KEVIN HARVICK, NO. 29 BUDWEISER FOLDS OF HONOR CHEVROLET – QUALIFIED SECOND
TELL US WHAT HAPPENED OUT THERE
“I was really loose coming to the green and I got up out of the groove. So I knew that if I didn’t stop, I was going to have a bad lap and it’s kind of a catch-22 with the temperatures there and obviously that didn’t help us coming to the checkered. But all in all, it’s better than it was going to be if I’d have come to the green that way. So, it was a decent lap. Obviously it won’t be a pole lap by any means, but it’s better than it was looking to start with.”
TALK ABOUT THE TIRE CHANGE AND THE EXTRA PRACTICE THIS EVENING, DO YOU WANT THAT TO HAPPEN?
“That needs to happen. We don’t have any clue really as to where we need to be. So, we have a guess, but with the tires being that old, having an hour to figure it out will be interesting.”
DID YOU FIND A PACE WITH THE LEFT-SIDE TIRES THAT SEEMED TO WORK YESTERDAY?
“Once we blistered the first set we went into conservative mode and finding a pace that would work for the tires to complete a whole run. We felt pretty good about it but obviously there were a lot of problems.”
WAS MAKING THE CHANGE THE RIGHT MORE?
“Oh, yeah, I think that’s the right move. We don’t need another Indy, so I’m glad that they had a back-up plan.”
KASEY KAHNE, NO. 5 FARMERS INSURANCE CHEVROLET – QUALIFIED FOURTH HOW WAS YOUR QUALIFYING LAP? “It felt really good. The Farmers Insurance Chevy was nice to drive. That is the hardest I’ve driven so I probably could have went harder. I don’t know it’s just kind of a different deal I probably didn’t get as aggressive as I needed to as a driver but I think my car was really balanced well.”
WHAT DO YOU EXPECT IN TONIGHT’S PRACTICE SESSION? “I think it is definitely going to be different. We’ve got two full days of practice with the tires we are on. I feel like we were actually really fast at that point. We had a good balance this is going to switch it up. It will switch it up for everyone so hopefully we still have a small advantage from where we were up to this point.”
RYAN NEWMAN, NO. 39 U.S. ARMY CHEVROLET – QUALIFIED FIFTH
HOW WAS YOUR LAP? “It was better than I expected for the U.S. Army Chevrolet. We weren’t super competitive yesterday in qualifying trim. A lot of guys did qualifying runs the second practice. We didn’t know where we were going to stack up. Being fourth now after 30 couple of cars is better and more competitive than I thought we were going to be. We will learn from what we did and keep going.”
WHAT DO YOU EXPECT IN TONIGHT’S PRACTICE SESSION? “The track is going to change. The tire is going to change because of the track. The grip is going to change so we will have to rebalance the car for sure. We will just have to see.”
TONY STEWART, NO. 14 OFFICE DEPOT/MOBIL 1 CHEVROLET – QUALIFIED EIGHTH TELL US ABOUT YOUR LAP: “The car was a little free, but we’ve still got a good starting spot. I’m proud of Steve Addington (crew chief) and all the guys on this Office Depot/Mobil 1 Chevrolet. They had two extra days of practice last week in Pocono; we tested earlier this week in Bristol and then came to Michigan a day early for an extra day of practice. Now we’ve got an extra 75 minutes of practice tonight. They’ve worked their guts out and I’m really proud of their effort.”
JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 LOWE’S CHEVROLET – QUALIFIED 10th
“We’re going so early it’s really tough to know where it’s going to stack up. But I repeated the time that I ran yesterday, so I feel good about that. We just, unfortunately, have to sit and wait a long time to see where it’s going to stack up. But it was a solid lap. From yesterday, the track continued to pick up speed the more and more cars ran, so I’d hoped to be a little bit faster because I think some guys will go faster than that.”
ON THE ADDITIONAL PRACTICE WITH NEW TIRE
“Yeah, we can’t start a race on a tire we haven’t practiced on. So, I’m happy to hear that we have a practice session to try to understand what’s going on there. Hopefully this tire is the fix. My concern is what if the tire isn’t the fix? What do we do at that point? So, we’ll learn a lot at six o’clock tonight.”
‘In years past when we’ve been through this, it might sound wrong or awkward, but you just don’t have your tires blister as bad as anyone else. And you just don’t want to be the first guy with blisters is what it boils down to. So, if you can prolong that and just not be the first guy, you won’t be the caution. And if this tire has a problem, we’ll have to go into that mindset and it’s a lot like Indy however many years ago, where you just didn’t want to be the caution. You hoped a caution would come before you had your issue.”
WERE YOU HAPPY THEY MADE THE TIRE CHANGE? “At the end of the day, yes; I’m happy to see that there’s a change and especially that there’s a practice session. But I don’t know why we missed it. I don’t know why we’re in this situation.”
REGAN SMITH, NO. 78 FURNITURE ROW CHEVROLET – QUALIFIED 12th
HOW WAS YOUR LAP?
“You know, it was good. It was better than yesterday. We only did one mock run yesterday, so we didn’t get a lot of opportunity to check stuff out. It’s tough to tell. The track’s going to be faster or slower than yesterday. I don’t think they’ll go as quick as they did with a ‘teen or a 20 or whatever it was yesterday just because there was other cars involved with that lap. But we’ll see. Hopefully it stays in the top 15, which would be good for us. I was happy with my car in race trim yesterday at the end. Unfortunately it’s going to change for everybody now but the guys have been working hard on the Furniture Row Chevy and we’ll keep digging with the rules changes tonight and see where that puts us.”
DO YOU HAVE ANY EXPECTATIONS FOR TONIGHT’S PRACTICE?
“I expect it to be a lot slower. Outside of that, I don’t think any of us really, truly know. It’s going to be slower and we’ll just have to wait and see from there.”
AUSTIN DILLON, NO. 33 AMERICAN ETHANOL CHEVROLET – QUALIFIED 22ND HOW WAS YOUR LAP? “It was good. I think I gave up a little bit here and there but you know the consistent thing was I just wanted to get in the show. The good thing is we have happy hour tonight because I can go out there and really practice and see what we’ve got for the race. Qualifying I mean it was good we did our job.”
About Chevrolet
Founded in 1911 in Detroit, Chevrolet is now one of the world’s largest car brands, doing business in more than 140 countries and selling more than 4 million cars and trucks a year. Chevrolet provides customers with fuel-efficient vehicles that feature spirited performance, expressive design and high quality. More information on Chevrolet models can be found at www.chevrolet.com.
