Catchfence

Bristol, Tenn (August 21, 2010) – Jamie McMurray, No. 1 Bass Pro Shops Chevrolet, moved to 13th in the point standings with a solid third-place finish tonight in the Irwin Tools Night Race at Bristol Motor Speedway. With two races remaining until the start of the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup, McMurray is 100 points out of the top-12 Chase positions.

Four-time NASCAR Sprint Cup Series (NSCS) champion Jeff Gordon, No. 24 DuPont Chevrolet, clinched a spot in the 2010 Chase with his 11th place run tonight.

Clint Bowyer, No. 33 Hamburger Helper Chevrolet, finished fourth in tonight’s 500-lap/266.5-mile race. He is 12th in the standings after 24 races.

Ryan Newman, No. 39 Wix Filters Chevrolet, continued to battle for a spot in the Chase with a strong sixth place run tonight. He is 15th in the standings, 118 points behind Bowyer.

Juan Pablo Montoya, No. 42 Target Chevrolet, was seventh at the checkered flag to give Team Chevy four of the top-10 finishers.

Points leader Kevin Harvick, No. 29 Shell-Pennzoil Chevrolet, battled a loose race car for the majority of the night but came home in 14th place. He holds a 279-point lead.

After on-track contact forced him to pit road for repairs, two-time NSCS champion Tony Stewart brought the No. 14 Office Depot/Old Spice Chevrolet to the finish in 27th place. He dropped to sixth in the standings.

Jeff Burton, No. 31 Caterpillar Chevrolet, also fought handling problems all night. He finished 16th and remains seventh in the standings.

Four-time defending champion Jimmie Johnson, No. 48 Lowe’s Chevrolet, finished 35th and dropped to ninth in points after contact on-track send him hard into the wall and to the garage for repairs. He returned to the track 70 laps down.

Mark Martin, No. 5 CARQUEST Auto Parts/GoDaddy.com Chevrolet, dropped to 14th in the standings after handling issues relegated him to the 23rd finishing position, 101 points out of 12th.

Kyle Busch (Toyota) was the race winner.David Reutimann (Toyota) and Kasey Kahne (Ford) completed the top-five finishers.

After the final off weekend of the season, the Series’ resumes action at Atlanta Motor Speedway on September 5, 2010.

JAMIE McMURRAY, NO. 1 BASS PRO SHOPS CHEVROLET – Finished 3^rd

POST RACE PRESS CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPT:

THE MODERATOR:  Let’s roll into our post race for the Irwin Tools Night Race here at Bristol Motor Speedway.  Our third place finisher Jaime McMurray.  He drives the No. 1 Bass Pro Shops Tracker Boats Chevrolet for Earnhardt Ganassi.  Jamie, you battled up front just about the entire evening.  You had a good race car.  You put on a good show.  Your thoughts about tonight’s performance?

JAMIE McMURRAY:  Yeah, we qualified well this weekend, and we had an issue on pit road with a lug nut and had to go to the tail end, but fortunately it happened early enough in the race that we were able to recover from that.

And you know, we had that long 130 lap run and just had a really fast car throughout that, was able to drive up to the lead.  And then we put our last set of tires on.  The tires just felt flat in the front and I couldn’t get my car to roll through the center as quick as it had earlier in the night.  It wasn’t way off, but it was off just enough that I couldn’t compete with the 18 there.

Q.  The first pit stop I think you rolled through the box, too, right?

JAMIE McMURRAY:  About four boxes I rolled through it looked like, yeah.

Q.  What’s going through your mind when you have two missed pit cues like that and especially when you know you have a really good car?  Did you sort of have to settle down and go?

JAMIE McMURRAY:  Well, this is a pit road that you can gain a lot of spots on by really pushing the limits, and we were fortunate with the way the timing lines were that you could cheat it.  I don’t know, my pit stall was just a lot slicker than what I expected, and it only cost us like three or four spots, I think, the first time.  The lug nut cost us quite a bit.

You know, when you have a fast car, and certainly this racetrack is very raceable.  If you have a good car you can pass on it.  And it really wasn’t that big a deal.  We went to the back and I passed about ten cars the first set of tires.  We passed like ten cars the next set of tires, and then we had that long run and I drove to the lead.

I think when you know you have a good car    what you worry about for me is just getting caught up in someone else’s mess there; someone is blowing a tire while you’re caught on the outside of them or something, but it really wasn’t a big deal.

