Catchfence

Carl Edwards, No. 99 Cheez-It/Kellogg’s Ford (Finished 2nd)
“Kevin wouldn’t give me enough room to run into him. He stayed on the bottom because he said I knew I was going to hit him. I wanted to get him for Trevor last night (laughs). He did a good job staying on the bottom and I couldn’t get a run to get up to him at all. That was a great race. As much as I am frustrating for not winning, tonight was about remembering our heroes and what America is about. I appreciate the fans coming out here. Hopefully we bring all these troops home soon. It was a fun race and I am ready to go win this championship.”

WHAT DOES TONIGHT SAY ABOUT THE ROUSH GUYS ON SHORT TRACKS? “I says these other guys might have somebody new to deal with. I am excited to go to Loudon now and Martinsville. We have something here that is really great. I want to thank Kellogg’s and Cheez-It for being on board. We only run a couple races for them and I would love to get a win. Thanks again to the fans for coming out here. It was a huge crowd and it was a pleasure to put on a shot for you.”

Matt Kenseth, No. 17 Ollie’s Ford (Finished 23rd)
WERE YOU SURPRISED BY THE AMOUNT OF CAUTIONS TONIGHT? “Yeah, it seemed like there were a lot more than normal for whatever reason, I don’t know. But it did seem like there was a lot of wrecked stuff.”

YOUR THOUGHTS ON BEING IN THE CHASE AGAIN AS WE HEAD TO THE LAST 10 RACES. “Tonight wasn’t a good night for us at all so I am looking forward to trying to forget about it and go to Chicago and hopefully compete.”

DO YOU FEEL LIKE CHICAGO IS A GOOD KICK-OFF SPOT FOR YOU WITH IT BEING A MILE-AND-A-HALF TRACK? “I don’t know. We ran good on some and not so good on others. Everybody else groups the tracks together but you really can’t. Atlanta is nothing like Chicago and Chicago is nothing at all like Las Vegas. I mean, it is hard because you can’t loop them together. They are different. Just because it is the same size around the circle they are still a lot different. It seems like our cars run a little better on the bigger tracks than the shorter tracks but yet on the other hand the 16 and 99 and 6 all ran really stout tonight. I think our equipment is okay, we just have to get running better.”

David Ragan, No. 6 UPS Ford (Finished 4th)
“We needed to win this thing and our UPS team did a nice job. It is the same car we ran well with here in the spring. We had a race winner here if things would have fell our way. I think there are four or five guys that could have won this race depending on pit strategy and how the cautions fell. We weren’t very good on the short runs. We needed about a 150 or 200 lap run and I think we would have been fine but our UPS team did a good job. We want to win every single time we come to a race track. A top five is good. We gained some points from our recent bad luck and we will move on.”

TALK ABOUT HOW ROUGH IT WAS OUT THERE. “It was rough. Everyone was racing hard and I think the Chase atmosphere and the Saturday night racing here at Richmond I think there are some guys that had some payback before the Chase started. It was fun to watch that. If one of them had gotten in our way we would have been mad but we were able to drive around them. I am glad we had a fast enough car that we could be the aggressor and not the one being pushed around.”

Travis Kvapil, No. 38 Long John Silver’s Ford (Finished 28th)
WHAT HAPPENED WITH YOU AND THE 88?
“I don’t know. I think we were racing for the Lucky Dog, and two or three times I got a run on him on the outside – obviously the hard way to pass – and he chopped me a couple times. So I gave him a tap at the start-finish line, and next time by he let me go and then he just wrecked me. It’s just frustrating. Obviously neither one of us was having a very good night, so it just made both of our night’s worse. I feel like we had an OK car, we just caught up in that big wreck really early and it really messed our car up on both ends.”

CARL EDWARDS PRESS CONFERENCE

Carl is the 5th seed with 2,003 points based on his one win of the season.

CARL, TALK ABOUT THE RACE HERE TONIGHT AND YOUR THOUGHTS NOW THAT THE CHASE FIELD IS SET. “Well, once I get over the frustration of not winning this thing I am going to be really excited about how fast our team is. We really turned things around tonight. That is the best we have run on a short track in years. That was huge. That was a tough race not to win. I feel like we had the car beat and if we had another lap or two we would have been all over Harvick there. It was a fun race. I had a good time and I am ready to go get this Chase on.”

LOOKING AHEAD TO THE CHASE, WHAT DO YOU SEE AS THE GREATEST CHALLENGE TO YOU AND YOUR TEAM? “I am pretty excited about all the races we are going to after tonight. This is the best we have run on a short track in a long time. The race I am usually worried about the most would be Martinsville and now I am pretty excited. I didn’t expect us to run as well as we did tonight. I think for a little while we kind of were slowing down and then the last week we ran really well at Atlanta and this week we felt like we had a dominant car, a really fast car. I am excited.”

WHY DIDN’T YOU PIT AND WHY THAT DIDN’T COST YOU THE RACE? “I am actually excited that Brad doesn’t get those bonus points. I didn’t know that until just now. I am pumped about that. I don’t know why we didn’t pit. I think Bob thought there was going to be another caution. We were getting caution after caution and we just thought more guys would stay out. We were still running third when the next caution came out and still should have been able to win. I just didn’t get a good enough restart and didn’t get by Jeff quick enough to have a lap or two once we got to Kevin. We learned a lesson. It cost us three points. Once I get over the frustration of not winning I will be happy about how we ran.”

