Category: NASCAR Cup Series

MONSTER ENERGY NASCAR CUP SERIES
BRISTOL MOTOR SPEEDWAY
FOOD CITY 500
TEAM CHEVY PRESS CONF. TRANSCRIPT
APRIL 5, 2019

CHASE ELLIOTT PUTS CAMARO ZL1 ON POLE AT BRISTOL

BRISTOL, Tenn (April 5, 2019) – For the fifth time in his Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series (MENCS) career, and first at Bristol Motor Speedway, Chase Elliott will lead the field to the green flag for Sunday’s Food City 500 behind the wheel of the No. 9 NAPA Auto Parts Camaro ZL1.

Elliott’s pole is the 39th for Chevrolet at the high-banked .5-mile concrete track, the fourth pole for the Camaro ZL1 this season, and 703rd for the Bowtie Brand in NASCAR’s premier division.

For the second consecutive week, it is an all-Chevrolet front row for Hendrick Motorsports. Starting alongside Elliott will be William Byron behind the wheel of the No. 24 Axalta Camaro ZL1.

Giving Team Chevy three of the top-10 qualifiers is seven-time MENCS champion Jimmie Johnson. Johnson will roll his No. 48 Ally Camaro ZL1 off in 10th for the 500-lap race.

A total of 16 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 drivers will take the green flag on Sunday for the eighth race of 2019 season.

The Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway gets underway on Sunday, April 7th at 2 p.m.ET. Live coverage can be found on FS1, PRN, and Sirius XM NASCAR Radio.

PRESS CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPT:

CHASE ELLIOTT, NO. 9 NAPA AUTO PARTS CAMARO ZL1 – POLE WINNER
THIS IS YOUR FIFTH POLE, YOUR FIRST AT BRISTOL MOTOR SPEEDWAY. TELL US ABOUT YOUR QUALIFYING RUN
“I’ve been wanting a pole outside of Daytona and Talladega for quite some time now. I felt like I was able to deliver a pole to my team that really deserved it on way more than one occasion over the years and I felt like I haven’t done my part. So, it was nice to get my guys one, today. From that standpoint, I had a fast NAPA Chevy. I had a solid lap in that last run. I think Ryan (Blaney) probably threw me a bone like he messed up. Thought he had a pretty good lap going. We have some work to do tomorrow to be really good on Sunday. But, I think it’s do-able. The starting spot is great, but it’s also just a starting spot. I think the first pit box down there is probably a bit more important than anything. So, I’m looking forward to that. Our car has pace, so I think if we can get it driving good, we can hopefully give ourselves a chance.”

DO YOU FEEL LIKE THIS IS INDICATIVE OF THE RUN OF MOMENTUM THAT HENDRICK SEEMS TO BE SHOWING LATELY. DO YOU FEEL LIKE YOU GUYS ARE MAKING GAINS? THERE WAS A LOT OF FRUSTRATION OVER THE INCONSISTENCY OF THE TRACKBIKE COMPARED TO PRACTICE AND QUALIFYING. WHAT DID YOU EXPERIENCE?
“I definitely think when you run good or have good Fridays or good Sundays, I think that’s a product of hard work, regardless of how you get to that point. It doesn’t happen by slacking off and being lazy, that’s for sure. So, I think there’s a lot of hard work and effort going on at our shop at Hendrick Motorsports. This is a place where you get your car driving good, you can have a chance. It’s a great race track and a fun race track.

“As far as the grip-stuff goes, I feel like it was just like it’s been. It seems like it’s always taken some heat to get going. I don’t really feel like that’s anything new. The only difference was today everybody was in qualifying trim. We usually have two practices or a longer practice where guys run race trim and I think it gives it more of a chance. But for guys taped-up going out there running just a couple of laps this morning in practice, they’re not going to be willing to throw away their two or three laps before they get hot to make it good for everybody else. So, that’s just the way it goes.”

ARE YOU SURPRISED THAT SO MANY OF YOU SHOWED HESITATION DURING PRACTICE TO GO DOWN THERE?
“It wasn’t hesitation. It’s that it was really slick. And, you can only run a few handfuls of laps with being taped up solid running mock qualifying runs. So, it wasn’t that we didn’t want to go down there that we were super hesitant, you just couldn’t afford to throw away your laps for nothing, I guess, basically. So, you were better off moving up the track and at least getting a lap in and getting some sort of identifying what your car was going to drive like rather than throwing it away and running down there where it was still slick.”

FOR SUNDAY, HOW DO YOU FORECAST THE LENGTH OF TIME THE TRACKBITE WILL STAY THERE BEFORE EVERYONE MIGRATES TO THE TOP?
“I don’t know. I think it just depends. I don’t think it’ll take long. I think momentum tends to always win at the end of the day, and you sure get a lot of momentum running around the top here. So, I think it depends a little bit on the sunshine and whether it’s hot or overcast. I think that can either speed up that process or slow it down. But, the bottom has grip and whether or not they re-apply it after the Xfinity race, too. I’m sure it’s going to be fairly used up after tomorrow. My guess is that we’ll be up pretty quick.”

WITH THE RECENT SPEED THAT HENDRICK MOTORSPORTS IS SHOWING, ARE YOU MORE EXCITED NOW THAT YOU’RE AT BRISTOL ON POLE? WHAT CAN WE EXPECT FROM YOU GUYS ON SUNDAY?
“Yeah, it’s definitely a great Friday, like I said. I haven’t had many good Fridays in my career. So, I certainly want to enjoy it and having that first pit box is always a big deal; probably as big of a deal here as anywhere we go. So, that’s huge. And like I said, it’s not something I’ve enjoyed a whole lot in my career. So, I would like to enjoy it some more and yeah, I hope we can keep it rolling. But we’ve got to focus on Bristol first and trying to get a win sooner than later. I think if you have your car doing well and do your job and execute, this is a place where you can make a difference and I think we can compete.”

YOU WERE EIGHTH IN PRACTICE. DID YOU THINK YOU HAD A GOOD SHOT AT THE POLE OR WAS IT THAT THE TRACK WAS CHANGING SO MUCH WAS IT REALLY NO CLUE?
“It was hard to say. To me, the biggest thing was just the fact that everyone was brought way closer together time-wise. I think you saw that with everyone moving to the bottom. I looked there one time and it was like a tenth and a half from first to 13th, which is very little. There was very little room for error. Obviously that grip strip can make up the difference for some balance issues sometimes, if you hit it right, and I think that’s why it brings everybody closer together. Alan (Gustafson) and the guys made some good adjustments to kind of be prepared for that happening. Luckily, like I said, I probably got a bone thrown from Ryan there on that last round like he messed up a little bit. And we just had a solid lap and luckily it was good enough. I’ve been on the other end of that. I’ve messed up and had a good lap going, too. So, it’s part of it and I’m happy to get one today.”

YOU MENTIONED GETTING A POLE OUTSIDE OF DAYTONA AND TALLADEGA. PRIOR TO THIS, THERE WERE SIX TIMES WHERE YOU QUALIFIED SECOND. DID IT FEEL LIKE GETTING THIS WAS SORT OF LIKE THE WAIT FOR THAT FIRST WIN?
“Yeah, it was awesome. We joke about it regularly. That’s why we were excited to get a pole. It’s one of those things. We’ve had some fast cars at the plate tracks. Obviously Alan (Gustafson) has had a lot of success there long before I came around. So, that was really no surprise, I felt like, to anybody who keeps up with this deal. But, to come to one of these places I feel like I contributed a little more than I do at Daytona and Talladega for qualifying. So, it’s certainly something I’ve been wanting to do for them for a while. Probably one of those six or two of those six, we had a car that was capable of being on the pole. And whether I messed it up or whatever didn’t do it. So, it’s just nice to get that done. I haven’t qualified first very much and it’s something I haven’t been able to enjoy much in my career. Hopefully we can do it some more.”

DO YOU DRIVE A DIFFERENT LINE THAN OTHER DRIVERS AROUND HERE? “I don’t know, I haven’t really looked. Whatever it was, it was a enough. That is what really matters to me.”

