Clint Bowyer (Winner, #15 5-hour Energy Benefitting Avon Foundation for Women Toyota) ‘This is my worst race track. To come here and have cars capable of qualifying in the top five, and race up front, I mean, I tell you that means a lot to me. I think it speaks volumes about our team, Brian Pattie [crew chief] and everybody he has assembled around him. It makes me almost giddy. It’s so much fun to come to the race track knowing you have got cars that are capable of getting the job done. We ‘re still in contention for the championship. Never in a million years did I think the caution wouldn ‘t come out. We had too much left in the race. We were a burnout short of making it!’
Michael Waltrip (Team Owner, #15 5-hour Energy Benefitting Avon Foundation for Women Toyota) ‘Not only did the Toyota engine run with as much power as we needed to win with; we got the fuel mileage we needed to win and had enough gas to do one of the most amazing starts to a burnout I ever saw. It really went kind of downhill from there. But to have an engine under your hood that can perform like it did, qualifying in the top five with a new track-record speed; to have that kind of speed and also have the economy it takes to race to the checkered and not have to pit late. Clint’s won three races, and he hasn ‘t been able to drive to victory lane yet because of getting there with just enough fuel.’
Brian Pattie (Crew Chief, #15 5-hour Energy Benefitting Avon Foundation for Women Toyota) ‘We had a good qualifying setup for here in the spring and came back here and qualified better. We evolved our setups over the summer. We were a little too tight and burned the tires off too fast, though. We knew in practice that we might have to save gas for fuel mileage, and we worked on that some. Everyone did their part to make it work. These are a great group of guys. It’s fun to show up on Monday.’
Denny Hamlin (Second-Place Finisher #11 FedEx Ground Toyota) ‘It’s almost impossible to save fuel [when driving for a win]. It goes against everything we have learned as race car drivers. We had a good run, obviously, and put ourselves in position all day. It’s good to have a fuel mileage race go somewhat our way. Darian [crew chief Darian Grubb] made a gutsy call to bring us in [even though it meant we would] lose all of our track position in the middle of the race. Obviously, he knew what he was doing. We slowed down just enough to finish second. It’s frustrating to know whether we could have cut the reins a little sooner and tried to catch the 15 [Bowyer]. We just needed one more lap. You are just running the race backwards. Basically, you are just seeing how slow you can go and maintain your track position. It puts everyone in kind of a weird window. You have to prepare for it, and we did prepare for it a little bit better. It’s tough because I ‘m sitting there thinking I could go by [Bowyer] or catch him anytime I wanted. Darian is screaming at me to back off. As a race car driver, you really don ‘t want to save gas.’
Jimmie Johnson (Third-Place Finisher #48 MyLowes Chevrolet) ‘We made a bunch of circles out there tonight and made it on fuel. It’s weird running so long. There are some tracks and some conditions where that is just the game you have to play. The thing I ‘m excited about is we ‘re still learning. We don ‘t have the confidence that the 2 car [Keselowski] shows in some situations with how hard they can run. We finished a fuel mileage race here much better than we have done in the past. So, I feel like we are smarter racing in that department. It seemed like the three cars of the 2 [Keselowski], the 11 [Hamlin] and we were running one, two, three through a large portion of the night. With two stops to go, we saw the opportunity for long green runs and you just talk to yourself if you use too much or not enough.’
Greg Biffle (Fourth-Place Finisher, #16 3m/IDG Ford) ‘It was too loose all night. I just didn ‘t want to take big enough swings at it. And then fuel mileage; we are just not in that game to go as far as those cars were going.’
Kyle Busch (Fifth-Place Finisher, #18 M&Ms; Toyota) ‘Fuel mileage played against us again. We had a really good race car barring circumstances and how they played out, but it just wasn ‘t there for us at the end.’(CMS)(10-14-2012)
