JIMMIE JOHNSON:

“It was obviously a good day for us. We had some issues. We had a tire roll away on a pit stop that caused us some trouble. And then I tuned on the car a little bit off of Turn 4 on the wall and bent up the suspension a little bit. Over the long haul, I don’t think I really had the speed to run with Jeff Gordon or Jeff Burton. But at the end, we put right side tires on and make a tire pressure adjustment that really brought the comfort back to the car. I had that edge I could lean on and really push hard to get by Gordon and Burton and then hold off Gordon at the end. It was a great day for us. To overcome the adversity this weekend of coming back on a new tire and not having any experience on it, and working through all the issues we did, it was a very good weekend for the Lowe’s team.”

JEFF GORDON:

“I don’t want to make excuses because we just basically got beat. We all had an equal opportunity to come in and get tires and fuel and adjust on our race cars and we had the position. I will say that I think it would have been a lot different had Jimmie been behind me and not Jeff Burton because he was the only one who could make the outside of turn four work. When he got that little bit of bumper, just like yesterday in the Busch race, when he got that little bit of bumper to the outside of me, when he got to the outside of me, I was so loose up underneath him, I was just kinda stuck on the bottom and Jimmie just took advantage of that. Jimmie deserves a lot of credit, he drove from the back, he had a fast race car, he saw an opportunity to get by us and he did, then he went up and passed Burton. You have to give him credit for that too. Burton seemed like he could take off for about four or five laps and then he faded pretty bad after than, even though he had some engine trouble earlier, he did that same thing. That is where we got beat.”

DENNY HAMLIN:

“There was no side-by-side racing and you just couldn’t the cars were so loose. We could not get our car tightened up all day. When you tried to pass somebody, especially on the inside, you can’t do it. Unless, they just gave you the spot. If they wanted to hold you up, they can. The groove is not widen out enough which is understandable, the track is new and that will come in a few years. But I would rather run fast for a few laps and then slow down instead of just running qualifying laps every single lap and that is what we are doing on these hard tires.”

MARK MARTIN:

“The U.S. Army Chevy was fantastic,” continued Martin. “We were looking like a third place car but then on the (final) restart the car picked up a real bad push. It was a great run — I am so proud of this team. I am having the time of my life driving this car. It’s going to be hard to get out of it.” “We had a better car than fifth,” explained Martin. “I couldn’t run with those first two — (Jeff) Gordon and (Jimmie) Johnson. I’m thrilled to get a top five when we weren’t at our best at the end. It’s really a privilege to work with these guys and represent our brave soldiers. I am just loving life.”

TONY STEWART:

“You just had to be a lot more cautious than normal,” said Stewart. “You knew that if you pushed too hard and got over the edge that it was going to cost you. Just look at how many guys early in the race were wrecked. It was just one of those days where you had to be very, very careful because of the circumstances. You raced as hard as you could with what you had. Everybody did that. I went as hard as I could go without crashing.” “With the exception of a couple of guys, all the drivers did a great job of give-and-take,” said Stewart. “It wasn’t just in situations with me. I could see situations in front of me and behind me where everybody was giving each other room and trying to be courteous to each another. I think the drivers made the best out of a bad situation here.”

RYAN NEWMAN:

“We’re happy based on what we’ve been running in the past. It was a good run for us. We’re happy to have the Alltel Dodge in the top 10 on an intermediate track at the end of 400 miles. We’ve got more things to work on. We were by far not the fastest car, but we’ve made huge improvements. Michael Nelson (crew chief) and the guys are doing a great job. The Penske/Jasper engines are strong. We’ve just got to keep on working making it stick in the corners. It’s turning around. We’ve just got to get it back up to the top. We didn’t have a good Friday here for sure. I was disappointed, but I didn’t let it get me down. I knew we were a lot better than we qualified. It was a good effort for us to fight back the way we did. We avoided a lot of accidents. A lot of crazy things were happening today, but overall it was a good run for us. We needed a couple of good points races to get the season started off right and get the boys in the shop pumped up. That’s big.”

KASEY KAHNE:

“We got it as good as we could get it, and I thought we could run in the top 10. Our McDonald’s Dodge Charger was pretty decent, but we just couldn’t go much better than eighth. I don’t know what the 38 was doing. First off he’s hard to pass. Then you get by him and he’s two laps down and he starts battling. I let him him go and he still didn’t pass me. I have no idea what he was thinking, but that’s the way it goes. I was the tightest I’d been all day on that final run there, and then I got loose and spun out. It was just a bad situation. I’d been on the inside of a lot of cars all day and nothing happened. I don’t understand it, but it’s just a bad way to end a pretty good day. “It was terrible all day and it’s terrible right now, but it’s the best that it’s been all day. We were tight right there. I turned in under a car and spun out. It’s just a bad situation. It’s slippery and whether it’s the front end or the back end, it’s sliding around. There’s not a whole lot of grip, but we hung in there all day long and then we didn’t finish the race. You just can’t get a hold of the racetrack. “You had to slow down a little bit. You didn’t want to race too much side by side. You had to lift early getting in when you had a car on the outside of you. The stuff I’d done all day I did right there and it didn’t work. Things happen. The car wasn’t turning that good and the next thing I know I’m backwards. The 38 was trying to battle me for some odd reason. I don’t even know why. I just kind of let him go. I wasn’t battling back and he wouldn’t pass me. He’s suddenly really fast and then he’s suddenly really slow. Then we’re crashed.”

ELLIOTT SADLER:

“Today was frustrating. We had a great qualifying lap and great track position, but we just couldn’t get a handle on the car. We were tight all day. The guys did a really good job on the car. We’ve just got to work better together on making changes during the race. We need to get our tire data and get a handle on these tires. We’d make one adjustment and it would go one way, then make the same adjustment the next stop and it would go the other way. It’s just frustrating to lead laps in the first half of the race and spend the second half of the race struggling to finish 14th.”

KURT BUSCH:

“We were down on power about halfway through the race. We kept trying to battle back because we didn’t have the power, so we’ll go back and figure it out. We were trying to stay low and stay out of the way because we didn’t have the power we needed.”

JUAN PABLO MONTOYA:

“It’s a shame. The Texaco/Havoline Dodge car was really fast today. When we went a lap down we were checking the 48 and the M&M’s car just got in the way. I had damage on my fender and from there a grille broke and we just went backwards from there and the car became undriveable. The car was good from the beginning. When you damage the fenders at a track like this you’re done. We’ve just got to keep working on the cars and making them faster.”

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