IS JIMMIE CRAZY TO RUN THE BOSTON MARATHON? WOULD YOU DO IT? “I don’t think he is crazy. He certainly enjoys fitness. I think everybody has their way of disconnecting and getting away. You live in this world, and you are traveling so much and it is just racing, racing, racing. I think that is his way of disconnecting and doing his own thing to clear his head. It is something he enjoys and just so happens to be good for him. Kudos to him. I’m not going to run the Boston Marathon for sure. But I think it is awesome, and it is something he enjoys and it is healthy. No, I don’t think it takes away from his efforts on track at all. There is enough time to disconnect and separate and go do something you like to do, and clear your head and still focus on the weekends. As you know, we do this a lot. I think it is good for him to get away and do his thing.”

CHEVY STILL DOESN’T HAVE A WIN THIS YEAR. IS THIS A CHEVY DISADVANTAGE, OR IS IT THE INDIVIDUAL TEAMS THE ONES THAT ARE BEHIND. “That’s a good question. I can’t speak for RCR or those guys, I really don’t know what they fight week-to-week. From our end, sure, we have work to do. I can’t say…I’ll put it to you like this. The grass is always greener on the other side until you get there, right? So, I think blaming the manufacturer is the wrong route to go, and certainly isn’t productive. I think the more you sit back, and do your job and make the most of whatever you have, the better results you are going to have. Outside of that, there really isn’t much I can do about it. So, we will keep working to improve and wherever that side of things goes, it goes. We’ll try and do our best to keep up with whoever is out front.”

ARE YOU CLOSE TO A WIN? “I’d like to think so. I certainly felt like we were close in Martinsville. We were in contention there which is great. Not as great as winning, or getting the job done. That was a good event. That was by far our best event of the year. Hopefully we can carry some of that here and give ourselves a chance on Sunday. It was 500 laps at Martinsville, and same here and its a long time and a lot can happen. If we execute and do our job tomorrow and get our job driving good, I think we can have a chance on Sunday and that is all I can ask for.”

Team Chevy high-resolution racing photos are available for editorial use.

About Chevrolet
Founded in 1911 in Detroit, Chevrolet is one of the world’s largest car brands, doing business in more than 100 countries and selling more than 4.0 million cars and trucks a year. Chevrolet provides customers with fuel-efficient vehicles that feature engaging performance, design that makes the heart beat, passive and active safety features and easy-to-use technology, all at a value. More information on Chevrolet models can be found at www.chevrolet.com.

Toyota Racing Post-Qualifying Report
Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series (MENCS)
Bristol Motor Speedway – April 5, 2019

TOYOTA STARTING POSITIONS
1st, Chase Elliott*
2nd, William Byron*
3rd, Ryan Blaney*
4th, ERIK JONES
5th, DENNY HAMLIN
17th, KYLE BUSCH
21st, MATT DIBENEDETTO
23rd, MARTIN TRUEX JR.
35th, TIMMY HILL
*non-Toyota driver

TOYOTA QUOTES

ERIK JONES, No. 20 Craftsman Racing for a Miracle Toyota Camry, Joe Gibbs Racing

Qualifying Position: 4th

What was your take on qualifying?

“We were close. We just missed it a little bit. The Craftsman Camry had good speed. We just didn’t quite have the balance we needed. That was good from practice. We didn’t really practice in the PJ1 so the transition into qualifying, we had to make some big changes and we did a good job of it. We just didn’t have quite enough. It’s good to start up front and get a good pit stall here which is really important. Hopefully it will play out good on the initial start and we’ll stay up there all day.”

A lot of talk about the bottom line coming in today with the Xfinity Series on track. Did you see it coming in?

“A little bit from watching there on tv and seeing where they were running. Overall I wasn’t sure what was going to happen. We practiced in a very odd line all day so it was good to have it finally come in and get a little normality back to what we do and we knew how to adjust, so we did a good job. I figured especially after the start of qualifying that we were going to be running down there.”

DENNY HAMLIN, No. 11 FedEx Freight Toyota Camry, Joe Gibbs Racing

Qualifying Position: 5th

How was the bottom line during qualifying?

“Once the traction compound came in and the Xfinity (Series) guys kind of heated it up, it really kind of took off there.”

With the way the top groove is so dominant here, would you be in favor if they did a choose rule at this particular track?

“I think they certainly could do a choose rule at a lot of race tracks where it’s an advantage to be in one lane or the other. When I think of Michigan, one that you really don’t think of, it’s a huge advantage to be on the top lane at that track. This track I think it’s a little more equal than some, but certainly a choose rule is something that I’ve always been in favor of.”

MONSTER ENERGY NASCAR CUP SERIES
BRISTOL MOTOR SPEEDWAY
FOOD CITY 500
TEAM CHEVY QUALIFYING NOTES & QUOTES
APRIL 5, 2019

TOP TEAM CHEVY UNOFFICIAL QUALIFYING RESULTS:
POS. DRIVER
1st Chase Elliott, No. 9 NAPA AUTO PARTS Camaro ZL1
2nd William Byron, No. 25 Axalta Camaro ZL1
10th Jimmie Johnson, No. 48 Ally Camaro ZL1
14th Alex Bowman, No. 88 Nationwide Camaro ZL1
15th Austin Dillon, No. 3 Symbicort Camaro ZL1

TOP FIVE UNOFFICIAL QUALIFYING RESULTS:
POS. DRIVER
1st Chase Elliott (Chevrolet
2nd William Byron (Chevrolet)
3rd Ryan Blaney (Ford)
4th Erik Jones (Toyota)
5th Denny Hamlin (Toyota)

The Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway gets underway on Sunday, April 7th at 2 p.m.ET. Live coverage can be found on FS1, PRN, and Sirius XM NASCAR Radio.

TEAM CHEVY NOTES AND QUOTES:

CHASE ELLIOTT, NO. 9 NAPA AUTO PARTS CAMARO ZL1 – Pole Winner
HOW BIG OF A DEAL IS IT FOR YOU TO GET THE POLE HERE AT BRISTOL?
“It’s awesome. I’ve really been wanting a pole outside of Daytona and Talladega for a long time now. So, I feel like I was finally able to contribute from my end a little bit more and get a pole that my team certainly deserves. We’ve got a fast NAPA Chevy. I appreciate everybody’s efforts at Hendrick Motorsports and the engine department and the chassis shop and everybody back home. They’ve been working really hard to try to get better and this is a big deal. We have some work to do, I think, for Sunday and we’ll go to work tomorrow and try to get it driving good for 500 laps. That’s a long time.”

THERE WERE SO MANY UNKNOWNS. SOME WERE TIGHT AND OTHERS GOT LOOSE. WHAT WAS THE DIFFERENCE FOR YOU IN ROUND 3?
“Yeah, we were kind of tight. Every round, I feel like we got tighter. And we were freeing up as each round went, too. So, I actually thought we got a little behind for that last round. I kind of missed my lap. I didn’t feel like I got a perfect one and I was frustrated because I thought it could have been a little bit better. And as tight as it was, I was looking there at one point and a tenth and a half was separating first through 13th or 12th. So, a tight field when I was running around the bottom like that and I’m sure it’s going to change a lot for Sunday. It’s awesome. I’m happy to get a pole. It’s really cool. But it’s just a starting spot. So, we’ve got to go to work for race trim. Actually, I am excited. Take that back I am excited to have that first pit box. That’s a big deal. So, we’ll go to work Sunday.”

WILLIAM BYRON, NO. 24 AXALTA CAMARO ZL1 – Qualified 2nd
YOU ARE ON THE FRONT ROW FOR THE THIRD TIME THIS SEASON
‘It’s awesome. To be one-two for Hendrick Motorsports two weeks in a row; I hate to be on the second end of it, but it’s still fun to start on the front row. I feel like we’re making huge strides in the speed of our cars and it just makes things easier at the track. I feel like (crew chief) Chad (Knaus) and I are starting to gel a little more. Thanks to Axalta and everyone at Hendrick Motorsports for this race car, and Chevrolet, obviously. This is fun so hopefully we can keep it going on Sunday.”

JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 ALLY CAMARO ZL1 – Qualified 10th
ON QUALIFYING:
“We had a great qualifying session. Practice was so different with the grip strip not really coming alive, and us running in the middle of the track, which is really rare here. I think we all knew deep down it was going to go lower or higher. The bottom came in due to the Xfinity practice. The car was great. Ran really well. Wish we could have gotten a little bit more. I think our lap count on our tires was ultimately high. It took me two or three laps to get my fast lap. We’ll have to work on that before we come back here, but top-10 starting spot here. We’ll take it.”

