NASCAR CUP SERIES
TALLADEGA SUPERSPEEDWAY
GEICO 500
TEAM CHEVY POST-RACE NOTES & QUOTES
APRIL 24, 2022
TOP TEAM CHEVY UNOFFICIAL RACE RESULTS:
POS. DRIVER
1st ROSS CHASTAIN, NO. 1 MOOSE FRATERNITY CAMARO ZL1
2nd AUSTIN DILLON, NO. 3 BASS PRO SHOPS / TRACKER OFF ROAD CAMARO ZL1
4th KYLE LARSON, NO. 5 HENDRICKCARS.COM CAMARO ZL1
6th ERIK JONES, NO. 43 U.S. AIR FORCE CAMARO ZL1
9th ALEX BOWMAN, NO. 48 ALLY CAMARO ZL1
12th JUSTIN HALEY, NO. 31 LEAFFILTER GUTTER PROTECTION CAMARO ZL1
14th COREY LAJOIE, NO. 7 RAZE ENERGY CAMARO ZL1
15th WILLIAM BYRON, NO. 24 LIBERTY UNIVERSITY CAMARO ZL1
TOP FIVE UNOFFICIAL RACE RESULTS:
POS. DRIVER
1st Ross Chastain (Chevrolet)
2nd Austin Dillon (Chevrolet)
3rd Kyle Busch (Toyota)
4th Kyle Larson (Chevrolet)
5th Martin Truex Jr. (Toyota)
The NASCAR Cup Series season continues next weekend at Dover Motor Speedway with the DuraMAX Drydene 400 presented by RelaDyne on Sunday, May 1 at 3:00 p.m. ET. Live coverage can be found on FS1, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio Channel 90.
TEAM CHEVY POST-RACE NOTES AND QUOTES:
ROSS CHASTAIN, NO. 1 MOOSE FRATERNITY CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 1st
Ross Chastain with his patented watermelon celebration. You were a lap down at one point in this race. Talk me through the crazy last lap. You stayed on the bottom. Things just opened up for you.
“Holy cow. I’m always the one going to the top too early, making the mistake. There at the end it was like eight to go, I was like, I’m not going up there again. I did that a couple times today. I was like, I’ll just ride on the bottom. If it works, I’m not going to lose the race for us, I’ll just let them.
This Moose fraternity, almost a million Moose members across the world, in the country, I know there’s some out here at Talladega, to win with the Moose onboard, they’ve been with me for a few years now, supported me everywhere I went.
I have no idea. They kept going up, kept moving out of the way.”
You come to Trackhouse Racing this season. Could you ever imagine this amount of success this early on in your tenure here?
“No. Are you kidding me? You know me. I’ve wrecked myself so many times and gotten into it with guys. I’ve probably got a watermelon seed. This is a true seedless.
Yeah, I mean, Justin Marks and what he laid out for us was ambitious. I had no idea, you know, what to expect other than I knew I had my group from last year, I had AdventHealth, the Moose, now with Worldwide Express and Jockey coming onboard, we’ve got partners. They’re believing in us.
We started the year with a lot of races open. We’re almost full now. It’s because of the vision of Justin Marks. Pitbull, Armando, we won, yeah!”
AUSTIN DILLON, NO. 3 BASS PRO SHOPS / TRACKER OFF ROAD CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 2nd
“We came from eighth there on that last lap, just kind of rode the bottom and got people baited off the top. We had a good push there at the end. I think I was actually the one to push the one to the win. I gave him a good shove off of four and he kind of just drove away.”
KYLE LARSON, NO. 5 HENDRICKCARS.COM CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 4th
When you got out of the car, you said, I made a mistake. What would you have done differently?
“I feel like I did a pretty near perfect job for me at a superspeedway until the last lap there.
Yeah, I should have, like, I think just kind of faked going high, then went back low. I had that run. Ross helped me with that run. It kind of baited me into going to the outside. Just a little inexperience probably there.
But really proud of my team. We did a great job executing all race long. The car was great. I felt like we could push people great. I felt like we could receive pushes well. Yeah, like I said, really proud of them.
Honestly, the first time I’ve had a legit shot at winning a plate race in the Cup Series. Happy about that. When you’re close, I was in the exact position I wanted to be in, I didn’t want to be leading. I felt like I did a good job with patience and stuff. Made one small mistake there and it cost me the win.”
ERIK JONES, NO. 43 U.S. AIR FORCE CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 6th
On the other side of that celebration is Erik Jones. Such a strong run today. Where did it go wrong?
“I mean, just the last lap, right? It’s typical here. Been close here so many times, in this race and the fall race. U.S. Air Force Chevy had good speed, felt good to be up front.
Coming there that last lap, we were single file. I felt pretty good about it. They kind of doubled up behind us. That top lane was getting some momentum. Looking back, I wish I would have stayed at the bottom and let the 1 push me. I didn’t realize they were coming with that much speed.
But try to defend on the 5, you’re too far ahead already right here. Obviously a defense on the 5 kind of gives the door to the 1.
It is what it is. You’re trying to just win the race. You can only see how much is going on from the seat. You’re trying to make the best decision you can the last 1500 feet.
Happy to run up front, lead laps. Would really love to get the 43 in Victory Lane. I thought today might be the day. All day long we were fast and had speed. Especially being up front there at the end, the last 10, I knew we had a shot, but just couldn’t quite close it out.”
JUSTIN HALEY, NO. 31 LEAFFILTER GUTTER PROTECTION CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 12th
“It was a good day in our No. 31 LeafFilter Gutter Protection Camaro ZL1. We stayed clean, we just didn’t execute at the end. I’m proud of everyone at Kaulig Racing for working hard and helping us to be able to stay up front and have an opportunity to contend for the win.”
