Team Chevy Captures Two of the Top-Five Finishes at Phoenix
Jimmie Johnson Follows Daytona 500 Win with Runner Up Spot in Subway Fresh Fit 500
AVONDALE, Ariz. (March 3, 2013) – Jimmie Johnson, No. 48 Lowe’s Chevrolet SS, remained hot today as he vied for a second consecutive win in Round 2 of the 2013 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series season at Phoenix International Raceway. With the finish, Johnson extended his series lead to eight points ahead of his Hendrick Motorsports teammate, Dale Earnhardt Jr., No. 88 National Guard Chevrolet SS, who finished fifth.
Johnson’s hard-fought battle came up slightly short when the race was settled by a green/white/checkered finish. Although he couldn’t make the pass for the win, Johnson was able to hold off a challenge by Denny Hamlin (Toyota) who finished third.
Earnhardt led the 316-lap race for 47 circuits, but rallied late to score his second straight top-five finish. Tony Stewart, No. 14 Bass Pro Shops/Mobil 1 Chevrolet SS, started sixth and finished eighth in a solid run after being involved in an early crash in the season-opener last week at Daytona. After two events, Stewart sits 23rd in the point standings.
Hendrick Motorsports driver Jeff Gordon, No. 24 Pepsi MAX Chevrolet SS was ninth, and Richard Childress Racing driver Jeff Burton, No. 31 Cheerios Chevrolet SS was 10th, giving Team Chevy five of the top 10 in the final order.
Three other Chevrolet drivers finished just outside the top-10. AJ Allmendinger, No. 51 Guy Roofing Chevrolet SS was 11th, Juan Pablo Montoya, No. 42 Target Chevrolet SS was 12th, and Kevin Harvick, No. 29 Jimmy John’s Chevrolet SS was 13th.
Carl Edwards (Ford) was the race winner and Brad Keselowski (Ford) finished fourth, to round out the top five.
The series heads to Las Vegas Motor Speedway next week for the Kobalt Tools 400 on Sunday, March 10th.
JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 LOWE’S CHEVROLET SS – FINISHED 2ND:
KRISTI KING: We welcome our second‑place finisher Jimmie Johnson, driver of the No. 48 Lowe’s Chevrolet. Jimmie is currently our points leader by eight points over Dale Jr. Talk about your run out there today and those last few laps specifically.
JIMMIE JOHNSON: Yeah, definitely a good performance. First pit stop we went with four and nobody else did, and we lost a lot of track position and realized then that the game here, it was going to be a little bit different than what we had expected. That was our last four‑tire stop that we made. That was really key to keep track position.
I think we made the car better as the day went on and I know we made it a lot better from yesterday’s practice to today. We are still learning this Gen‑6 car and made some good improvements to it. At the end it got a little crazy, especially that last lap. Denny got a huge run, cut the corner down there and cleared us both, but I felt like I still had a chance if I just hung on, on the outside around turns 3 and 4 and I was able to do that and just kind of beat him back to the finish.
Q. Did you expect the Fords to gang up on you there at the end?
JIMMIE JOHNSON: I didn’t even notice the make situation at all, no. I felt like Carl didn’t follow the restart protocol and was slower than the pace car on his last two restarts, and it gives the leader a huge advantage when that happens. You’re supposed to wait until you get between the two lines and take off and this was all going on before it. Outside of that, yeah, that was the only issue that I saw.
Q. How close were you on fuel at the end, and for the last part of that green‑flag run before the caution, were you and Carl ‑‑ it looked like you were running all out but I couldn’t tell.
JIMMIE JOHNSON: Yeah, I started at the beginning, Carl got a comfortable lead and I knew how hard it was to pass the leaders so I went into fuel‑save mode then and felt like I did a good job early. I’m not sure the 99 did because I’m not sure they were concerned, at least what was being relayed on the radio to me. So I’d say just inside 40 to go, I started trying again and brought the pace up and using more fuel and that kind of stuff, and I got within three car lengths but that’s as close as I could really get to him.
Q. Were you kind of shocked to see Denny suddenly start to appear there beside you or were you keeping up with what he was trying to do dropping low?