AUSTIN DILLON, NO. 3 SYMBICORT CAMARO ZL1 – Qualified 15th
YOU MADE A BIG JUMP IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION FROM PRACTICE TO QUALIFYING
“Yeah, we were way off in practice and looked through our notes. The guys did a good job dialing it in a lot closer. If I knew what I had going in here, I think we could have made the top 12. Some small changes could have taken us a long way. So, I’m happy with where the car was. We can really improve on that for tomorrow. Starting position means so much here. To start 15th, I’m happy with that.”

Team Chevy high-resolution racing photos are available for editorial use.

About Chevrolet
Founded in 1911 in Detroit, Chevrolet is one of the world’s largest car brands, doing business in more than 100 countries and selling more than 4.0 million cars and trucks a year. Chevrolet provides customers with fuel-efficient vehicles that feature engaging performance, design that makes the heart beat, passive and active safety features and easy-to-use technology, all at a value. More information on Chevrolet models can be found at www.chevrolet.com.

Ford Performance Notes and Quotes
Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series (MENCS)
Saturday, April 6, 2019
EVENT: Food City 500 Qualifying

Ford Qualifying Results:
3rd – Ryan Blaney
6th – Aric Almirola
7th – Joey Logano
8th – Clint Bowyer
9th – Paul Menard
11th – Ryan Newman
12th – Brad Keselowski
13th – Kevin Harvick
18th – Michael McDowell
19th – Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
20th – Daniel Suarez
22nd – David Ragan
29th – Matt Tifft
32nd – Corey LaJoie

BRAD KESELOWSKI, No. 2 Discount Tire Ford Mustang – IS THE TRACK MORE SLICK THAN USUAL? “No, not really – just more unpredictable than before.”

ARE YOU OPEN TO TRYING THINGS LIKE THAT? “Oh yeah. That’s good. That’s healthy. That’s how you progress and get better.”

WHAT KIND OF RACE DO YOU THINK WE’LL SEE SUNDAY? “I think it will be the same that it’s been the last three or four races here. The bottom will have a lot of speed for about 200 laps, it will wear out and then the race will be on the top for the next 300. That’s just kind of what we’ve been seeing and I would expect anything different.”

IS IT A DIFFERENT FORMULA? SOME HAVE SUGGESTED IT MIGHT RUN DIFFERENT? “I’m not a chemist, but I’ve heard those rumblings and either way I don’t think it matters what formula they put down it’s gonna wear out 200 laps into the race and then we’ll move up to the wall and we’ll race up there.”

CLINT BOWYER, No. 14 Haas Automation Ford Mustang – “It wasn’t the most spectacular thing in the world, but a single digit here and starting up front and seeing the front it’s a fun, fun race track. It’s a long race, 500 laps around this baby is a lot to ask – a lot out of your equipment, a lot out of yourself, a lot out of your communication, out of a lot of different things. Tomorrow will present a whole different can of worms that we’ll have to overcome and then on into Sunday, but on this track as they put this stuff down it just evolves. I was happy. Usually, we struggle on Fridays here and kind of get ourselves buried and it takes three-quarters of the race to get established where we need to be, and then you fight a bad pit stall. Today enabled us to have a little bit better opportunities at a lot of those things.”

YOU SEEM TO HAVE AN IDEA OF WHAT THE PJ1 IS DOING. “No, I mean that stuff is wicked, man. It’s temperature sensitive. You hate to complain about qualifying and having to wait and everybody is like, ‘Well, they’re still waiting.’ We’re still kind of in a deal where you need somebody to get out there and get some temperature burned into that stuff and wake it up, I mean literally wake it up. Once it does, it’s like, ‘Oh, man. Here we are.’ You can see. Those first couple cars that go, they have their hands full. It’s kind of like being at the dirt track – every now and then you have to pay your dues and roll the track in.”

HOW LONG DOES IT TAKE TO GO AWAY DURING THE RACE? “I don’t know, we’ll find out. We’ll watch it as everybody will during the XFINITY race. Usually, the track will make a decision accordingly. A lot of times we’re worried about it and then we get rain and stuff like that that prevents them from doing that. I still think with the downforce and everything that we have in our cars I still think you’ve got a different outlook of a race regardless of the PJ1/VHT or whoever is sponsoring it.”

ARIC ALMIROLA, No. 10 SHAZAM/Smithfield Ford Mustang – “I chose not to wait at the end. I figured it was gonna get bottled up there with everybody waiting until the last minute, so I went right away and that was a mistake. The track had way less grip than it did the rounds before when I waited, so we went back out and actually went faster with only two minutes to turn our car around, so our car is really fast. I made a mistake by being the first guy out on the race track in that final round.”

RYAN BLANEY, No. 12 PPG Ford Mustang – WHAT HAPPENED IN THE THIRD ROUND? “I got greedy. I got greedy into three and missed it. I probably run about a .45. The first lap was our best lap and I just got greedy into three and missed it and then got loose out of it. We lost it by just a little bit for how bad I missed it, so just greedy. I ran one lap in every round, but messed up so bad the first lap in the last round that I had to run more and it just wasn’t as good.”

RYAN NEWMAN, No. 6 Wyndham Rewards Ford Mustang – “I saw some of the guys doing it in XFINITY practice, but didn’t expect to pick up what we did down there on the bottom, so that kind of surprised me and that’s what you’ve got to keep up with in this game.”

WAS THAT A PLEASANT SURPRISE? “It doesn’t matter. I wouldn’t have cared if it was right around the top three inches off the wall. I don’t care about that part of it, it’s just that you’ve got to keep up with the game that’s all.”

HOW LONG WILL THAT STUFF STAY IN ON SUNDAY? “I don’t know. It all depends on what they do and how they keep addressing it and dressing it, literally, with more – and what the K&N cars do. You just never know. You just go with the flow.”

KEVIN HARVICK, No. 4 Hunt Brothers Pizza Ford Mustang – “Our car was good I just missed my mark the first two laps in the center of the corner and just got out of the traction compound. It’s just as wide as the car and I just was a little bit too aggressive to keep it where it needed to be and finally calmed down the third lap and got a decent lap and just came up one spot short.”

HOW IS THE TRACTION COMPOUND? “Faster.” IS THAT GOOD? “I have no idea.”

IT SOUNDS LIKE THE PJ1 DIDN’T COME IN UNTIL LATER IN THE DAY. “Yeah, it’s kind of that and then they cut us so short on tires that when you get into a situation like this nobody is going to practice to save tires.”

YOU GUYS ARE GOOD AT ADAPTING. HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT HAVING THE PJ1 OUT THERE OR WOULD YOU PREFER JUST A NORMAL TRACK? “It doesn’t really matter one way or the other to me. I think you had two XFINITY practices to kind of just watch and see and in the end it just came down to me not doing a good enough job in the car. Our car was fine. I’ve run enough laps around here in the traction compound and up high to know what I needed to be doing and it didn’t really matter whether we practiced or not. I think that you probably could have enough cars here to probably have run before Cup qualifying, but I don’t make the schedules or anything.”

RICKY STENHOUSE JR., No. 17 SunnyD Ford Mustang – “Qualifying we were on the bottom. In practice we were in the middle until the bottom came in. It was really slick to start, so nobody ran down there in practice. It’s normal Bristol. Tomorrow we’ll probably move up quite a bit and move around and get the track even wider than it is.”

DID IT CHANGE MUCH AFTER THE OTHER SERIES WERE OUT THERE? “No, the bottom came in a little bit because cars got out there in race trim. We’ve all been in qualifying trim, so we didn’t have time to go just make laps and get the bottom run in, so the XFINITY cars got the bottom ran in and we were able to run down there in qualifying, which is a lot faster. We just missed it with our car. We were too loose in practice and then too tight there in qualifying.”

PAUL MENARD, No. 21 Menards/Sylvania Ford Mustang – “It was a solid day, a good starting spot. We were just too tight in practice and freed it up, but we needed to go more because we were too tight again in qualifying. Still, we had a nice pickup.”

