NASCAR CUP SERIES LAS VEGAS MOTOR SPEEDWAY SOUTH POINT 400 TEAM CHEVY POST-RACE NOTES & QUOTES SEPTEMBER 26, 2021
TOP TEAM CHEVY UNOFFICIAL RACE RESULTS:POS. DRIVER2nd CHASE ELLIOTT, NO. 9 NAPA AUTO PARTS CAMARO ZL1 1LE6th TYLER REDDICK, NO. 8 CAT TRIAL 11:HOT WHEELS CAMARO ZL1 1LE8th KURT BUSCH, NO. 1 MONSTER ENERGY CAMARO ZL1 1LE10th KYLE LARSON, NO. 5 TARLTON AND SON CAMARO ZL1 ILE13th AUSTIN DILLON, NO. 3 BETMGM CAMARO ZL1 1LETOP FIVE UNOFFICIAL RACE RESULTS:POS. DRIVER1st Denny Hamlin (Toyota)2nd Chase Elliott (Chevrolet)3rd Kyle Busch (Toyota)4th Martin Truex, Jr. (Toyota)5th Ryan Blaney (Ford)
The NASCAR Cup Series season continues next weekend at Talladega Superspeedway for the YellaWood 500 on Sunday, October 3, at 2 p.m. ET. Live coverage can be found on NBC, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio Channel 90. TEAM CHEVY POST-RACE NOTES AND QUOTES: CHASE ELLIOTT, NO. 9 NAPA AUTO PARTS CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Finished 2ndCHASE, A STRONG NIGHT FOR SURE, BUT SECOND PLACE. I KNOW THAT’S NOT WHERE YOU WANTED TO BE. TELL US ABOUT THE FINAL FIVE LAPS.“We were really close, just not quite close enough. Denny (Hamlin) did a good job of controlling the gap to me. He was having a hard time with the 21 (Ryan Blaney). I think he was doing a good job of giving himself enough room to him to be able to work the lanes, kind of control the gap back to me.”
“Super close. Really proud of our NAPA team. Feel like we’ve been performing at a really nice level the last three or four weeks, we just haven’t had great results to show for it. Proud of the effort tonight. Looking forward to the next two. Going to be wild. Looking forward to it.”
HOW WERE YOU ABLE TO MAKE YOUR CAR THE BEST AT THE END?“That’s a really good question. Obviously circumstances kind of went our way. We were able to get back on the lead lap when that cycle stopped. We were there in the middle with those guys making it on fuel. We were on the fortunate end because we got back on the lead lap, didn’t have to wave or get the Lucky Dog.”
“We just kept tuning on it, felt like we really needed a little track position.”
MAKE IT ANY EASIER FOR YOU GOING TO TALLADEGA NEXT WEEK?“I don’t know that it ever gets easy going there. The last Daytona race, I felt like that’s the best we’ve been at a speedway since I’ve been at HMS. I’m really proud of that.”
“Hopefully we can have that type of pace and car when we go to Talladega. If that’s the case, it will be a lot more fun, doesn’t mean you won’t crash, but could be more fun so I’m excited.” KYLE LARSON, NO. 5 TARLTON AND SON CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Finished 10th“We stayed out and had to do the wave around. I wasn’t on fresh tires and stuck in traffic. Everyone is fighting so hard back there to run their race that I just got kind of stuck. Not beat around, but just stuck and having to race. It’s just hard.”
“We were able to fight back for a top-10 and come away with an OK finish.”
IS IT SOMETIMES HARD TO KNOW WHAT TO DO IN TRAFFIC OR HOW HARD YOU CAN PUSH IT?“(Ryan) Blaney got through there better. I got stuck around the No. 42 (Ross Chastain), so he was able to get clear and get away and have a good finish. Just being on older tires and having to battle through all of them was difficult. You forget how hard everybody races back there; it’s pretty wild. There were moments where I thought I was going to end up crashed or get frustrate and run myself into the wall. But we were able to mentally fight through it and come away with a top-10.”
YOU’RE 57 POINTS ABOVE THE CUTLINE. THAT’S STILL A PRETTY GOOD CUSHION AND RESULT FOR THE DAY.“Yeah, it’s good that I didn’t let my emotions get the best of me and make my day even worse. It’s good to go to Talladega (Superspeedway) and be that far up. I would have liked to have been up more. I feel like we gave up at least 15 points today with the second stage. That’s a bummer, but we’ll fight through it and hopefully avoid issues at Talladega.”
AUSTIN DILLON, NO. 3 BETMGM CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Finished 13th “Good try tonight by everyone on the Richard Childress Racing team at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. The front end of our Chevy was never really to my liking tonight. We were bouncing through Turn 2, but Justin Alexander and all of the guys made adjustments throughout the race to improve our handling issues. We just needed a little more a little earlier. In Stage 3, we were running 12th when we made the call to stay out and long pit. It was just a gamble to try and catch a caution and make something happen. We led laps and were in position but didn’t get the caution we needed. It was worth a shot. We ultimately finished 13th. We’re headed to Talladega Superspeedway next week, and we’ll do everything we can to try and snag a win.” WILLIAM BYRON, NO. 24 AXALTA/SERVICE KING CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Finished 18thWILLIAM BYRON AND HIS NO. 24 TEAM HAD JUST A BIT OF BAD LUCK THERE WITH THE CUT TIRE THERE AT THE END. HOW WOULD YOU ASSESS YOUR RACE TO THAT POINT?“I thought we were really fast. We came from the back to the front, took the lead and then obviously had that caution. I chose the wrong lane there and had to run second there for awhile to Kyle. And then we had the strategy deal with not being able to make it on fuel and had to recover from that. We had to take two tires and that hurt us. We were able to drive all the way back to the front from the back again, so that was twice today. And then we had the flat tire.”
“We had an awesome car. The No. 24 Axalta Chevrolet was amazing. I think it was right there with the No. 11 (Denny Hamlin). We’ll just have to keep bringing that speed.”
THE GUYS IN THE BOOTH SAID GOING TO TALLADEGA, THEY WOULD RATHER BE WAY AHEAD OR WAY BEHIND. THEY WOULDN’T WANT TO BE IN THERE IN THAT MIDDLE GROUND. UNFORTUANTLEY, THAT’S WHERE YOU FIND YOURSELF. JUST FOUR POINTS BELOW THE CUTLINE. WHAT DO YOU THINK YOUR MENTALITY WILL BE AS YOU HEAD TO THAT SUPERSPEEDWAY? “Just be aggressive. I was aggressive all day today and passed a ton of cars. Just be as aggressive as I’ve been on the speedways in the past. We won a race on a superspeedway last year and I feel like we can do it again. The (Charlotte) ROVAL is a good track for us too, so we’ll see what happens.”
ALEX BOWMAN, NO. 48 ALLY CAMARO ZL1 1LE – Finished 22nd “We weren’t great. The stage two strategy just didn’t work out for us and it put us in a tough spot there to start stage three. The valve stem got knocked off on a pit stop and the rest is history. Not a good day on any aspects. We had a decent car, we just didn’t have the pit road and strategy we needed.”