JIMMIE JOHNSON: My spotter was all over it. I didn’t expect Denny to get up in front of us like he did. I thought we were going to enter three wide, and I was going to be in the worst spot. The clean line turns away from me, so I was looking out my window, and I could see a lot of the 11. I thought, well, I’m not sure really what’s going to happen here, sure not going to let off, and the 2, gave him some room, and we all rolled in there without wrecking. When I first heard that we were three wide I was pretty concerned that I wasn’t going to have a clean lane to race in.
Q. (Inaudible).
JIMMIE JOHNSON: Well, we’ll take it one week at a time. That’s a cool stat and I want to keep it alive, keep it going.
Q. Yesterday in Nationwide qualifying I heard Brad Keselowski say on the radio that he would like to beat you to everything including the race to the bathroom, and seeing how you guys raced out there today in the closing laps, coming off of the championship battle last year, do you think that this is going to be an ongoing rivalry between you and Brad for the 2013 season?
JIMMIE JOHNSON: Without a doubt, and it’s not just Brad-related. I’m sure Brad has a few others on his radar, and whoever is ahead of him on the track or in the points. But I’m well aware that with the success that I’ve had over the last eight or 10 years that there’s a lot of bull’s eyes on me. I’m kind of afraid to sleep at night sometimes. I know those guys are all gunning for me, and that’s a huge honor, it really is, to have the garage and then the reigning champion thinking that way about me.
Q. It looked really hard to pass the leader out there today. Is that more a factor of this track still being relatively new pavement or is there still some kinks to work out on the new car or a little of both?
JIMMIE JOHNSON: It didn’t seem a lot different than other races here to me since the reconfiguration. I don’t think the Gen‑6 car has anything to do with it at this point. I think next week in Vegas we have a track that has multiple lanes and we’ll see some great side‑by‑side racing. The garage area and the teams and owners and the competition side of NASCAR have worked so hard to make these cars equal and we keep changing and jumping through hoops, new chassis, new bodies, new this, new that. The cars are equal and when they’re equal you’re
going to have a situation like this. What we need now is the racetracks to consider the asphalt they’re putting down and even reconfigure the lanes so that we have somewhere to race.
Q. The final restart, it looked like you had a little bit of problem on the final restart. Did you, or did it just seem to appear that way?
JIMMIE JOHNSON: No, you’re supposed to maintain the speed of the pace car, so I maintained the speed of the pace car and the 99 is dropping back. At some point you can’t see the guy to know when he’s going to accelerate, and that’s the goal of the leader. If he can get you looking and get out of your sight and punch it, you never have a chance to recover and that is why the rule states that you’re supposed to maintain pace car speed.
You have the double red and the single red to work whatever you want to inside of there and to go when you want to still give the advantage to the leader of the race. So this was all happening before that, and that’s why I mentioned he didn’t follow the protocol.
Q. This kind of relates to one of the other questions, but in general, what did you think of the Gen‑6 car racing today, and do you have any ideas of how it could be improved?
JIMMIE JOHNSON: I think we have a great product. It’s going to continue to get better. One of the things that we’ve all recognized over the years is the faster we go the narrower track gets the harder it is to pass. Speeds will be up, especially when we get to the mile‑and‑a‑half’s, so with all that being said, I think we need to leave the cars alone for a good 10, 20 years. Let the teams be. Right here on this blacktop there’s a lot of work that can be done to help create better racing and keep the fans in the grandstands.
NASCAR SPRINT CUP SERIES
SUBWAY FRESH FIT 500
PHOENIX INTERNATIONAL RACEWAY
TEAM CHEVY POST RACE NOTES AND QUOTES
MARCH 3, 2013
JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 LOWE’S CHEVROLET SS – FINISHED SECOND
ON HIS DAY:
“Racing-wise, it was tough to pass all day long. Track position, and strategy on pit road really seemed to be the big deal. We went four early, and it cost us a lot of track position. We never made that mistake the rest of the day, and stayed up front. Very exciting finish there. To come across the line like that with Denny (Hamlin) was exciting. I didn’t think Carl (Edwards) followed restart protocol and slowed us down before we took off. But, outside of that, it was pretty much a perfect day. Very good start to the season. Leading the points. Up here running well on downforce tracks and superspeedway tracks. Life is good.”
YOU WERE FIRST AT DAYTONA, AND SECOND AT THE RACE TODAY AT PHOENIX. TALK ABOUT THAT FINISH
“Oh, I’m just very proud of this whole Hendrick team and everybody on this Lowe’s car and Chad Knaus (crew chief) and his leadership. It was a tough year for everybody in our shop during the off-season. Everybody worked hard to get us ready. And to open like this with great qualifying efforts, great speed in the race car, and great pit stops. Across the board, I’m very proud of this Lowe’s team.”
