Tums QuikPak 500 Post-Race Transcript
Tums QuikPak 500 Post-Race Transcript
An Interview With:
JIMMIE JOHNSON
CHAD KNAUS
KERRY THARP: We are pleased to be joined by the winner today’s Tums QuikPak 500 winning for the, I believe, sixth time this year, and the fifth time here at Martinsville Speedway; that’s Jimmie Johnson.
Jimmie, certainly you enjoy running here, you’re successful here, and with four to go, you’re looking really strong; your thoughts?
JIMMIE JOHNSON: Very proud of the effort we put up today. We executed. We had a car that could lead a lot of laps, one of the probably top two or three cars all day long, and stops were on the money, car was great, and I did my part and Chad had a great strategy. So very proud of the execution today. That was really what we needed to do.
I’m ready to go to Atlanta. I wish we were dropping the green flag at Atlanta right now. These guys are just on it, great cars. I’m focused and want this so bad, and ready to get to it.
Q. Just to check, is it time to start asking you about Kato (ph) yet?
JIMMIE JOHNSON: It’s getting closer. I’m going to have to answer those questions one of these days, aren’t I?
Today was a big step in the right direction. Still, as long as I can stay scared and on my heels and worried about losing this thing, the better this team is going to be. If we start getting comfortable and complacent, we are going to stub our toes and make mistakes.
Yesterday in practice, I knew the 24 was the best car and I was kind of content being second fastest. Felt good about things. Was worried about the 99, 31, 16. Yeah, we were better than those guys and we are good, and Chad was cracking the whip on me and he was like: “Dude, it doesn’t matter. Why are you worried about those guys? We need to go out and make sure we are the best car on track. Let’s not change what we have done. Let’s stay focused on being the best car.”
I looked at him; “Thanks.” If I worry about protecting something we are going to make mistakes, and he is, as well, and same with those pit stops. We are trying to keep our eye on the prize and go out and get points each week.
Q. What is it about Martinsville? You flat out dominate here. Jeff Gordon said in college he called you Mr. Martinsville.
JIMMIE JOHNSON: I have no clue. It’s amazing how I’ve gone from my first year running here and disliking the track and being totally lost on it to getting the rhythm of it and doing well here.
I typically do better at quirky tracks, tracks that need some type of technique. If it’s a rough track and an abrasive track, odd shaped, whatever it may be, those tracks really fall into my style, and I think it’s due to my off road racing background.
The tracks where there is a ton of grip and it easy to go fast, I don’t seem to I’m just kind of average there. I guess it’s probably easier for everyone, and everyone is brave and has confidence and is not scared of much, so they go fast.
But at tricky tracks like this, I do a much better job. I feel good at shorter tracks, and that’s leaving Bristol off the schedule but other than that, I feel like I do a great job on short tracks.
KERRY THARP: Shifting gears here for a second, no pun intended, but we have Chad Knaus, crew chief in here, we’ll take some questions for Chad and then let him get out to post race technical inspection.
First, Chad if you can just give some opening comments about performance out here, certainly the 48 team is very, very good right now.
CHAD KNAUS: Yeah, first off, I just want to say thank you to everybody at Martinsville Speedway for the incredible job they did on pit road and the renovations they did here. The pit road here used to be very, very treacherous. The pit road needed some assistance and they did a good job with that. All of the competitors appreciate that are.
As far as the 48 team, the Lowe’s Impala SS, it was good. We went through practice and we had some opportunities to try some different things and they didn’t show a lot of fruit for us. So we kind of went back and worked with some of our old stuff, and kind of tuned up a little bit, and used what we used in spring as a baseline and made some adjustments.
And Jimmie did a fantastic job all day today. We were in a position a couple of times where he could have gotten frustrated and lost his cool, and same with the pit stop guys. We had one vacation where our jack band slipped in the brake dust from the right front wheel, and he was able to recover from that and came back in and not make any more mistakes. It was a total team effort and fortunately enough, we did not get into a position today which would be typical Martinsville to where you get your cautions every 40 laps. We had some long green flag runs that kept the pit cycles, everyone on the same pit cycle, and that definitely worked out for us.
Q. With the car dominating and leading and everything and you on the radio to Jimmie saying that you’re making some changes that you’re going to like, does that mean you guys are satisfied with just never being good
JIMMIE JOHNSON: He’s never satisfied.
