IZOD INDYCAR SERIES
GRAND PRIX OF ALABAMA
BARBER MOTORSPORTS PARK
TEAM CHEVY DRIVER PRESS CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPT
APRIL 7, 2013
 
Ryan Hunter-Reay Wins at Barber Motorsports Park
With Strong Run, Helio Castroneves Takes the Points Lead
 
BIRMINGHAM, Ala.  (April 7, 2013) – Defending IZOD IndyCar Series champion Ryan Hunter-Reay started the No. 1 DHL Andretti Autosport Chevrolet on the pole, and finished the day atop the Victory Lane podium celebrating his 10th career-win, and his first at Barber Motorsports Park.
 
Hunter-Reay was credited with leading a race-high three times for 53 of the 90 laps that comprised the Grand Prix of Alabama, race two of the 2013 season. The win moved Hunter-Reay to third in the overall championship standings.
 
“Congratulations to Ryan Hunter-Reay on his hard-fought win today, and to Andretti Autosport on their second consecutive victory in 2013,” said Chris Berube, Chevrolet Racing Program Manager, IZOD IndyCar Series. “Back-to-back wins and poles, is a tremendous way for the Chevrolet IndyCar twin turbo V6 program to start the season. As we suspected, the competition was fierce and the win required very high execution levels from the team and tremendous focus and concentration from Ryan in the cockpit.  As we head to Long Beach, Team Chevy will be doing our part with the same tremendous focus and concentration to allow the Chevy IndyCar twin turbo V6 to put our Chevy Teams in a position to win again.”
 
With his third place finish, Helio Castroneves, No. 3 AAA Insurance Turbo Team Penske Chevrolet, jumped to the top of the point standings.  The three-time Indianapolis 500 winner started sixth and led once for a total of 25 laps during the race that saw only one caution flag for a total of four laps.
 
Will Power, No. 12 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet, finished fifth to give the Chevrolet IndyCar V6 engine three of the top-five finishing positions on the 2.38-mile, 17-turn road course.
 
James Hinchcliffe, No. 27 GoDaddy.com Andretti Autosport Chevrolet, was the point leader going into today’s event after his victory at St. Petersburg in the season-opening race, but sustained damage on lap one when several cars stacked-up in turn one.  Unable to return to competition, he was credited with the 26th finishing position, and now sits fifth in the point standings.
 
Scott Dixon (Honda) finished second, and Charlie Kimball (Honda) was fourth to complete the top-five finishers.
 
Next on the IndyCar schedule will be the Long Beach Grand Prix on April 21, 2013. The race on the Streets of Long Beach be televised live beginning at 4:00 p.m. (ET) by the NBC Sports Network (Verizon FiOS 90/590, DirecTV 220, DISH 159 and AT&T UVerse 640) and broadcast by the IMS Radio Network, including on Sirius and XM Channels 211 and www.indycar.com. Race timing and scoring can also be found on

JIMMIE JOHNSON TAKES TEAM CHEVY TO VICTORY LANE AT MARTINSVILLE
Chevrolet Drivers Bring Home Three of the Top Five Finishing Positions in STP Gas Booster 500
 
MARTINSVILLE, Va. (April 7, 2013) – Jimmie Johnson and the No. 48 Lowe’s Chevrolet SS team brought Team Chevy to Victory Lane for the third time in the first six races of the 2013 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series.  Hendrick Motorsports now has 20 victories at Martinsville Speedway, the most of any organization. The win marks Johnson’s eighth trip to Winner’s Circle at the 0.526-mile short-track, placing him in third on the all-time track win list; more than any active driver on the circuit.  The No. 48 Chevy SS dominated the competition leading 346 of the 500 laps and now retakes the point lead by six markers over second position.  Chevrolet has now won the last five straight races at Martinsville Speedway.
 
Johnson’s Hendrick Motorsports teammate Jeff Gordon, No. 24 Drive To End Hunger Chevrolet SS, posted his 33rd top-10 finish in 41 races at Martinsville Speedway. The solid run moved Gordon up six positions in the point standings and into the 12th spot.  Kasey Kahne, No. 5 Farmers Insurance Chevrolet SS, recorded his third top-five finish at the circuit’s oldest track.  Kahne gained two positions in the point standings and now occupies the fifth position.  Jamie McMurray, No. 1 Novo Nordisk Chevrolet SS, recorded his 11th top-10 finish in 21 starts at Martinsville Speedway.  His seventh-place finish is his best run thus far this season.  McMurray moved up three positions in the point standings to 13th.
 
Stewart Haas Racing driver Danica Patrick, No. 10 GoDaddy.com Chevrolet SS, made a valiant run after recovering from an early spin to record a 12th-place finish in her first start at Martinsville Speedway.  Patrick is the only woman to compete in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series at Martinsville Speedway and was the top finishing rookie.  Richard Childress Racing’s Kevin Harvick, No. 29 Budweiser Chevrolet SS, came home 13th followed by Tony Stewart, No. 14 Rush Truck Centers/Mobil 1 Chevrolet SS, in 17th. Virginia native Jeff Burton, No. 31 Childress Institute of Pediatric Trauma Chevrolet SS, finished 18th followed by his Richard Childress Racing teammate Paul Menard, No. 27 Menards/Pittsburgh Paints Chevrolet SS, in 19th.
 
Clint Bowyer (Toyota) finished second and Kyle Busch (Toyota) rounded out the top-five with a fifth-place finish.
 
The series heads to Texas Motor Speedway next week for the NRA 500 on Saturday, April 13th.
 
JIMMIE JOHNSON, CHAD KNAUS (CREW CHIEF) AND RICK HENDRICK (TEAM OWNER), NO. 48 LOWE’S CHEVROLET SS – RACE WINNERS
 
KERRY THARP:  Let’s hear from our race winning team, today’s 64th annual STP Gas Booster 500 here at Martinsville Speedway.  Our race winner is Jimmie Johnson.  He drove the No. 48 Lowe’s Chevrolet for Hendrick Motorsports.  He’s joined up here by his team owner Rick Hendrick. This is Jimmie’s 62nd NASCAR Sprint Cup Series win.  This is his eighth win at Martinsville Speedway.  That’s third all‑time in the history of the sport.
 
For Hendrick Motorsports it’s their 20th win at Martinsville Speedway, most of any organization in the history of the sport.  Not only do you guys win, but you make history.  Congratulations on that today.  Chad Knaus, crew chief has joined us, as well.
 
Jimmie, we had the conversation Friday about winning that eighth clock, and certainly you put the hammer down and went after it and got it.
 
JIMMIE JOHNSON:  Yeah, we had a great weekend and I know that the stats clearly show that.  But probably the most calm, relaxed thought‑out weekend that we’ve had as the 48, and mature weekend we’ve had.  We really fell back on our experience and stayed committed to that, and Friday was easier to stay committed because qualifying trim, Chad and Dave and everybody gave me just a way fast race car.
 
Made that easy, but as we got into Saturday and race practice, this track can play some games with you, and there were times where we could put up a fast lap but we didn’t have what we thought ‑‑ it wouldn’t look competitive compared to other guys on track and guys adjusting their cars to the current conditions.
 
We stuck to our game plan and knew what we wanted to have in the race and stayed patient, and it was tough to do at times, but it certainly worked out well.
 
And in the race, we had to adjust on the fly.  The track changed more than we thought it would, and Chad put some great changes under the car.  It’s kind of the time when the 18 and the 20 got to us, and we were able to get our car dialed in.  I’m not sure where they went following that, but and the 15 and 24 showed up and I still had my hands full.
 
Just a very well executed race, or I should say weekend, and clearly the race today, by the whole 48 team.
 
KERRY THARP:  With the win today Jimmie takes over the points lead, six points over Brad Keselowski, 12 points now over Dale Earnhardt, Jr.
 
Chad, just talk about the work that goes into a weekend like this and then how, as Jimmie alluded to, experience, you’ve got a blueprint for success here, how all that plays out.
 
CHAD KNAUS:  It’s funny you say that like that because I was actually talking to my father last week when we were coming to the racetrack, and he said, man, you guys have got a really good setup for Martinsville, you ought to be in pretty good shape, and I said, well, we did until they changed all the rules, and unfortunately all the rule changes and with the new car and everything that we had coming in here with the new tire, we really had to dig in deep.  And the off weekend gave us an opportunity to really look back over some past history and draw some conclusions that we were hoping were going to work out.
So my father, he’s like, well, how do you know where you’re going to start?  I said, well, I guess we’re just going to guess.  Fortunately enough we guessed right.
 
It was a great race.  It was a lot of fun.  I do want to put out there that I think Goodyear did a really good job with the tire that they brought.  Obviously it’s difficult for them to figure out what it is that they want to bring to the racetrack because when you do come here and test you don’t necessarily get the same conditions that you always have in the race.  And this tire was good.  I thought that it made us and forced us to come in and take four tires, and I thought that was pretty fun for the fans.  It was fun for me to watch how somebody that would come in and take tires, they could maneuver up through the field and pass race cars.  I think that was a big contributor to a great show today.
 
KERRY THARP:  Rick, 20 wins at one racetrack.  There are a lot of organizations that would like to have just 20 wins overall, but 20 wins at a racetrack, and certainly maybe just talk about obviously the latest one today, but 20 wins here at Martinsville.  Congratulations.
 
RICK HENDRICK:  Yeah, this is a ‑‑ I was looking at that scoreboard over there, the first time I ever came to a Cup race was here with my dad.  We’ve been very fortunate to have some great drivers, and this track has been awful good to us.
 
I knew we were tied with Petty I think the last win, and he’s dominated this place for so long.  But really proud of these guys and proud of the organization because they all ran good today.  Junior had some trouble, but I was worried that we were going to end up like we did this race last year when that caution came out because I didn’t know who was going to take tires and who was going to stay out.
 
But played out, and it’s been a great day for us.
Q.  Jimmie, what was going through your mind after that red flag came out?&n
bsp; It had to be a little bit anxious with Clint on your tail there.
JIMMIE JOHNSON:  Yeah, it was.  I mean, I had a real nice comfortable lead at that point, and didn’t want to see a caution at all and give those guys another chance at me, to get alongside of me.
 
But over the years, I feel like I’ve learned that there will be cautions, that things you do inside the car to kind of preserve the life of the tire, and then also how to restart and run your best laps, best five, ten laps, whatever it is, on old tires.  It’s not an easy thing to do.  And I’ve given away a few races over the years, really lost them to Jeff with his great experience here and how awesome he is at this track, and I’ve learned to adapt.
 
I think from a setup standpoint, too, Chad knows what kind of changes we need to make as the race goes on and the sun starts to set, and then for the short run, there’s always a bunch of short runs at the end.
 
Again, I think experience plays into it, and I felt like if I could get two or three corners and maintain the lead on Clint that I could stretch it back out.  Again, looking back on just one other thing, the most concerned time I had was during the red, wondering who was going to pit and not pit, and then when everybody stayed out, I didn’t have to worry about any tires coming, I felt a lot better about things and then knew I just needed a couple of good corners to get away from Clint.
Q.  Are you as comfortable with your notes for any other track in the series, and where does Texas rank in your comfort level?
JIMMIE JOHNSON:  Yeah, there’s just a rhythm and feel here.  The reason we laugh is my note‑taking has gone downhill in the last few years.  You can’t read what I write anyway, so I’m even sure why we take notes.
 
But there’s a feel to this track, and the history we have, 10, 11 years now of coming here and doing this, we just draw on and fall back on. For me to roll in here off of vacation and literally got home the day before and first lap out on the track put it up on the top of the board just tells me how good of a car I had.  It was really up to me to not mess it up as the weekend went on.  I usually need four or five runs to shake out the vacation stuff.
 
KERRY THARP:  How about Texas, where does that stand as far as your comfort level and how you
 
JIMMIE JOHNSON:  Yeah, I feel good about it.  We ran really good at Vegas, and California didn’t go as well as we wanted, but it’s a much different racetrack than what we have at Texas.  I would say that Texas and Vegas are closer together than Texas and California.  We’ll go there and see.  We’re still learning this car on the big tracks.  Fontana we were certainly trying some things, and smarter leaving there, and I know that these guys will work hard and give me a great car this coming race.
Q.  Clint came in here and he said I thought Jeff Gordon was going to be the car to beat today, and Jeff looked at him and said I thought you’d be the car to beat today just because of what they saw on Saturday.  What happened between Saturday and today that made you guys so dominant?
JIMMIE JOHNSON:  Saturday is just a different day.  We have very little laps on the track at that point.  The truck race changes it, and then our race is so long the track continues to evolve and change.  It’s kind of a moving target.
 
