MONSTER ENERGY NASCAR CUP SERIES
CHARLOTTE MOTOR SPEEDWAY ROAD COURSE
BANK OF AMERICA ROVAL 400
TEAM CHEVY POST RACE NOTES AND QUOTES
September 29, 2019
TOP TEAM CHEVY UNOFFICIAL FINISHING RESULTS:
POS. DRIVER (* = Playoff Contender)
1st * CHASE ELLIOTT, NO. 9 NAPA AUTO PARTS CAMARO ZL1
2nd * ALEX BOWMAN, NO. 88 NATIONWIDE RETIREMENT PLANS CAMARO ZL1
6th * WILLIAM BYRON, NO. 24 UNIFIRST CAMARO ZL1
9th JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 ALLY CAMARO ZL1
13th * KYLE LARSON, NO. 42 CLOVER CAMARO ZL1
TOP FIVE UNOFFICIAL FINISHING RESULTS:
POS. DRIVER (* = Chevy Playoff Contender)
1st * Chase Elliott (Chevrolet)
2nd * Alex Bowman (Chevrolet)
3rd Kevin Harvick (Ford)
4th Clint Bowyer (Ford)
5th Brad Keselowski (Ford)
UNOFFICIAL CURRENT PLAYOFF RANK (Following Round 3 of 10)
POS. DRIVER (* = Chevy Contender)
1. Martin Truex Jr. (Toyota)
2. Kevin Harvick (Ford)
3. Brad Keselowski (Ford)
4. * Chase Elliott (Chevrolet)
5. Joey Logano (Ford)
6. Denny Hamlin (Toyota)
7. Kyle Busch (Toyota)
8. * Kyle Larson (Chevrolet)
9. Clint Bowyer (Ford)
10. * William Byron (Chevrolet)
11. Ryan Blaney (Ford)
12. * Alex Bowman (Chevrolet)
13. Aric Almirola (Ford)
14. Ryan Newman (Ford)
15. * Kurt Busch (Chevrolet)
16. Erik Jones (Toyota)
The Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series season continues next weekend at Dover International Speedway with the Drydene 400 on Sunday, October 6 at 2:30 P.M. ET. Live coverage can be found on NBCSN, NBC Sports Gold, MRN, and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.
TEAM CHEVY POST-RACE NOTES AND QUOTES:
CHASE ELLIOTT, NO. 9 NAPA AUTO PARTS CAMARO ZL1 – RACE WINNER
“It’s almost like an away team taking away a win at home. All my guys are from here and obviously Hendrick Motorsports is right over here behind the race track. It’s a home win for most people and that’s all that matters. What a day; I was about as tired as I think I’ve ever been after an event. So, I just appreciate the effort. The guys just didn’t quit. It was unbelievable, they fixed the thing the right away. A lot of times, you can make mistakes fixing these things and sometimes you can even make it worse. They made sure they did it the right way and got us a win.”
HOW DOES THIS SEND THE MESSAGE TO THE COMPETITION, AS FAST AS THIS HOTROD WAS TODAY AND PICKING UP THAT WIN HERE IN THE FIRST ROUND OF THE PLAYOFFS?
“Yeah, it’s our last road course, so the biggest thing is I think we have six more bonus points to continue forward with. A win is awesome. It doesn’t get any better than that. There’s no feeling like winning one of these races.”
“Appreciate all our partners, everybody that helps us on this car, Hooters, Mountain Dew, Kelley Blue Book, Valvoline, Chevrolet. Obviously had great power today to drive back up through there. What a day. Somebody in the media the other day asked me if this would be like an upset if a guy from Georgia came up here to North Carolina and won, and I never really thought about that, but now that he says that, I kind of like it. We’ll take this one back to Georgia. For me and all my guys here, we’re going to celebrate and enjoy it. These wins are too hard to get not to enjoy, and just happy we could overcome a lot of adversity.”
ALEX BOWMAN, NO. 88 NATIONWIDE RETIREMENT PLANS CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 2nd
WENT TO INFIELD CARE CENTER IMMEDIATELY FOLLOWING THE RACE. ALEX, WHAT DID THEY DO TO YOU?
“I was just really sick Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday; I felt a little bit better today. But I was just really behind on being hydrated and just kind of exhausted. I was tired and everything was real tingly, which is not a great feeling inside a race car. I got some fluids and I’m definitely feeling better. We’ll be good to go in Dover.”
CONGRATULATIONS ON MAKING IT INTO THE NEXT ROUND. HOW DID YOU GET THAT DONE AFTER THE FIRST LAP INCIDENT AND HOW TOUGH WERE THE FINAL LAPS KNOWING YOU DIDN’T FEEL WELL?
“Yeah, I mean probably about lap 10 of the race, I was pretty done and out of it just from a physical standpoint. I just tried to keep digging and obviously, I tried to give it away on lap 1. As soon as I touched the brake pedal it started wheel-hopping and turned around on me. I apologize to those that got collected in that. I feel like I hurt myself more than anybody on that one. But I’m glad we were able to rebound and the guys obviously gave me a really strong car to get back through the field. There at the end, cautions were rough. Under green it is what it is. But under caution, when you actually have time to think about how you feel, it’s not much fun.”