Q. as front runners now as compared to catch up guys compared to the last few years.
CHAD KNAUS: Yeah, I’m never satisfied. You know
JIMMIE JOHNSON: He’ll lie to me on the pit box and say, “Oh, we’re a tenth off” and we’ll be a tenth ahead. Only way I find out is from my wife and Mr. Hendrick. Mr. Hendrick busts his butt all the time on that.
CHAD KNAUS: (Coughing) excuse me, I’m sorry got a frog in my throat.
JIMMIE JOHNSON: Truth hurts, huh?
CHAD KNAUS: Stings a little, geez.
But no, we have to be that way. I think it’s real easy in this industry to get complacent. People that stay in a job for a long period of time, you win races and get comfortable, and it’s easy to get complacent. And the one thing we strive on at Hendrick Motorsports is to make sure that we staff up with personnel that are competitors. If you’re a true competitor, you are never satisfied and you always want more. You can call it greed or whatever you want, but it’s the competitive nature that we have at Hendrick Motorsports that makes us do what we do.
If we would have left the car alone, which it was good at that point and the 89 and 99 had made adjustments to their car and got better to their car; and if we lost because we didn’t, it would be shame on us. And so we have to continually do that and if we don’t, championships and race wins won’t come.
As far as being front runner, we are happy to be the position we are in, but there’s no room for complacency. We have to continue to push and go for more wins.
Q. You talked about making changes throughout the race. How much does a track change from the beginning of the race through when the shade starts coming over especially through turns one and two?
CHAD KNAUS: It changes an awful lot, and I think if you even watch the way the racetrack develops throughout a run, if you go about 60 laps on a green flag run you’ll actually see the racetrack starts to lay down rubber and you’ll see big chunks of rubber. And the handling characteristics of the car are going to be different than when you just come back to green flag racing, because when you run around the caution, it picks up all the rubber on the racetrack.
It changes a lot not only from mid day to evening, but even from 60 laps to 120 laps into a specific run.
Q. Jimmie told a story when we came in about you kind of gut checking him, reality check after practice, and maybe you could share that story from your side of it. He was talking about you kind of making him rethink things, and also, your crew and team are so used to being around together for so long, that’s good; and also, when you talk about complacency, that can be more difficult to manage.
CHAD KNAUS: Yeah, you know, again, it’s the competitive nature that we’ve got. I think the deeper that fire burns inside of you, the more success you’re apt to have.
Yesterday in practice, I felt like we were probably the second best car here compared to the 24. And it’s real easy to look at the practice sheet, look at the lap times and the lap count and see where you fall and figure who it is you’re racing and say, okay, we are good enough to beat them.
But what will happen is if you sit back and do that, you’ll put yourself in a vulnerable situation, and you’ve got to continue to push. If you’ve got the fastest car, you’ve got a Top 5 car and those guys have problems, then you can kind of start to determine your own destiny.
If we would have been in a situation with the 88 pressuring us right there being ahead of those other guys, we could have backed off but if we were struggling to be in the in the top five, we would not have been able to that. We have to continually be able to push and hopefully that will push us on through.
Q. With 50 some laps left, there’s a caution flag, and all season long, track position has been so important and you’re in the situation that frequently becomes the no win situation and the leader comes in and nobody stays out and you came in and nobody came in with you. Talk about making that call. As a second guesser who gets paid to do that, I’m sitting here going: Well, there’s no way I’m coming in here and next thing you know, you’re all coming into pit road. That seems to have gone against the grain much the season and recent trends.
Talk about that decision.
CHAD KNAUS: If you look at the pace of the race and how the speeds had declined and realizing that we pitted on lap 358, and so with 50 laps to go at that point, everybody had no, it wasn’t 358; that’s a lie. But we had about 50 laps and at that point, that’s an awful lot. There were other six cars on the lead lap at that point, and if we pitted and all those guys stayed out an old tires, we stayed out on fresh tires, we would have beat these guys on however many laps are left.
I think the 17 stayed out and he was not able to hang on very well; I don’t know where he ended up but he felt back pretty quickly. You know you just have to pay attention that. We lost a race here in 2003 in the fall, we were leading the race, and there was 45 laps to go, caution came out, and we stayed out and everybody else, the top 20 cars behind us came down pit road and I think we ended up third, so a little bit of a lesson learned there maybe.
Q. You talk of just continually pushing yourself and racing your competition. For someone like you who has been in the sport as long as you have, how much in a way, and maybe in an indirect way, are you chasing history?
