Carl Edwards, No. 99 Cheez-It/Kellog’s Ford (Finished 4th) “It was a really good day at the beginning and we showed a lot of speed and then we struggled a little bit but came back with great fuel mileage at the end and that was huge for us. It allowed us to jump up to fourth and really get good position. That was a nice finish for us in this first race and something we can definitely build on as we head to Loudon. I am really proud of my guys on the team, they did a really nice job today. I have to thank Aflac and Ford as well and all these fans for coming out here and sticking around this weekend, they were great. We will just try to build on this effort today and go to New Hampshire next weekend.”
David Ragan, No. 6 UPS Ford (Finished 11th) “We had a top-10 car but the fuel mileage races haven’t been fun to us this year. We had to save quite a bit of fuel there at the end. It was just one of those days where we were from 6th to 12th about all day and that is where we finished, in 11th. One of those days where things just didn’t fall our way. If we could have had a couple lucky breaks I think we had a better car than where we finished. We didn’t get any scratches and gained some points on some guys around us and can’t wait to get to New Hampshire.”
Matt Kenseth, No. 17 Crown Royal Ford (Finished 21st) “I don’t know what to do about the fuel mileage. It is really frustrating to be a race car driver and they drop the green on the last run of the day when you are supposed to put on a show for the fans and you have to run half throttle and can’t floor it or you will run out of gas. It is pretty aggravating to do all the work and qualifying and pit stops and adjustments but none of it makes a difference.”
IT HAS TO SUCK TO BE TOLD TO LET TONY STEWART BY FOR THE LEAD SO YOU CAN SAVE FUEL. “yeah and we still ran out with a half a lap or lap to go. It is not a great definition of racing, but how are you going to fix it? I don’t know how to fix it. It is frustrating. You do all that work and for nothing. There were so many races this year that have been like that already where the guy running half throttle, or pitted off sequence or whatever and has won. I wish they could figure out how to fix it because it is not a lot of fun.”
Greg Biffle, No. 16 3M Filtrete Ford (Finished 26th) “We didn’t figure out what it is yet. Something fell off. We are still trying to determine what happened. It definitely hurt our chances today though. Fuel mileage was something, but we were handicapped. We had bigger problems then that. We had more problems today than fuel mileage.”
Jack Roush, owner Roush Fenway Racing CAN YOU ASSES THIS FIRST CHASE RACE AND WHERE YOUR GUYS ARE NOW? “I think we are in good shape. We had reasonable speed today and Matt obviously had the pole. Carl ran well. Carl wasn’t as good on two tires as he was on four. Fuel mileage wasn’t great but it wasn’t a huge problem for us. It was okay. It is a shame when these races come down to fuel mileage. It is a shame when you get rained out. Those things are realities. I haven’t seen the points but I understand we are about third and fourth now and it depends on how far we are out, that is the main thing. It is a reasonable start. We had a little problem with Greg where he had a radiator pan that fell off the car and got hit by something on the race track, so we didn’t have that happen to one of our Chase cars, so that is the good thing about that. I guess all in all we will take what we have from today and move on.”
