MONSTER ENERGY NASCAR CUP SERIES
FOLDS OF HONOR QUIKTRIP 500
ATLANTA MOTOR SPEEDWAY
TEAM CHEVY QUALIFYING NOTES AND QUOTES
MARCH 3, 2017
RYAN NEWMAN, NO. 31 CATERPILLAR CHEVROLET SS – Qualified 2nd
WHEN WE’VE GOT DAYTONA BEHIND US AND YOU’VE GOT SPEED AT ATLANTA, HOW DOES THAT MAKE YOU FEEL ABOUT THE NEXT COUPLE OF MONTHS?
“’Well, it’s big. I’m just proud of everybody at RCR and ECR with this Caterpillar Chevrolet. We were so close. I really wanted to beat my old buddy, Buddy Baker’s record there. Been tied with him for a while so that was kind of rough. But I’m just proud of the guys and proud of the effort. It is the litmus test for us for a lot of the rest of the season. It was a good start for sure.”
JAMIE MCMURRAY, NO. 1 MCDONALD’S CHEVROLET SS – Qualified 7th
HOW WAS YOUR QUALIFYING EFFORT BOTH CHIP GANASSI RACING CARS LOOKED REALLY FAST:
“Yep, good cars this weekend. Both our cars I thought had a legitimate shot at the pole the way qualifying works here with the tires falling off it is crazy how years ago, your first lap would be your best and now it is like everybody kind of ran the same speed all three laps. Yeah, good cars, look forward to tomorrow.”
YOUR CAR LOOKED REALLY STABLE, EVERYBODY ELSE SEEMS TO BE FIGHTING LOOSE IS THAT A PRODUCT OF THE NEW RULES PACKAGE?
“I’m glad my car looks that way because it doesn’t feel that way inside. I don’t think so. This is just a really slick track and it’s kind of always been that way no matter what package we have.”
DALE EARNHARDT, JR., NO. 88 NATIONWIDE CHEVROLET SS – Qualified 12th
ON MAKING IT TO THE FINAL ROUND:
“I know we are pretty pumped up. We have historically been terrible in qualifying, so me and Greg (Ives, crew chief) sat down this winter and talked about some ways that we could set some much more attainable goals and achieve those and get some confidence. I just have no confidence in myself or what the car can do in qualifying. I always race really well. So, we are going to try to work on my confidence and our qualifying package, but we overachieved today for the goals that we set starting out the season, so that feels great. We will try not to get too greedy and keep working on our confidence over the next several weeks and try to move those goals up as we go. That is kind of how we did it when we started with Steve (Letarte) with my racing in general was set some reachable goals, don’t go out there and put pressure on yourself to get first every time. Set some reachable goals get to where you achieve them and gain some confidence little by little. It really helps. So, we are really happy today, this is one of my favorite tracks. The car was a lot of fun to drive each run in qualifying and hopefully it is just as good and fun to drive tomorrow and on Sunday.”
JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 LOWE’S CHEVROLET SS – Qualified 18th
“To be honest, this is a lot better than we qualified the last two years and we won the races the last two years. This track has been kind of hard for me and difficult for the No. 48 in qualifying trim for a while now. Of course, we’ve hoped that we’ve fixed it everywhere we needed to. It just didn’t happen. We’ve got a practice session tomorrow and a race that I really love at a track that I really love. So, when the checkered falls and we’re most worried about; of course, we want to qualify well here, those stage points are important but not necessarily in the cards for us in the first stage, it looks like. And now we’ll go to work and do what we need to do to get ready for the race.”
TY DILLON, NO. 13 GEICO CHEVROLET SS – Qualified 26th
ON QUALIFYING:
“I had a really good lap through (Turns) 1 and 2. The car was really good. Just kind of got a little aggressive in (Turns) 3 and 4 and that bottom line is very sensitive. You’ve got to be slowed down to catch it and then once you catch it you can go back to the throttle. I just missed it and got tight. I’m just more mad at myself. The guys gave me a good car, just disappointed it kind of screwed up.”
KASEY KAHNE, NO. 5 FARMERS INSURANCE CHEVROLET SS – Qualified 29th
“I had a pretty good (Turns) 1 and 2 and I was happy about that, and then I got into (Turn) 3 and it just jumped sideways. I drove in pretty far, similar to practice, expecting it to be fine but it got loose. It took a bit getting out here so we didn’t get a chance to go twice and make up for my mistake. I just expected the track to be similar and it was freer in (Turns) 3 and 4 with the sun down in (Turns) 1 and 2 compared to today; it was more similar in each corner.”