JOEY LOGANO, No. 22 Autotrader Ford Mustang – “The track changed mostly through practice to qualifying with the XFINiTY cars. Us being the first cars out there in practice, we pretty much learned nothing in practice because where the line was was in a different spot, so you’re just kind of guessing on where you’re gonna run, what you’re gonna need in your car and what that’s going to change to the balance of your car. We tried to make the best guesses possible. I think we made a couple gains to our car, but, honestly, I think we would have qualified in the same spot if we just unloaded and qualified. It was a challenging day because you’re waiting for the bottom to come in, you’re waiting for the top to come in and we’re all in qualifying trim and not making laps helping any of that, so you just kind of go through the motions in practice and didn’t really learn a whole bunch. The good news is we’re not that far back. I think we’re seventh, so we’ll race from there.”

DAVID RAGAN, No. 38 MDS Transport Ford Mustang – “We just slowed down a tenth and we needed to probably pick up half-a-tenth. In this knockout qualifying you’ve got to run a little better each round to advance and I felt like we had a really good lap the first round. We made a little adjustment and didn’t have the cleanest of laps in round two and I think we ended up 22nd, so that’s better than 25th, better than 23rd, but not as good as top 12 or 14 starting spot. The track changed a lot today. We’ll have some good practice tomorrow I’m sure to tune on our Mustang and I look forward to a good Bristol race. Bristol has been great to me over the years. I love coming up here. It’s always a good show.”

DANIEL SUAREZ, No. 41 Haas Automation Ford Mustang – “I wasn’t very happy with the balance of the car, but we’ll see what happens tomorrow. I feel like tomorrow morning’s practice is gonna be a mass kind of thing because we’re gonna be everywhere, but hopefully in happy your we can be a little bit better.”

WHAT DID YOU THINK ABOUT THE PJ1? “I think it’s coming in for sure and getting better. The problem we had was after practice we made adjustments to run the top and we didn’t qualify there, so we just didn’t have the right balance to run out there.”

MATT TIFFT, No. 36 Surface Sunscreen/Tunity Ford Mustang – “It (the track) went through a big transition. That’s kind of what hurt us there was most of today we’ve been in the middle to the top of the race track, but it seemed like when the K&N cars ran a little bit earlier the grip strip started to come in some. We just missed it, being able to hook up our rear tires to be able to get enough throttle down and make a lap time, so it definitely went through a big transition from our first practice where you couldn’t touch it, so it’ll be interesting to see how that moves throughout the whole weekend.”

DO YOU EXPECT THE BOTTOM TO COME IN ON SUNDAY? “I feel like it will some. It seems like whenever you get the top super-rubbered up you can have a bit of a passing lane down there, but it doesn’t seem nearly as grippy as it has been in year’s past here. I don’t know if that’s because of the rain last night or this morning, but it certainly seems like it’s taking a lot longer to work in than it usually does here.”

MONSTER ENERGY NASCAR CUP SERIES
BRISTOL MOTOR SPEEDWAY
FOOD CITY 500
TEAM CHEVY PRESS CONF. TRANSCRIPT
APRIL 5, 2019

ALEX BOWMAN, NO. 88 NATIONWIDE CAMARO ZL1, met with members of the media at Bristol Motor Speedway. Selected questions and answers.

TALK ABOUT WHAT HAPPENED AT TEXAS? “Well, in our backup car we weren’t terrible in the race. We just ran over the commitment box, and that car didn’t have any of the new things that the other three cars had. We still had speed. We weren’t as good as them, but we weren’t…we were definitely better than we were at a place like Fontana or a place with higher tire wear. I think that track (Texas) suits our race cars a little more. It maybe exaggerated the gains we had a little bit. But it was definitely a very positive weekend for us.”

ARE YOU LOOKING FORWARD TO RICHMOND? “Richmond has always been really hit or miss for me. I love Bristol. I’m really excited to be here. That is a place that’s been really good to me. Richmond has really hit and miss. We had terrible races there. The first race last year we were awful. Then the fall race we were really pretty good until the last run. I think we were almost top-five in the stages. We were sixth in the second stage so we had great speed in our car and just fell off too much at the end. So we will wait and see. I love short track racing so hopefully we put on a good show.”

HOW DO YOU THINK HENDRICK MOTORSPORTS STACKS UP TO PENSKE AND GIBBS? “We are still a ways off from them. I feel like they still are better week in and week out. So while qualifying last week was good for our organization, we still didn’t go dominate and win the race. Chase led for a while and that was good. Jimmie was up front and William was up front. So all that was good but we still have a ways to go.”

IS IT ONE BIG THING OR A BUNCH OF LITTLE THINGS? “I feel like if I could accurately answer that, I could solve our problems. I don’t know; that is a tough one. HMS has been down for awhile. We won the championship in 2016, but it wasn’t in the fashion that we would have liked to. So I think, we got off base before William (Byron) or I came along.”

WHAT CAN WE EXPECT AT TALLADEGA? “I’m pretty curious. They put the tail extension panel on which made my car get really loose there during the test there. Even by myself I was a little bit out of control . They also are going to raise the ride-heights a bit so that will put more downforce in the car and we a little different. We were really fast in the test Daytona. Curious to see where the speeds are and how the cars race. It is so hard to say from a test with only three cars what’s going to happen. I don’t think we have a good idea about how it is going to race until we get there.”


Team Chevy high-resolution racing photos are available for editorial use.

About Chevrolet
Founded in 1911 in Detroit, Chevrolet is one of the world’s largest car brands, doing business in more than 100 countries and selling more than 4.0 million cars and trucks a year. Chevrolet provides customers with fuel-efficient vehicles that feature engaging performance, design that makes the heart beat, passive and active safety features and easy-to-use technology, all at a value. More information on Chevrolet models can be found at www.chevrolet.com.

Ford Performance Notes and Quotes
Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series (MENCS)
Saturday, April 6, 2019
EVENT: Food City 500 Media Availability

RYAN BLANEY, No. 12 PPG Ford Mustang – WHAT WAS THE TRACK LIKE AND HOW WILL QUALIFYING BE? “It was interesting. No one went down in that bottom lane and it looks like no one still is going down in it. I was kind of surprised, to be honest, but I was kind of surprised we didn’t go down in there. I hit once with my left side tires and it was pretty slick. You just need a lot of cars running on it to get it going. I thought the XFINITY cars would run down there with them being in race trim and get it rolling, but it looks like they’re not, so I’m not sure. I was kind of nervous. I was thinking, ‘Oh, these XFINITY cars and K&N drivers are gonna run down in it and then we’re gonna have to be in it for qualifying and I don’t know how our cars are gonna be.’ No one will because no one is running it yet, so I don’t know. You just kind of see and watch practice and kind of see where everyone is running and this might be a deal to where they use the middle up and they just go to the top and then we’ll all be at the top of the race track. It’s kind of interesting. The first handful of cars don’t go down in it and then everyone just says, ‘All right, we’ll just run the middle.’ It’s kind of weird how that flows and works, but you never know. It might work down and we might be in it in qualifying, you just have to keep watching.”

THREE TOP FIVES AND FOUR FIINSHES YOU’D RATHER FORGET. HOW FRUSTRATING HAS IT BEEN? “There are moments you get frustrated at it. You just wish stuff would stop happening. We had that run there of really good finishes like we finished where we had been running. I wouldn’t say it’s relieving, but it was nice to finally actually not have anything go wrong in those races, and then you look at last week leading the race and a part falls off and we end up blowing up. That part is frustrating. It kind of got taken out of context. I was angry and like the one story that came out last week was I’m tired of looking at the positives, and the good thing about it is we have really fast cars, so that’s always the positive. I kind of meant it as I’m tired of being in spots with a chance to win and just dumb luck happens and it just gets taken all away from you, so that part gets frustrating, but I’m really only frustrated for 10 minutes after the deal happens. You move on and figure out what you can do to prevent stuff from like that happening and then you focus on the next week because there’s nothing you can do about it after something like that happens. You just try to make sure it doesn’t happen again. The good thing is we’ve had speed all year and sometimes it can get frustrating that we haven’t won a race yet because, honestly, I think we’ve had cars good enough to win almost every single one of them – at least have a shot at them – and, yeah, more bad things have happened than good – but as a whole group, as a whole Penske group, we have to stay on top of the circle here. We’re at the top of our game and I think our cars are the fastest ones out there – us and the Gibbs guys seem to be the class of the field, and this all goes full circle. You’ll have slumps, you’ll have good times and you just try to capitalize on the good times.”