I was looking at the scoreboard wondering where Clint was.  I expected him to roll right up there with how awesome he was yesterday. And Jeff on the longer run probably had the car to beat.  Jeff has a really good line here on the long run, and he started catching me before the last caution, and I was thinking, man, if this stays green this could be a Jeff Gordon day, and when the caution came out I knew it was swinging back my direction because we had such a good car on the short run.
Q.  Was yesterday nerve‑racking at all after the contact with Joey, and were you nervous at all today on that one restart where you fell back to sixth and the caution came out so you ended up being back up front?
JIMMIE JOHNSON:  Yeah, there was some oil down in 3 and 4 so that’s why the caution came out.  I went into the turn and the car just went straight.  I’m not really sure what happened.  Caution was out, fortunately I was still leading and I got to hang on to the lead.
 
But the contact with Joey, I stayed in the car so I didn’t get to see it.  Chad was ‑‑ we saw another set of stickers left, so Chad looked at it, the guys were working on it, and we were already discussing what changes we wanted to make for that last sticker run.  So I could tell right away that it was more cosmetic and nothing really bad.  I hate that the contact happened but it luckily didn’t hurt our car or move the splitter around. That would be the tough part is if ‑‑ luckily it hit the bumper bar and smashed that in instead of bending the splitter up or down.
Q.  This question is for Jimmie.  Jeff Gordon was on pit road during his post‑race interview and kind of joked around saying when you guys qualify 15th or back in the pack you kind of gave them a chance to win.  What’s the advantage of getting that No. 1 pit stall and doing it two times in a row, the pole in the fall, winning the race, and doing the same thing here in the spring?
JIMMIE JOHNSON:  Yeah, you make your day so much easier when you qualify up front, qualify on pole and get that first pit stall.  Jeff sent me a funny text Friday, you’re tough enough to beat when you qualify 15th, now on the pole it’s going to be impossible to beat you.  I got a good laugh out of that.
 
There’s four or five cars that we race with here that I don’t want to see them get the pole because it could be that little advantage that gives them a chance to win.  We all could see how bad it was to start in the outside lane, and if you can come off pit road first and not second, it makes all the difference in the world.  Even third versus second, you’d much rather be third than second.
Q.  I heard you say I think to Chad on the cool‑down lap something to the effect of we looked like we knew what we were doing today, which is kind of amusing when you consider this place has been hosting Cup races for more than 50 years and the only guys with more wins than you are Richard Petty and Darrell Waltrip.  I know it’s tough to put that in perspective, but can you talk about being third all‑time here by yourself, no other active driver has eight wins?  Do you ever sit back and think about that?
JIMMIE JOHNSON:  Yeah, I think the fact that we had just such a calm weekend was the biggest part.  I mean, it’s easy to start chasing things here and get yourself off track.
 
We always race well, and fortunately here you pit a lot and you can make big changes to your race car to get you in the ballgame.  We’ve won races where we were just terrible to start the race, having no fun.  Chad is throwing spring rubbers in the car and track wear is coming up or down, wedges in and out, all those huge, huge changes, and we get ourselves in contention.
 
I don’t know where we were ‑‑ someone said the worst I was on the track today was fourth.  We just executed from the first laps in practice to where we were at the end of the race, and that was fun.  That’s what I meant by that, that we weren’t chasing a setup or track conditions or a variety of things that we’ve done in the past.
Q.  Chad, after the race Denny tweeted or told somebody, this was a lay‑up win, the inference being he wasn’t out there so y’all had a pretty easy time of it.  Is that the kind of thing you’ll remember in October when you come back or do you not need bulletin board material to get your team up for a race?
CHAD KNAUS:  I guess I am glad I don’t tweet.  (Laugh
ter.)
You know, I don’t really pay ‑‑ I don’t know.  Denny, I think it’s pretty obvious that it’s not Denny, it’s the Gibbs cars.  If you look at Matt Kenseth, he couldn’t get out of his own way when he was in a Roush car here, and he went out there today and was making it happen.  I think it’s probably more car than driver here for that team.
 
But Denny does a really good job here.  He’s fantastic at the short tracks here, Richmond, a lot of those tracks, and I hate it that Denny is hurt.  That’s not the way we want this stuff to go down.  But I still think that they’re going to be in the Chase and I think they’re going to be in contention for the championship.
Q.  Rick, you’ve seen Jimmie win so many times here.  Just from what you watch, what do you think makes him so good here?
RICK HENDRICK:  Just watching him in the car and the feedback he’s giving Chad and then the way he’s taking care of the tires and kind of feeling the race unfold, I watched him today, I like to go to the front stretch and watch the cars come off the corner nice and straight and don’t bobble, and he does an excellent job with the throttle.  I was talking to Gordon about it, and he said that you will master it looking at the traces and figuring out how to run the track.  He said he’s sorry he ever showed you one of his.
Q.  Rick, which would you have predicted today, Jimmie winning the race or Danica finishing 12th?  Which surprises you more?
RICK HENDRICK:  Danica.  I thought he was going to win the race, when we got sitting on the pole.  His track record here.  I didn’t realize she finished 11th.  That’s a great job.  But I’m definitely ‑‑ I don’t know how to answer that.  I’m not surprised that he won the race.  I’m surprised she finished 11th.  Is that what you said?  That’s what you asked me.  Yeah.  Okay.
Q.  Chad, since now we’ve had two of the short tracks and at this point in the season, where do you see the work that needs to happen with this generation of car and maybe a critique at this point, best and worst, good performing versus one you need to actually do a little bit more work to?
CHAD KNAUS:  Honestly I think the car is performing really well to be quite frank with you.  I think that Goodyear needs a little bit more time with this car so they can get us the tires that we need to continue to race.  They did a great job with this tire that we’ve got here.  We actually knew that they tested last year with this tire with the 2013 car, and I think that they came very, very prepared, and I think the more that they can do that, the more experience they get with the Gen‑6 car is only going to help the racing as a whole because as the tire falloff increases I think the racing gets better.  I think we saw that today, and I think that we’ll see that next weekend going into Texas.  It’s pretty abrasive and difficult on the tires so I think you’ll see some good racing there just like we did at Fontana.
 
The more the tracks that we go to where the tire falloff is lower, the racing inherently is not as good because the line selection is minimized.
 
So I think that from a car standpoint, I don’t think we need to mess with it a whole heck of a lot right now, just kind of let things shake out and let Goodyear get to work and see what they can do with the product.
Q.  Jimmie, from your perspective, Jeff called it kind of like more old school Martinsville with the tire falloff.  Most drivers seem to like that. What did you think this weekend and do you feel that it’s heading in the right direction, kind of like Chad said?
JIMMIE JOHNSON:  Yeah, I agree with what Jeff said, and Chad’s point of view, as well.  The competitors have been asking for a tire that falls off, and with changes in the vehicle, this Gen‑6 car is allowing Goodyear to comfortably make some adjustments and change.  Their green tire that they’ve introduced naturally wears out differently, and seems to wear more, which is good, and creates that falloff.
 
So I think directionally we’re going the right way.  I do still feel that there are some surfaces that just ‑‑ the type of surface that’s put down doesn’t put on good races, and we need to be smart when we resurface tracks.
 
But tire falloff is what we’re all after.  The competitors have been saying that for a long time but Goodyear was afraid to do so with some of the loading and things that we saw with the other car.  They still want it to last.  The last thing they want is four or five blown right fronts and drivers climbing out of the car mad and hurt talking about the tire not doing its job.  So they’re walking a tightrope.  It’s easy to beat up on them, but they do have a tough job.
 
 
JEFF GORDON, NO. 24 DRIVE TO END HUNGER CHEVROLET SS – FINISHED THIRD
DANICA PATRICK AND TONY GIBSON (CREW CHIEF), NO. 10 GODADDY.COM CHEVROLET SS – FINISHED 12TH
 
KERRY THARP:  Danica Patrick has joined us, too.  She had a strong 12th place showing her first trip here to Martinsville Speedway. Certainly Danica driving the No. 10 GoDaddy.com Chevrolet for Stewart‑Haas.  Outstanding job out there today.  Maybe just talk about your experience driving at Martinsville and how you thought things went.
 
DANICA PATRICK:  Yeah.  I had a spin at the very beginning.  I don’t know how many laps in, 10, 20, something like that, and felt like I kind of got pinched down but I also got in pretty hard.  When you’ve got the momentum going that way, it was sort of a perfect storm.
 
But I learned my lesson to make sure that you just don’t go in too hard because they’re going to be holding you tight, and there’s going to be nowhere to go, nowhere to slide up, and you get into them and it’s a lot ‑‑ if you’ve got wheel in it you’re probably going to come around.
 
Learned that lesson early.  We were two laps down at one point, so I’m probably most proud of getting those two laps back and then running strong until the end there on the lead lap.
 
You know, it was just nice to have a good weekend after having so many that weren’t good since Daytona.  Yeah, it was a fun little track.  I was told that if it goes well, you’ll be like, I don’t mind this place at all, let’s come back, and if it doesn’t you don’t ever want to see it again.  Today was one of those days I had a good car, and Gibson has got a good track record here, obviously Newman won this race last year, and he’s always run really well.
 
I think the team has a lot to be proud of.  The stops were good.  We had a little right front damage from early in the race so it was a little bit of a pain in the butt to get that tire off and then back on for stops.  But it was good to get the Go Daddy car up there, and Hendrick did a nice job all weekend.
 
Obviously I had to start from the back because I decided I was going to go from 4th to 3rd and coming up to speed on my out lap in practice, and that’s not the normal progression.  I got 11.4 on the revs, and they were like, we should probably just take that out.  Unfortunately I had to start from the rear.
 
But Hendrick gave me another really strong engine, and I felt like we had decent speed in practice, and it was nothing different today.
 
Q.  How do you feel about your performance today?
DANICA PATRICK:  I guarded down into 3 on the last lap, and then the 55 hit me and got me loose and pushed me up the track, and then I held it next to him, came off the corner, and then Harvick is on the very inside so we were three wide coming to the line, and then for some reason the 55 just spun all the way ‑‑ like big smoke going into 1.  I don’t know if that’s what you were talking about.  I don’t know what happened.  I have n
o idea.
 
DANICA PATRICK:  Okay.  I’m such a rookie.
 
You know, it was ‑‑ we just answered how the day went.  More than that, kind of what Clint said about the sport being exciting, a lot going on.  I hope the fans enjoyed that late red that made for a chaotic last seven or eight laps there.  You know, it was good to look up in the stands and see it full.  It was good to see people with their shirts off.  Summer’s coming, so I’m ready for it.  I’m sure y’all are because it snowed here on Thursday.
 
Things are just going well, and for me it was just really nice to have a nice weekend since Daytona because we haven’t had ‑‑
 
KERRY THARP:  Jeff Gordon has joined us.  Jeff finished third today.  Jeff drives the No. 24 Drive to End Hunger Chevrolet for Hendrick Motorsports, and Jeff, talk about your run, certainly battling for the win out there, but how did it look from your seat?
 
JEFF GORDON:  It was an exciting day for us.  You know, same thing kind of what Clint said, we were a little bit tighter when the race started than we anticipated, but we also burned the rear tires off of it the first couple runs.
 
Luckily that improved, and I made a bonehead move and overshot my pit stall and cost us a bunch of positions.  I was just sitting back there not passing anybody, not going anywhere thinking, uh‑oh, I’ve really screwed us up.  The long run we made a couple of adjustments and freed the car up and the long run came and our car was unbelievable in that long run.  I obviously didn’t want to see a short run there at the end, but you know it’s pretty typical; it’s going to happen at Martinsville.  I think third was a great finish for us, and happy to bring home third.
 
We needed the points.  We needed a good solid run.  The 48, you give him that No. 1 pit stall at Martinsville, and I mean, it’s almost near impossible to beat him.
 
Q.  Danica, they say that the toughest thing about your first race here is getting comfortable.  At what point ‑‑ was there a point in the race where you felt that comfort level grow, and when you did spin, were you thinking, okay, everything everybody said about this place was right, it is a little hard to get around here?
 
DANICA PATRICK:  I think it was just the circumstance, but it just got me on my toes when I was inside of people, making sure I didn’t slide up into them and them kind of help turn me sideways.  Honestly I felt pretty comfortable from the get‑go.  When you have a decent car, things just are a lot easier.  I’ve had a lot of other worse weekends, like Fontana, I’ve been there a bunch of times, but it was misery until the race.
 
It was just a good car, so we were steady all weekend and we just kind of kept improving.  We also improved in the race, which is always really important.  We ended up getting really good power down by about halfway through the race and no matter what I did I could really get on it well coming off the corner.
 
I would say that I learned pretty early, I was backing up my corner and kind of going it easy and trying to kind of save everything.  I was getting really loose doing it, so once I finally got back to going in hard again and loading the front up like I was before, it seemed like the car got really balanced again.
 