CHAD KNAUS: Well, I don’t know. I mean, we are chasing. We are running like hell. I don’t know what we are chasing but we are chasing something.
You know, we have got a great opportunity to do a lot of things. I feel like that we and myself, probably primarily, gave away two championships and 2004 in 2005, and I feel like that we had a big learning curve at that point and I’d like to somehow get those championships back.
I feel like if we can go on to win a couple more championships and maybe be status quo and I can fall over and die, because that’s probably what is going to happen when I finally quit.
JIMMIE JOHNSON: He’s also very hard on himself.
Q. Chad, do you ever have fun? You’re so driven on this thing, do you sit back on Monday morning or something and actually just grin and realize you came out here and just whipped everybody’s butt?
CHAD KNAUS: I love it.
JIMMIE JOHNSON: This is fun for him. Today what was.
CHAD KNAUS: This is fun.
JIMMIE JOHNSON: He’ll be miserable again tomorrow. This is happy. This is good. (Laughter).
CHAD KNAUS: You have to realize, I love racing. And it’s like the old saying says, you know, find an occupation that you enjoy and you’ll never work a day in your life.
Every day when I go into Hendrick Motorsports and look at the big beautiful buildings and realize the driver and teammates that we have got, it’s awesome. And I want to prove it to everybody that we can do what needs to be done. And I owe it to Rick and I owe it to Jimmie and the rest of the team to give it everything I’ve got. Whether that means I’m grouchy from time to time or whatever, but that’s just the way it is, man.
KERRY THARP: Chad, you’re clear down here, congratulations. We appreciate it. Now let’s go back to Jimmie Johnson. Who has got questions for Jimmie Johnson?
Q. You’re talking about complacency, but look back last year, this started your four race winning streak that clinched the championship. You’re going back to these tracks and you have multiple wins on several of them. How can you not be fairly confident going into those, overconfident?
JIMMIE JOHNSON: Overconfident would be a mistake. That’s the thing that we really want to focus on not doing and we need to carry the momentum and have it work in the right direction for us and we need to be confident in what we are doing and the equipment we are taking to the track. But we can’t be cocky. Cocky, we are going to get our hand slammed in the door. It’s just not what we are about and how we operate right.
We are going to go in with plenty of confidence. We feel very good about what we are doing and where we are at right now. But the hungrier we can stay, to go out and have performances like we did this weekend, that’s what is going to make this thing right and that’s how we would want to win a championship.
So the perfect world is do it two or three more times and just lock it up and go to Homestead and hang out and that would be the perfect world. Is that going to happen? Doubt it. But I’m not preparing for it. We are striving for that but we want to win out and do all that we can, but the guys are (indiscernible) awfully damn tough to beat.
Q. We are all going to write a lot of words about how good your team is and how good you were today, but before you came in, Dale and Carl were talking about how good you are and how good your team is. What does that mean to you when your peers are the ones standing in line and waving the banner and saying how good you are check heck?
JIMMIE JOHNSON: That truthfully means more to me than anything. Trophies are great. All of the different markers that we have out there that show that you’ve been success, they are all great. But when you walk through that garage area and I might not know the guy’s name and it’s a crew member on the 83 team or wherever it may be, and you see people and you can tell that they respect you and respect what you’ve done, there’s nothing that feels better. And to have competitors that I’ve raced with over the years, it’s not easy being competitors, and also respecting someone, that means more than anything to hear that those drivers have said those things.
I remember after winning the championship in ‘06, walking into the garage area in Daytona and guys that I never met before and new on other teams would shake my hand and say: Congratulations, you won the championship, you’ve done a great job. That means more to me than anything, it really does.
Q. We always hear competitors say that it’s hard to stay on top once you get there. Based on your recent success, your team seems to be disproving that theory. Having trailed in the points for much of the year, which was more difficult getting to the top or maintaining that position through the Chase?
JIMMIE JOHNSON: Truly getting back in championship form was the hardest for us. We got off to a start we were not accustomed to that start of the season, and that was frustrating. But it made our team stronger and made the relationships stronger inside the team and makes me really proud today to be where we are at knowing that we flat out sucked at start of the season. There were times where we were terrible.
So to fight through that is a lot of fun and I can say that for the first time in my career I feel more comfortable in this position, in leading and being on top, than I ever have. I think that comes from experience and also just being confident in my race team and what we are doing.