IS THAT WHY IT’S IMPORTANT TO GET A WIN NOW BECAUSE YOU HAVE AN ADVANTAGE? “Yeah, I think we’re in contention to win all year. Our team is capable of that, but when we have so much speed right now as a whole group, yeah, you want to capitalize on it. I mean, you want to rack them up as much as you can as quick as you can when you can, so that part kind of stinks sometimes, but I’d rather have fast cars and things happening when we’re in contention to win races than be running 15th and wondering, scratching our heads where the speed is at. They’re both frustrating, but I’d rather be in this position and you just keep having fast cars and running up front. You hope the problems stop and you hope you can figure out a way to try to pull through at the end of one of these races.”

IS THERE MORE PRESSURE BEING THE ONLY PENSKE DRIVER WHO HASN’T WON YET THIS YEAR? “I don’t feel pressure at all. Yeah, you want to be part of the group, but we have the ability to do it and it’s just a matter of kind of getting it done. Everybody knows that, my whole team knows and all of Penske knows and all of the competition knows that we’ve been one of the best cars all year. Yeah, you still hate to have a zero in that column even though it’s still really early in the year, but, no, the pressure thing I used to let get to me a handful of years ago and then it doesn’t help you, so you just try to stay pressure free no matter how good or bad things are or how things look, so, no, there’s no pressure just because Brad and Joey have won. You just try to focus on your deal and what you need to do to try to get your team in victory lane and help your teammates and your team the best you can, but you just try to overlook all that stuff and just focus.”

THOUGHTS ON RICHMOND NEXT WEEK. “I’m curious about that. We’ll have to see. It’s kind of hard to judge that. It’s been hard to really even, you know we haven’t been to a place like Richmond yet. Phoenix is way different. Here is way different. Martinsville obviously is way different, so Richmond will kind of be the first of its kind with this new package, so I’m not really sure how it’s gonna race with the cooler temps and being able to move around maybe a little bit more with these cars and things like that, so it’s kind of hard to tell right now, but I’m optimistic for it. Richmond hasn’t been our best place and I feel like we’re starting to turn it around there, so hopefully we can keep it going, but it’s kind of hard to judge right now. It’s hard for me to give you an answer of how the racing is gonna be, but I’m optimistic about everything. I think this package this year has shown some pretty decent races. It’s obviously worked the bugs out of it and things like that, but I think Richmond will be a good race. It always puts on a pretty good show there and the night race there, I think, is pretty cool under the lights. It should be a good one.”

DID YOU THINK YOU WOULD BE FASTER HERE WITH THIS PACKAGE? “What did we qualify last year? (15.0 or 15.1) We were 14.8. I feel like some of that. I feel like we would be a little bit faster if we were on the bottom. I think last year we were on the bottom right away and I don’t know what that was from, from the sun being out all day or just cars committing to it right away. I’m not sure. It might not have rained so much, so there as a little bit more on it. I was guessing we were gonna be running 14.6’s, so I was a couple tenths off, but I felt like we’d be a little bit faster if that stuff on the bottom was good to go, but, no, you can feel it. Two tenths here is a lot. That’s a lot faster than what you’re used to is throttle time and how hard you get in the corner compared to last year, but you knew you were gonna be up. I think speeds are gonna be way up here, Dover is gonna be fast – really fast with this package, so that will be interesting – but, yeah I expected us to be a little bit faster, but that’s just the way it is.”

SO DO YOU EXPECT THIS TO BE PHYSICALLY DEMANDING FOR 500 LAPS LIKE BRAD SAID? “This race is always tough. It’s a long race, one of the more physical race tracks that we go to – physical and mentally challenging – but as far as just holding on for dear life so much more than we were last year? Not really. I don’t really expect that to happen.”

MICHAEL MCDOWELL, No. 34 Love’s Travel Stops Ford Mustang – HOW HAS THIS SEASON GONE SO FAR? “It has been a rough one. Daytona obviously went well with a top five and then it was down hill from there. We really struggled with executing the races well. We had parts failures, pieces and made mistakes, so it was rough there and then last week it felt like we got back on our feet. We qualified in the top 15, raced in the top 15, ran in the top 10 a lot of the day and probably our best race to date – maybe not our best finish – but just overall competitiveness of the car and execution of the day and not a lot of attrition either, it was a really good day for us. So we’re excited to be back here at Bristol, where last year was a pretty tough go for us. We just have to do everything we can to get all the laps in.”

HOW ARE YOU LIKING IT WITH THE TEAM THIS YEAR? “I’m really excited where we’re at as a team and an organization. We haven’t had a whole lot to show for it, but my new crew chief Drew Blickensderfer is great. I’m really excited that we got him and he’s done a good job. We haven’t done all the things that we wanted to do, but it’s early yet. The season is still young and I feel like last week was good indication of what we could do and hopefully we’ll just keep building on that.”

HOW MUCH MOMENTUM DO YOU GET FROM A RUN LIKE LAST WEEK? “Momentum is something that’s really real in our sport. It is absolutely real. When the momentum is going the wrong way and when the momentum is going the right way. It definitely happens and I think more than anything is once you start clicking off results it’s not that it ever gets easy, but you just know what you have to do and you do it and then it just goes. It’s hard to explain until you’ve experienced it, so momentum is a very real part of our sport. It’s hard to get and you just can’t have any mistakes and that’s the biggest thing.”

HOW DO YOU DEAL WITH BEING A SMALLER TEAM AND REALIZING YOU MAY NOT HAVE A CHANCE AT WINNING EVERY WEEK? “I don’t think about stuff like that. I just want to do the best I can every single lap and every single day, and that changes. This sport is tough. There’s one winner and 39 losers every single weekend and if you look at an entire season, you guys will do the numbers better than I can, but what is it, 13 guys maybe that win a race – 13, 14 guys a year? It’s been like that for a long time, so you have to set expectations and goals and you just go out and try to achieve them. Now, Kyle’s goal is to win every race. That’s my goal, too. I’d love to win every race, but we know where we’re at and we know where we want to get to, so 15th last weekend, that was winning the race for us. We executed all day long. We did a lot with what we had and we hit it perfect, so you just look at those days and you build on those days. You just can’t let your highs be too high and your lows too low in this sport, otherwise you end up miserable and you can see some of those other guys are.”

YOU SEEM TO HAVE A BIT OF A SWAGGER THIS YEAR. HAS THAT ALWAYS BEEN THERE? “People have said that, I don’t notice it. I feel the same. I think more than anything it’s just, for me, if you look at my entire career this is really only my fourth season running full-time. I’ve been doing it 12 years, but those were start-and-parks and only running a handful of laps, so, to me, I just feel like I’m getting in the rhythm of coming back year after year with quality equipment and building on that momentum. You go and you run 15th and you run 13th and you run 12th and you do that over and over you go, ‘OK,’ you start to get that confidence. I don’t think anything has really changed other than just getting more seasons under my belt and more races. Like I said, the first half of my career was just getting seat time.”

IS THERE ANY KIND OF CHIP ON THE SHOULDER OR STATEMENT MAKING SEASON? “No chip. I know this sounds crazy, but I could really care less what people think. I really don’t try to do anything to please people because it’s empty. I mean, people-pleasing is impossible, so if you try to do it, it’s just an empty road. I just know what I’m trying to achieve and what I’m trying to do and I know my goals personally as a driver and I know our team goals and I know the things we have to do to achieve those and I just focus on those. I don’t worry too much about the perception because you can let that build you up and you can let it tear you down. It goes both ways, so I just don’t put a whole lot of value on it. I just try to do the best I can.”