I learned that kind of easy, and that’s kind of what helped me get more comfortable in race runs.
 
Q.  Danica, you were five spots ahead of Tony Stewart and many more ahead of Ryan Newman.  How did it feel to be first in class for Stewart‑Haas Racing today?
 
DANICA PATRICK:  Well, I mean Ryan Newman had an issue, and he was really nice out there.  There was one time he let me in when I was stuck up high, so that was really helpful of him.  And I felt a little funny kind of racing really hard for position there with Tony at the end, and then to get in front of him, that was a little victory for me because he’s so good.
I’m going to go over to his bus after this and see what he has to say about it.  But no, it was really fun.  Gibson just prepares nice cars for Martinsville.  It’s not about being first on your team, it’s about being first out there overall, and you work towards that the whole time.
Q.  And then also, is this place ‑‑ you’ve had success at Phoenix, at Milwaukee, at flat short tracks like this.  Does this place remind you of either of those and is that why you got so comfortable so quick and got that rhythm?
 
DANICA PATRICK:  No.  I mean, I just think there’s less risk in finding the limit on a track that you’re not going as fast on.  I think that’s a little bit a part of it as opposed to when you’re at Fontana and it’s a tricky track and you’re carrying a lot of speed, and the consequences seem a little bit bigger when you try and find the limit there than at a short little track here like Martinsville.
 
I think that might be kind of it.  I’m not 100 percent sure.  All I can say is that I know that a car that’s comfortable to drive always makes a huge difference.
 
Q.  As a follow to what you just said, when you were racing Tony for 16th with about 35 laps to go, did it enter your mind at all that maybe it would be a good idea to let him in, or is he just another driver on the track at that point?
 
DANICA PATRICK:  No, we were racing for position, so it didn’t cross my mind to let him in.  I went underneath him to go by him.  No, all that crossed my mind is that I just ‑‑ I’d be fair and give room and run hard, and if I get the spot, great; if I don’t, you lost it to a guy like Tony Stewart.
 
But no, I’m out there to race, and I don’t think Tony would want me to lift.
 
Q.  Jeff, with the victory today with Jimmie, that gives Hendrick Motorsports its 20th victory, breaks a tie with Petty for most all‑time here at Martinsville.  You and Jimmie have combined for 15 of those victories.  Can you talk about the dominance Hendrick has had here and what it means to hold that milestone?
 
JEFF GORDON:  I’m guessing Hendrick has got something figured out pretty good here.  You know, I mean, the first time I drove for Rick, I knew how good their equipment was everywhere we went.  The teams, they just do such a good job from the entire ‑‑ through the depth of the organization, from the engineering and how we build the chassis and everything that we do.  We hit on some things years ago for us here, but they had success prior to me getting there, and then I think the 48 has been able to take that success that we had and really build on that, as well.
 
And Jimmie, he just has really figured this place out.  There’s just certain tracks where the drivers that Hendrick has had over the past as well as now and just our race cars, it just really suits that.  Like I said, qualifying up front really can be huge here.  You get a driver like Jimmie and a team like the 48, or ours, as well, or the 15, you put them on the pole in that No. 1 pit stall, it’s going to be really, really hard to beat them.
 
The next thing we’ve got to work on now is trying to qualify better.  But that’s awesome.  I’m so proud to be a part of Hendrick.  Happy for Rick.  I got to see him out there, and I know that these types of stats and records really mean a lot to him, you know, and he deserves it.  They’ve got an awesome organization and work very hard at it.  It’s great to be a part of that.
 
Q.  Jeff, finally it seemed like there was that moment where it was like, oh, man, we’re going to have a bad day and then you managed to battle back.  How important is that just looking at the season as a whole to have that kind of turnaround today?
 
JE
FF GORDON:  Yeah, when it happened I was pretty disappointed because I made the mistake, and we know how ‑‑ you’ve got to be flawless at a track like this, and it just seemed like it was tough to pass.  When you get that far back in traffic.
 
At first I was disappointed in myself, and I thought, well, we’ve got a good car, we can make it up through there, and they dropped the green and I went backwards and I wasn’t passing anybody, and I thought, uh‑oh, I’ve really put ourselves in a hole here.  Luckily we had a long run, and like I said, we made some good adjustments, and we just started picking them off one by one, and the car was unbelievable on that long run.
 
You know, we can’t afford to do those things.  I can’t be making those mistakes, and we can’t have those mistakes made, and that’s just how crucial it is in the sport today as competitive as everybody is and how close the cars are.  You know, we kind of got fortunate today.
 
Q.  On Friday you said that you didn’t quite know about Martinsville.  Do you like it now?  What’s your feeling about it?
DANICA PATRICK:  Turn left.  Left, brake, left.  You know, as I said earlier, we did kind of answer this, but ‑‑ or I did, I had a pretty good car from the start, so it was comfortable, wasn’t really fighting anything huge.  A little loose in.
 
But I didn’t know what to expect, but I said that I feel like finding the limit on a short track where you’re going a little slower is a little bit ‑‑ there’s a little less penalty there, a little less risk than finding the limit on a really big track where you’re doing 200 miles an hour and you get sideways and you don’t always catch those.  I guess that’s probably the comfort level for me.
 
I felt like it was kind of traditional passing here, setting it up and getting your nose in there, a little bit more road course style, so that might have some effect because I’ve done so much of that.
 
But good car, steady day.  I got a lot of advice on keeping my head cool and just letting things go.  Nobody has straight fenders after the race, although Jimmie might.  Does Jimmie have all of his fenders straight?
 
Q. On her rookie battle between Ricky Stenhouse, Jr.
            
DANICA PATRICK:  Actually I decided I’d fly back to Chicago and he’s going to drive back.  That was the plan all along.  But if he’s not back at the bus when I get back there, that means he’ll be mad.
 
You know, you have good days and you have bad days, and we’ve definitely had our fair share of bad days the last few weeks, so it was nice to have a decent one.
 
Q.  Jeff, on pit road you mentioned something about this being like old school Martinsville.  Was that in reference to the tires?  And it seemed that many of the people who raced yesterday and today seemed to like the falloff of the tires.  Do you think that’s headed in the right direction?
 
JEFF GORDON:  Yeah, I do.  I didn’t like it at lap 60 on the first run because it seemed like some others had it figured out a little bit better than we did.  But as the race went on and the wear got a little bit better, then it seemed like ‑‑ and the adjustments we made, we were very competitive.  I do like the falloff.  I like how you’ve got to manage how hard you push it at the beginning versus ‑‑ and the grip level, how it goes away and you’ve got to really use your foot to keep from spinning the tires.
 
So that is kind of old school Martinsville that I grew up with, and I do like that.  I think it brings more of the driver into play, even though it seemed like air pressure kind of helped that.  I think we all started maybe a little bit too high on rear pressure.  But yeah, that was fun.
 
I’d like to see that more.  Durability is a big deal, especially on the bigger, higher speed tracks, and so they’re limited on what they can do, especially on the repaves.  But on these older tracks, it’s kind of encouraging to know that they can build a tire that can withstand long runs but does fall off and wears a little bit.  I’d like to see more of that.
 
Q.  Danica, did you talk about what happened when you had contact with Junior?  Did Vickers get inside of you and did you feel like you were giving Vickers enough room there and also at the end?
 
DANICA PATRICK:  Well, we were lined up on the inside of 1 and 2, and Vickers hit me and hit me into Dale, and Dale got sideways and then went down the back straight and Dale was trying to put me down in the wall on the inside, and we got into 3 and he went around sideways and spun.
 
I wasn’t trying to lose any friends out there, that’s for sure.  It was tight, like it is, bumper to bumper, and I just got hit from behind.  Yeah, 55 found my bumper again at the end.  You know, it’s Martinsville, right.  Three wide, coming to the start‑finish line, it’s all exciting.
 
Q.  You’re not mad?
DANICA PATRICK:  No, I wanted to make sure Dale wasn’t mad.  I wasn’t trying to hit him or anything.  We were just lined up on the inside of 1 and 2 and we were all running tight and I got bumped and I got bumped into him and was able to get alongside of him.  Why wouldn’t I take it?  He came on the radio and said he wasn’t mad.  I didn’t do anything wrong.
 
KERRY THARP:  Thank you very much.  Good luck next week at Texas.
 
TONY GIBSON, CREW CHIEF, NO. 10 GODADDY.COM CHEVROLET SS:
DID YOU IN YOUR WILDEST DREAMS THINK SHE COULD FINISH 12TH HERE IN HER FIRST ATTEMPT?
“Nah I’ve never. I figured if we could finish top 25 and be a couple of laps down it would be a miracle. I never dreamed. I knew after Saturday and Friday that we had a good car. I knew she was capable of doing it, as far as speedwise and driving. To be able to go through all that beating and banging and survive and finish 12th – she did a great job.”
 
IN REGARDS TO LISTENING AND ADAPTING:  
“Going to Little Rock was obviously huge. Going there and just king of getting in that mode of braking and working on a couple of things setup wise to help her. Martinsville is one of those places where if you can road race, you’re going to get around here pretty good. Obviously, she’s a pretty good road racer so having that straight line braking mentality and finesse of not just overdriving the car, that helped her the most coming into here. She definitely did a really, really nice job all day. She got aggressive when she needed to at the end.”
 
HOW HAPPY WERE YOU TO SEE HER GET AGGRESSIVE AT THE END?
“It was great to see that. I was worried about that. I knew that with 30 to go the restarts were going to get more and more aggressive, and that’s why I told her it’s not going to get any easier. I was really, really happy to see how aggressive she got. You know, being able to be on the defense. They would bump her and she wouldn’t get flustered and shake her out. I was really, really impressed with that. That was the biggest thing I was nervous about  – how she would do in a situation like that. It will help her gain some confidence. Obviously, this is the worst case scenario of where we go for a restart. To come out of her proving she can do it…on these restarts be more aggressive and do what these guys are doing and hopefully build some confidence that will help her down the road here.”
 
HOW MUCH CONFIDENCE DOES THIS GIVE YOU GOING INTO TEXAS?
“It’s big. We ran really good there with her last year towards the end, and that was our first race with her. We had some confidence out of there and into Phoenix. So it’s awesome to come out of here with some confidence and a little momentum going into Texas and coming up on some tracks wh
ere I think we can run really good at. It’s huge right now for us.”
 

IZOD INDYCAR SERIES
GRAND PRIX OF ALABAMA
BARBER MOTORSPORTS PARK
TEAM CHEVY DRIVER POST RACE QUOTES
APRIL 7, 2013
 
TEAM CHEVY DRIVER QUOTES:
 
RYAN HUNTER-REAY, NO 1 DHL ANDRETTI AUTOSPORT CHEVROLET, RACE WINNER: ON THE RACE: “Helio and I always race clean. I had a little bit of contact with him before, I just couldn’t slow the car down and he was on the outside of me. Luckily we both just kept going from that, he took the lead at that point. His tire strategy worked in our favor, we had new reds on when he had blacks on, and he was just a sitting duck at that point. Will, on the other hand, did an unbelievable job keeping me behind him on reds. It was our worst set of reds though. I just kept patient and made it happen when I needed to. It was very challenging out there today, I’d like to thank all the other drivers, though, for keeping it on track and not going yellow because man, I didn’t want it to go yellow at the end. I had a little contact there with Helio (Castroneves), I feel bad about it.  Good thing nobody was affected by it but man, I was driving my tail off trying to stay in front of (Scott) Dixon.  Will (Power) did a good job staying in front of me on blacks, not sure how he did it. A lot of great racing out there. It’s just great to get a win for DHL, Sun Drop, Circle K and Chevrolet back in victory lane.  A good way to start the season.”
 
ON GETTING ANDRETTI A WIN AT BARBER: “It is excellent. It shows what we’re about, it shows that last year wasn’t a fluke. We really worked for it today. Unreal. I’m exhausted.”
 
IS THIS TEAM EVEN MAYBE BETTER THAN IT WAS LAST YEAR?  WHAT MADE THE DIFFERENCE? “It is. You know, we’ve never had a car like this at Barber. So, to do that is just unreal. But man, I’m really disappointed that my wife and my little boy aren’t here. We’re going to have to go win many more.  This one is for the little boy at home. It almost brings me to tears that he’s not here right now. But it is what it is. He’s going to Long Beach and all the rest of them.”
 
