ABSOLUTE HEARTBREAK FOR WILLIAM BYRON, WHO WILL NOT ADVANCE TO THE ROUND OF 12. HE’S OUT OF THE CAR. THEY’RE TRYING TO ASSESS EXACTLY ALL THE DAMAGE ON THE NO. 24 CAR, BUT IT IS GOING TO END HIS EVENING. WHAT HAPPENED, WILLIAM, ON THE TRACK? EVERYTHING WAS GOING FINE AND THEN WHAT HAPPENED?
“I think the No. 51 car (Joey Gase) checked up in the middle of the straightaway. As fast as we were running the top, I was right behind the No. 95 (Christopher Bell) and I had literally nowhere to go. You can’t stop in the middle of the straightaway when everybody is so committed to the top like that. Just ridiculous that that’s what takes us out. I thought honestly we had a shot to run top-five or seven. The car was really, really good. We just needed a couple good pitstops. We were running probably ninth or tenth there. Just super disappointing – I’ve got to go back and watch that because that was kind of ridiculous.”
GIVE US A LOOK AT THE INCIDENT THROUGH YOUR PERSPECTIVE.
“Yeah, we were running tenth, I believe, and trying to get a couple of stage points. We had gotten a few in the first stage. Our car was really good, just needed a little bit of track position I feel like. Probably went the wrong way on the last adjustment – tried to get myself turning a little better and it got too free. (inaudible) Really the incident, the No. 51 (Joey Gase), I think it was green and black car, was coming off the corner and the No. 95 (Christopher Bell) and I were both running the top. The No. 51 just checked up in the middle of the straightaway and had nowhere to go. And the No. 95 slammed on the brakes to try to not hit him and I slammed into him because I was on his bumper. So, just a terrible situation, but not really sure why that happened or what really transpired for him to stop like that. But, go back on SMT like we can now and look at what happened and move on.”
DESCRIBE THE EMOTIONS OF WHAT YOU’VE GONE THROUGH THE LAST MONTH WITH THE WIN AND THE WAY YOU FALL OUT TONIGHT.
“I think they’re two separate things. It would have been worse if we just completely ran horrible this first round, but I think outside of Richmond, we were going to have two top-seven finishes. I feel like we were well capable of finishing in the top-five tonight. It was only halfway through the race and we were going to finish top-10 in both stages, probably, and move on from there. So, yeah I don’t really know – things like that, I don’t know, you’ve just got to be more aware I guess than that to check up like that. But I don’t know – I don’t know what happened that would cause that really.”
HOW DO YOU EVALUATE THIS SEASON? OBVIOUSLY, YOU GOT YOUR FIRST-CAREER WIN AND THERE’S STILL SEVEN RACES LEFT THIS YEAR. HOW DO YOU LOOK AT THIS SEASON, EVEN THOUGH YOU’RE OUT IN THIS FIRST ROUND?
“Yeah, I think it’s been a great season. I think that we’ve performed well. I think we would have liked to perform better, based on how we ended last year. But we got a win and I feel like really the last five or six weeks, we’ve had all top-10 runs, besides Richmond, which is our worst track. I don’t know – hopefully continue being fast the next few weeks.”
— Team Chevy —