CHEVY MENCS AT POCONO 1: Team Chevy Race Notes & Quotes

KYLE LARSON, NO. 42 DC SOLAR CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 2nd

THAT RESTART, WITH LESS THAN 10 TO GO.  GREAT MOVES BY THE 78 OF TRUEX BUT A GREAT COUNTER BY YOU

“Yeah, I actually liked that the 78 tried to pull down and block me a little bit because it messed his angle up to the corner.  I knew he would have to slow down a little more on entry and I was hoping I could get close enough to him to get him loose.  Which I did, but I also got kind of loose behind him.  So I just had to tuck back in line on exit and then had to try and fight off the 18 and the 4 behind me.  I was just trying to stay lower than them on exit to get them tight.   I am happy we finished second because we were probably a sixth or seventh place car today and to finish better than where you run is always a good thing.   I am happy about that.  Our DC Solar Chevy was competitive, but needs to be a little bit better to compete with the 18, the 4, and the 78.   They are definitely the class of the field.   We are close and we are getting a little bit better, but so are they.  So we just have to keep working hard.”

 

JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 LOWE’S FOR PROS CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 8th

“My guys kept fighting all day long. That was a hard-fought eighth place finish. We just need to keep improving, but we’re slowly chipping away at it.”

CHASE ELLIOTT, NO. 9 NAPA AUTO PARTS CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 10th

“We had a good car, I felt like it was much better than where we finished.  I didn’t do a very good job on that last restart. With old tires we fell back and had to put on tires and I had too much ground to make up.”

TY DILLON, NO. 13 GEICO CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 23rd

“Our GEICO Racing team played the strategy game today. We didn’t have the speed that the leaders did, but my crew chief Matt Borland made strategy calls that kept us ahead of the other cars on our lap. We took the wave-around during each stage break to get back on the lead lap, and we were able to maintain our position in the final stage. The first caution of the last stage fell perfectly into our pit strategy, and we really had the balance of our Camaro ZL1 in a better place than it had been all day. I would have loved to break into the top 20 there at the end, but we didn’t give up and kept fighting back. We had good execution today, and that is what is going to make us better.”

WILLIAM BYRON, NO. 24 UNIFIRST CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 18th

TALK ABOUT THE RACE OVERALL. WAS IT A PRETTY GOOD DAY?

“Yeah, we seemed to have a pretty good day. We just took off a little bit tight on the last restart and got stuck in some bad aero spots, but overall not bad. It was good to get a solid finish and have executed pretty well to put ourselves in a good position. We just needed probably a 15-lap run just to get spread out a little bit. But, it was not bad, and we’ll go on to Michigan.”

DARRELL ‘BUBBA’ WALLACE, JR., NO. 43 WEIS MARKET CAMARO ZL1 – Sidelined on Lap 108 with engine issue.  Finished 38th

YOU LED FOUR LAPS EARLIER TODAY DUE TO STRATEGY.  NOW YOUR DAY IS OVER.  WHAT HAPPENED?

“We got back there.  I made a mistake on pit road speeding again here at Pocono.  We took the wave around and we were on older stuff.   The No. 95 was a little bit better than us, well, for sure better.   I just tucked in behind him so we didn’t waste too much time and kind of did like a long shift and give up a little bit of time.  I did it earlier in the race around some cars and had no trouble with it.  I just had too much weight and pulled to the left and went from third to second.  I really hate and I have never done it before.  It’s a bummer.  She screamed pretty loud for a second and that was it.  It didn’t re-fire after that.  Just a bummer for our No. 43 Weis Market Chevrolet Camaro.   Drew (Blickensderfer) came up with a good strategy to make us rebound from that penalty that we had, and I thought we were going to set ourselves up for a decent finish.  That’s what we needed.   We kind of struggled with some front grip all weekend long, but we started hitting on it right there at the end.”

Ron Fleshman

RIS NASCAR Editor.  Has been with RIS since the middle 90's. Writes on each of the three main series of NASCAR.

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Volume 2018, Issue 6, Posted 8:01 PM, 06.03.2018