MICHAEL ANDRETTI, TEAM OWNER, ANDRETTI AUTOSPORT – RACE WINNER: ON THE RACE: “It really was a perfect weekend. We got the pole in both races and the win both races and led most of the laps, you can’t ask for much more than that. I’m really happy and proud of the whole DHL crew. They did a great job all weekend, and the whole Andretti team and it was really good. We knew we had to get it done because we had the reds and Helio had the blacks, and that’s how Helio was able to get us, so we had to try to return the favor. The team did a great job all weekend and Ryan did a hell of a job. This is awesome. I’m so happy for DHL and with the DHL car and also Sun Drop and everybody and Chevy. We’re happy to keep their streak going. So it was a good day.”
 
HOW MENTALLY EXHAUSTING WAS IT FOR YOU?
“It was a tough race because there are so many different things going on with the tires and all that. You just had to have faith in our strategy and it worked.”
 
HELIO CASTRONEVES, NO. 3 AAA INSURANCE TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET, FINISHED 3RD: YOU LOOK PRETTY FRESH, CONSIDERING, BUT YOU WERE NOT IN A GOOD PLACE AT THAT START:  “No, because I was boxed-in. I saw Dixon trying to pass Will and then he got shoved to the side. Everybody went wide. And all of a sudden, I’m like c’mon Will, go! And we were at that point to the rear. It was a shame because we were hoping for a good start. And then we had to change the plan of strategy and Turbo was there in the end. Let me tell you, that little snail was awesome because he was pushing me totally all the way to the end.”
 
BUT THE SNAIL (FROM THE MOVIE TURBO) WISHED HE HAD REDS AT THE END, RIGHT? “Yeah, but that’s the price we pay. We change strategy in the middle of the race and we got to make time and that’s what we did. I thought we would be able to hold on, but it was 15 or 17 laps to go, it was too many laps; the blacks were a little bit tough to hold on to those guys. At least we got a podium and hopefully more points for the championship.”
 
YOU ARE NOW THE POINTS LEADER. DID YOU KNOW THAT?
(Laughter) “See, that’s good. Let’s keep going that way and hopefully we’re going to be there. So, a good job by the boys and everyone. Everybody did a hell of a job and I appreciate the support.”
 
WILL POWER, NO. 12 VERIZON TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET, FINISHED 5TH: ON HIS RACE: “It was a tough start for us, we couldn’t get in the right slot and then committed to a different strategy to hopefully get the Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet on the podium. We thought we had a good plan and just needed a yellow at any point after Lap 31. Unfortunately it didn’t come and we fought for the fifth place finish. It isn’t exactly what we wanted to get out of the weekend but is still a good points day and gets us closer to the top.”
 
MARCO ANDRETTI, NO. 25 RC COLA ANDRETTI AUTOSPORT CHEVROLET, FINISHED 7TH: ON HIS RACE:  “I thought we the RC Cola car was quicker on track than where we ended up. Coming into barber, you can always expect this to be a physical race. Not finding the podium is always tough to swallow, but having back to back top ten finishes keeps us in a good position going into Long Beach.”
 
E.J. VISO, NO. 5 TEAM VENEZUELA PDVSA CITGO ANDRETTI AUTOSPORT HVM CHEVROLET, FINISHED 12TH: ON HIS RACE: “Probably not the race that we wanted. Anyways, we stayed out of trouble and we did all we could. Unfortunately in our race there were not many red flags to give us any margins to risk and to work on strategies. It was a very clean race. Not much action on track – just trying to keep the pace with the others. That’s about it. I’m very happy for Ryan – he won the race! Hopefully my turn is coming.”
 
TONY KANAAN, NO. 11 HYDROXYCUT KV RACING TECHNOLOGY SH RACING CHEVROLET, FINISHED 13TH: ON HIS RACE: “It was just a long day. I started the race on the primary tires in order to get them out of the way and was hoping to get more speed out of the red alternates to pick up some track position, but once I got stuck in traffic in the middle of the pack there was nothing I could do. Lost a handful of spots during our pits and managed to get some of them back at the end of the race, but it was still not our day. Let’s move on to Long Beach in a couple of weeks and focus on getting a better result there.”
 
ORIOL SERVIA, NO. 22 CHARTER PANTHER DRYER & REINBOLD RACING CHEVROLET, FINISHED 15TH: ON HIS RACE:  “That was a disappointing race. On the first lap, I was involved in the first crash. I got hit from behind and I hit Hinch (James Hinchcliffe), which I’m sorry for. I saw three cars abreast in front of me and I tried to take it easy, maybe Graham [Rahal] didn’t see it and we all just ran into them. It was a bad start and it’s hard to come back from last. We had a decent car, but I had the rear bumper ripped off in that first crash so the car was not behaving at its best. We did what we could, we were never as fast as the top five cars, but we definitely as good as those running 6th, 7th, and 8th. If we would have been able to jump up front, we would have been able to stay there.”
 
SEBASTIEN BOURDAIS, NO. 7 MCAFEE DRAGON RACING CHEVROLET, FINISHED 16TH: ON HIS RACE: “We knew it was going to be a long day starting in the back of the field. We had a good car and were able to make it up to 11th, but I made a mistake and we lost our position and fell back to 13th. On the last lap I was confused with a call on the radio and thought it was the end of the race, so I backed off and lost 3 more positions. Disappointing way to end the day.”
 
JR HILDEBRAND, NO. 4 NATIONAL GUARD PANTHER RACING CHEVROLET, FINISHED 17TH: ON HIS RACE:  “I felt good all day, and the Panther team did a great job in the pits as well. But I felt like we had a couple varying scenarios that inevitably didn’t go our way. We were definitely expecting
for there to be more yellow flags as the race went on, and with it being so tough to pass, we were trying to get off-sequence with the group of cars that we were around. And early in the race we had the pace to get away from a lot of those guys. In our effort to get off-sequence it was always so close, but never ended up working for us, and that’s the frustrating part. We had to run a long stint there at the end and we lost a few positions, but we were able to fight hard to keep our spot in the last few laps and I think at the end of the day we need to continue moving forward and working with what we have to get better. These last two races if we would have started up front we would have stayed there, so that’s the aim going into Long Beach.”
 
SIMONA DE SILVESTRO, NO. 78 NUCLEAR ENTERGY AREVA KV RACING TECHNOLOGY CHEVROLET, FINISHED 18TH: ON HER RACE:  “It was a tough race for us. We were always in traffic and there was always something going on. At the start I kind of got pushed out and lost a few positions and had to work my way back up. You know we were always fighting with different people and different tires and it was really hard to get by, so we kind of got stuck there and it wasn’t great. But, we’ll go on to the next one and hopefully we’ll be alright there.”
 
A.J. ALLMENDINGER, NO. 2 IZOD TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET, QUALIFIED 10TH:  ON QUALIFYING:  ON HIS RACE: “All in all today was a good day in the No. 2 IZOD Team Penske Chevy and there are a lot of positives to take out of it. We had a good start and I thought I was pacing myself well, we could have had a top-10 day without the couple breaks against us. It was a good day with a bad stall and unfortunately after that point we were saving fuel so it made it tough to make up ground. But I know that I can compete with these guys and look forward to getting even better at Long Beach.”
 
SEBASTIAN SAAVEDRA, NO.  6 TRUECAR DRAGON RACING CHEVROLET, FINISHED 20TH: ON HIS RACE:  “I’m really disappointed with the way our day ended here at Barber. We had an amazing car and I was really happy with it, challenging drivers like Will Power for position. Pit stops did not go as planned and we lost what we had gained, moving to the back of the field. I’m ready to move onto Long Beach and go for the results I know we can get. “
 
ED CARPENTER, NO. 20 FUZZY’S PREMIUM ULTRA VODKA ED CARPENTER RACING CHEVROLET, FINISHED 22ND: ON HIS RACE:  “We tried to top off the fuel tank early under yellow and then do a two-stopper.  But the Fuzzy’s car wasn’t very good on the Black Firestones.  I thought the car felt good with the Firestone Red tires.  We ran some pretty consistent laps for a while there.  We committed to a strategy with just two stops and it just didn’t work out for us.  This track is tough and it is very hard to move forward.  We had a good first day here and I disappointed myself on Saturday in qualifying.  But today I felt the car was better and we learned some things for the future.  We had a pretty good at St. Pete and I think we’ll have a good run at Long Beach now.  At the end of the today, we have to take the positives and move on.”
 
JAMES HINCHCLIFFE, NO. 27 GODADDY.COM ANDRETTI AUTOSPORT CHEVROLET, FINISHED  26TH – AS A RESULT OF DAMAGE RECEIVED IN MULTI-CAR INCIDENT ON LAP 1 AND STOPPED ON LAP 3 OF THE 90-LAP RACE: ON WHAT HAPPENED: “From what I have been told, we all piled into turn eight; I was behind Tony (Kanaan). From what I hear, (Graham) Rahal hit (Oriol) Servia who got in the back of me. I got in the back of Tony a little bit, but it was pretty square, and it didn’t do any damage to the front. I knew I had gotten hit, but everything was fine at first, but I guess, under caution, things started to work itself loose. As I started to warm the tires up, the wheel actually broke, that was what it was. That goodness it happened under caution where it did, because there are a lot of fast parts of this race track where if your wheel goes flying, it could have been really big. If there is anything to take out of this weekend, it’s all we did is lose a wheel, and didn’t write-off a car.”
 
ON NOT BEING ABLE TO GET BACK TO PIT LANE: “It was frustrating to sit there for 75 laps, watching everybody else go around, when you can ‘t do anything.  Thank goodness Ryan (Hunter-Reay had a good race, he was keeping me excited. I stayed out there the last 15 laps with the safety crew, who are awesome by-the-way. They were trying everything to get me back. It was just awesome to watch Ryan get the win. Happy for him. Two weekends in a row Andretti Autosport on the top step of the podium, and that is what it is all about.
 
“Certainly not the race that we wanted, but it wasn’t really our weekend at all. You know we had problems in practice, obviously the issue we had in qualifying, and then got hit on the first lap of the race. It’s too bad because I think the strategy we had with the tires was going to be a good one, and obviously the car was strong with Ryan bringing home the win. It sucked to have to sit there – praying for a yellow, staying in the car, hoping we’d get the car back to the pits and maybe salvage a position or two. But ultimately it didn’t work out for us; just one more thing that didn’t fall our way this weekend. We kind of laugh it off because there’s nothing else you can do at this point – put it behind us and move on to Long Beach, and try to put the Go Daddy car into a better position.”
 

NASCAR SPRINT CUP SERIES
STP GAS BOOSTER 500
MARTINSVILLE SPEEDWAY
TEAM CHEVY POST RACE NOTES AND QUOTES
APRIL 7, 2013
 
JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 LOWE’S CHEVROLET SS – RACE WINNER
FOR THE EIGHTH TIME YOU WIN AT MARTINSVILLE. EVERY WIN HAS A STORY. YOU HAD A HUNGRY GUY BEHIND YOU THERE IN CLINT BOWYER. WHAT WAS THE STORY OF THIS WIN?
“It was just a long-fought day. Martinsville stays the same over the years and you just have to dig-in and get into a rhythm and drive your own race and see how things unfold at the end and how things happen. Fortunately we didn’t have any craziness with two tires or four tires at the end. I feel like the fastest car won the race. It was a very standard Martinsville race; although I thought some guys might peel off and take tires. It was just a hard race. This race track is tough to get around. But we have a great notebook. I’ve got to thank (crew chief) Chad Knaus and all my guys and everybody back home at Hendrick Motorsports. I want to encourage everybody, if you didn’t go already today, to go to Lowe’s and buy some stuff. It’s springtime. Life is good. We’ve had two wins this year.”
 
YOU SAID WHEN YOU ARE GOOD AT A TRACK, SOMETHING JUST STICKS. HOW WERE YOU ABLE TO HOLD OFF CLINT BOWYER AND JEFF GORDON?
“I think the last stop or two we really got our car adjusted right and got some clean air and track position, which was very important. For a period of time there, I kind of thought Matt Kenseth was going to win this thing and he hates this race track. I couldn’t believe he ran that well here today. I’ve got to give him a hard time about that. Just as the day wore on and we got to the end, they were flawless on pit road and I did my job on the race track to maintain track position, and we could control the race at that point. Being stuck on the outside lane on a restart would have been the death of whoever was out there. Fortunately we had control of the race late and held off a lot of hard-charging guys.”
 
JEFF GORDON, NO. 24 DRIVE TO END HUNGER CHEVROLET SS – FINISHED THIRD
AT THE END, DESCRIBE THAT FINAL RESTART
“Well, we just didn’t need those cautions there at the end. I made a mistake on pit road and got us way behind. But, what an incredible effort for this Drive to End Hunger Chevrolet team. They had good pit stops and then they also made great adjustments. We were real tight there at the middle part of the race. And then boy that thing just took off. And on the long runs, I feel like we had the best car. But you know those cautions are going to come out there. We tried to free it up. We just didn’t get it quite freed-up enough. So, I was just trying to get the front end to cut and I knew that we just didn’t quite have it. We just needed more laps there at the end. Congratulations to Jimmie (Johnson, race winner) though; yes he is so impressive here but the thing that impresses me the most are those darn poles! Where did that come from? He used to at least give us a shot when he would qualify like 15th. So when those guys get that number one pit stall they’re almost impossible to beat. It was a lot of fun. We needed that third place finish. So I’m very proud of this team.”
 
