JAMIE MCMURRAY – No. 09 Zaxby’s Ford F-150 (Finished 16th) – “I slid the left-front and caused it to flat spot. We just didn’t have a very good truck today thanks to the limits of practice and we were one of the worst trucks when we unloaded. There’s no reason for the equipment we have and this is a good track for me to be that far off, so with just 50 minutes of practice, we just never got close.”
BRENDAN GAUGHAN – No. 10 Int’l MAXXFORCE Diesel Ford F-150 (Finished 22nd) – WHAT HAPPENED AT THE END? “Timothy Peters, who everytime he runs he runs into me. We had a Ford that was about to finish in the top 10 and the last corner he just flies into me and causes another late-race wreck. For our MAXXFORCE Ford, that’s five out of the last six races that within the last 10 laps, and for three races in a row, the last lap we’ve had a top 10 get taken away from us. Our Fords are better than that, but we just keep having stupid things happen like this.”
RICK CRAWFORD – No. 14 PowerStroke Diesel by Int’l Ford F-150 (Finished 3rd) – “It was a steady, solid run and a lot of pulling power with this Ford PowerStroke Diesel by International. I can’t say enough for Circle Bar Truck Corral. Tom Mitchell has been with me 17 years. Today is his 77th birthday so for a top-three that’s pretty good. These Fords, everybody needs to drive one. It’s Built Ford Tough. Look over there, I used my left-front fender all day and it’s just got a little scratch. I can polish it out and have it ready to go to Phoenix.” WHAT WAS THE KEY TO YOUR DAY? “I just followed that other American-made truck up there and Dennis was real steady. Sometimes we were running faster lap times than he was, but I just couldn’t get around him without rooting and gouging. I’m not that way, especially to him. He’s not that way to me. We just followed each other all day, but we were up front and that helps.”
ERIK DARNELL – No. 99 Northern Tool + Equipment Ford F-150 (Finished 19th) – “It was frustrating. I don’t know. That’s not real racing with these things out here. It’s all about track position and getting your pit stop out of the way as quick as you can. We don’t have real pit stops like a Cup race. We don’t have enough laps to do what they do out here and it just makes it tough because it’s all about track position. You’ve got guys in the middle of the pack and toward the back of the pack just running over each other, wrecking each other and spinning each other out. It’s just so hard. Not having any horsepower with these things it’s so hard to pass people.” WHEN YOU GET SPUN LIKE YOU DID AND LOSE TRACK POSITION IS YOUR RACE ALMOST ALREADY OVER? “Your race is over as far as having a shot at winning the race. Even if you’ve got a decent truck, if you get back there halfway through the race, there’s no way you’re gonna get back to the front. When we hit the wall, we hit the left-front and I don’t know what we did, but the thing just wouldn’t handle after that. We were just fighting for all we could. The Northern Tool + Equipment Ford was decent early on. I really think we could have rode it out and finished in the top 10, but I got jacked up, turned around and spun into the wall, which is the way it goes here. It’s just frustrating.”
RICK CRAWFORD PRESS CONFERENCE – “I followed the other American-made truck and finished third today. At first, I passed Dennis and we pitted and he just barely beat me out of the pits and then all day long we raced hard together and he seemed to keep a couple truck lengths ahead of me and that was just it.” WHAT IS YOUR ASSESSMENT ON JOHNNY BENSON? IS THIS HIS FINEST HOUR? “It doesn’t hurt any to peak right now or to peak during your season. He’s been tough all year long. He’s had a couple of problems, but other than that, the 23 truck has been up front. Even when he blew a tire at Vegas the other week he was top two or three. When he had transmission trouble or whatever trouble they had at Memphis he was leading the race or running second, so he’s going after the championship. Just like I overheard Dennis say when I walked in, he passed everybody. He even passed me and it didn’t take him long when he caught me, so he clearly had the fastest truck today.” DO YOU EVER WATCH OTHER DRIVERS TO LEARN ABOUT THE LINE? “I do that. Yeah. I watch practice. I watch the speed chart on the computer. I watch every lap I can. I even watch a few races on television, maybe not all the race, but I watch a few laps of it – the laps that count anyway. Today I was constantly watching Dennis and finding out what he was doing and see if my truck would work where he was running. He moved around a little bit today and mine moved around with him, but I never could make it up. I never could make that distance up.”