MONSTER ENERGY NASCAR CUP SERIES
AUTO CLUB 400
AUTO CLUB SPEEDWAY
TEAM CHEVY DRIVER RACE NOTES & QUOTES
MARCH 26, 2017
KYLE LARSON, NO. 42 TARGET CHEVROLET SS – RACE WINNER
“I was staying as calm as I could be, but also frustrated at the same time. It seems like every time I get to the lead at the end of one of these things, the caution comes out and I’ve got to fight people off on restarts. Our Target Chevy was amazing all day. We were able to lead a lot of laps today. (Martin) Truex was better than us that second stage by quite a bit. We were able to get the jump on him the following restart and led pretty much the rest of the distance. I had to fight them off there after the green flag stops and that was a lot of fun. I can’t thank Target enough, Credit One Bank, all of our partners, Chip Ganassi, Rob Kauffman, Felix Sabates, I hope you are feeling better at home, wish you were here. This is just amazing. We have been so good all year long; three seconds in a row. I’ve been watching all the TV like ‘he doesn’t know how to win’, but we knew how to win today, so that was good.”
DO YOU FEEL LIKE THE PRESSURE IS OFF? “Yeah, no doubt. I made a mistake early in the race and lost a lot of track position sliding through my (pit) box, but they had awesome pit stops all day long. Great pit stops there at the end especially and our restarts were good. I spun my tires a couple of them and had to drag race Denny (Hamlin) and Kyle (Busch) into Turn 1, but we had a good last restart, got some clean air and came on to the win. Like I said, I can’t thank everybody up here enough and everybody at the shop too. They have been working their tails off all off-season and it’s carried over into this year. It’s spectacular all the hard work is paying off.”
WHAT WAS IT THAT PROPELLED YOU ALL THE WAY AROUND DENNY (HAMLIN) AND EVERYBODY ELSE?
“We had a few lap fresher tires than them and I knew that was going to be very important to get to the lead quick. I was hoping we weren’t going to have a caution like we had. We were just able to have a good restart there on the last one and get a really good push by Truex on that launch. I got a little nervous that he might peel underneath me or try and get above me, but we were able to carry enough momentum around to hold onto the lead and ultimately get the win. Can’t say enough about everybody on this Target team, Credit One Bank. The crew is amazing, our pit crew has been spectacular this year and we have had a lot of speed in our race cars. It is a lot of fun to come to the race track right now.”
TAKE US THROUGH THE LAST PIT STOP:
“I knew my pit crew was really good, so I actually ran a little bit slower down pit road by one light just to be safe. I didn’t want to speed, I didn’t want to do anything stupid and we were able to get the jump there off pit road and line up on the outside, which was awesome.”
WHAT HAPPENED IN STAGE 2 AND WHAT MADE THE DIFFERENCE IN STAGE 3?
“Well, I had slide through my (pit) box at the end of that first stage and I had to overdrive some to get to second and then Truex was just really good that run and I had run the top of (Turns) 3 and 4 and probably wore my tires out too much. When I got to the lead in the third stage I knew to just commit to the bottom of (Turns) 3 and 4 and save my tires the best I could. Our long run was really good the rest of the race.”
CHIP GANASSI, TEAM OWNER, CHIP GANASSI RACING – RACE WINNER
“I’m pretty excited today here with the sweep this weekend. It’s all Kyle Larson this weekend, all Kyle Larson.”
JAMIE MCMURRAY, NO. 1 MCDONALD’S CHEVROLET SS – Finished 6th
“Our team and our whole organization has done an amazing job to get to the point that we are. It’s not one thing; it’s hundreds of small things. I’m so happy for all the guys at our shop that have worked hard. In our sport, every team works hard; and you’re not always rewarded for it. It’s awesome to be rewarded for all the work.
CHASE ELLIOTT, NO. 24 NAPA CHEVROLET SS – Finished 10th
ON THE RACE AND PIT STRATEGY:
‘Yeah, we were just trying to do something different. I thought that was going to give us the best chance of winning. Alan (Gustafson, crew chief) did as well. We had a good NAPA Chevy and we were on the same page. He made the right call. And, you can’t control when the caution comes out. So, that’s just part of it.”
AUSTIN DILLON, NO. 3 AMERICAN ETHANOL CHEVROLET SS – Finished 11th
“I wish we could have done more with the position we were in with tires. On the outside lane, we cannot fire off the first couple of laps. We struggle with that and I’m going to start practicing it and figuring out why we can’t turn. I’m proud of my guys, but I guess we just wanted more.”
RYAN NEWMAN, NO. 31 CATERPILLAR CHEVROLET SS – Finished 15th
“It was a tough and long day for us. We got a hole in the front nose on the first lap that cost us our track position. Then we battled an extremely tight-handling car that put us a lap down. We finally raced back onto the lead lap with 19 to go. It certainly wasn’t the finish we wanted but it was a decent recovery.”
AJ ALLMENDINGER, NO. 47 RALPH’S CLICKLIST CHEVROLET SS – FINISHED 17TH
“We definitely started off really loose which, kind of thought we might just going into the race just trying to get on the other side of it. I was still a little bit tight trying to roll the center, which is kind of where we have been struggling a little bit, but made good adjustments and thought we got the car as good as we could have gotten it. It was kind of right in that area. I thought we maximized the speed of the car today and wish we would have had one less yellow. I really thought I had made a good move and gotten clear of the next group behind me and thought maybe we would pick off a couple more. Just that wrong if you do, wrong if you don’t kind of scenario. Didn’t pit on the last one even though we only had a lap and a half on tires, it just… all the guys behind me for the most part had tires. I knew my only shot was to get clear off of Turn 2 and I got pinned three-wide and from there all the guys with the new tires were kind of able to eat me alive. Disappointing, I thought we were going to get a little bit better, but the West Coast swing has been really tough for us. We have learned a lot. I think we know where to work on and hopefully we continue to get better.”
TY DILLON, NO. 13 TWISTED TEA CHEVROLET SS – FINISHED 18TH
“My No. 13 Twisted Tea Chevrolet team fought hard all day. We really struggled with the balance in the first two stages. I was tight through the center and loose on exit. Crew chief Bootie Barker worked with different adjustments to get us where we needed to be. Our Chevy SS was the best it had been all day there in that last segment. We made a strategy call and stretched our gas mileage to try and make it with only one green-flag stop to end the race while the leaders would need another, but late-race cautions kept that from working. We battled hard and, despite handling issues, it was a good end to the day.”
CHRIS BUESCHER, NO. 37 BUSH’S BEANS CHEVROLET SS – FINISHED 25TH
“It was a long afternoon in our No. 37 BUSH’s Beans Chevy. We got a decent starting spot, but got shuffled back early and struggled to gain spots back. Then on the last restart everyone got fanned out from another car getting in the wall and we just lost all momentum. Next week we’ve got a completely different setup as we go short track racing and I’m looking forward to racing with the short track program at JTG Daugherty racing.”
JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 LOWE’S CHEVROLET SS – Finished 21st:
“Man, we definitely didn’t have the fastest car out there today. I think we used up all the good luck in the season finale last season. We battled all day long to get back on the lead lap, but we have got some work to do. I’m looking forward to spending the week with my girls and heading to Martinsville next weekend with this Lowe’s team.”
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