TRAVIS KVAPIL – No. 28 Golden Corral Ford Fusion (Finished 42nd) – “We hurt something in the engine. We were just running along there and the car was pretty good. We passed a few cars and were just kind of running mid-pack and we came off the corner and it was flat and kind of started missing. It was just down on power. Instead of just riding it out and eventually probably destructing the engine, we brought it in to see if we can look at it and figure it out what’s wrong with it and hopefully fix it up or patch it up and get it back out there to run the laps.” YOU’RE FIGHTING FOR THAT TOP 35, SO THIS HURTS. “Yeah. The top 35 deal is definitely within our reach. This was the last thing we needed to have happen. I think we could have finished top 20, top 15 pretty easily, so that would have probably got us right where we needed to be. It’s just disappointing. We’ve had great race cars pretty much all year, we just haven’t been able to get the finishes here or at Daytona. We’ll just have to go into Bristol and do it there.”
BOBBY LABONTE – No. 96 Ask.com Ford Fusion (Finished 40th) – “I think it broke a valve spring. As good as last weekend was, it turned on us today, but that’s the way it is. We struggled in practice and got a little bit better for the race. We spun out early and caught us a caution, so we got to work on it. I just didn’t want to be the one to do it, but we actually got our lap times better and better. Lap time-wise we weren’t that bad. The 2 car got by me and we were hanging on there. The caution came out because they said a tire was on pit road and then we cycled back around and something happened to the motor. It’s just one of those days. You’re gonna have that.” IT’S A STRANGE RACE ISN’T IT? “Yeah, the cars are all over the race track and cars you think would be good cars are not good cars and stuff like that. Some of it is typical Atlanta and then some of it is, I think what little bit I know about the tire is it may quite as conducive as it was last fall or something like that. But tire wear was good and they don’t have a problem, so I guess that’s good.”
BILL ELLIOTT – No. 21 Motorcraft Ford Fusion (Finished 36th) – “All I saw was Sam, it looks like he got it loose and overcorrected and went into the wall, instead of trying to hold it up against the wall – or if he couldn’t or whatever – and when he came back across I was committed. I had one car, I can’t remember who it was, right in front of me and it was just one of those deals that I couldn’t go up and I couldn’t go farther down. I was just trying to beat him to the bottom and I lost. It’s just a shame for the Wood Brothers with what they’ve done and Motorcraft and Ford and all the people that have supported this deal. They’re gonna stick to 12 races and maybe we can go to Texas and have a decent day.”
MATT KENSETH – No. 17 DeWalt Ford Fusion (Finished 12th) – “We weren’t very good all day. We short-pitted there a little bit, which actually kept us one lap down instead of two laps down. That was a big part of us getting our lap back, but we just ran really terrible. I ran out of gas at the end and lost all of our track position doing that. It was just a terrible day and really not a very good weekend for us.” HOW WAS YOUR RACE? “It was just a struggle all day. We struggled yesterday in practice getting the car right and we were just off all day. It was just an uphill battle all day.” WHAT DID YOU THINK ABOUT THE CREW GUY IN THE INFIELD? “I didn’t see it. I just heard about it, I didn’t see it. If there’s a tire in the infield, they’re probably gonna throw the caution too, eventually, and probably let everybody cycle through. Maybe he’s new. Maybe he hasn’t seen us drive, but we tend to wreck a lot. I wouldn’t want to be out in the middle of that grass.” DID IT AFFECT YOUR RACE? “Yeah, I mean it got us a lap down, but, really, it probably helped us because we ran terrible and finished 12th. We ran a lot worse than that and it only put us one lap down because we short-pitted. I just passed Kurt before the caution. A lot of cars that would have beat us were two laps down, so, in a way, it probably helped us more than it hurt us.”
