NASCAR SPRINT CUP SERIES
STP 500
MARTINSVILLE SPEEDWAY
TEAM CHEVY RACE NOTES AND QUOTES
MARCH 29, 2015
AJ ALLMENDINGER, NO. 47 BUSH’S BEANS CHEVROLET SS – Sidelined by engine issues on lap 177
WHAT PUT YOU GUYS IN THE GARAGE?
“Motor issues of some sort, I’m not sure what the exact problem is with the motor. We had a fast Bush’s Beans Chevy just trying to be patient. There were a lot of guys already starting to wreck out there, so I was just trying to keep the car clean for the first 400 laps. We needed to work on it a little bit to be up there with the top three or four guys, but I felt like the car was pretty strong. I noticed some smoke start rolling in the car and I could see it start out of the back of the car. I think when that was happening there had to be stuff starting to get on the tires and stuff. I just started losing speed and then by that point it was smoking so bad they black flagged me, which they probably should have. Nobody could see behind me. We are here (in the garage) now.”
DALE EARNHARDT JR., NO. 88 DIET MOUNTAIN DEW CHEVROLET SS – Involved in multi-car crash on lap 228
YOU’VE HAD SOME PROBLEMS WITH THE SHIFTER. WHAT’S BEEN GOING ON THERE?
“A lot of guys I think are having some transmission or gear problems. We got some real bad vibration in the car 30 laps into the race and it just kept breaking the shifter. The vibration is so bad it breaks the shifter off. It breaks right off, right at the top of the transmission. It’s just swinging up there just like a tuning fork. We got another shifter on it, a different one finally. We didn’t know if that was going to hold up. They stopped down there in the corner. I didn’t know they were stopping. I don’t know why they stopped. Somebody got checked-up there and we didn’t see it, didn’t have time, whatever; and knocked the radiator out of it. It’s been a tough race. The car has been fast and we’ve been having fun out there; but we’re not going to be having too much fun the rest of the day.”
WHAT HAPPENED?
“Well guys got checked up into (Turn) 1 and we knocked the radiator out of our car. I didn’t have a chance at getting it stopped. Just good hard racing and we were running a little too tight getting into that corner. We had some vibrations with the drive train that were really bad and kept breaking the shifter off and had us back there in the back. The car was real fast though. I had a lot of fun driving it. I don’t know if it’s going to be too quick the rest of the day. But we will get out there run around and have some more fun. We don’t get to race next weekend so we will get all we can the rest of the day.”
WHAT IS IT LIKE OUT THERE ON THE TRACK? IS IT AS AGGRESSIVE AS IT LOOKS?
“Uh, yeah, it’s pretty aggressive, but I’m fine with that – short track racing, man. I was having a blast. I was happy our car was good. You can’t do anything about bad finishes like this you just have to learn from everything that happened to us today and come back here a little stronger next time. We will have better days and we have some good speed in our cars. We don’t need to be too worried. We don’t need to panic, just kind of get through the weekend and get back to the race track as soon as we can.”
WHAT HAPPENED?
“Just a lot of checking up getting into (Turn) 1, somebody must have got turned sideways, but they all stopped pretty hard getting into the corner. It happens here. We were in the back of it, couldn’t get slowed down and knocked the radiator out of it. It happens. You get back in the back there and get in that heavy traffic. It was good fun racing though. My car was really good except for we had a real bad vibration in the drive train that kept breaking the shifters off right on top of the transmission. It was vibrating real bad and that shifter is like a tuning fork and it just snaps it right on top of the transmission. So I can’t even – there is nothing there to use. We finally put a third shifter on it that was unlike anything else we have had in the car. I don’t know if that would have lasted the rest of the day, but the car was great. Just bad luck there being in the back.”
HOW DISAPPOINTED ARE YOU HAVING THIS HAPPEN AFTER WINNING IN THE FALL?
“I have had a lot of good cars here. You’ve got to be toward the front and out of trouble. We weren’t there we were in the back. And it’s high risk back there. It bit us today. I’m not going to second guess what we were doing. I feel like our team is strong. We won’t have any problem coming back.”