NASCAR CUP SERIES
BRISTOL MOTOR SPEEDWAY
FOOD CITY PRESENTS SUPERMARKET HEROES 500
TEAM CHEVY POST-RACE NOTES AND QUOTES
MAY 31, 2020
TOP TEAM CHEVY UNOFFICIAL RACE RESULTS:
POS. DRIVER
3rd JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 ALLY CAMARO ZL1 1LE
6th AUSTIN DILLON, NO. 3 SYMBICORT CAMARO ZL1 1LE
7th KURT BUSCH, NO. 1 MONSTER ENERGY CAMARO ZL1 1LE
8th WILLIAM BYRON, NO. 24 AXALTA CAMARO ZL1 1LE
10th BUBBA WALLACE, NO. 43 VICTORY JUNCTION CAMARO ZL1 1LE
TOP FIVE UNOFFICIAL RACE RESULTS:
POS. DRIVER
1st Brad Keselowski (Ford)
2nd Clint Bowyer (Ford)
3rd Jimmie Johnson (Chevrolet)
4th Kyle Busch (Toyota)
5th Erik Jones (Toyota)
The NASCAR Cup Series season continues at Atlanta Motor Speedway with the Folds of Honor QuikTrip 500 on Sunday, June 7, at 3:00 p.m. ET. Live coverage can be found on FOX, PRN, and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio Channel 90.
TEAM CHEVY NOTES AND QUOTES:
JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 ALLY CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Finished 3rd
JIMMIE, WALK US THROUGH THE WILD AND CRAZY RACE FROM YOUR PERSPECTIVE.
“Yeah, wild and crazy night for sure. Very strong performance for us. Really proud of the guys keeping our chins up through the last four weeks. We’ve had fast cars, really haven’t had the results to show for it.”
“To put together a solid race, start to finish, great pit stops, fast car, be a threat. We need more long runs. There’s only one long race in the whole race. We were battling for the lead with Kyle. I wish there were more long runs because our car didn’t have the short run speed in it. But we still salvaged a great day out of it with the Ally Chevy.”
ALL THINGS CONSIDERED IN THE TWO WEEKS, HOW SATISFIED ARE YOU WITH THE PROGRESS THAT YOU AND CLIFF HAVE DONE, ESPECIALLY WITH THE LONG LAYOFF TO NOW, A VICTORY IS ALL THAT’S MISSING?
“We’re excited. I felt like when the lockdown and quarantine started, we had momentum on our side. I was really bummed that we couldn’t see that through. Then to sit on ice for eight, nine weeks, whatever it ended up being, then come back and really actually be stronger than we were before the lockdown happened is really a testament to everybody at Hendrick, the leadership on Cliff’s side, what he’s doing with these crew guys. I felt like we would be good, but we definitely stepped it up after the lockdown lifted, now that we’re back racing.”
AUSTIN DILLON, NO. 3 SYMBICORT CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Finished 6th
“P-6 for the No. 3 car. The Symbicort Chevrolet was good when it mattered. We worked really hard today; hard-fought battle. The car was tight; low right front. Goodyear said they didn’t know what happened to the tire. But we recovered and made some great adjustments. We were pretty fast there at the end. Justin (Alexander, Crew Chief) made a great call to take tires with 38 laps to go and it showed up. I can’t believe the 2 car won; just shows you have to stay in these races until the end. We were racing him right before that last caution, came out and he goes off and wins the race. We’re close, we’re getting there. Love how these races are playing out. Getting closer and closer! Thanks for all the support – next week is Atlanta!”
KURT BUSCH, NO. 1 MONSTER ENERGY CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Finished 7th
“Wow, what a day for us! The Monster Energy Chevrolet – not one straight panel on it. We went through a lot of damage, went through a lot of looseness early in the race. Man, we had a lot of lucky breaks that fell our way there at the end to be able to come home seventh. There were a couple of guys that wiped each other out, couple of guys chose the wrong lane on the restart and we were able to take advantage with our long run speed. We’ve got to work on our short run speed and how the car drives when it’s on stickers. But we’ll keep digging – we’re not going to give up!”
WILLIAM BYRON, NO. 24 AXALTA CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Finished 8th
“It was a tough race at the start for us but we finished eighth which was good. Lately we’ve had damage and just a lot of things go wrong for us. We just really needed a good finish and we did today.
“We had a loose wheel at the start of the race and had to start at the back of the field after that. We marched our way through the field, back to the top 10. We then again had to start at the back to make repairs to account for the loose wheel. For a third time we had to start back again later because of right side damage. Once we finally got our track position back, we stayed up towards the top 10 and keep ourselves up there. At the end, some of those guys had fresher tires and we faded a couple spots. Overall though it was a good day for us, and we can go onto Atlanta where I think we have a good shot at winning.”
BUBBA WALLACE, NO. 43 VICTORY JUNCTION CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Finished 10th
“That was hard fought. I am worn-out after that one. That was a good day for our Richard Petty Motorsports No. 43 Victory Junction Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 1LE. There were ups and downs, back and forth. We have to figure out our pit road speeding. I am 99.999% sure I was way under the limit – just because we got caught the first time, so there was no need to push it. Besides that, we rebounded from those penalties. I over stepped adjusting the car. We were just way out of place at the beginning of the race and our team over-adjusted, and came back full circle as the track rubbered-up.