If you look at other pro athletes, there are a few that can do it and can stay on top. We all want to be that guy, and hopefully I can do it and I’m trying to do all that I can and I know my team. Is but you watch somebody like Tiger Woods, Lance Armstrong, you go through guys that have just dominated year after year, it’s out there. Some people can do it. And I would love to be that guy in NASCAR racing.
Q. In light of what you just said, have you had a pinch me moment that you’re winning and tearing it up every week; does winning races come really naturally to you?
JIMMIE JOHNSON: I wouldn’t say natural. I do get more used to the situations from time to time and I think that helps, and the team does, as well, and that helps us from having so many peaks and value he’s.
We have to go in this stride and we are focused on next week, and I think that focus really helps us in championship battles. Even when you have a bad week, you learn from it and you stay in stride and stay focused on the next race.
So you know, I can say, at the end of the season, last year for that matter, the fact that we won four races in a row, I remember leaving Phoenix and just shaking my head the whole way home, like I cannot believe that I’m experiencing this.
I can go back through major moments in my career from the Brickyard to the Daytona 500, my first win, those moments have really been there for me.
My rookie season was a special year, to finish fifth in points, win three races, and not win Rookie of the Year somehow which is crazy to me; that was a pinch me year, the first year.
And since then, I’m like, well, I guess I’m awake. Better figure out how to keep doing this.
Q. Earlier in the race, I think you had gotten maybe behind a little bit, we were sitting here watching you and you were three wide against two lap cars and splitting the middle of guys going in the corner, and second and third place guys are struggling and you had a good race car and you’re up 150 points; what in the heck are you trying to prove? Last year we asked you the same question in Texas when you were racing Kenseth. Do you just not have a dimmer switch? Are you set on kill all the time?
JIMMIE JOHNSON: I feel that I felt like I was making calculated moves and I was in the right position on those three wides. I feel like maybe I’m crazy, but I feel like I’m doing the right things at that point in time, and it might be risky. But I kind of evaluated the chase going on and I’m in the best position of the three guys that are three wide.
So there’s times where you’ve got to race, and I feel that I’ve raced people very fair over the years, and people race me back the same way. So I feel like I can get into situations with guys like Kenseth last year where we can run side by side at 190 for five laps and not wreck each other because we have history and respect one another.
I put a lot of faith in that stuff, and I think it speaks a lot to the relationships that I have and the kind of guy I try to be out on the racetrack. Sometime I’m criticized for not being rough enough but at the end of the day, you have to race these guys week in and week out. I have guys, lap cars today, being respectful to me that typically aren’t. I had some that weren’t which drove me crazy. But you’ve just got to take your chances when you think you can.
Today I was focused on winning a race. I wanted to win a race and get maximum points and tried not to think about the 31, the 99, the 16. I felt myself looking in the mirror from time to time, and the 16 every once in awhile, didn’t see the 31 much and saw the 99. I’m still paying attention to those guys but the more I can focus on doing my teal can trying to get the trophy, the better we’ll be.
Q. Would you say you’re motivated more by a fear of failure or the idea of winning, and if you would just explain that a little bit?
JIMMIE JOHNSON: I think in 2005, 2006, that period of time, it was failure.
Now I’m excited about what I think we can do, and that transition has been because of experience and going through this championship battle in the past, and having confidence in myself and our team and not having fear. You hear guys hit golf shots that say, you get over the ball if you have any fear, you’ll pull it and pull it in the water. It’s the same thing, I don’t want to be cocky, but I want to be confident with what we can do and go out and race without any fear and just race and do our jobs.
That’s changed a lot this year. I think last year we were heading that direction and then this year, we’re certainly in that place mentally.
Q. Not just feeling comfortable in the championship situation which you appear to be, but this seems to be a different Jimmie Johnson, if we are talking about Chad not having fun all year, you’ve been laughing more and I just think feeling more comfortable about yourself and I don’t just mean in the championship situation, because of championship experience?
JIMMIE JOHNSON: I was worrying about saying the right thing, being the right place and doing all that stuff but I do have a personality and over the years, I’ve grown more comfortable in my work environment to let that come out. Not like I’m trying to hide anything, but I wanted to do this for a long time and realize that two stressed out guys not having fun is not good for this race team. And so I try to keep my crew guys spirits up and take them out for a beer and have fun and keep them light hearted and that’s my job on the team.