Q.  Obviously it’s tough to win in this series.  Kyle did it three times in the weekend, all three.  What do you think of an accomplishment like that?

JAMIE McMURRAY:  I mean, it’s pretty remarkable what he’s been able to do this weekend, especially with owning his own truck team.  I know that’s been fairly stressful for him.  And obviously the Nationwide, it’s; I don’t know, it’s amazing how many races they can win in that car.  But then to be able to come out tonight and win again, he obviously has a really good feel for this place, and he just had a really good weekend.  He’s been close to doing that before, so that’s really impressive what Kyle has been able to do.

Q.  Another pit question actually:  Last pit stop you had gotten the lead from Kyle at that point, and then you both pitted.  Can you walk me through that?  Obviously he was able to get the lead from you, but it looked like you both had pretty good stops.

JAMIE McMURRAY:  Yeah, I mean, he just had just a little bit    we came in, and I was very self conscious not to get caught speeding entering pit road.  If you get    a pass through here would just end your night.  So I was a little bit cautious coming in, and Kyle was able to get beside me.  And then I think he just had a half second or a second quicker pit stop and was able to beat me out.

It was amazing because he beat me out of the pits and just that little bit was like five cars that got stuck in between us.  My car just didn’t feel as good that last run, and I was having a hard time even passing the lap car, so that really let him spread it out, and I think David actually short pitted.  I didn’t even know that he was leading the race.  I thought I was in second actually.

Yeah, I mean, it’s frustrating but its part of it.  It’s a team sport and my sliding through the pit box, they didn’t get mad at me, and so you can’t get mad at them for anything like that.

Q.  Jamie, you you’ve moved into 13th in points.  Do you dare to start thinking the possibility of a Chase with two races to go?

JAMIE McMURRAY:  No.  I’ll let Bono worry about it.  He certainly is worried about it, and    I remember the stress that goes along with that, and I’m really fortunate this year that we were able to win those two big races because if we don’t make the Chase, it’s not going to be devastating.

So yeah, it does    I want to make the Chase, but there’s nothing you can do.  We drove as hard as we could tonight and finished third, and I don’t think we really gained any points.  But two races left, a lot can happen, and certainly Atlanta is one of those tracks that, man, you can really have a good car there and you can really miss it and be three laps down.

So we’ll just have to wait and see.  It certainly is a better position to be in right now for us because there only is one person we have to pass.  When you have three or four in between you, you have to hope all of them have something bad happen to all them.

But the 33 is running really well right now.  I kind of put him in the same category as us.  They are running really well but they’ve had a lot of DNFs.  I think that team will perform fine, and we will just have to wait and see how it works out.

Q.  Can you talk a little bit about it looked like you were blocked in or somebody was in your pits as you were trying to exit that last time.  Can you kind of describe what happened, it looked like maybe Kevin Harvick?

JAMIE McMURRAY:  Yeah, Kevin was just trying to get in his stall, and actually I forgot about that.  I don’t know if that cost us beating the 18 out, but it certainly probably cost us a couple car lengths.  But you know, what are you going to do there?  Bono did a really good job of screaming that the 29 was on the outside, and you’ve just got to let that guy get in his stall.

Q.  In watching the race, it looked like the battle between Reutimann and Kyle Busch was, I mean, a long, fierce, kept everybody else behind it.  Once he got cleared of him, was that a case of the difficulty in getting around Reutimann allowed him to get a huge advantage or did you just really not have the car that he did to get around Reutimann?  Seemed like Reutimann was kind of holding up Kyle but maybe not holding up the people beyond.

JAMIE McMURRAY:  Yeah, my last set of tires just didn’t have the grip, the front grip.  They felt flat.  Honestly, when I pulled out I felt like the rims were actually hitting the racetrack.  The tire was folding under so much.  I talked to Bono, and we didn’t really have less air pressure in them, but when we made that green flag stop, that tire just didn’t agree with me.  We really needed another caution to put another set of tires on.

Even when I got back in the back of the pack, honestly I think thought maybe I had the best car.  I was amazed at not only how well it would turn but the drive that I could have off the corner, and I had that all night except for the last 100 laps, and that last set of tires just didn’t have the speed.

I think if I could have cleared Reutimann that I would have drove away from him.  I just didn’t have enough car to clear him on the bottom.  It’s hard.

THE MODERATOR:  Jamie, thank you so much, and we’ll see you.  Appreciate it.

FastScripts by ASAP Sports

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