WHAT DO YOU EXPECT THIS WEEKEND? “Bristol is always so challenging, it has been for a lot of years. There’s just not a lot of time to think about what you’re doing. You just get in that rhythm and get in that fish bowl and you’re swinging around here and it’s fast. It’s just a momentum race track. You get in the zone. It’s hard to do in qualifying trim, though. I got done with my first run and I’m out of breath. ‘I did three laps. It’s like 45 seconds and I’m out of breath,’ and it’s just because it’s so intense here you forget to breathe and you’re holding on and it’s fast and it’s fun. In the race, about 25 laps into it you’re like, ‘OK, if I don’t stop death-gripping this wheel, I’m not gonna make it 500 laps,’ so you just get into that zone and get into that rhythm and I feel like Bristol is the same Bristol. When you unload here it feels very similar. The extra downforce and all those things I think the cars are a little bit faster, but not a tremendous amount faster. I think the speeds were probably pretty similar just because that PJ1 hasn’t really come in yet, but Bristol is Bristol. Last year, I think I did a total of 10 laps here out of the 1,000 allotted and one was my own doing and the second one I had nothing to do with it. It’s just everything happens so fast. You can just have one of those races here like we did last year.”

RYAN NEWMAN, No. 6 Wyndham Rewards Ford Mustang – HOW DO YOU FEEL YOUR YEAR HAS GONE SO FAR? “I wish I was sitting here saying it was better than what it is, but I think we’ve progressed – maybe not to the pace that I was hopeful of – but I feel like we’ve progressed. Last weekend was a good race for us. We’re off a little bit here, a little bit there. The way the state of the sport is now when you’re competing so tightly against other organizations from a manufacturer’s standpoint we’re one of 14 Fords, so if you’re at all behind a little bit you’re behind 14 or more potentially. I’m not saying it’s bad, I’m just saying the way it is it’s really tough to have yourself be that top five percent. I think right now we’re the top 40 percent and that’s not good enough, so Scott, all the guys on the team chemistry-wise I think we’re getting better and stronger. I guess I never really thought about it before the start of the season, but this is the first time I’ve ever had everything new – I mean absolutely everything. Even when I started, when I had no idea what NASCAR Cup racing was about, we still did a bunch of testing. Here, we did one test for a day-and-a-half in Vegas and came out with a new car, a new engine, a new crew chief, a new manufacturer so to speak – not just body and aero rules, but a Mustang body. Everything was new and I think I underestimated that just a little bit, but in saying that I think we’ve done a good job of making ourselves competitive. We’re obviously on the outside looking in now of the top 16, but I feel like we’re more than capable of racing our way up and performing better each and every week.”

YOU DIDN’T THINK ABOUT ALL THIS CHANGE BEFORE THE SEASON STARTED? “I think you have a lot of confidence in all the things you have around you, the people you have around you. It’s like assembling a group to go to battle, like we all know our jobs, but we have really never done all our jobs together and I think I underestimated that just a little bit and that’s why I said chemistry-wise and personality-wise, what are we seven races together now? It has definitely gotten better and grown, which is good because it needed to, and at the same time starting with everything new it’s totally different than if we had been starting with last year’s package. If we could have taken the things that we knew from last year, whether it was Scott from Gibbs, me from RCR, the people at Roush obviously, it would have been so much easier, but it’s magnified our need to improve, which is good as long as we have our eyes open.”

THIS IS YOUR FOURTH TEAM IN CUP. DOES EACH ONE HAVE ITS OWN DISTINCT PERSONALITY? “I guess not a lot of drivers can actually have that conversation, but, yeah, I think for sure. I’m not gonna go into the exact details of it. I think it’s fairly obvious from the outside and it’s pretty spot on from the inside, but definitely different families I guess you could say. The mentality is still a lot the same. It’s racing. It’s do what you can to try to win and you’ve always got somebody in the organization that is full of excuses and you’ve always got somebody in the organization that is trying to overcompensate. That chemistry, that makeup is always there at all four organizations, but it’s interesting. It’s still fun.”

THE FORD PECKING ORDER. IT’S FAIR TO SAY ROUSH SLOTS IN….”No, I wasn’t saying it in respect to that. What I was saying was if say for instance if Ford goes to the race track with five less horsepower one weekend, there are 14 of us that have five less horsepower. Do you know what I mean? It’s more something like that. That’s not a dig on Doug Yates or anybody else, it’s just the facts are the facts. When it comes to us, which the post Texas wind tunnel results will be interesting and a great tool for us to learn from a Roush standpoint of where we are and how we shake out compared to those other guys.”

DO YOU FEEL YOU CAN COMPETE WITH THEM EVEN THOUGH SHR HAS FOUR CARS AND PENSKE THREE? “The number of cars, to me, isn’t so much of a factor. I still go back to the 78 winning the championship. It’s not a necessity to have four cars. If it was, Hendrick would be winning the championship every year and that obviously has not been the case, so I don’t see it as that’s the make up of how to become a champion. I think it’s all about the assets that you have and those assets are the people and the parts and the chemistry that goes along with everybody doing their job.”

HAS SHORT TRACK RACING CHANGED SINCE YOU GOT INTO THIS DEAL? “It’s gotten a lot faster. Going around here in sub-15 second laps routinely and racing 15.50s where we used to fall off to 17.50s is definitely different, but it’s just the downforce of the cars, the speeds of everything has made it more like Indy Cars. I don’t know if that’s ideal for me. I kind of liked where we were – downforce and driveability-wise and what we were doing inside the race cars as far as lifting and having to brake a little bit. My throttle time at Texas was 90 percent. Ninety percent throttle wide-open. It’s hard to out-drive somebody. It’s hard to out-brake somebody. It’s not gonna happen in that three-tenths of a second that lap. It’s just not.”

HOW IS THE PHYSICALITY AT THESE TRACKS? IT SEEMS YOU GUYS GET INTO EACH OTHER LESS AND LESS? “It’s a combination of things. The bumpers, the way they line up now, it’s almost impossible for us to spin somebody around. It’s like you have to drive through them and then knock a hole in your nose, where before you could just lift a guy’s tires up off the ground and kind of shake him out of the way. If he saved it, he saved it. If he didn’t, well, we’d talk about it afterwards. Now, the bumpers line up and we race so close to the same speed that it’s really just a challenge to race people, whereas before if you raced up on somebody and he blocked you or whatever, you just kind of moved him out of the way and it’s not that cut-and-dried anymore.”

WHERE ARE YOU IN RELATION TO WHERE YOU THOUGHT YOU WOULD BE AT THIS POINT IN THE SEASON? “I expected to be better than where we are. I think 37 other guys would tell you the same thing, but at the same time we are where we are. I recognize our strengths and I recognize our weaknesses and we just have to go out there and fix everything we possibly can and then some. The guys that are winning are still doing a better job the next week, so we’re behind the eight-ball, but at least we have a little shade.”

DO YOU AND RICKY TALK MUCH ABOUT DIRECTION? “I’ve spent more time at the shop this year – let me put it to you this way, I’ve spent four times as much time at the shop per week than I did in the last five years, which is bad and good because as a driver you’re spending time there because you need to make things better, but you’re spending time there to make things better so I think we have some really great meeting when we have our sitdowns, and layers of meetings – not just a meeting but layers of meetings that make us perform better and learn where we’re at and I think that we have much better potential of showing what we’re made of as we hit some of these race tracks the second time than we did the first time just looking at our experiences so far this year.”

HOW DO YOU LOOK AT RICHMOND? “Richmond is kind of an animal all its own because of the forward drive issues that you have there. We really didn’t even have forward drive issues at Martinsville, so when you go to a place like Richmond it’s probably gonna be there, but with the amount of downforce that we have not as much as we’ve had in the past. Usually, Richmond is all about forward drive and getting your car to cut in the center so that you’re not trying to accelerate while it’s still trying to turn.”

THE NIGHT RACING. DO YOU LIKE IT? “Yeah, I like night races, but it seems anymore we don’t get home until morning anyways, so our night races still kind of make you a waste the next day. It still takes another 12 hours to try and recalibrate. Maybe I’m just getting old.”

MONSTER ENERGY NASCAR CUP SERIES
BRISTOL MOTOR SPEEDWAY
FOOD CITY 500
TEAM CHEVY PRESS CONF. TRANSCRIPT
APRIL 5, 2019

BUBBA WALLACE, NO. 43 BLUE-EMU CAMARO ZL1, met with members of the media at Bristol Motor Speedway. Selected questions and answers.