JAMIE MCMURRAY, NO. 1 NOVO NORDISK CHEVROLET SS – FINISHED SEVENTH
YOU HAD A REALLY STRONG RUN AND WHAT LOOKED LIKE AN EVENTFUL DAY WHAT WAS IT LIKE FROM YOUR PERSPECTIVE?
“We had a really good car at the beginning of the race.  Even if we fell back I could get back in the top five and then after that little incident we got in.  I don’t know, I thought the car was going to be better without the bumper cover on it.  In the wind tunnel that is a big advantage.  I was actually kind of pumped up that it got ripped off.  The car just wasn’t as good after that.  I think the track, even though you couldn’t see rubber, the track got tighter and tighter as the race went on.  We adjusted for it, but just didn’t have enough speed there at the end.  Made a good pit call at the end and got a couple of extra spots.  That was a really good day for us.”
 
DANICA PATRICK, NO. 10 GODADDY.COM CHEVROLET SS – FINISHED 12TH
YOUR FIRST TIME AT MARTINSVILLE SPEEDWAY.  DID YOU IMPRESS YOURSELF?
“I don’t know. I think you take what the car gives you and Tony Gibson (crew chief) has a really good track record here, he is a great crew chief, and my car was good all day.   We kind of balanced her out after being a little loose to a little tight but we got the GoDaddy.com car back up there.  We obviously went down real early with that spin and then were two laps down at one point.  So I feel that is one of the things that I am most proud about is coming back from two laps down and being on the last lap.   Then grabbing a 12th place finish in the end was good and I think it was the right call to stay out because I don’t think tires were quite worth enough to pit, so it was a good run today.”  
 
TELL US ABOUT THE END OF THE RACE
“Yeah, well, never being at Martinsville before, I didn’t know what to expect. All I knew was that it was going to be a little bit crazy. The bumping and banging sure gets going. I tried to guard the inside right there at the end and then (Brian) Vickers gave me a bump and I get it. I was trying to defend and hold my position. We still came away with a 12th place finish. It was good to do that for GoDaddy and obviously Hendrick Engines was very strong today. I felt like I made a lot of passes. I feel like I just passed all day. But I’m sure a lot of people do that on a short track. It was a nice day for us. It was nice to have a good weekend. We’ve had quite a few bad ones since Daytona. So, we’ll take this and get rolling into the summer because we don’t have a break until July.”
 
THERE WAS A LOT OF DOUBT ABOUT HOW YOU WOULD TAKE ON MARTINSVILLE SPEEDWAY. YOU IMPRESSED A LOT OF PEOPLE TODAY. DID YOU IMPRESS YOURSELF?
“I don’t know. I think you take what the car gives you. Tony Gibson (crew chief) has a really good track record here. He’s a great crew chief. And my car was pretty good all day. We kind of bounced around from being a little loose to a little tight but we got the GoDaddy car back up there. We obviously went down real early with that spin and were two laps down at one point in time. So I feel like that’s almost one of the things I’m most proud of is coming back from two laps down to being on the lead lap and then grabbing a 12th place at the end was good and I think it was the right call to stay out because I don’t think tires were quite worth enough to pit. So it was a good run today.”
 
KURT BUSCH, NO. 78 FURNITURE ROW/SERTA CHEVROLET SS – FINISHED 37th
WHAT HAPPENED THERE AT THE END THAT RESULTED IN CONTACT WITH THE WALL?
“Something let go in the brakes.  The brakes got real spongy and then the pedal went straight to the floor.  I had to turn the car to the right otherwise I was going to hit harder than what we did.  Fuel pump issue and then a brake issue, bummer day for the Furniture Row guys.  They work really hard and we buy a lot of the same parts all the big teams do we just had some bad luck today.”
 
QUICK THINKING BY YOU TO PULL THAT FIRE EXTINGUISHER IN THERE ARE YOU OKAY?
“Yeah, just couldn’t get the window net down as quick as I needed to so we will look at exactly what that was.  It’s one of those things where we were running 38th 20 laps down what more can go wrong? But I will find it out there for sure.”
 

Ryan Hunter-Reay Wins the Pole at Barber Motorsports Park
 
BIRMINGHAM, Ala.  (April 6, 2013) – Defending IZOD IndyCar Series champion Ryan Hunter-Reay will start the No. 1 DHL Andretti Autosport Chevrolet from the pole of tomorrow’s Grand Prix of Alabama at Barber Motorsports Park (Barber). With a lap of 1 minute, 07.0871 seconds at 123.422 miles per hour (m.p.h.), Hunter-Reay went to the top of the Firestone Fast Six leader board with less than a minute remaining in the 10-minute final session.
 
Today’s Verizon P1 Award is Hunter-Reay’s third-career pole, and his first at Barber as well as his first of the 2013 season.
 
Making it an all-Chevrolet IndyCar V6 front row is two-time Barber race winner, Will Power, No. 12 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet, who will start alongside Hunter-Reay for tomorrow’s 90-lap race on the challenging 2.38-mile, 17-turn, purpose-built road course.
 
“Congratulations to Ryan Hunter-Reay and the entire No. 1 DHL Andretti Autosport team on winning the pole for the Grand Prix of Alabama,” said Chris Berube, Chevrolet Racing Program Manager, IZOD IndyCar Series. “As always with this exciting method of qualifying, it was tense down to the last seconds of the Firestone Fast Six, but Ryan Hunter-Reay and Will Power were focused and managed to deliver at the end to secure the top two spots. We are very proud to have Chevrolet IndyCar twin turbo V6 engines on the front row to lead the field to the green flag at Barber Motorsports Park for the second consecutive year.”
 
Helio Castroneves, No. 3 AAA Insurance Turbo Team Penske Chevrolet, will start sixth tomorrow giving Team Chevy three of the top-six starters in Round Two of the 2013 IZOD IndyCar Series season.
 
The 90-lap Grand Prix of Alabama will be televised live at 3 p.m. (ET) by the NBC Sports Network (Verizon FiOS 90/590, DirecTV 220, DISH 159 and AT&T UVerse 640) and broadcast by the IMS Radio Network, including on Sirius and XM Channels 211 and www.indycar.com. Race timing and scoring can also be found on

Chevrolet Drivers Score Double Wins in Rolex Sports Car Series at Barber Motorsports Park
Max Angelelli and Jordan Taylor Win Overall and DP; John Edwards and Robin Liddell Take Top Podium Spot in GT
 
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (April 6, 2013) – Max Angelelli put the No. 10 Velocity Worldwide Wayne Taylor Racing Corvette Daytona Prototype (DP) in the lead with 45 minutes remaining in the third race of the GRAND-AM Rolex Sports Car Series season.
 
The determined driver never stopped pushing, leading the final 33 laps around the 2.38-mile, 17-turn circuit to post his 22nd DP victory. Co-driver Jordan Taylor, who led five laps during the opening hour, scored his first DP triumph after winning twice in the GT division. It was team owner Wayne Taylor’s first win of 2013.
 
The Angelelli/J. Taylor duo led a trio of Corvette DP’s across the stripe to make it an all-Chevrolet podium in the DP class.  Alex Gurney and Jon Fogarty took the checkered flag in second place, with Gurney handling the driving duties for the final stint in the No. 99 GAINSCO/Bob Stallings Racing Corvette DP. In third place was Richard Westbrook wheeling the No. 90 Spirit of Daytona Racing Corvette DP with co-driver Ricky Taylor.
 
Bringing home the victory in the Grand Touring (GT) class were John Edwards and Robin Liddell in the No. 57 Stevenson Motorsports Camaro GT.R. Edwards started the race from the pole, and Liddell won the race off pit lane from the final stop, and held off a hard challenge to win by 0.733 seconds.
 
 “Congratulations to Max Angelelli and Jordan Taylor on their win today at Barber in the No. 10 Wayne Taylor Racing Corvette DP,” said Jim Lutz, Chevrolet Racing Program Manager, GRAND-AM Road Racing.  “And to John Edwards and Robin Liddell for winning the GT class with the No. 57 Stevenson Motorsports Camaro GT.R.  Both teams did an excellent job with pit strategy throughout the race, and the drivers in both cars held off stiff competition in the closing laps of the race to get their wins. It was an exciting finish, and we are pleased that the No. 99 and No. 90 Corvette Daytona Prototypes were on the podium as well. Race results like this are very rewarding for everyone at Chevrolet, our teams and our technical partners that work tirelessly on the GRAND-AM Road Racing program.”
 
Eric Curran and Boris Said brought the No. 31 Marsh Racing Corvette, to the finish in third place in GT, giving Chevrolet two of the three podium positions in-class.
 
 In the 2.5-hour Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge race, Stevenson Motorsports teammates John Edwards and Matt Bell finished second in the No. 9 Camaro GS.R to capture their best finish of the season to date.  Lawson Aschenbach and Eric Curran brought the No. 01 CKS Camaro GS.R to the checkered flag in fifth place, equaling their strongest run of the season so far.
 
“In addition, congratulations to John Edwards and Matt Bell on their second-place finish in the Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge race this afternoon,” Lutz concluded. “It was also a very tense race with an edge-of-the-seat exciting finish. Chevrolet had a good presence in the finishing order with the No. 01 CKS Autosport Camaro capturing the fifth finishing position.”
 
The next event for Team Chevy in GRAND-AM Road Racing will be at the GRAND-AM Road Racing debut event at Road Atlanta, in Braselton, Georgia, April 18 – 20.  The GRAND-AM Rolex Sports Car Series race can be seen live on SPEED, Saturday, April 20, at 4:30 p.m. EDT/1:30 p.m. PDT. The Continental Tire Sports Car Series race will run Saturday, April 20 at 11:30 a.m. EDT, with television coverage set for broadcast on April 27, 2:00 p.m. EDT on SPEED.
 
POST RACE OWNER AND DRIVER QUOTES:
ROLEX SPORTS CAR SERIES:
MAX ANGELELLI & JORDAN TAYLOR, NO. 10 VELOCITY WORLDWIDE WAYNE TAYLOR RACING CORVETTE DP – OVERALL AND DP CLASS RACE WINNERS:
 
THE LAST TIME YOUR CAR WENT TO VICTORY LANE HERE WAS 2005 AND YOU WERE A DRIVER, ALONG WITH MAX. NOW YOUR GET YOUR SON, JORDAN, HIS FIRST DP WIN IN A TAYLOR-OWNER CAR. CONGRATULATIONS:
 
WAYNE TAYLOR:
“Thank you very much. This team did an outstanding job this weekend. They worked really hard the whole year. Our pit stops are just terrific and Jordan and Max did an absolutely outstanding job. I owe this to the team. The team has worked so hard since the beginning of the season and, clearly, we’ve been better than the rest in the pits all season. Sometimes, you need to have a little bit of luck to win these things, but I just can’t say enough about this team and how everybody has elevated their game to perfection. A huge thanks to Velocity Worldwide coming on board at the time they did. You know, it was really a tough time at the end of last season trying to get everything together. I owe a special thanks to Paul Blakely, Enda McShane and Brian Stockman from Velocity. And, to Toshiba, who have stuck with us through everything we’ve done over the years. I have so much to repay them. And then there’s General Motors. Everything that Mark Kent, Jim Campbell, Mark Reuss – the support that they’ve put behind the series and behind these Corvette teams is just incredible. I can’t thank them enough. I’m just so happy for everybody.”
 
MAX, YOU LAST WON HERE AT BARBER IN 2005 AND YOU ARE VICTORIOUS AGAIN HERE TODAY. CONGRATULATIONS:
 
MAX ANGELELLI:
“Thank you very much. It’s been almost ten years and so I’m happy. After ten years, that’s good. Thanks to the team and to Jordan. They deserved it. They won the race.”
 
WATCHING THE LAST 15 MINUTES OF THAT RACE, IT LOOKED LIKE GURNEY COULD GET CLOSE TO YOU, BUT THEN YOU COULD PULL AWAY ALMOST AT WILL. WERE YOU JUST KIND OF RUNNING YOUR OWN RACE AND CONSERVING? WERE YOU PLAYING WITH HIM A LITTLE BIT OUT THERE?
 
MAX ANGELELLI:
“When you have the car to do that, it’s pretty enjoyable to inflict philological pain. So, I just enjoyed myself.”
 
