you couldn't go, All right, let me run at the top a little bit, because I knew I would back into the fence. When I tried to catch Tony there at the end, it just slid in there like it was on marbles. You run to the bottom, you're just as helpless down there. So really, you're just working hard. Nothing's coming from it.