Q. Is it the only thing that’s going to stop you is if we take every race out here and change it around?
JIMMIE JOHNSON: Don’t give them any ideas (chuckling) there’s still four races, we can have a flat, get a wheel loose, cut an engine, get caught up in a wreck. It’s nice to see that we can execute like we feel we can and shown ourselves, like history shows, it’s tough to do. And I’ve never been like this in my career and never had this fortune and been able to do this kind of stuff.
I wish, I hope that we can bottle it up and keep it for many, many more years, but there’s something special going on with this race team and just very proud of that and ride the waves as long as it’s up.
Q. I wonder if you can talk about the day that Hendrick Motorsports as a whole had.
JIMMIE JOHNSON: Good day. Tough circumstances to come back for Rick. It’s nice to all four cars run well, so he goes home and knows that we have honored his family and friends in the right way.
Just a great performance. I’ve always said that I’ve had better equipment here than what I’ve been capable of over the years, and I’m certainly doing my part now, and I think Kasey did an awesome job today and same with Junior and Jeff.
It’s good when it works like that. I wish these setups, they were much closer here than any other track we run at. I wish our styles crossed enough where we could use and expand that program, but our styles are all different and we end up with different setups trying to get the same result. So here would be the closest that we would ever have the four cars, and it’s nice to see all four run well.
Q. You spent a lot of time today racing with Gordon and you had Earnhardt in your mirror. How much give do you have compared to racing with guys like Juan Pablo who you are not affiliated with?
JIMMIE JOHNSON: It gets tough out there sometimes. There’s sometimes where teammates for whatever reason race me harder than other guys.
I look at Junior trying to win a second race and Jeff trying to win a race, it helps me understand where their mind set is at. We were joking in our debrief yesterday. Junior and Jeff and Kasey all three said: If you’re leading this thing, and I’m behind you, be ready, be ready. And I’m thinking about that when the 88 is behind me, damn, I’d better get back. Jeff was wanting to lead some laps early in the race and kind much got me into a tough situation, where I could have lost a bunch of sports, fortunately I didn’t.
At times teammates really work well with you and at other times they have had a job to do, as well. I find that sometimes lappers, you mention Montoya, and Montoya has been great to me, and I give him the different respect at different points in time in the races and we trade that back and forth. Tony, today, the 26, as well, guys that I’m catching them slowly but surely chipping away at it, but they just pulled me over and let me go. So I have done that for them in the past. Each situation is different, and it’s nice to have friends out there that will work with you instead of guys taking shots at you all the time.
Q. You mentioned you expected kind of at the beginning of the race to see Jeff and Carl there in contention, but did you expect to see Dale in your rear?
JIMMIE JOHNSON: Yeah, this is one of Junior’s better tracks. Before he was a teammate in all of the years I’ve raced against him, he’s done a great job here. I really felt like he was going to be one of the cars to beat today. I was impressed with Carl’s effort and know he’s been making gains on this track and today he was rock solid all day. I would say he impressed me the most.
Q. Do you have any emotion one way or another going to Atlanta next week, because it will be the last time you’ll have a race in Atlanta; they traded with California next year.
JIMMIE JOHNSON: Forgot all about that. Luckily we run well at California. I had completely forgot about that.
It’s going to be nice on the West Coast where it is warm and not freezing in Atlanta and raining potentially. I wish I had something for you but I just have not thought about it.
Q. What do you do with all of the grandfather clocks? You have to have a pretty big house for all of those clocks.
JIMMIE JOHNSON: Yeah, I have some at my office, one at the house, and a really cool warehouse that I’ve been putting together and collecting I collected my first off road buggy, trying to find my off road trucks that I’ve raced, I have my Iroq car that I won in, ‘06 championship car, and I even have a jet ski that I raced back when I was 13 that my brother found and is restoring it.
So I have all of this stuff that I’ve been collecting over the years and really cool where I’ve been putting the grandfather clocks so there’s room for another one there.
An Interview With:
DALE EARNHARDT JR.
CARL EDWARDS
KERRY THARP: We are going to roll into our post race press conference and we are pleased to be joined in here by race runner up Dale Earnhardt Jr. He drives the No. 88 Amp energy National Guard Chevrolet.
Had a great run out there today, Dale, and your thoughts about your performance chasing that 48 all day, but certainly you’ve got to be pleased with your strong run.