AFTER THE DISAPPOINTMENT OF AUSTIN FIVE WEEKS AGO, HOW SPECIAL IS IT TO GET THE WIN HERE TODAY?
 
MAX ANGELELLI:
“It is great for the guys; not for me, for the guys. That’s it.”
 
THIS IS YOUR FIRST WIN IN A FAMILY-OWNED DAYTONA PROTOTYPE. HOW DOES THAT MAKE YOU FEEL?
 
JORDAN TAYLOR:
“Yeah, it’s cool. We had a strong car in Daytona and Austin, but it just didn’t go our way. Little things held us back. So, we knew we had it coming and it’s nice that it came this early in the season and that sets us up in a good position for the rest of the championship, so we’re looking forward to it.”
 
ROBIN LIDDELL AND JOHN EDWARDS, NO. 57 STEVENSON MOTORSPORTS, STEVENSON AUTOMOTIVE GROUP CHEVROLET CAMARO GT.R – GT CLASS RACE WINNERS:
 
THIS CAR STARTED ON THE POLE WITH JOHN EDWARDS AND YOU BROUGHT IT HOME TO VICTORY LANE TODAY, BUT IT WASN’T EASY. YOU HAD YOUR HANDS FULL OUT THERE IN THE CLOSING LAPS:
 
ROBIN LIDDELL:
“Yeah, we were under quite a lot of pressure. Alessandro (Balzan) was doing a good job in the No. 63 Ferrari was doing a good job. He’s not been in the series very long and we’ve already had a good few races with him and with those guys. Obviously the car was out front with John starting on the pole and that helped a lot. It takes the pressure off as the second driver. It’s not an easy track to pass around here and although the car was very good, it was key for us getting track position and trying to stay there rather than trying to fight out way through the field. The second pit stop was very key. We just managed to sneak out ahead of those guys. Great job by the team and the crew to do that and I had a pretty risky move in the pit lane just to stay ahead of him going down past their box. So, I figured that was going to be the key to the race. We obviously managed to come out ahead. We were certainly good on new tires and I think we were even better in the traffic. Overall, they
were very strong and they were closing the gap pretty tight and pretty quickly at the end there. So, hat’s off to all our crew and thanks to everybody on our side: Stevenson, Chevrolet, John, Mike Johnson, and everybody did a super job today.
 
“I think I gained a little bit from some track experience here. Obviously Alessandro has not been at some of these tracks and I think I just knew where to position the car and when the tires started to go off, I think I could cope with that a little bit better. He was a wee bit quicker in the end and obviously we were under quite a bit of pressure. But generally speaking, I seemed to get the breaks; and where I was able to stop a DP going by to get a run out of the corner and keep him between us, I was able to do that. We were looking very strong in the last section into the last couple of turns and I full expected him to have a lunge being made at me in the last lap, but he wasn’t close enough to me. So, all credit to the guys. The team did a wonderful job. In the end the guys did a super job in the pits and it was very, very tight on the way out because the No. 63 car came out of the box and I really thought we were going to make contact. I just my foot in because I figured that would be the key to the race, which I think in the end, it was. So a great job by everybody.”
 
YOU WON THE POLE AND YOU STARTED FROM THE FRONT WHERE YOU WANTED TO. AND YOU GUYS MADE IT WORK:
 
JOHN EDWARDS:
“Yeah, I had a pretty intense stint there because we chose to take tires and other people didn’t. So we were a bit faster but the tires were starting to go off as I was catching Jeff Westphal who hadn’t taken tires. And I didn’t think I was going to get by him without a mistake or some traffic, so I saw an opportunity with traffic and took it; and ended-up going sailing off the road, so I hope I didn’t give the team a heart attack doing that. But we ended up pitting behind Jeff and came out ahead. So full credit to the Stevenson crew and the tire change. We weren’t waiting on fuel for that stop. So the guys with the tires and Robin and Mike with the driver change, really deserve a lot of credit for taking that spot because if we had come up behind Alessandro, I don’t think we would have had a shot getting by him.”
 
 ALEX GURNEY & JOHN FOGARTY, NO. 99 BOB STALLINGS RACING, GAINSCO AUTO INSURANCE CHEVROLET CORVETTE DP – FINISHED 2ND:
TALK ABOUT THE DAY, AND THOSE LAST LAPS:
 
ALEX GURNEY: ON HIS RACE: “Well actually the last four (laps) we were on fumes there so I backed it way down. But for a while there, when I’d get free of traffic I’d try to mount a run on it and it seemed like I could gain a little bit, but he (Max Angelelli, race winner) did an awesome job. He never made a mistake. Hats off to him. We were about the same. I think if we were in the lead, we probably would have won, as well. But anyway, it was a good solid race and a great points day, for sure.”
 
JON FOGARTY: ON HIS RACE: “The opening part of my stint was great.  The car was really perfect and I was able to open up a gap and kind of maintain my pace.  Then a yellow came out, people kind of mixed up their strategies, and we came out in the middle of the field.  Working our way through traffic we came up upon a bunch of slower cars and I just picked the wrong line. I ended up following a GT car through the grass and was just fighting from there. We had a good clean race. The 10 car went around the outside of me for position, it was a good move, but I feel like that is what put us in second place. It would have been great to win, but we are conscious of the fact that we play for championships.  Podium points are solid and this moves us closer to the championship.”
 
RICHARD WESTBROOK AND RICKY TAYLOR, NO. 90 SPIRIT OF DAYTONA RACING, VISITFLORIDA.COM/GOPRO CORVETTE DP – FINISHED 3RD:
RICKY TAYLOR RAN PRETTY LONG THERE AND PUSHED THE FUEL ENVELOPE IN THE FIRST RUN, BUT YOU PICKED IT UP. DID YOU HAVE ENOUGH TO TRY TO GET TO VICTORY LANE?
 
RICHARD WESTBROOK: “No, we were pretty much out of fuel; but that’s car racing. Sometimes you’ve got to play the fuel-mileage game. It’s a real shame when you’re driving because you know how good the car is and you’ve got to save fuel. Even with saving fuel, we could race them up to a point and then there was no point and we’d get overtaken in fuel-saving mode. So, we backed-off and brought it home. Good points and I think when we wake up tomorrow we’ll all be happy.”
 
ON HIS RACE:  “It’s good to get our season going with some points.  A little bit disappointed because we had a really good car, like we always do here.  When we wake up tomorrow we will be happy with the points when we look at the points table because it looks a lot stronger for us.  The team did a great job.  Just a little bit unlucky with the strategy. We had to save a lot of fuel during the race, which is part of sports car racing, but it’s not nice when you drive in it and you know the car is good. You want to race, but you’ve got to back off just to get around.  That is what makes this sport so interesting sometimes the strategy that is played out.”  
 
RICKY TAYLOR:
ON HIS RACE:  “We had a good car and thought pit stops and strategy were really good.  I was a bit disappointed with the way I drove today. It was a good day.  I think we can build on it in Atlanta.  It’s good to have a podium after a rough start to the season.”
 
MORE: “The car was really fast in clean air. I felt like we were definitely as good as the 99 and then the 10 and 01 didn’t have the pace we did for sure. I was a bit frustrated with myself in traffic and I kind of let them get away. But at the end of the day it’s a good podium and I think we can build on this for the rest of the year.”
 
CONTINENTAL TIRE SPORTS CAR CHALLENGE:
 
JOHN EDWARDS AND MATT BELL, NO. 9 STEVENSON MOTORSPORTS CAMARO GS.R, FINISHED 2ND:
 
JOHN EDWARDS: ON HIS RACE: “It’s the elusive double win (referring to his win earlier in the day in the Rolex Sports Car Series GT class). Bill (Auberlin) has been able to do it twice, and I’ve come close once before, and can’t pull it off quite yet. I hate sound depressed to finish second, but when you are leading with 20 – 30 minutes to go, and just make a rookie mistake, I just missed a shift and let Hugh (Plumb) right by. Hugh drove great. After the restart, I got in a scrap with David Empringham. We had some contact in (turn) five, which is fine; we were side-to-side. Then going down the straightaway, he just turned right into me. So, don’t know what he was doing.”
 
MATT BELL: ON HIS RACE: “We didn’t have a car for second place. To come away with it is really, really impressive. Not enough can be said about the Stevenson team. Really, I mean…when I started driving the car, it was really good for two laps, but I was in traffic and couldn’t capitalize on it. We had a pretty good lap, but they just immediately faded. One I got a handle on it; the car was just getting looser and looser, just almost to the point of being un-drivable. They made a decision to make a change, and the change was perfect. The next stint they made another change, so John’s drive was even better. Then again, on the final stint, they made more changes.  Like I said, we didn’t have a second place car; to come away with it is really impressive.”
 
LAWSON ASCHENBACH AND ERIC CURRAN, NO. 01 CKS AUTOSPORT CAMARO GS.R, FINISHED 5TH:
 
LAWSON ASCHENBACH: ON HIS RACE: “We actually had a really good Team Chevy CKS Autosport Camaro. But, we just really had nothing for them today; it was a little bit frustrating. We got put back a little bit on our last stop; we took four tires instead of two. It’s hard to come back here with track position. Considering everything that happened, and what happened with
Eric in the beginning of the race, I’m pretty happy with fifth place. A little bit disappointed, but to get out of here with a fifth…hopefully we will just regroup and get a little bit better for Road Atlanta.”
 
ERIC CURRAN: ON HIS RACE: “The race was good. The Continental Tire Series is always tough, but this Team Chevy No. 01 CKS Camaro was great all day long. I got tangled up with an ST car early running in the top-five, but got back up to the fourth position. Lawson did a great job finishing up in fifth. We needed the points. We had a tough race at COTA. We’re excited to finish in the top-five. With the other Camaro, the Stevenson car, in second, It has been a good day overall for Chevrolet. We finished third with Corvette in the GT class of the Rolex race earlier. There were a lot of Chevrolets on the podium today, so I’m excited for that.”
 
POST ROLEX SPORTS CAR SERIES RACE WINNER’S PRESS CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPT:
 
MAX ANGELELLI AND JORDAN TAYLOR, NO. 10 VELOCITY WORLDWIDE WAYNE TAYLOR RACING CORVETTE DP – OVERALL AND DP WINNERS
TELL US A LITTLE BIT ABOUT THE RACE FROM YOUR PERSPECTIVE:
MAX ANGELELLI: “For my side it was kind of easy because I only had to maintain the gap looking after the tires so I really babysitting the tires all along.  The car was great.  Jordan (Taylor, co-driver) allowed me to have such a race.  Easy race, easy stint because he put the car in such a good position ahead of the No. 99 that really helped.  On top of it the team really made a good call.  I never thought about it and I was the one pushing the team for only a one stop race but they, as usual, they didn’t listen to me.  So we won the race.”
 
TELL US ABOUT YOUR FIRST ROLEX DP WIN:
JORDAN TAYLOR: “It was a pretty exciting day I would say.  I would say the first 10-15 minutes before that first yellow wasn’t great for me.  I got caught in a bit of GT traffic with (Memo) Rojas.  We were also saving a little bit of fuel at that point.  I knew if the yellow had come and we had to take a stop we would be in a good position to jump them maybe and our guys are always strong in the pits so we were able to get back by them, but we lost a lot of track position.  I think we were sixth or seventh in line, but the car was super strong.  We were able to kind of maintain a decent pace and pick off guys not aggressively and not taking high risk it was kind of in traffic.  I think when I got Jon (Fogarty) he was held up by a GT car over the hill and I was able to get around him.  I don’t remember a couple of the other ones, but Ricky (Taylor) was another one, he got held up by one of the Nonnamakers I think and I was able to get around him.  It was exciting.  When you are in the car for that kind of a period of time you don’t really know what is going on around you.  I didn’t know where we were track position wise or fuel wise when we put Max (Angelelli, co-driver) in.  So once I got out of the car, spoke to the guys, heard that we had a decent gap and we were the only ones at that point fully fueled to get to the end I was pretty excited.  Those last 50 minutes were pretty stressful.  I’m used to finishing the races in GT so it’s a little different on this side, but it was good.  Max did a great job.”
 
CORVETTE HAS FINISHED 1, 2, 3 TODAY AND QUALIFIED PRETTY WELL.  WHAT ABOUT THIS TRACK SUITS THEM?
MAX ANGELELLI: “Probably we have the best teams.  Chevy had the best teams.  That is what I think and best drivers.”
 
JORDAN TAYLOR: “We definitely have strong teams, good strategy and like if you look at the driving pairing in the Corvettes compared to the Riley’s it is pro/pros in most of the Corvettes and pro/am in most of the other cars.  I think if you look at the fastest laps the Riley’s were right there.  I think Brendan Harley even had the fastest lap of the race.  Over a lap over a stint I think if you have pro/pros in both cars it’s going to be a fight at the end.  I think the only difference was it was an all green race and the pro/pro line-ups made that gap at the beginning where it mattered.  I think that is kind of where you see the difference.”
 