RICKY STENHOUSE JR., NO. 47 KROGER/SUNNYD CAMARO ZL1, sidelined by damage sustained in an accident on lap 89.
SOME OF THE GUYS SAID THEY COULD KIND OF SEE THIS ONE COMING. COULD YOU, JUST WITH THE WAY THE ENERGY OF THE PACK WAS GOING?
“I thought it was fairly smooth, really. I didn’t even see what happened, so I’ve got really no clue what actually happened. You wouldn’t think on a restart that you would have any issues, but apparently someone didn’t push in the right spot I guess. Again, I haven’t seen it, so I don’t know. I thought it was pretty calm, really, the whole race. Just kind of two-by-two. We really couldn’t get the third lane going.
I felt like our No. 47 Kroger/SunnyD Camaro was really good. I really wanted to get up and lead one of the lines. I felt like we had a car capable of pulling up and leading. I felt really fast and it drove really good. Just a bummer that we didn’t really get that opportunity.”
WERE YOU CLOSE TO BEING ABLE TO GET IT FIXED?
“No, I was just riding around so we could beat a few of the people that were already in the garage. It destroyed the right-front. So, not close at all.”
DANIEL SUAREZ, NO. 99 TOOTSIES ORCHID LOUNGE CAMARO ZL1 – Sidelined by damage sustained in an accident on lap 89.
YOU LED SOME LAPS TODAY AND HAD A SHOT AT A WIN.
“Our Camaro was fast. I was really happy with how the car was driving. I wasn’t good in traffic. I felt like we needed to make an adjustment or two. We made an adjustment and the car was much better by the end of the run. We just needed a little track position.
I felt like we were being patient, just trying to wait for the right time to try and get aggressive and get in the right position. I don’t even know what happened. I just saw the No. 22 (Joey Logano) sideways, wrecking, in the top lane. Unfortunately, we were just in a bad position.”
WAS THERE NO WAY TO AVOID IT?
“No, there was nothing I could have done, unfortunately. I wish there was something I could have done different, but unfortunately not.”
THE TEAM WAS TRYING TO REPAIR IT, BUT WAS THERE JUST TOO MUCH DAMAGE?
“Yeah, I couldn’t keep the car straight. I don’t know, something broke in the steering. The car was going left and right by itself. I wasn’t going to be able to stay on track.”
TY DILLON, NO. 42 BLACK RIFFLE COFFEE COMPANY CAMARO ZL1 – Sidelined by damage sustained in an accident on lap 89.
WELL, TY DILLON HAD A GOOD RACE GOING, TALKED ABOUT YOU GUYS EARLIER AND WE SAW IT ON THE REPLAY YOU WERE JUST AN INNOCENT BYSTANDER. WHAT DID YOU FEEL THERE?
“Yeah, that was tough. I felt like I shifted to fifth gear to get in high gear and then all of a sudden, I saw the 22 and there was no where I could go. Just a bystander. As soon as Stage Two started, I could feel the energy just wasn’t the same and it had ramped up for whatever reason with way too many laps to go. Every year we come back; you have to finish the race to have a chance. So, we are bump drafting doing silly things with way too many laps to go. I’m bummed for our guys at Black Rifle Coffee and our guys at Petty GMS. We had a fast, fast Camaro and couldn’t keep it outside the top 15 and just kind of doing my thing that I’d been successful doing here at these speedways. Trying to be smart and stay out of trouble and manage the race. It’s a chess match and you’ve got to use your brain a little bit at these races to have a shot and some people don’t ever realize that every time we come back.”
DANIEL HEMRIC, NO. 16 MAJESTIC STEEL CAMARO ZL1 – Sidelined by damage sustained in an accident on lap 56.
“We were up there mixing it up, pushing and getting a little more aggressive. That had nothing to do with us getting crashed. We were simply riding in the bottom lane. We had been flirting on temperatures the whole run. I was able to poke my nose in and out enough to cool it down. It definitely got probably 10 to 15 degrees hotter than it had been all race. I tried to make a valid effort there to get it halfway lower on the back straightaway to get clean air to the motor. I had a tone change in the engine. We didn’t lose power, so I assumed it was just myself getting my car in clean air. As soon as that thought crossed my mind, then I lost a cylinder and the engine blew up. I ran out of time to get my hand out. To slow down at such a rapid pace, the No. 3 (Austin Dillon) got into me and I was just trying to catch it from there on.
I hate it for everybody that got caught up in that. There were a couple of big hits it looked like; it felt like anyways. I’m disappointed, for sure. I’m super thankful for the opportunity with Kaulig Racing. Just not the way you want it to go.”
YOU TRIED TO CORRECT IT. WHAT IS IT LIKE JUST TRYING TO KEEP IT OFF THE BANKING?
“These cars, in general, are very, very sensitive to sitting back on the left rear. That’s just naturally the way all teams go about trying to make speed with them. I couldn’t get it off the left rear enough and it steered right. When that happens, you know whatever comes next is not going to be good. I’m glad everyone is OK.”
TYLER REDDICK, NO. 8 BETMGM CAMARO ZL1 – Sidelined due to mechanical failure.
“Just an unfortunate day for our No. 8 BetMGM team. We started 10th and were just focused on staying out of trouble and running with the pack. As a driver, you know you need to be there at the end. We started falling back and just weren’t able to come back from it. I felt like we were starting to make up some ground in the middle of Stage 1 but then we had an engine failure. We have run thousands of miles without an issue so it’s just tough. But, we have a team that doesn’t give up. Everyone at RCR and ECR work so hard each week to bring us fast and competitive racecars, we’ll bounce back and come back stronger at Dover next week.”
Team Chevy high-resolution racing photos are available for editorial use.
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