DALE EARNHARDT, JR.: Yeah, I have to hands it to Chad, and the whole team, Jimmie, he did it a great job today. Really he had such a good race car. He was able to cut, roll the center (inaudible, video static) tried to put the gas and get the gas to full throttle. It was pretty difficult for me at the end, and I feel like I was going to just try to do what I could with Jimmie, but he was too strong, just trying to protect our position on the last lap.
Pretty tough, pretty proud of my team. We had a long day and it was a tough day, run real hard and this place, you have to run so hard here every lap, and to get what you want, to get the finish you want, you can’t really take any time off or pace yourself any. I’m proud of my team. We did a good job on pit road and had some good pit stops that helped us stay up front, and I had some good adjustments from Tony Jr., too. We started the race car really tight, and we had it running up there real good at the end. I’m just proud of my team.
Q. You’ve watched Jimmie’s team from afar over the last few years and now seeing it up close what they are doing. How good is what they are doing in the Chase?
DALE EARNHARDT, JR.: Oh, man, it’s pretty obvious I think to everyone that they are such a great race team. Reminds me a lot of it’s very, very similar to the three serious I don’t know, there’s a lot of great teams that were huge into sport, obviously Daddy had a great run and was dominant. He run a lot of races on just brute instinct and determination.
But they only really dominated the sport in ‘87 and maybe a little bit in ‘86. All of the other things they did in sport were just by brute determination.
Jimmie and those guy ares are slick and they are faster week and they win races by being the best car. I look at the history of the sport, and I think about Richard Petty and David Pearson and the Wood brothers and Yarborough, and later on Darryl and Junior, and I put them right up there with them teams there, and there’s maybe only a good handful or half a dozen teams that are in that group and I feel like they are really achieving that. To do it, Dad and Jeff and several other great competitors, Rusty and all those guys were great race car drivers and had awesome careers.
But to pack it in three years and just dominate like that, there’s only a good half a dozen teams that’s ever been good like that and been that strong consistently year after year after year.
Q. On the long run you seemed to be able to reel Jimmie back in a little bit. Do you think if that last 30 some laps had gone green the whole way you might have a chance to get to him?
DALE EARNHARDT, JR.: I felt like I had a better car handling, a better set of tires, my car was a little free, it had been free the first 20, 30 laps of the run. So I was struggling with that a little bit.
We were, I felt like, the best car at lap 100 on tires, but you’re never going to get that here hardly. You might get it once or twice in the middle of the race like we did today but you won’t get a hundred. NASCAR is not going to let that thing go green to the end. We had a race to green to the end, I can’t remember how long, but you’re going to get a caution near the end, bunch the field up and get the fans back into it and give everybody at home a good race to watch.
You know that going and you try to set your car up for that and be ready to be good when you need. It was real tight, the air pressure was real low on the left side and I was real tight for five or ten laps and the car would start pinning the tires up by the curb, and by lap 50 just turned into a great race car and we just get better and better as guys were falling off really bad. I would have liked to have had that opportunity and I think I could have give Jimmie a good run for his money, but I knew for a fact that that wasn’t going to be the outcome.
Q. Dale, you talked about your perspective on where Jimmie in history, a lot of people say second can be the first loser but is it almost a win, anyway, for you, especially at a track like this?
DALE EARNHARDT, JR.: I did the best I could today and got a great result out of. It I would have liked to won the race. I felt like we got it going at about lap 300 and I really started Targeting trying to win the race, and consistently considering and thinking that every lap we had been just the first half before the race you’re just tuning on the car and concentrating on how to make the car roll to the center, power down and do all of these things. And we got the car better and better and better, and I was just really determined on trying to win and whatever it took to win. And we ran hard and got guys up on the racetrack and tried to take positions with force and whatever.
But I just couldn’t, I never had an opportunity. I could catch Jimmie and those guys in traffic and maybe make a move at that point or do something there, but running in a straight line, their car was so dominant, man, I just didn’t have an opportunity with the kind of with the way our car was handling, there was nobody was going to be able to get to him and even try to get by him. His car was just so good.
But it does feel good, it does feel great finishing like this. We have had such bad luck the last six weeks and tore up so many race cars. I’m proud of myself all year long of not wrecking cars and keeping all my cars in one piece. I think we went through about six in the last month or something like that; it’s been terrible. But this is good for my team.
Q. Correct me if I’m wrong here, but seems like to me that you were in a hell of a fix at the end because if you have a car that takes awhile to come in, you can’t afford a caution flag because you want a long run, but by not having a caution flag you’re so far behind that it doesn’t do as much good because of the time it will take you to track him down. I know that seems kind of simple, but it puts you in a tough spot where you’re trying of damned if you do either way?