THERE WAS PRETTY MUCH A LACK OF DRY RUNNING TIME FOR MOST OF THE WEEKEND.  DID THE CAR FEEL AS WHAT YOU EXPECTED IT TO BE OR DO YOU THINK THERE COULD HAVE BEEN IMPROVEMENTS IF YOU HAD MORE DRY TIME?
JORDAN TAYLOR: “I think there were definitely rooms for improvement. Qualifying was basically the only dry session we had.  It was basically my first time back in the DP here in a couple of years.  I don’t think my feedback was that accurate.  We didn’t really want to take a risk on a change before the race.  We knew we had a decent car.  We qualified third so we were safe in that respect, but I was able to have good running in the race and Max (Angelelli, co-driver) only drove in the wet the whole weekend.  His first dry lap was actually his first lap in the race.  He had to adapt pretty quickly and not lose that gap that we had already.  It was an exciting day, a lot of firsts for everyone.  I’m just glad we were able to get through it the way we did.”
 
IN REGARDS TO THE TRACK SURFACE:
JORDAN TAYLOR: “It’s always nicer when you have more grip and compared to last year we had the predicted lap on the dash from the year before and that is always nice to see that ticking down the whole way around the lap.  The new Continental tire was much better as well so we were able to push throughout the stint and not really have to maintain a pace.  That made I think the racing more exciting.”
 
WITH ALEX GURNEY HOUNDING YOU TOWARD THE END WHAT DID YOU HAVE TO DO DIFFERENTLY TO HOLD HIM OFF?  WERE YOU AWARE OF HOW CLOSE HE WAS?
MAX ANGELELLI: “No, I wasn’t worried.  I knew what I had.  My car was so strong.  I could pull away. I think I show it to him.  There was not a worry. I had the situation in my hands and just managed the gap.  I just kept him around two seconds I guess.  That is it. Our car was really good.  It’s been a good weekend.”
 
THEY GROUND THE TRACK DOWN AND YOU HAD A NEW TIRE COMPOUND THIS WEEKEND.  HOW DID THAT COMBINATION WORK OUT FOR YOU GUYS TODAY?  WHAT DID YOU THINK DIFFERENTLY FROM LAST YEAR?
MAX ANGELELLI: “Continental delivered a great tire compound. Finally they were able to decide their own destiny changing the tires.  It was about time.  Finally we can practice; finally we can race hard so that was great. Now we have good tires and we can push all the way to the end.”
 
HOW DOES IT FEEL TO GET YOUR FIRST DP WIN?  WITH YOUR BROTHER ON THE PODIUM HOW WILL THE FAMILY GO ABOUT CELEBRATING THIS EVENING?
JORDAN TAYLOR: “I don’t know if he will be celebrating as much as us.  We both want to win, but it’s cool that we were both on the podium.  I know he probably wanted to be on the top step like we are and vice versa.  If I was in his position I would want the same.  Our brother relationship isn’t really like other brother relationships.  We don’t look at it as a competitor wanting to kill each other out there.  I think you can see from both races that we race respectably.  Same with (Jon) Fogarty we never touched once in Austin or here.  It’s good racing and we know one of us is going to be better one weekend the other is going to be better the other weekend.  I don’t think any comparisons need to be made.  I think someone is going to have a good day and a bad day and the other day is going to be vice versa.  We enjoy it.”
 
JOHN EDWARDS AND ROBIN LIDDELL, NO. 57 STEVENSON MOTORSPORTS CAMARO GT.R – GT WINNERS
IN REGARDS TO HOW THE RACE UNFOLDED:
JOHN EDWARDS: “I had the first stint, then we pitted and took tires and a l
ot of people didn’t so I had to try to work my way through the field and I think that was still the right call because we saw Boris (Said) struggling on his tires at the end of his stint and lost a lot of track time.  I think that was the right call, but it did put us back in traffic and I had to work hard to make that up.  Made a pretty opportunistic move with some traffic when I caught Jim Norman was trying to go around the outside of (Jeff) Westphal while he was inside Jim Norman and went sailing off at the exit of turn four.  That was maybe not my wisest decision, but in a two hour race we are flat out the whole time and you know that those positions are really going to matter.  In the end I didn’t get by him and pitted from P2 (position 2) and the crew did an awesome stop.  We were a bit concerned that driver changes it’s tough to do within the tires and the driver change went perfectly and got done before the tires.  The crew did a great job on the tire change.  Dropped the car and beat the No. 63 out of pit lane and that was really the key to the race.  After that Robin (Liddell) with two maybe dry laps in practice went out and did a 27.7 on his first lap and then held off (Balzan ) Alessandro the whole time.  Excellent job by him as well.”
 
ROBIN LIDDELL: “Although it was a short race and reasonable uneventful from my point of view I felt under quite a lot of pressure.  Obviously, same sort of deal for everybody this weekend.  It was a wet weekend up until qualifying.  Although I did a couple of laps at the end of that final practice it really wasn’t completely dry.  Obviously, the track has changed quite a bit.  I think the testing that we did here in November helped us quite a lot.  Or helped me at least just being able to go out and get into the groove straight away.  I knew that was important plus with only fourteen minutes or so to go, fifteen minutes I guess maybe.  I felt the pressure of being able to go out and basically stay in front of those guys, but got into a good rhythm pretty quickly.  The car felt good.  The track has improved quite a lot from our point of view although there is some fall off in the tire degradation it’s not as bad as it used to be so it’s definitely a step forward.  That is a credit to the team here at the track for dealing with that and the Continental guys.  Obviously, John (Edwards) as usual did a good job, got the car on pole, drove a really good stint and really I think it came down to the guys in the pits.  We had a pretty good second pit stop and I came down pit lane and the Ferrari had dropped and started to go.  He came out at quite an angle, but of course by that time I was doing 45 (mph) and I just literally thought to myself ‘if he comes out I am just going to crash into him.’ There was no way I was lifting I just had to stay on the outside lane.  I wasn’t willing to lift.  I figured at that point if he got ahead of us in the pit that probably was going to be the game changer.  We managed to stay ahead and we were pretty strong on new tires actually compared to them.  I think in the traffic as well we were able to keep them at bay quite effectively.  I think in some respects they have proven themselves to be pretty strong competitors already.  We have had a few tight races with them so far in the short time they have been in the series, but also in terms of our experience here at this race track and on fading tires with traffic, etc.  I think that did play out a little bit to my advantage and was able to choose my moments better and keep the advantage in the traffic situation.  All in all very happy, I must say I wasn’t expecting to come out of here with a win.  I really thought we were going to have a tough time this weekend.  Very happy for all the team and everybody else at Stevenson and Chevrolet.”
 

Ryan Hunter-Reay Wins the Pole at Barber Motorsports Park
 
BIRMINGHAM, Ala.  (April 6, 2013) – Defending IZOD IndyCar Series champion Ryan Hunter-Reay will start the No. 1 DHL Andretti Autosport Chevrolet from the pole of tomorrow’s Grand Prix of Alabama at Barber Motorsports Park (Barber). With a lap of 1 minute, 07.0871 seconds at 123.422 miles per hour (m.p.h.), Hunter-Reay went to the top of the Firestone Fast Six leader board with less than a minute remaining in the 10-minute final session.
 
Today’s Verizon P1 Award is Hunter-Reay’s third-career pole, and his first at Barber as well as his first of the 2013 season.
 
Making it an all-Chevrolet IndyCar V6 front row is two-time Barber race winner, Will Power, No. 12 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet, who will start alongside Hunter-Reay for tomorrow’s 90-lap race on the challenging 2.38-mile, 17-turn, purpose-built road course.
 
“Congratulations to Ryan Hunter-Reay and the entire No. 1 DHL Andretti Autosport team on winning the pole for the Grand Prix of Alabama,” said Chris Berube, Chevrolet Racing Program Manager, IZOD IndyCar Series. “As always with this exciting method of qualifying, it was tense down to the last seconds of the Firestone Fast Six, but Ryan Hunter-Reay and Will Power were focused and managed to deliver at the end to secure the top two spots. We are very proud to have Chevrolet IndyCar twin turbo V6 engines on the front row to lead the field to the green flag at Barber Motorsports Park for the second consecutive year.”
 
Helio Castroneves, No. 3 AAA Insurance Turbo Team Penske Chevrolet, will start sixth tomorrow giving Team Chevy three of the top-six starters in Round Two of the 2013 IZOD IndyCar Series season.
 
The 90-lap Grand Prix of Alabama will be televised live at 3 p.m. (ET) by the NBC Sports Network (Verizon FiOS 90/590, DirecTV 220, DISH 159 and AT&T UVerse 640) and broadcast by the IMS Radio Network, including on Sirius and XM Channels 211 and www.indycar.com. Race timing and scoring can also be found on

Ryan Hunter-Reay Wins the Pole at Barber Motorsports Park
 
BIRMINGHAM, Ala.  (April 6, 2013) – Defending IZOD IndyCar Series champion Ryan Hunter-Reay will start the No. 1 DHL Andretti Autosport Chevrolet from the pole of tomorrow’s Grand Prix of Alabama at Barber Motorsports Park (Barber). With a lap of 1 minute, 07.0871 seconds at 123.422 miles per hour (m.p.h.), Hunter-Reay went to the top of the Firestone Fast Six leader board with less than a minute remaining in the 10-minute final session.
 
Today’s Verizon P1 Award is Hunter-Reay’s third-career pole, and his first at Barber as well as his first of the 2013 season.
 
Making it an all-Chevrolet IndyCar V6 front row is two-time Barber race winner, Will Power, No. 12 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet, who will start alongside Hunter-Reay for tomorrow’s 90-lap race on the challenging 2.38-mile, 17-turn, purpose-built road course.
 
“Congratulations to Ryan Hunter-Reay and the entire No. 1 DHL Andretti Autosport team on winning the pole for the Grand Prix of Alabama,” said Chris Berube, Chevrolet Racing Program Manager, IZOD IndyCar Series. “As always with this exciting method of qualifying, it was tense down to the last seconds of the Firestone Fast Six, but Ryan Hunter-Reay and Will Power were focused and managed to deliver at the end to secure the top two spots. We are very proud to have Chevrolet IndyCar twin turbo V6 engines on the front row to lead the field to the green flag at Barber Motorsports Park for the second consecutive year.”
 
Helio Castroneves, No. 3 AAA Insurance Turbo Team Penske Chevrolet, will start sixth tomorrow giving Team Chevy three of the top-six starters in Round Two of the 2013 IZOD IndyCar Series season.
 
The 90-lap Grand Prix of Alabama will be televised live at 3 p.m. (ET) by the NBC Sports Network (Verizon FiOS 90/590, DirecTV 220, DISH 159 and AT&T UVerse 640) and broadcast by the IMS Radio Network, including on Sirius and XM Channels 211 and www.indycar.com. Race timing and scoring can also be found on

Helio Castroneves Tops Speed Charts in Practice for Sunday’s Grand Prix of Alabama
 
BIRMINGHAM, Ala.  (April 5, 2013) – Today, at the conclusion of the first day of practice for Sunday’s Grand Prix of Alabama, Helio Castroneves, No. 3 AAA Insurance Team Penske Chevrolet, was at the top of the speed charts. His teammate, Will Power, No. 12 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet, was fifth in the final combined practice run-down.  Castroneves and Power are the only two drivers to have won races, as well as pole positions in the three previous races held at Barber Motorsports Park.  Castroneves has one pole and one win at the 2.38-mile, 17-turn track, while Power has two poles and two wins, including the 2012 debut of the Chevrolet  IndyCar V6 Direct Injected, Twin Turbocharged engine.
 
Other Team Chevy drivers turning in times that landed them in the top-10 were: E.J. Viso, No. 5 Team Venezuela PDVSA Citgo Andretti Autosport HVM Chevrolet – seventh and A.J. Allmendinger, No. 2 IZOD Team Penske Chevrolet – eighth.
 
The IZOD IndyCar Series will return to the track for a 30-minute practice session at 8:00 a.m. CT Saturday morning in preparation for qualifying that is slated to start at 10:25 a.m. CT.
 