DID THE RED FLAG MAKE IT WORSE?
“Oh, for sure. I saw them coming with water and I was out of water in the car; and they didn’t get to me. They got like four cars behind me and then they started rolling. And I was like, dang-it, man; I could have used that water. It’s just part of it. I feel like I’ve been doing a pretty good job on the physical side of things this year with a lot of help from Josh Wise and leaning on Jimmie Johnson a lot. But, when you’re sick, it just gets to you.”
NOW THE TOUGH PART OF THIS RACE: ON THE INCIDENT WITH BUBBA WALLACE. WALK US THROUGH WHAT HAPPENED. IT SEEMED LIKE IT HAD BEEN GOING ON FOR A WHILE
“Yeah, I don’t know if he was mad about the first lap, or what, but obviously that was just a mistake. And then I got flipped off every single straightaway on the entire race track for three laps. I got flipped off by him for like three or four laps in a row at Richmond, so I’m just over it.”
AND YOU DECIDED TO TAKE ACTION ON YOUR OWN?
“I’ve got to stand up for myself at some point, right? He probably wouldn’t have got wrecked if he had his finger back in the car. But, I’m just proud of our guys today and just really focused on moving forward and being good this weekend (in Dover).”
YOU HAD THE INCIDENT WITH AUSTIN DILLON LAST WEEK AND THEN THIS WEEK WITH BUBBA WALLACE. IS THERE A CONCERN ABOUT THAT MOVING FORWARD AS A PLAYOFF DRIVER?
“No, we’ve just got to focus on going and running well. At Dover we finished second in the spring, so our race car is going to be really strong there and we’ve just got to capitalize on that.”
WILLIAM BYRON, NO. 24 UNIFIRST CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 6th
WHAT WAS THE SIGNIFICANCE FOR YOU IN ADVANCING TO THE NEXT ROUND OF THE PLAYOFFS IN JUST YOUR SECOND YEAR OF CUP?
“Yeah, it feels awesome. It was a goal accomplished. We had a good car and we could have gone for more, for sure. But I just wanted to finish the race. I knew we were close on points, so just to finish the race was a goal accomplished. A sixth-place finish is good and we’ll go onto Dover. I know it’s a good track for us.
HOW DOES THE MINDSET CHANGE NOW FROM GETTING ENOUGH POINTS TO MOVE ON TO NEXT WEEK?
“Same thing, we can continue to do this for sure. I have to recover from this race, the heat and go to Dover and have a really good race there.”
JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 ALLY CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 9th
“We had a good car. We lacked a little drive off of the turns and would fade a little bit over the long haul, but I still think we really were a top-five car. I just made three really big mistakes in the race and cost us. I locked up my front tires three different times, flat-spotted the tires, and we had to pit out of sequence. I spun around once on one of those wild restarts. So, a rally back to ninth was a nice recover, but I’m kicking myself for the mistakes I made.”
HENDRICK MOTORSPORTS CARS WERE FAST TODAY. HOW DOES THAT EFFECT YOUR CONFIDENCE GOING INTO THE REST OF THE SEASON?
“Yeah, we’re getting better. Man, it was impressive to watch that 9 car. He had the field covered. If we keep working together and understanding what’s making the cars go, then we’re going to have all four cars where they need to be soon.”
KYLE LARSON, NO. 42 CLOVER CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 13th
“I felt like Chase (Elliott) was probably the fastest, but I felt like myself and William (Byron) were probably the next best. We won the first stage and during that pit stop, I didn’t wait on them to pull tape and kind of drug the crew member out of the pit box. So, I got a penalty there, a pretty stiff one. I had to lose a lap, but I got the lucky dog. I thought we were going to be OK and there at the end. We actually had a slow green-flag stop because we had some damage and they couldn’t get the right front out. We ended up 13th, but I felt like we could have easily been in the top-three. Just disappointed that we don’t have the finish to show for how good our car was.”
“We just had to be cautious and stay out on older tires to try to be ahead of the craziness that was bound to happen. I just lost a lot of spots to guys on new tires. I just wish I would have had more points so we could have come to pit and be aggressive on tires and not really worry about crashing. We’re onto the next round. We’ve been running pretty strong in these Playoffs, so we’ll keep going.”
IS THIS A SURVIVE AND ADVANCE THING HERE WITH HOW CRAZY THAT IT IS?
“I felt like the first round, for sure. If you can stomach mistakes, you can make it through. We haven’t made many mistakes, we have two top-10’s out of the three races and pretty comfortably made it to the next round. You may be able to do that in the next round, but once you get into the third round, you have to start winning.”
HOW HARD DO YOU THINK ROUND TWO WILL BE?
“It’s going to be a harder round for sure. You just have to be on your game, you have to be running good like we have been.”
Team Chevy high-resolution racing photos are available for editorial use.
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