CARL EDWARDS – No. 99 Aflac Ford Fusion (Finished 3rd) – “We just had two tires because we had a bad pit stall there. We were gonna be blocked in – the 24 and the 88 – I think we were the only three guys together, so we took two tires and did our best. I’m just real proud of the whole Aflac gang for making it run as fast as it did. It’s good to be in a Ford here at Atlanta, we just couldn’t pull it off.” DID YOU NEED MORE LAPS? “I don’t think more laps were gonna help us. We just needed more tires. That would have done it.” CAN YOU GO THROUGH THE FINAL RESTART? “Kurt had been fast all day, so I knew he was the guy to beat. He was right there behind me with four tires and I kind of felt like a sitting duck there, pun intended. We got down into turn one and he got to the outside of me and that was it, so I was fighting with Jeff there to try to get everything we could. Third place, considering our pit debacle down there. We were boxed in. It was just a bad pit stall selection and it didn’t work out like we planned, but we made the most of it.” HOW MUCH DID THE PIT STALL PLAY INTO TAKING TWO TIRES? “I think that’s all we could do. If we took four and got boxed in and went back there, that was gonna be very frustrating, so I think that pit box put us in that position to have to take two. We made more of it than I thought we would. Third place with two tires is all right.” HOW MUCH OF A HANDFUL WAS IT? “It was a little bit of a handful. When Kurt went by me there I got real loose and I was like, ‘Man, that’s all I’ve got.’ But it’s racing. It’s a fun race track. I wish we raced here every week. This is a blast.”
DAVID RAGAN – No. 6 UPS Ford Fusion (Finished 19th) – “Compared to where we started, it was a good day for our UPS team. It’s not where we wanted to be, but we did the best we could. We were pretty loose all day and the crew really worked hard to get this car where it needed to be. We didn’t lose a lot of points but we didn’t really gain any either. So we’ll just have to go back and work on some things and get a little better before we head into the next race.”
CARL EDWARDS PRESS CONFERENCE – “We had a great car all day. We fought hard and we just had our pit stall was between Jeff and the 88. I didn’t pick that pit stall and Bob is not here to defend himself, so we’ll just say that that pit stall got picked and it will never be picked again as long as I live (laughing). I guess we didn’t think you (Jeff Gordon) were gonna run that well (joking). Anyway, it didn’t work out, so our decision at the end was based on that. We had to take two tires. If we took four and got held up in there and came out seventh or something, it would be bad so we got to restart the green-white-checkered in the lead. I think that was the best position we could have been in and had a good race with Kurt and Jeff, but they got by us and we ended up third, which, I think was best-case in our situation.”
DID GUYS DO A GOOD JOB ADAPTING TO THE TIRE? “I thought we all knew what we had and even though the tire is hard to drive, you can still get the car out of shape and gather it back up. I didn’t have any trouble, really, racing with anyone. It would seem once you caught some you could pass him. As much of a handful it was, it’s still easier in a way than those tracks where you’re all just locked down and if you wiggle at all you crash, so I’ll take this over that any day.”
IS THIS A SIGN THAT MAYBE THERE’S A POWER SHIFT AND IT WILL BE MORE THAN JUST THE BIG FOUR TEAMS AT TRACKS OF THIS SIZE? “I echo that. They’ve been working hard. Pat and those guys have done a good job and that’s one thing about these cars, we’re all in such a tight box that if you can figure something out, it doesn’t matter how big your shop is you can go fast.”
HOW DISCOURAGING WAS IT TO SEE THE STANDS AS EMPTY AS THEY WERE? “We are far from immune to what’s going on in our economy. It’s like what Jeff said, this is one of the best, if not the best race track we go to as far as competition, on-track performance and passing and action and things like that. It’s too bad there aren’t more fans in the grandstands, but I feel like my responsibility and I’m sure Jeff feels the same way is to go out there and race as hard as we can, deliver for our marketing partners and deliver for our fans and do the best we can, and hope that as the economy comes back up those stands get more full. But there’s nothing we can do about it. I’m just glad for the fans that are here.”
ON THAT PIT STALL. “We were so messed up there. I told Bob to tell Steve (Letarte) to back up their sign as much as they can because I’ve got to stay out wider, otherwise I can’t get out. I did everything I could, but we were just put in that position and we do the best we can.”