DALE EARNHARDT, JR.: Not really. With 60 to go, with 60 or 50 to go before the caution came out, we were catching the tail end of the field, and that was going to be really what I needed to put some moves on Jimmie was see him get in traffic and struggle. Or we were in the tail end of the field, I can’t remember.
But I feel like that my best chance was for the race to go green, and my best my worst chance was how it turned out.
Q. Obviously you had Carl running close at the end. How tough was it to hold him off down the stretch?
DALE EARNHARDT, JR.: Well, Carl is a real hard racer and you know, we got to running there earlier in the race and I took care of him a little bit.
I don’t mind a guy getting into me a little bit. I just don’t want to get spun out or run up into the marbles, you know. When it’s ten to go, and a guy gets underneath you, you have to expect to get run up a racetrack a little bit and the guy is going to use up some of the racetrack a little bit. But I just don’t like get putting in the marbles, and that’s all I was really worried about at the end of the race here.
We run together about a hundred to go and took care of each other a little bit there and I guess, you know, he had that in the back of his mind there at the end of the race. I don’t know, he can answer that.
But it was fun. I was trying to take my position. Me and Carl had about equal cars there at the end and I was having trouble getting a straight run out and getting the power down and having to stop at the end of the corner, and he had some opportunities to get into me a little bit if he wanted to.
Q. You were talking about beating and banging a little bit. Can you just talk a little bit about how balanced that with patience today you appeared to be pretty patient at times.
DALE EARNHARDT, JR.: I was sitting there watching Tony Stewart, and he would run Tony is kind of funny to watch.
We were sitting there running and he’s running real hard and his car starts pinning up on the conner and he just kind of drops back and punts. What he does is he’ll just pull over and get behind you and cruise and try to wait on his car.
I’m sitting there thinking, you know what, Tony is always near the front of this thing near the end, and I’m always the one burning my brakes off and never having nothing to stop my car from going into the corner at the end of the race and rear hopping the tires because the front brakes is burned off at the end of the race.
So I just started taking care of my car. I was doing the same thing at Charlotte. I was like, man, I never finish this race, never got top fives here and always lead or run or mess something up.
So today there was a lot of times we were sitting there running fourth and fifth and I was just sitting there chilling, keeping my two car length distance between me and the guy in front of me and just laying off the brakes and rolling down in the corner and trying to save a whole lot of race car and see what happened there at the end is and see if it pays off and I never had good brakes at the end of these races because I run so hard these first 400 laps; so I was trying to take care of it.
Q. Kind of mean this in a humorous fashion, but we were talking the other day how you would like to see some other tracks into the Chase; if Jimmie keeps winning and doing so well, do you want to change it up to make sure he doesn’t have the same luck the next two or three years going on?
DALE EARNHARDT, JR.: I think, you know, I’m fortunate enough to be in the shape shop as Jimmie and see how they work and what they do and hopefully a lot of that stuff is going to rub off on us. We look at their setups and our setups and we try to understand how their setup makes their car drive and what he likes and whatever, but I don’t think I want to change it up too much.
It’s good when you have a teammate running good, really good, because you like to lean on that. You know, Jimmie, I don’t know, I would rather have him running really good, because I want to know what I need to put in my car every week, you know, or at least have a backup plan if we can’t get it working, and having Jeff definitely provide that for us.
So I still have not really truly ran their setup here. I’ve always kind of we’ve still kind of huddled around our little thing we have been working on the last coupleful years because we run pretty good here but we may ease in that direction because they are having such good success and they are winning so many races.
KERRY THARP: We appreciate it very much, thank you and good luck in Atlanta.
We are also pleased to be joined by our third place finisher in today’s race, Carl Edwards, driver of the No. 99 Office Depot Fusion. Carl is currently fourth in points, 198 out of the lead.
Carl, hard fought race, your thoughts about how you performed out there today.
CARL EDWARDS: For us, this is almost a win. You know, we have never run this well here, so that was good for us.
You know, it’s just Jimmie is just doing an unbelievable job. We had obviously some misfortune last week that you know, really, really made this race important. I felt like if we came here and ran good today it would keep our hopes alive, and if we didn’t, it would put us in a hole. So it’s a great day for us.
Q. As well as you ran and as pleased as you are with that, is this like the final nail in the coffin maybe for everybody with what Jimmie did?
