NASCAR SPRINT CUP SERIES
COKE ZERO 400
DAYTONA BEACH INTERNATIONAL SPEEDWAY
TEAM CHEVY RACE NOTES & QUOTES
JULY 2, 2016
KYLE LARSON LEADS FOUR TEAM CHEVY DRIVERS TO TOP-10 FINISHES
IN WILD NIGHT AT DAYTONA
DAYTONA BEACH, Florida (July 2, 2016) – Once again, the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series July night race at Daytona International Speedway provided fireworks for the fans both on and off the track.
Kyle Larson, No. 42 Target Chevrolet SS, survived ‘The Big One’ on lap 89 of the 160-lap race that eliminated or damaged 19 of the 40 starters of the Coke Zero 400, and brought home a sixth-place finish to lead four Chevrolet SS drivers in the Top 10.
Austin Dillon scored his eighth Top 10 finish of the season with a seventh place run in his No. 3 Bass Pro Shops/NRA Museum Chevrolet SS. Clint Bowyer finished ninth in his No. 15 AccuDoc Solutions Chevrolet SS, which marked his third Top 10 finish of 2016; and Michael McDowell was tenth in his No. 95 KLOVE Radio Chevrolet SS, which was his best finish of the season thus to date.
Brad Keselowski (Ford) was the race winner, Kyle Busch (Toyota) was second, Trevor Bayne (Ford) was third, Joey Logano (Ford) was fourth, and Ricky Stenhouse Jr. was fifth to complete the top five finishers.
The Series moves to Kentucky Speedway, which has a brand new racing surface at the 1.5-mile speedway, next Saturday night, July 9.
POST RACE NOTES & QUOTES:
DID YOU THINK YOU HAD A CHANCE TO WIN THIS RACE? “No. We were one of the teams that didn’t take any tires on that caution, and we put tape on the nose. I was a little bit tight and a couple of laps before that I came off of four and Casey Mears was luckily paying attention because I ran him all the way up the race track because I got tight off of four. So I tried to get up to the top, and I got up there and then I don’t know why I got loose, but I did get loose going into one.”
ON POINTS: “We can’t gain on anybody who just wrecked. We knew might be able to gain points here, but it is a coin-toss that you might get in a wreck here and for us it was more of trying to take care of ourselves. When that big wreck happened, that really opened the door for us to take care of ourselves. Two of the three guys that are around us were in it. I probably should have been smart and sat back a little bit, but at that point with 30 to go, we were in position to get a top-five out of it so we had to take a chance.”
KYLE LARSON, NO. 42 TARGET CHEVROLET SS – Finished 6th:
“I got a little bit better restart than I thought I would, through (Turns) 1 and 2 and was able to get to Joey (Logano’s) inside. I had a decent run. I got clear of the No. 22 (Logano) down the back and the No. 17 (Ricky Stenhouse, Jr.) shoved me and gave me a really good, but it kind of got me squirrely and stalled me out. And the No. 22 got another run to my outside. I should have probably moved up in front of him. But I knew we had a good night going so I didn’t want to risk anything. I knew the last couple of laps were going to be hairy. So, me messing up on the backstretch probably ruined our shot at a win, but we still finished at Daytona, so that’s good.”
AUSTIN DILLON, NO. 3 BASS PRO SHOPS/NRA MUSEUM CHEVROLET SS – Finished 7th
LOOKED LIKE TRACK POSITION WAS KEY TONIGHT AND A LOT OF GUYS WERE TRYING TO HOLD THAT POSITION
“I don’t know about track position but I thought that 2 car was pretty darn stout. He was the same way at Talladega and you just can’t get to his back bumper. He does a good job of keeping that bumper and that car is fast, so I really think fast cars pay off here and win races. We are getting closer, we just have to keep working.
“You want to be safe. These are wild and crazy races. To come home seventh on all four this year is better than upside down. We had a good day. I’ve got to thank the good Lord for taking care of us and we’ll keep working.”
