Friday, April 8, 2011
Texas Motor Speedway O’Reilly Auto Parts 300 Post-Race Quotes NASCAR Nationwide Series
http://twitter.com/teamdodge www.media.chrysler.com
BRAD KESELOWSKI (No. 22 Discount Tire Dodge Challenger R/T) Finished 2nd “I thought that we were really close today. It was a good battle at the end. I hope everybody enjoyed it. I thought that I might be able to get him (Carl Edwards). He had about six or seven lap newer tires; more importantly he had the clean air and the ability to put his car where he wanted to and he did a good job with that. I caught a few breaks in lapped traffic to inch closer. I felt like I could almost get him and then I’d lose the nose with an aero push. That’s just racing. I needed the track to widen up just a little bit more and maybe could have moved around. All and all, a pretty decent day. I think we made some pretty big strides with our Nationwide program this weekend. I saw a little bit of it a couple weeks ago in California. I felt like if we could have beaten him off of pit road, we might have been able to hold him off with clean air. Who knows; it was a good race.”
WHAT DID YOU LEARN FROM TONIGHT THAT YOU CAN CARRY OVER TO TOMORROW? “Probably, mostly how important clean air is and how valuable it can be even if your car is quite a ways off the pace.”
HOW BIG WAS CLEAN AIR? “It was everything. When I got out in the lead, it felt like I ran a half of a second faster. Clean air is really important. The track really hasn’t widened up and it’s still a tough place to pass at times. We brought a really fast Discount Tire Dodge Challenger to Texas. We made some big gains from where we’ve been this year. Just some small tweaks and I think we’ll be right there.”
TODD GORDON (crew chief, No. 22 Discount Tire Dodge Challenger R/T) “We unloaded pretty fast and got a chance to work on our Discount Tire Dodge Challenger from there. I felt like if we would have gotten out in clean air, I think we would have drove away from them. Every week is a learning experience for the two of us. Every time we go racing, it helps us get better as a team. A good night for us tonight that’s for sure.”
SAM HORNISH JR. (No. 12 Alliance Truck Parts Dodge Challenger R/T) Finished 16th “Being out of the car as long as I was (since Daytona), we had some ups and downs tonight. I feel like we had a car that we definitely could have brought home in the top 10 if not the top five. We had a wheel issue and had to pit which had us off sequence. We could never get back. That’s one of the interesting things about the Nationwide Series, we only have five sets of tires. That dictates some of the strategy. That’s what happens sometimes. I’m really proud of all the guys that work on the Alliance Truck Parts Dodge and look forward to next week, racing two weekends in a row. We were way too free starting off the race. We adjusted the car too much when it was hot and when it cooled off, the car was really loose. We could go after 20 laps, but it was getting to that 20 lap mark.”
CHAD WALTER (Crew Chief, No. 12 Alliance Truck Parts Dodge Challenger R/T) “You always want to come here, be competitive and run up front. We had a car to do that, but had an unfortunate issue with a loose wheel. That’s racing luck. Sam hung in there. We didn’t have very good luck with the wheel, so we tried to make a little luck with the wave around, but didn’t get the caution that would have put us back in the sequence. All in all, the Alliance Truck Parts Dodge team did a good job tonight. This is a team working together for the first time. Sam drove his heart out. He really did a good job. This builds confidence for the whole team. We would take this car to Talladega, but we’ve got a better bullet back at the shop. That race is a wildcard, anybody can win there. I feel like Penske Racing has really done its homework and we’re going to have something for them next week.”