CARL EDWARDS: No way. He could have any sort of trouble at the next two races and be right back there with us. So you know, with all of these guys that are kind of bunched together, look like all of us were within 40 or 50 points, second through fourth maybe.
So, it could happen to anyone. We saw what happened with Kyle and his team. Those guys seemed unbeatable and they just had the bad luck. You know, like what happened to us last week. We still don’t know exactly what happened. Just some sort of gremlin in the electrical system.
No, this isn’t over until the last lap at Homestead, that’s for sure.
Q. Even though you said it’s like a win for you, how does it feel when you’re out there running maybe your career best race so far at this place, and you still see that 48 up there just going away, going away, going away?
CARL EDWARDS: Yeah, I mean, it feels just like you think it would feel like. You think, damn, those guys are good. You know, they are just good at what they do.
We all know how important this place is and how special it is for them, and I mean, I have a lot of respect for Jimmie and Chad and the way those guys compete. They are I think some of the best competitors out there. I mean, if you looked up competitor, it would be those guys. They are real competitive and have a lot of respect for everyone. So that’s cool.
Q. I just thought about the second part of my question, considering that this is sort of their track, did you guys kind of come in here expecting to lose some points to them and just try to keep that to a minimum?
CARL EDWARDS: After practice yesterday, we thought, man, if everything goes perfectly, we can win this race. Our car was fast enough.
Bob and I actually talked about it and I said, “It would be awesome to win this thing.”
He said, “Listen, Bud, if you can just finish in the Top 10 and not lose too, too many points at Martinsville, that’s a win for us.” So being realistic, this was a very successful day for us.
Q. You and Biffle and Burton are all sort of right there in the chasing mode, so they kind of had weeks this week like you had last week. So how are they feeling right now from your experience from last week? How does it feel to come in and see that happen?
CARL EDWARDS: It’s frustrating when you have something bad happen, and you lose a bunch of points. You start to think, man, you know, this is going to be a whole ‘nother year. It’s like if you have a bad game bowling and you think, okay, this game will be over in a couple of frames and you just start over. You know, that feeling, boy, it feels good to start over.
But there is no starting over. You have to dig until the end. It’s interesting that way. It crescendos pretty big that way the whole year. We’ve got to essentially go out and win the next four races; that’s what we’ve got to do.
Q. I was wondering, NASCAR is getting away from more and more short track events. What do you think it’s going to take for NASCAR to add a short track field to these cookie cutter tracks?
CARL EDWARDS: You know, we have been having good races at all the racetracks. The short tracks are real fun. They are exciting. I think the fans enjoy them a lot. I liked watching them before I was racing here.
I think NASCAR is doing the best we can. We still have some very exciting finishes at the big tracks. There’s a balance. The sport has to be able to get out there to people in Kansas or maybe the northwest some day or whatever and we might have to build new tracks for that.
But as long as we get to race at places like this and Darlington, the tracks that have been on the schedule for a long time, I think that’s a good balance there.
Q. Where three of the next four at intermediate tracks, how do you see that panning out trying to catch Jimmie, or at least leveling it out a little bit?
CARL EDWARDS: You know, if we run the way I believe we can run at the next two, without having any bad luck, we should be pretty tough.
But Jimmie has been running real well at those places, too. If you look at what happened at Lowe’s, I’m not sure where he finished, but I think it was ninth, seventh or ninth or something like that.
Q. Sixth.
CARL EDWARDS: Sixth? Well, that’s pretty good. That’s not going to make a good point there. (Laughter). Ninth?
Well, let’s see he finishes tenth and we win the next four, we could catch him, it would be pretty close, I don’t know. I’m done worrying about it. I’ve got to worry about, we have got to get all the points we can, and Jimmie is going to do the same.
Q. Greg was talking about how he had never had as good of breaks here since he’s ever competed here. Is that in part why you said you were as good this weekend?
CARL EDWARDS: I did have real good brakes. I don’t know if we did something a little different. I know the guys have been working really hard on making sure that we don’t waste any of the cooling energy. So that’s good.
But it takes the whole package here. It started off with qualifying being rained out and giving us a spot up front. I think we could have qualified pretty well this time.
But starting out up front is a big deal. Pit strategy is big and obviously like deal was saying, the breaks, it’s really easy to ruin the breaks here on all of those long runs, and definitely a key I think to running well here.
KERRY THARP: Carl, appreciate it is. Enjoyed watching you race today.
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