CLINT BOWYER, NO.15 ACCUDOC SOLUTIONS CHEVROLET SS – Finished 9th:
GOOD NIGHT FOR YOU GUYS
“Yeah, a solid night. You always want to do better and there were a couple times there where I would have, could have, should have. Its one of those deals where you know if you take action you know that the chances of crashing are far greater than not. I just kind of was watching to see and what happened, happened. I stayed on the bottom till it opened up in the middle and I got a good run getting into three and that kind of put me in position to get a solid finish. Certainly needed a little bit more speed but 10th is always a good run for us.”
CASEY MEARS, NO. 13 GEICO CHEVROLET SS – Finished 12th
YOU HAD A GREAT RUN UNTIL YOU TANGLED WITH TONY STEWART, SO YOU MUST BE DISAPPOINTED
“Yeah, I’m disappointed because we ran so well. To be able to salvage a 12th place finish out of a night like this is pretty good, I guess. And I’m just happy. I’m proud of our guys. It’s been a rough season for us. We’ve had really good cars and just terrible results. It’s been one of those years. It was good to be competitive all night long and have fun and get to run up front and show people what we’re capable of. Hopefully this gives us a little something to build from going into the second half of the season. It’s indescribable how odd this year has been. We’ve had some of the best cars we’ve ever had and the team is the best it’s ever been and we’re just getting terrible results. It was nice to have a good night tonight.”
AJ ALLMENDINGER, NO. 47KROGER/DRUMSTICK/OUTSHINE CHEVROLET SS – Finished 13th:
“I kind of just rode around for the first 80 laps like we planned and I was fortunate. We were just kind of in the right place when the wreck happened to not really have to feel like I was in any trouble. From there it was just trying to pick the right lane. On that restart I split the middle and I thought we were going to get a good run and I don’t know whoever was kind of in front of me, moved up and caught my nose. The No. 11 (Denny Hamlin) was on the tail of me and hit the wall pretty hard. Looking at it, it was really hard. So on that last restart I just tried to get as much as I could. I bogged down on the restart and split the middle at the end and got whatever we could.”
DALE EARNHARDT JR., NO. 88 NATIONWIDE CHEVROLET SS – Finished 16th
ON SURVIVING TO THE END:
“I just rode around. I couldn’t get in there and get two and three-wide because the car needed a couple lanes to run well.”
KURT BUSCH, NO. 41 MONSTER ENERGY/HAAS AUTOMATION CHEVROLET SS – Finished 23rd
“We positioned ourselves to be the car to get a good run off the bottom. It just didn’t work out with him (Joey Logano) trying to drive straight through us. And it would have worked out better if he would have pushed us. We could have had a shot at the No. 2 (Brad Keselowski). And with just the way that it turned out, I feel disappointed that I didn’t get the win for (Tony) Gibson (Crew Chief) and all these guy that work for our team. We did everything right tonight except cross the line where we were supposed to.”
DO YOU EXPECT HIM TO PUSH YOU BECAUSE THAT’S HIS TEAMMATE IN THE LEAD? DOES THAT MAKE IT MORE UNDERSTANDABLE?
“On the last lap, there is so much going on. You can’t drive other people’s cars for them. I think that he made an aggressive mistake. You can’t go from fifth to first. There’s just no shot at it. And, it’s a shame that we ended up spun around and wrecked. We could have come out of here with the point lead.”
YOU ARE SO GOOD AT PLATE TRACKS, IS IT A CONSOLATION KNOWING THAT YOU WERE SORT OF IN A SPOT TO GO FOR IT AT THE END?
“That’s what I always hope for. I hope to be right there where I was tonight on a green-white-checkered and one day the chips are going to fall in my direction. There’s no way that it can’t. It’s almost two rotations around a roulette wheel for how many times we’ve been here and haven’t won. But we’ll keep trying.”
TONY STEWART, NO. 14 BASS PRO SHOPS CHEVROLET SS – Sidelined in crash on lap 148, Finished 26th
WHAT HAPPENED? “I got loose into one there. Hadn’t been loose all day, but I got loose there and then over-corrected for it and drove it in the fence. So definitely my fault.”
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