DO YOU FEEL YOU ARE BACK WHERE YOU NEED TO BE TO GO OUT AND WIN THIS THING? “Yeah, big time. These guys know how it feels. When you are running really well everything is easy. When you are struggling you get nervous about when you will get back on track. I feel like after tonight’s run, the way we ran, that is a shot in the arm for me. I feel like we can run with the guys that are running, like Brad has been running the last few weeks. I feel like we are back up there. I know it is one race, but I think everyone will agree that Richmond tests a lot of parts of your team. You have to have a real good car. We made one strategy mistake tonight but we are a team and we are in this together. If that is the worst mistake we make in the Chase then we will be okay.”

MATT KENSETH PRESS CONFERENCE

YOUR THOUGHTS ON MAKING THE CHASE AS THE NO. 4 SEED? “If you take tonight out of the equation, tonight was a disaster, but I feel like we have been pretty good lately. If you look at the three weeks before that we have been qualifying really well and running up front and running up in the top-five most of the day. We didn’t finish all those races up there but they are three different tracks and I felt like we had a top three or four car at all three tracks. I knew we needed to do a little better than that but I feel good going to Chicago and it has been a good track for us in the past and hopefully we can start off on the right foot.”

THERE WAS A LOT OF STUFF THAT WENT ON TONIGHT BUT YOU ARE PROBABLY THE ONLY GUY THAT CHANGED A TACHOMETER IN THE CAR. HAVE YOU EVER HAD TO DO THAT BEFORE? “No, and I felt kinda dumb because I said I should pay more attention at the shop. It was actually kind of fun. That was the highlight of my night, to be able to change that. It was a rough night. It was a rough weekend for us, right from the first lap on the track yesterday, we were just awful. The best lap we had all weekend was our qualifying lap really and that was 25th. We really struggled I don’t really know why. But we were way off all weekend, and then I caused that wreck which I feel real dumb about and feel bad for I guess the 27 got wrecked in that and I spun out the 78 so I had a problem locking up the left front and I haven’t had that here for years. I have no idea why it happened or how it happened, but I locked the left front up and missed the corner down there and wiped out the 78 and the 27, as well. I feel bad about that, besides running bad.

YOU MIGHT HAVE JUST ANSWERED THAT, BUT I WAS GOING TO ASK YOU HOW BADLY YOUR CAR WAS MESSED UP WHEN YOU GOT RUN OVER IN THAT FIRST ACCIDENT DOWN IN 3 AND 4. “It was more messed up than I thought. That first accident, I don’t really know what happened and they called a caution real late or whatever because some people were stopping and some were running wide. I don’t know how that works as far as here’s a caution , I don’t know how that works. I actually heard it kind of late and I actually ran into the back of I think it was the 78, but not very hard, and I was stopped and it was a few seconds and I don’t know who it was but somebody just drilled me, and it messed the right rear quarter panel real bad, and I think Richmond is a short track but we’re still doing 140 miles an hour, and pretty much lost all our side force back there, so I think that was part of our handling issue all night. That definitely didn’t help us.”

BEFORE TONIGHT, YOU’D RUN FIFTH, SIXTEENTH, FOURTEENTH, TENTH, SIXTH AND NINTH. IF YOU LOOK AT GOING INTO THE CHASE, DO YOU FEEL LIKE THOSE RESULTS ARE ENOUGH OR COULD BE ENOUGH?
“No, that’s not good enough to win a championship. I feel like if you take out tonight, and I think back three weeks and it’s amazing I can remember three weeks ago. But most tracks I felt like our performance was good enough to be a contender. Our finishes weren’t but I thought our performance was pretty good. We qualified good, maybe led a few laps here and there, ran toward the front but just didn’t finish the races off. We didn’t get the finishes where we ran. You’ve got to do better than that. I think one thing our team used to be really, really good at it, it seems like we always over achieve. Part of that is because we didn’t qualify well but it seemed like where we ran the last lap of the race was generally the highest we ran. That’s always important when you’re having a bad day and you’ve got a 16th place car and you figure out how to finish 11th with it or you have one of the dominant cars you need to figure out how to win with it. I think those results aren’t good enough to win a championship but I feel like our performance in some of those races and how fast our cars were and the speed in our cars and the pit stops and stuff, I feel like that’s good enough. I feel like we have everything, but we’ve got to get the finishes and we’ve got to do the right things every week.”

“For some reason, I’m not sure why, last week was a little bit better, but my restarts have not been very good, and if you get a short run toward the end, especially at some of these slick racetracks it’s very important. There’s a lot more going on in the restarts. Seems like the third place guy starts hanging back and gets the first place guy three wide early. There’s a lot going on in the restarts that make it difficult as the weeks go on, especially when you’re running second and starting in the front row it seems like. That needed to get better. Just keeping up on the racetrack, my information I give Jimmy and adjustments we make to make sure we have the car right at the end of the race with our best set of tires on the car and our best adjustments and having the car right for the end of the race, I think those are the biggest things here if I take tonight out of it is our restarts were hurting us a little bit and our car adjustments, having the best tires on at the end of the race with all the adjustments and having the car handling the best that we can make it handle for that last run.”