TEAM CHEVY DRIVER QUOTES:
 
HELIO CASTRONEVES, NO. 3 AAA INSURANCE TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET FASTEST IN PRACTICE: HOW MUCH MOMENTUM DOES BEING FASTEST TODAY GIVE YOU GOING INTO TOMORROW? “First it is great to have AAA. I don’t know if you guys know it, but AAA and Turbo (the movie) are teaming up together. Which I have to say will probably help a little bit out there. It is great to talk about it so people, when they go out there, even that we go fast with Turbo, to not text and drive and don’t talk on the phone. Don’t forget to watch it July 17. That is the premier of the movie. I want to make sure you watch it because it is going to be a lot of fun. Be safe when you drive. I think it is better to be lucky than good. Obviously with the yellow at the end, a lot of guys probably didn’t put on tires. But the car felt pretty good. The AAA machine felt very strong this morning. Unfortunately, it was a little bit difficult because it seemed that the track has a lot of grip, and when you have an extra set of tire, certainly it helps a little bit. But, at the end of the day, with A.J. (Allmendinger) and Will (Power), we’ve been actually throwing a lot of different stuff out there, and it seemed to be working. Again, it is just the first day. There were a lot of weepers, if you guys noticed. If you didn’t, it feels like that even if it is warmer right now, the weepers are coming out a little bit more, and sometimes when you hit just the line, the car kind of does some weird things. But, I am happy that Chevy is working together. Hopefully we continue the good momentum.”
 
WILL POWER, NO. 12 VERIZON TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET, 5TH IN PRACTICE:  “We definitely have a bit of work to do with the Verizon car because we’re just off the pace a bit. We were running top five all day, but we really had to push to get there. We’ll get together tonight and work to figure out how to improve for qualifying tomorrow.”
 
E.J. VISO, NO. 5 TEAM VENEZUELA PDVSA CITGO ANDRETTI AUTOSPORT HVM CHEVROLET, 7TH IN PRACTICE: “Well it’s been a pretty good day. We’ve gone through different car setups, and at the end we believe we found a good scenario to keep working with the car for tomorrow morning’s practice before qualifying. The team has done a good job here. I believe we have a good baseline and fundamental setup shared between the four cars. Tomorrow is going to be very interesting, and we can already tell that this race, and this weekend, is going to be based all around tires. Tires is the key word – for good or for bad. We will need to be working very closely with them (tires).”
 
A.J. ALLMENDINGER, NO. 2 IZOD TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET, 8TH IN PRACTICE:
HOW MUCH HAS THE TRACK CHANGED CONDITION-WISE FROM THE OPEN TEST IN MARCH TO NOW? “When we got here at the test, for me, I was trying to learn the race track, and it was so cold, there was just a ton of grip out there. I felt like the first session was real slick compared from the test with the GRAND-AM cars here, and the Continental cars here, then obviously with just the rain, and no rubber really being down on the race track.  For me, it is just a process. It’s just trying to learn how these weekends go. Trying to keep up with the race track as it changes. It’s so funny…on the (NASCAR) Cup side of it; you have a set day of it. Friday you work on qualifying. Saturday you work on race set-up. And, Sunday you go race. Here obviously you are working on speed, but there isn’t a lot of time to work on race set-up. So I think it is just the process of going through the weekend; figuring out how the weekend goes and how we use our tires; what we are working on. So far, I felt like the first day was good. I think we were ninth and eighth.  I think there is still a lot out there in me. The cars are going to be fast. That is the good thing about the Penske organization, especially around this place. Then winning all the races. I know the car is going to be fast. I know the setup is going to be fairly close. It is just about me trying to go out there and figure it out. Figure out what I need in the race car. How I get the speed out of it. I still left a lot out there on that lap that I did. I think tomorrow, the biggest and toughest thing for me is that qualifying lap. Putting those reds (tires) on for the first time, and not having had any practice on them, and just have to go get that lap. It was a solid day so far.”
 
RYAN HUNTER-REAY, NO 1 DHL ANDRETTI AUTOSPORT CHEVROLET, 12TH IN PRACTICE: “I think it was a good solid day for the No. 1 DHL Chevy. I think that we made some good progress this morning. We were very disciplined with the tires this afternoon, not taking a second set, which is why we’re down in the charts right now – we never took the second set like most of the rest of the field. I’m feeling pretty good about tomorrow; we need to make a few changes to stay ahead of the track development but other than that… we’ll see in the morning. I think we’re a top five car right now so I’m happy about that.”
ORIOL SERVIA, NO. 22 CHARTER PANTHER DRYER & REINBOLD RACING CHEVROLET, 13th IN PRACTICE:  “I’m actually very pleased.  We woke up the car – it’s a lot more alive. I’m much happier than after the first session. We did our best lap on old tires. When we put on the sticker tires, the red flag came out so we didn’t get a lap in. It’s always a question mark how much we would improve on new tires, but everyone improved quite a bit. The pace we had on old tires was encouraging.  I think we’re on a good path, we just need to fine-tune it a little bit and the Charter car should be in good shape.”
 
JAMES HINCHCLIFFE, NO. 27 GODADDY.COM ANDRETTI AUTOSPORT CHEVROLET, 15TH IN PRACTICE:  “Today did not go as planned, but you get these days in racing. We had a couple of things go wrong in the first session, and the way the yellow fell in the second (session) we didn’t really get a proper run all day. I think we can get the Go Daddy car up there tomorrow when it counts. I think it’ll be a challenge, but that’s what they pay us the big bucks for.”
 
TONY KANAAN, NO. 11 HYDROXYCUT KV RACING TECHNOLOGY SH RACING CHEVROLET, 16th IN PRACTICE: “The track is much slicker now than it was during our open test about a month ago, which made our work cut out during these two sessions. We did some changes to car and got it going our way by the second session, but there is still a lot of work to do for tomorrow before we get to qualifying.”

SIMONA DE SILVESTRO, NO. 78 NUCLEAR ENTERGY AREVA KV RACING TECHNOLOGY CHEVROLET, 17th IN PRACTICE:   “The day was alright. I think we need to tweak a couple of things a bit. It’s definitely a little different from the open test, but I think we should
be alright. We haven’t gotten a lap in this afternoon so we have to work on that to get the gap tomorrow and get it in. I really think we should be alright. Hopefully we’ll qualify up front and have a good race from there.”
 
MARCO ANDRETTI, NO. 25 RC COLA ANDRETTI AUTOSPORT CHEVROLET, 19TH IN PRACTICE: “Not the greatest end of day result for the RC Cola car. Right now we have some room for improvement, but I feel that we will be in good shape by Sunday. We didn’t get a chance to do a run on new tires so we still have some unanswered questions. We’ve had positive results here in the past so I’m confident that we can get where we need to be.”
 
SEBASTIEN BOURDAIS, NO. 7 MCAFEE DRAGON RACING CHEVROLET, 20TH IN PRACTICE: “It was a very interesting day, we tried something completely different than we tried in the test a few weeks ago and got the same read. Coming out of the second practice we were not able to use new tires due to a red flag, but if we had we should have seen the results we are looking for. We still have some work to do, but we should see better results in the #7 McAfee car tomorrow.”
 
JR HILDEBRAND, NO. 4 NATIONAL GUARD PANTHER RACING CHEVROLET, 23RD IN PRACTICE: “The fact we didn’t throw a new set of tires on the National Guard Chevy at the end of the session today obviously has a significant effect on where we were at (on the speed chart). Another piece of that is that the track gets better as it cools off here and we were one of the first cars to go out when we did our fastest lap. That all aside, the track is significantly different from when we tested here, and we’re still trying to get everything dialed in. Between myself and Oriol (Servia) we both made some changes that we’ll all end up going to when we roll out in the morning.”
 
SEBASTIAN SAAVEDRA, NO.  6 TRUECAR DRAGON RACING CHEVROLET, 24th IN PRACTICE: “It’s been a tough day for the whole Dragon Racing team, we were expecting so much more after finding a strong pace in St. Pete. We know what we need to work on and we know what we need to bring tomorrow. It’s a matter of confidence and we have it, it’s just a matter of small things we need to fix. We need to keep focused and bring that #6 True Car tomorrow in a positive way as we did in St. Pete.”
 
ED CARPENTER, NO. 20 FUZZY’S PREMIUM VODKA ED CARPENTER RACING CHEVROLET, 25TH IN PRACTICE: “Both sessions were a little weird today.  The track had some weepers and, actually, the weepers were worse in the second practice.  That is a little strange.  The track has changed from the test last week.  We did learn some good things this afternoon.  We closed the gap a little on the leaders.  We need to get more.  We had a mistake on the new tire run, so I think we’ll be faster with the new setup.  I think we can do better on Saturday.  We were moving in a better direction with the car now.   This place is a hard track, and you tell it with everybody.  Someone will get a good lap and then fall off the next one.”
 
POST PRACTICE PRESS CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPT: HELIO CASTRONEVES AND A.J. ALLMENDINGER:
 
HELIO CASTRONEVES, NO. 3 AAA INSURANCE TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET FASTEST IN PRACTICE: HOW MUCH MOMENTUM DOES BEING FASTEST TODAY GIVE YOU GOING INTO TOMORROW? “First it is great to have AAA. I don’t know if you guys know it, but AAA and Turbo (the movie) are teaming up together. Which I have to say will probably help a little bit out there. It is great to talk about it so people, when they go out there, even that we go fast with Turbo, to not text and drive and don’t talk on the phone. Don’t forget to watch it July 17. That is the premier of the movie. I want to make sure you watch it because it is going to be a lot of fun. Be safe when you drive. I think it is better to be lucky than good. Obviously with the yellow at the end, a lot of guys probably didn’t put on tires. But the car felt pretty good. The AAA machine felt very strong this morning. Unfortunately, it was a little bit difficult because it seemed that the track has a lot of grip, and when you have an extra set of tire, certainly it helps a little bit. But, at the end of the day, with A.J. (Allmendinger) and Will (Power), we’ve been actually throwing a lot of different stuff out there, and it seemed to be working. Again, it is just the first day. There were a lot of weepers, if you guys noticed. If you didn’t, it feels like that even if it is warmer right now, the weepers are coming out a little bit more, and sometimes when you hit just the line, the car kind of does some weird things. But, I am happy that Chevy is working together. Hopefully we continue the good momentum.”
 
HOW IS YOUR FEEL FROM PRACTICE TODAY GOING INTO QUALIFYING TOMORROW? “I feel good. I feel like we have a great car; a great team. We’ve showed that in the last three years.  We just have to go out there realistic. I do feel like a lot of guys out there did not have the opportunity to put tires on. I feel like tomorrow will go fast, the track is going to get fast, especially with the red tires. Plus the way the track is going. I feel good. I feel definitely pumped for tomorrow. So hopefully we can put AAA in same spot we put it today.”
 
HAS ANYTHING A.J. HAS ASKED YOU SURPRISED YOU? “Absolutely not. You know, like I said before. If we put everybody in this chair, I guarantee you he is going to be the fastest guy out there, because he can jump in every kind of cars, and do really well. Right now. I have to give him credit, because to go there and only have a few tests in the car, and already start running there in the top-10, in this competitive series, that just shows he is here for a reason. For us, in fact the first session, he was able to, we were discussing a lot of things, and I was able to make some adjust in the car related to what he felt, because I didn’t have the opportunity to have two sets of tires in the morning. So, yes, he does help. And every time somebody out there especially with his caliber, it is always good to have more information.”
 
A.J. ALLMENDINGER, NO. 2 IZOD TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET, 8TH IN PRACTICE:
HOW MUCH HAS THE TRACK CHANGED CONDITION-WISE FROM THE OPEN TEST IN MARCH TO NOW? “When we got here at the test, for me, I was trying to learn the race track, and it was so cold, there was just a ton of grip out there. I felt like the first session was real slick compared from the test with the GRAND-AM cars here, and the Continental cars here, then obviously with just the rain, and no rubber really being down on the race track.  For me, it is just a process. It’s just trying to learn how these weekends go. Trying to keep up with the race track as it changes. It’s so funny…on the (NASCAR) Cup side of it; you have a set day of it. Friday you work on qualifying. Saturday you work on race set-up. And, Sunday you go race. Here obviously you are working on speed, but there isn’t a lot of time to work on race set-up. So I think it is just the process of going through the weekend; figuring out how the weekend goes and how we use our tires; what we are working on. So far, I felt like the first day was good. I think we were ninth and eighth.  I think there is still a lot out there in me. The cars are going to be fast. That is the good thing about the Penske organization, especially around this place. Then winning all the races. I know the car is going to be fast. I know the setup is going to be fairly close. It is just about me trying to go out there and figure it out. Figure out what I need in the race car. How I get the speed out of it. I still left a lot out there on that lap that I did. I think tomorrow, the biggest and toughest thing for me is that qualifying lap. Putting those reds (tires) on for the first time, and not having had any practice on them, and just have to go get that lap. It was a solid day so far.”
 
WHAT IS THE CONTRAST IN MINDSET FROM WHEN YOU WERE IN TESTING TO NOW WHEN YOU ARE HERE TO COMPETE?