DALE EARNHARDT, JR., NO. 88 NATIONAL GUARD CHEVROLET SS – FINISHED FIFTH
ON HIS DAY:
“Well, I hate to be frustrated at Phoenix, but I think we are. We had a real good car. We feel like we could have finished better than fifth, maybe won the race. Just didn’t get the breaks on pit road. We kind of got boxed in, and picked on beating the No. 99 (Carl Edwards) off pit road. I think we could have beat him off pit road, but somebody was pulling in their stall in front of us, and just had to lift and give the spot to the No. 99. That was the race in my opinion, and we almost had it won right there. Real good race car. Tough in traffic; tough to get to people. But, we made our car good enough to actually make some passes and gain on some guys.”
ON THE RACE
“Well, I think we used strategy to get up front, on pit road, to get ourselves track position. We had a pretty good car. On that pit stop the No. 99 (Carl Edwards) got the lead. I was on the inside of him on pit road and I think I could have beat him off, but the No. 13 was trying to get in his stall and I had to lift for that. And I knew right then that was my opportunity to win the race was right there. It’s difficult to pass with the big spoiler. But our car was good enough to actually run up on some guys and make some passes. I want to thank (crew chief) Steve (Letarte). He made a lot of good changes and did some good stops on pit road. I’ve got to thank National Guard and Diet Mountain Dew and all our partners. But we haven’t been good here. So that was a good run for us. I was a little disappointed because I think we could have won. And you hate to give away them points. And I’d love to get to Victory Lane. This is a good sign for us though that we’ve improved this much at Phoenix. Hopefully it’s a sign for the rest of the season and that we’re going to be all right.”
TONY STEWART, NO. 14 BASS PRO SHOPS/MOBIL 1 CHEVROLET SS – FINISHED EIGHTH
ON HIS DAY:
“I think it was just a matter of where you cycled on the pit stops as far as when everybody figured out you had to take two tires than four. It was just a matter of figuring out where in the cycle you were and whether you could get back the track position. When we got up to the top three or four there we had good speed, but when you got hemmed up in the back there it was hard to make that ground.”
TRACK POSITION WAS EVERYTHING TODAY?
“Unfortunately, it was. You could still pass. It was harder to pass the further back you were.”
WHAT DO YOU THINK HAPPENED TO THOSE RIGHT FRONT TIRES ON DANICA (PATRICK) AND RYAN’S (NEWMAN) CARS?
“I don’t know yet. I honestly don’t know what happened. I saw Ryan’s the first time I think. I knew it was a tire, but I didn’t know what happened the second time. I will find out when I get a chance to talk with those guys.”
THOUGHTS ON THE NEW GEN-6 CAR ON A MILE TRACK UNDER RACE CONDITIONS?
“It will change, but I think for the first race it is pretty sporty so far I think.”
JEFF GORDON, NO. 24 PEPSI MAX CHEVROLET SS – FINISHED NINTH
TALK ABOUT THE RACE TODAY:
“It was a solid top-10. We had a better car than that. We just made some choices that lost us track position. Sometimes the cautions fall your way and sometimes they don’t. Today most of them didn’t, but we had a couple there at the end that did. That got us a little bit of that track position back. We were able to come home ninth, so all-in-all that was pretty solid.”
HOW WAS THE NEW CAR ON THIS TRACK?
“It drove good. It was definitely challenging this is probably not the best track to judge by. This track is tough, flat and doesn’t lend itself to the best racing that we have on the series. Yet, I thought on the long run when the tires gave up a little bit you could start searching around, making some moves. Track position was key. We knew that coming in.”
JEFF BURTON, NO. 31 CHEERIOS CHEVROLET SS – FINISHED 10TH
ON HIS DAY:
“Over the last 60 or so laps we consistently had the fastest car in the field. It was great to top it off with a top-10 finish. Especially after all the adversity the team faced early in the day when Luke (Lambert, crew chief) flew home to be with his wife who is pregnant. Ernie (Cope) stepped in and made great calls all day. I appreciate the entire Cheerios team pullin
g together and working hard. It paid off in the end with a solid finish and we hope to build on that momentum next weekend.”