WHERE DO YOU FEEL YOUR TEAM IS AT THIS POINT IN THE YEAR? “We are kind of behind. I think the biggest thing is dollar signs and over the years we have kind of tip-toed around that, but that’s enough of that. We are kind of behind on money. It’s all about being up front and being blunt. It’s coming down to a crucial time. I mean we just have to start running better. I have asked why would new companies want to come in and sponsor the No. 43? You can play the racecar number all you want. You will get a lot of attention, sure. But, for me, I’m competitive and look at results and new companies don’t understand that. The more money you spend, the better you do. It is hard to get their heads wrapped around that. Certainly not knocking the partners we have now. We are very thankful for every opportunity that comes our way. World Wide Technology jumping on for most of the season. The Air Force is there, so that’s nice. I keep saying we are doing a lot with a little. We look at practice speeds, and we are bottom half of the 20’s. It doesn’t look good at all for sure. It drives me up a wall. But we have to look at who we are around, and we are around the cars we are racing with in the points.

“Will we ever have the speed of the big teams? Yes, when we go to Talladega and Daytona where we are all equal. Other than that we just have to keep doing what we can. We are all working hard. I’ll keep working hard.”

HOW HARD IS IT TO STAY POSITIVE? “I just have to carry a positive light. I have to go back what my Mom always said, ‘Don’t give the media anything negative to talk about.’ So I keep putting a smile on my face no matter how mad I am.”

WHAT DO YOU THINK IS GOING TO HAPPEN WITH THE NEW PACKAGE AT TALLADEGA?
“Who the heck knows? We had three Chevrolets test at Daytona, and we were stupid fast around there. I know we are getting a new car for that race just because of all the new packages and changes that are going into it. But just like this weekend, we don’t know what to expect from it. Nobody went out on the bottom lane just because it was so bad. Qualifying will be different. I don’t know if Xfiniity cars got down on the bottom, I didn’t watch. But if they brought the groove in, then it will be a totally different game from first practice for us.”

IS THE COMPOUND MORE FRICTION BASED? OR DOES THE SUN HELP IT TOO? “I think a little bit of both. Any kind of heat, and then you start wearing it in with friction and getting the tires mixed in with it will definitely help. There are a lot of variables.

“This track was good for me last year. It was the highlight of my season. Not sure where we were in practice, but we have a good race car. Qualifying is qualifying. I’m not the best at qualifying. For the race we will get it dialed in tomorrow. So it is hard to talk about what we think about the race because we haven’t been in race runs yet. We will get it dialed in tomorrow. So like I said. Get the balance dialed in and go have some fun on Sunday. And see if we kind of inch up in points.”

Team Chevy high-resolution racing photos are available for editorial use.

About Chevrolet
Founded in 1911 in Detroit, Chevrolet is one of the world’s largest car brands, doing business in more than 100 countries and selling more than 4.0 million cars and trucks a year. Chevrolet provides customers with fuel-efficient vehicles that feature engaging performance, design that makes the heart beat, passive and active safety features and easy-to-use technology, all at a value. More information on Chevrolet models can be found at www.chevrolet.com.

MONSTER ENERGY NASCAR CUP SERIES
BRISTOL MOTOR SPEEDWAY
FOOD CITY 500
TEAM CHEVY PRESS CONF. TRANSCRIPT
APRIL 5, 2019

RYAN PREECE, NO. 47 KROGER CAMARO ZL1 met with media and discussed the season thus far, what improvements need to be made, the importance of qualifying and more. Highlights:

HOW DO YOU THINK THIS NEW PACKAGE IS GOING TO PLAY OUT AT A PLACE LIKE RICHMOND WHICH, IS A NIGHT RACE, WITH POTENTIALLY COOLER TEMPERATURES?
“Are you talking about bunching us up? I don’t think that’s going to come into play at Richmond. This is tough to answer. When you go to a short track, you see close racing because it’s a half-mile, right? There is only so much you can get away from somebody. You go to a 1.5-mile and you’ve got a lot more distance. So, if you’re five car lengths behind somebody at a 1.5-mile, that’s basically being a car length and a half at a short track. Richmond is a short track. So, I think it’s going to be the same. It’s going to be racing. You’re going to have comers and you’re going to have goers, depending on the tires’ attrition is. So, I think if there is some fall off in the tire, you’re going to see some guys go forward and certainly go backwards. So, it’s really just going to be no different. Yeah, you’re going to have a higher downforce but you’ve got a harder tire, so it’s going to basically balance that. I mean we have higher downforce pretty much just as much horsepower and we’re going slower here, I feel, right? So, it doesn’t change much.”

HOW IMPORTANT IS QUALIFYING GOING TO BE FOR SUNDAY’S RACE?
“It’s very important. If you have a very fast car and something happens, I think you can dig yourself out of that hole; but, if you’re a 10th to 15th place car, and you qualify 30th, you’re going to be in trouble. So, qualifying is going to be very important and I feel like hopefully we can have a good qualifying run.”

DID YOU SPEND A LOT OF TIME WORKING ON IT?
“We did two qualifying runs (during practice) real quick. We weren’t where we need to be right now as far as where we should be. So, we’ve got some work to do. I feel like we made the right changes and hopefully we can show that in qualifying.”

WHERE DO YOU FEEL LIKE YOU GUYS ARE LACKING THIS YEAR?
“We came out really good in Atlanta. It’s just a process of learning what you can and cannot do. I feel like we’ve definitely learned what not to do. I feel like we have cars that are certainly capable of running where we did in Atlanta. We’re going to get there. That’s what it comes down to. It’s only six or seven races in. It’s not like its race 25 or 20 and you’re scratching your head. So, it’s just everybody having a little bit of patience and support and we’ll get there.”

IS IT STILL MORE ABOUT YOU LEARNING THE CAR AND MESHING WITH THE TEAM OR IS IT JUST TRYING TO FIGURE OUT WHAT YOU CAN AND CAN’T DO WITH IT?
“No, this racing is very similar to what I’ve been doing my entire life. Racing scenarios, that’s why I race. I’ve won a lot of races in my life so I think a lot of it is just finding the right balance and finding what we need and we’ll get there.”

Team Chevy high-resolution racing photos are available for editorial use.

About Chevrolet
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Toyota Racing – Erik Jones
Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series (MENCS)
Bristol Motor Speedway – April 5, 2019

Joe Gibbs Racing driver Erik Jones was made available to the media in Bristol:

ERIK JONES, No. 20 Craftsman “Racing for a Miracle” Toyota Camry, Joe Gibbs Racing

How special was the Niswonger Children’s Hospital visit and the special program that you’ve got going on with Craftsman?

“Yeah it’s been great. I obviously have had a few opportunities to do stuff where the sponsor gives back to the community and this is by far the largest one with Craftsman. They’ve already given $100,000 to Children’s Miracle Network and then the possibility for one million dollars on Sunday if we win, so that’s obviously a huge deal. As far as that goes, going to the hospital and seeing the kids is just a neat opportunity. Any time you can brighten up a kid’s day a little bit, especially the kids that are in that position is a great feeling as a person. Not as a driver or as an athlete, but just as a person.”

Is there any hazing that goes along with you being the youngest on the Joe Gibbs Racing team?

“Not that I’ve noticed. Obviously I’m really close with Kyle (Busch), so nothing ever from him. Martin (Truex Jr.) doesn’t ever really talk so nothing from him either. Denny (Hamlin) is kind of the same way. He doesn’t talk either.”

How close are you to signing your contract extension?

“It’s going to take time obviously, but it’s in the works so hopefully we can get it knocked out here within the next couple of months. Obviously both sides are fighting against each other with the extension, but I think there’s a middle ground. We’re pretty close to where we both want to be. I want to be there for a long time and JGR (Joe Gibbs Racing) I think wants to continue our relationship for a long time, so I feel like it’s pretty close.”

Do you worry about it being a contract year for you?

“I’ve always let it take care of itself. I have great people working with me. Alan Miller out of Michigan has always been really great to me. From the time I was 14 years old the guy helped me out and really led me in the right direction with getting hooked up with Toyota to begin with and then with KBM (Kyle Busch Motorsports) and JGR (Joe Gibbs Racing) and worked through that transition for Furniture Row for a year. I’ve never once questioned what I was going to be doing or where I was going to be racing the last three years. I think for me it’s something I’ve been fortunate not to have to think about.”