CAN YOU EXPLAIN TRADING OUT THE TACHOMETER AND WHAT WAS INVOLVED IN THAT AND HOW DIFFICULT IT WAS FOR YOU TO DO THAT DURING THE CAUTION? “It wasn’t really that hard. We have it right on our steering column and they’re electric now so it’s just a plug that goes in the back and there’s just a nut on the back of it. I was kind of surprised I got it done but I got my gloves off under that caution and as clumsy as I was tonight, glad I didn’t hit anything when I was looking down on it and got it changed. The bad thing about not having a tach is pit road speed. You have no idea what pit road speed is unless you’re following someone else. You’re always going to err to the slow side, so I was concerned when we went out that early we wanted to try to get it fixed.”

YOU’RE MAKING FUN OF ALL THIS STUFF, BUT ACTUALLY WE’VE SEEN KURT AND WE SAW TONY AND WE KNOW JIMMIE, AND HALF THE RIVALS THAT YOU HAVE IN THIS CHAMPIONSHIP HAVE HAD PROBLEMS RIGHT NOW. I DON’T KNOW HOW TO DESCRIBE IT, BUT THEY’RE NOT ON THEIR HEAD GAME RIGHT NOW, AND YOU’RE LOOSE AND COOL AND ALL THAT. DOES THAT GIVE YOU SOME KIND OF PSYCHOLOGICAL ADVANTAGE? IN THIS GAME, WHAT’S UPSTAIRS IS PROBABLY MORE THAN WHAT’S IN YOUR HANDS IN THE STEERING WHEEL HALF THE TIME. “I don’t know about that. I mean, the start of it all is having fast race cars. If we can show up at the racetrack and our cars can be fast when we get them on the racetrack, that’s the start. If you don’t have that, you’re not going to have a chance. I don’t care how good your pit stops are, I don’t care how smart you are, what kind of good moves you make, how you call the race. If your car is slow, you’re not going to have a good day unless it’s a fluke and you’re the one that can make it on fuel and you’re shutting engines off and running half throttle and don’t have to pit an extra time. But other than that, you just don’t have a chance. So I think that you have to have fast race cars and then just do the best you can and not worry about that stuff. I don’t think there’s any kind of advantage, but I will tell you, it’s nice to not be in any of that stuff. I love watching it. It’s great, great entertainment, seeing what’s all going on. Everybody likes conflict, I guess, to a point. Most people don’t like to be a part of it, but it’s fun to watch. It always makes you feel bad when, like tonight causing that wreck, I feel terrible about that. You know, some of these guys up here had their problems with each other. Certainly you never know what’s going to happen down the stretch, but I like not being involved in it when I can be.”

THERE’S BEEN NO TEST YET OF THIS NEW POINTS SYSTEM. HAVE YOU EVEN TRIED TO FIGURE OUT WITH THIS POINTS SYSTEM WHETHER THE CHASE WOULD BE ANY DIFFERENT? DO YOU HAVE ANY FEEL OF WHAT MIGHT IMPACT THINGS MORE WITH THIS POINTS SYSTEM THAN IN THE PAST? “Well, there’s a couple things that I think of there. The guy who finishes the highest every week still gets the most points. The strategy and all that stuff is the same. It pays the most to win and lead the most laps, and second most for second and so on. You’re still going to want to finish as high as you can. But the couple things I guess that come to mind are if you have a bad day and you get four points one day, I think that’s going to be pretty tough to come back from unless you can get on a roll and win three or four races. The other thing I remember, I honestly don’t pay that close of attention to the points because as long as you finish as high as you can every week there’s nothing you can do about it. But I did notice a few times this year there’s been ties and I don’t know why but I keep thinking there could be a tie for the championship or for third or fifth or whatever and I’m not sure how that’s going to work, but certainly with this low number of points, it seems like that’s pretty possible.

JEFF GORDON WAS IN HERE A MINUTE AGO AND HE SORT OF HINTED OR INFERRED OR SUGGESTED THAT MAYBE THERE WAS SOME TEAMWORK INVOLVED WITH THE LAST CAUTION, THAT MENARD WHO WAS 81 LAPS DOWN CAUSED THE CAUTION TO GIVE HARVICK A SHOT. YOU’VE GOT TEAMMATES. IS THAT SOMETHING WE SHOULD BE CONCERNED ABOUT, OR IS GORDON JUST VENTING? “Well, I didn’t see any of it, so I don’t really have any idea. I was kind of confused because wasn’t Harvick leading before the caution? I don’t know, I was so far behind, they were passing so fast, I was working hard to stay out of the way, so I can’t really comment on that one. They all stay locked in their motor coaches. There’s no talk. No, there’s really not. I don’t know of any time where anything has happened. Maybe it has, but I’ve never really noticed or paid much attention to that or really thought about it.”

- PCGCampbell for Ford Racing, Press Release