TOYOTA NASCAR Sprint Cup Series (NSCS)
Post-Qualifying Notes & Quotes
Talladega Superspeedway
500.1 miles, 188 laps
April 30, 2016
TOYOTA STARTING POSITIONS
4th, MATT KENSETH
8th, DENNY HAMLIN
9th, CARL EDWARDS
12th, MARTIN TRUEX JR.
17th, KYLE BUSCH
33rd, MICHAEL WALTRIP
35th, MATT DiBENEDETTO
36th, COLE WHITT
40th, DAVID RAGAN
TOYOTA QUOTES
MATT KENSETH, No. 20 Dollar General Toyota Camry, Joe Gibbs Racing
Starting Position: 4th
How was your qualifying effort?
“We seemed to have pretty good speed. We had good speed, but qualifying doesn’t necessarily mean a lot for the race. These guys have been doing a good job and I qualified well at Daytona and qualified well here, so that was encouraging that they got the speed in the car.”
DENNY HAMLIN, No. 11 FedEx Express Toyota Camry, Joe Gibbs Racing
Starting Position: 8th
CARL EDWARDS, No. 19 ARRIS Toyota Camry, Joe Gibbs Racing
Starting Position: 9th
How was your qualifying effort?
“The Toyotas seemed to have some speed, so this is good. We actually picked up a little bit of time the second round which is great. Now we’ll just go race.”
MARTIN TRUEX, JR., No. 78 Furniture Row Toyota Camry, Furniture Row Racing
Starting Position: 12th
How was your qualifying effort?
“Uneventful, so good. Anytime it’s uneventful, it’s good. We’re ready to go racing. I thought everybody picked up, but us, which is kind of interesting, but I don’t know why that is. Other than that, everything is good.”
Is the plan to team up with the Toyota Camrys tomorrow?
“It’s going to be a little harder to make it happen here. I think it’s just typically here it’s at least three wide all day – sometimes four – where Daytona is always two, so it’s definitely a little bit different. Hopefully, we can all as a group and work together as well as we did. It’s just a matter of – I feel like we can. I feel like we have a game plan to try to do that I believe. It’s going to be a little harder to pull off here, but hopefully we’ll be able to make it work, if possible.”
KYLE BUSCH, No. 18 Skittles Marvel Toyota Camry, Joe Gibbs Racing
Starting Position: 17th
How was your qualifying effort?
“Horrible, we should be in the top-12.”
Is this a track where qualifying doesn’t matter much?
“Yeah, it doesn’t matter where you qualifying, but just expected to have a little more speed in our Skittles Marvel Camry and hoping that we would have a better start than what that is, but it doesn’t much matter here for the race. It’s every man for himself and wide open times out there.”
Is Talladega more aggressive than Daytona?
“I’d say a little bit. The Daytona 500 is an aggressive race because of what it is. Talladega is just a race that we have to get through and try to get out of here healthy.”
Will the group coordination have the same impact here at Talladega as it did in Daytona?
“I’m not sure if it will have the same effect here. I still think that if you can coordinate enough of a group to stick together for a long enough group of time that that’s going to overcome some of those that are trying to get through to you.”
MICHAEL WALTRIP, No. 55 Peak & BlueDEF Toyota Camry, Premium Motorsports
Starting Position: 33rd
MATT DiBENEDETTO, No. 83 Dustless Blasting Toyota Camry, BK Racing
Starting Position: 35th
COLE WHITT, No. 98 RticCoolers.com Toyota Camry, Premium Motorsports
Starting Position: 36th
DAVID RAGAN, No. 23 Schluter Services Toyota Camry, BK Racing
Starting Position: 40th