TOYOTA NASCAR Sprint Cup Series (NSCS) Post-Race Notes & Quotes Gatorade Duel 150s Race #1- February 23, 2012
DENNY HAMLIN, No. 11 FedEx Express Toyota Camry, Joe Gibbs Racing Duel 1 Finishing Position: 17th How was your car in the Duel? “Our car was pretty strong. We raced right to the top five in five laps and really had a car that we felt like could contend with those guys. We didn’t have very good fuel mileage and we had to pit when those other guys didn’t, so it just really hurt our chances going a lap down.”
How did your pit strategy play out? “When everyone pits and topped off it gave them the ability to — if they were going to have to pit again, it was going to have to be with just a couple of laps to go, where we had to do it with 15 to go. By doing that, you just lost the entire draft and the pack speed that you normally run. If we had to do it all over again, I’m sure we would do it different, but we learned now.”
Did you learn anything in today’s Duel that will apply to the Daytona 500? “We learned that even though we had a really slow car in qualifying that we did have a fast race car. We can definitely race our way to the front on Sunday.”
MICHAEL WALTRIP, No. 40 Aaron’s Dream Machine Toyota Camry, Hillman Racing Duel 1 Finishing Position: 18th What happened to cause the accident? “I just went the wrong way and lost the car. I feel like I let everybody down. I raced my way to the front and then I let them down. It’s just really hard. I don’t know what to say — it’s just sad. Thankful to my team and Aaron’s for giving me the opportunity and hate that I let everybody down.”
DAVID STREMME, No. 30 Inception Motorsports Toyota Camry, Inception Motorsports Duel 1 Finishing Position: 19th
LANDON CASSILL, No. 83 Burger King Toyota Camry, BK Racing Duel 1 Finishing Position: 25th