Somebody mentioned to Denny Hamlin that maybe he was in the hot seat this year and then with it being a contract year for you, do you think about it as maybe somebody is in trouble at Joe Gibbs Racing because Christopher Bell is coming up soon to the Cup Series?

“I don’t think either of us felt that way. I think both of us have felt pretty comfortable where we’re at. I think Christopher is a great driver, but still when he moves to the Cup level, it’s going to take time to develop. You’re going to take a year or two to really get where you want to be at that level. I think both of us feel comfortable. Obviously I’m very young compared to my teammates. I feel like I’m going to be there for a long time. I’m sure Christopher will get his opportunity in Cup at some point. He’s definitely got the talent and he’s good enough to do it so he’ll get there for sure.”

When you have two teammates that have multiple wins this season do you feel like you have to start winning too to keep up?

“Yeah, you always want to keep up with what you’re teammates are doing. Obviously Kyle (Busch) is very talented and last year he had a great year and he’s on pace for another great year. I feel like we were making the right strides. There was just a lot of circumstantial stuff that happened in the last few races that didn’t play out. Texas was a good race for us obviously. We have the speed and we’ve got the team. If we keep having races like Texas that win is going to come. I feel really good about this weekend. I feel like we’ve got a great chance to really knock this one out and have a pretty good race and hopefully win it. You feel that pressure, you want to win. If you’re team is strong and capable of winning, you want to be the guy that’s in victory lane too.”

Do you feel like your group is in the same place as Kyle Busch’s and Denny Hamlin’s teams?

“I feel like last weekend was the first weekend we were. A few weekends before that I didn’t feel like we were on the same level as them at least in the race. Speed wise we were there in practice, but we didn’t adjust to the race we needed to. Texas I felt like we were right there with them and making the changes and doing the stuff we needed to do to be just as competitive as they were.”

When you have the need to win in a contract year, will it make it extra special or is there extra pressure on you to get that win?

“No. I put pressure on myself. I’ve never really felt much pressure outside my own mind really. You always want to win races. At least I do. I think most guys do. For me racing is the one thing that I’ve loved to do for a long time and I’m very competitive about it. You always feel like pressure – I think most guys internally feel that pressure to go out and perform.”

What changed to make you more equal to your teammates do you think?

“Nothing really. I think we just learned a lot through the – the West Coast swing we learned a lot. Phoenix we had a mistake. We had a wheel come loose and had to pit and it ruined our day. California we just missed the adjustments late. Vegas kind of the same thing. Martinsville we got taken out. There was a lot of stuff that wasn’t going our way. It wasn’t all necessarily on us. Texas was the first race where it was like okay things kind of went our way today. I don’t know that we really changed a lot. We just kind of had a race where things finally didn’t go against us. It was a normal day for the most part and things worked out a little bit better.”

MONSTER ENERGY NASCAR CUP SERIES
BRISTOL MOTOR SPEEDWAY
FOOD CITY 500
TEAM CHEVY PRESS CONF. TRANSCRIPT
APRIL 5, 2019

KURT BUSCH, NO. 1 MONSTER ENERGY CAMARO ZL1 met with media and discussed the track conditions at Bristol, his expectations on the new package next week at Richmond, the start of the season thus far, and more. Full Transcript:

HOW WAS THE PJ1 (TRACKBITE) AND HOW WAS THE CAR WHEN YOU WENT OUT TO PRACTICE?
“As far as the spray and the rubber that they mixed in with it, as far as the drivers were told, it was going to be about four feet wide. I was measuring it. It was about seven feet wide. And then it just didn’t look as much as normal. And then you saw us all waiting to start practice today because again there’s traction compound but it takes heat to activate it and for it to actually work and stick. Nobody wanted to go out there and be the first car to go out. We needed the Xfinity cars to kind of rub it in and those guys aren’t even going in there right now. Interesting. Bristol, each time we come back here it’s like a brand new track.”

LOOKING AHEAD A WEEK TO RICHMOND, WITH THE NEW PACKAGE AND IT BEING A NIGHT RACE AND A LITTLE COOLER, HOW DO YOU THINK THE NEW PACKAGE MIGHT PLAY OUT THERE?
“I think at the short tracks, the center of the corner speed is going to be up and you’re going to have more grip on corner exit because of the downforce. And so I’m expecting the way that Martinsville went, that the cars are going to be easier to drive and they should stay underneath the driver longer. So, I expect a pretty good show here on Sunday and then next week at Richmond, because of the way the tire drop off is at Richmond, whereas the concrete tracks like Bristol and Martinsville, the cars don’t drop off as much. So, Richmond, I think, is going to be a really good indication of a ‘blast of the past’, so to speak, of what we wanted this package to be.”

YOU’VE BEEN A TOP-10 FIVE OUT OF THE LAST SIX RACES. YOU GUYS HAVE THE CONSISTENCY. ARE YOU PLEASED WITH THAT OR FRUSTRATED THAT YOU’RE NOT QUITE WHERE YOU PROBABLY WANT TO BE?
“I’m pleased with it. It’s been a good start with us teaming up with Ganassi and everybody that was on the No. 1 car and the results they had from years prior, I would say that we jumped into another category. And we also know we can go and grab another category, and that is to get those top-5’s. But right now, the Penske guys are really strong. The Gibbs guys are really strong. And SHR might be off just a little bit with the start of the season. And so when you’re trying to battle for top-5 spots and Penske and Gibbs have them on lockdown, that’s where we know we need to work at our own pace, find our own speed, and make both the Ganassi cars better. And, we’ll find it. We’ll find our spots to run really well and we’ll find some weak areas that we still need to fix. But, I’m pleasantly surprised and happy with the way the season has started.”

IS THERE ANY DIFFERENCE AT A SHORT TRACK BETWEEN YOU RUNNING THE FORD LAST YEAR AND THE CHEVROLET THIS YEAR? CAN YOU TELL ANY DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THE CARS? YOU’VE GOT A NEW AERO PACKAGE, BUT ARE THERE ANY OTHER THINGS THAT COME INTO PLAY?
“I’ll learn more in race trim tomorrow with the low end torque. It seems like the Fords qualify well because they run well on the top end. And I think the Chevys run good on the bottom end. And, that’s just a small indication of what I’ve felt so far. So, the lower the rpm, it seems like the Chevys are a little different where the Fords are a little different at the top end of the rpm. There’s not all that much difference. At a short track like this, you can throw out the aero balance changes.”

CAN YOU TALK ABOUT THE INFLUENCE YOUR DAD HAD ON YOUR RACING CAREER EARLY ON AND HOW IMPORTANT HE WAS TO YOU TO MAYBE HELP YOU GET HERE?
“Yeah, my dad, Tom, committed so much to (brother) Kyle’s and my racing career. Mom was there every step of the way as well. And, my favorite story was when I was given a Go-kart for Christmas around the age of 7. The Go-kart wasn’t a toy as I thought it was going to be. It was more of a tool. And, he would only let me run it with him, with his supervision, of course. And, it would be on Sunday after we watched the Cup race together. If I didn’t watch the Cup race with him, then we didn’t go play with the Go-kart. And, so when I would watch the Cup race with him and then it was Go-kart time, then it was more of a tool and he would teach me about corner entry, the apex, corner exit; we’d get the stopwatch out and then he would take apart the carburetor sometimes and have me put it back together. And so it was more of a tool then it was a toy. And, from that beginning, I was only about two years into it, I was about 9, and I could run faster lap times than him in that little Go-kart because I was lightweight. I was probably 80 pounds and he was like 180. That’s when it started transitioning into being a bit more serious.”

Team Chevy high-resolution racing photos are available for editorial use.

About Chevrolet
Founded in 1911 in Detroit, Chevrolet is one of the world’s largest car brands, doing business in more than 100 countries and selling more than 4.0 million cars and trucks a year. Chevrolet provides customers with fuel-efficient vehicles that feature engaging performance, design that makes the heart beat, passive and active safety features and easy-to-use technology, all at a value. More information on Chevrolet models can be found at www.chevrolet.com.