“All-in-all, it was a good day at the Bristol Motor Speedway. It was fun there at the end. It was wild – that race had pretty much everything. I have seen a lot of positive comments from fans. That’s Bristol Motor Speedway for you. We will carry some momentum over – finally got a good finish after two bad ones. We got the bad juju off our back and we will go onto the Atlanta Motor Speedway! We’ve got some work to do there. I am excited about the speed we’ve been bringing to the track each week. The speed we have been bringing has been good. We need to tweak some things to get us to the next level. We are knocking on the door. We’re doing really good things.”
MATT KENSETH, NO. 42 MCDONALD’S CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Finished 16th
“Another tough day for me and the 42 team. We had a lot of things go right today with good stops in the pits and some runs with really good speed, but couldn’t turn it into a good finish. So, all in all a frustrating day that ended without the finish we could’ve had. We’ll keep working hard as we look forward to Atlanta and hopefully put together a better race next weekend.”
CHASE ELLIOTT, NO. 9 NAPA AUTO PARTS CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Finished 22nd
WE JUST TALKED WITH JOEY LOGANO AND HE GAVE US HIS TAKE. WHAT’S YOUR TAKE OF WHAT HAPPENED?
“Oh, just going for the win, you know, trying to get a run underneath and got really loose-in. I don’t know if I had a tire going down or if I just got loose on entry. But, as soon as I turned off the wall, I had zero chance of making it. I’ll certainly take the blame. I don’t think so, I just got loose and got up into him. Yeah, you know, I feel like that was my shot. He was really good on the short run and I feel like I had to keep him behind me right there in order to win the race with only three or four laps to go. I hate we both wrecked. But you can’t go back in time now.”
RICKY STENHOUSE JR., NO. 47 KROGER CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Sidelined in crash on lap 228; Finished 34th
“We just got crashed. Our Kroger Camaro was just so good. Two weeks in a row, I feel like, we had one of the best cars I’ve had at that given race track. We were just racing hard. The No. 42 (Matt Kenseth) had to check-up and the No. 48 (Jimmie Johnson) just ran into our left rear and spun us. But, it was a bummer. I felt like we had a really good shot at racing them for the win. We were getting it dialed-in there. Starting on the inside was a little tricky on re-starts in trying to get yourself up, and we were starting to get some momentum back to the top five there and just got crashed. He about got us last week. He got us this week. But, it’s just part of it. It’s short-track racing. Hopefully our guys bring another good car to Atlanta next weekend, and we’ll go get ‘em.”
TYLER REDDICK, NO. 8 ALSCO UNIFORMS CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Sidelined by crash on lap 228; Finished 36th
“Well, unfortunately we had an early end to my NASCAR Cup Series debut at Bristol Motor Speedway. We had a handful with the balance of our Alsco Uniforms Chevrolet today and weren’t quite where we needed to be to start the race. We worked really hard though and got it to where I thought it needed to be. We were even able to start clicking off some top-five lap times, just needed some track position to get up there and start contending. We had started to weed away at that, and I’m confident we would have gotten up there. I could run the top lane pretty well, which was helping a lot. It’s unfortunate, but it’s a case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time at Bristol. I saw the No. 47 get spun, and I saw him go down but then I couldn’t see him anymore. I was worried if I checked up too much I’d get caught up in it, but it didn’t matter and I got caught up in it anyway. Just a tough situation and a tough way to end our day.”
ALEX BOWMAN, NO. 88 CHEVYGOODS.COM/ADAM’S POLISHES CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Sidelined by crash on lap 228; Finished 37th
ALEX, WALK US THROUGH WHAT TOOK PLACE FROM YOUR VANTAGE POINT?
“It looked like the 47 (Ricky Stenhouse Jr.) crashed and I just couldn’t get stopped in time. I was hoping they would stay low and as they all came up, I got on the brake pedal, just locked the fronts up and couldn’t turn. Bummer – hate it for our ChevyGoods.com Adam’s Polishes guys. The first race for having Adam’s Polishes on the car; bummed for them. We had a really good car, just had some weird stuff happen today. We cross-threaded a lug nut, had to come back down and change that out. The clutch pedal fell off inside the race car, so that wasn’t good for pit stops by any means. So, we struggled with that the last pit stop and lost some more track position. And then, just wrong place wrong time. Hate it, but it looks like the 9 (Chase Elliott) is running really well, so hopefully a HMS car can park it in victory lane. It was one of those days that everything was going wrong and finished it off.”
TY DILLON, NO. 13 GEICO CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Sidelined by crash on lap 198; Finished 39th
“Rough day for the third race in a row. Obviously today we got caught up in a wreck after having the car fall off the jack during a pit stop. It’s just unfortunate, but our Germain Racing team is strong though. Our cars are really fast. Our GEICO Camaros are a lot stronger than we have been in the past couple years. We have plenty of time to rebound and accomplish our goals this season. We will keep our heads up, keep digging and fight until the end. Bad days will come; it’s just how you fight through them. We will go try again in Atlanta.”
Team Chevy high-resolution racing photos are available for editorial use.
About Chevrolet
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