Roush Fenway Racing

“Second is bittersweet,” said Edwards after posting his top finish of the season. “You want to win, but we are obviously very happy with the result. If we run that well every week we will win plenty of races. The key is that we ran so well. If we can continue that every week we will be in good shape.”

The organization placed two more cars inside the top-13 and Edwards teammate Greg Biffle appeared to have the strongest car of the fold, before falling victim to a late race mechanical issue. Throw in the fact that Edwards was the leader of six Ford Fusions that occupied the top 14 in the race and there could be cause for added excitement in the Roush Fenway camp, as the Sprint Cup Series heads into one of the biggest races of the season and into a stretch that will decide the 12-car field that makes up the 2010 Chase for the Sprint Cup.

Considering that after 19 races in 2010 no team in NASCAR has more cars inside the Chase cut-off point than Roush Fenway, a potential peak at the right time could bold well for the four-team organization that has twice before taken home NASCAR’s most coveted prize.

“We are definitely on the horizon,” said Edwards after Chicagoland.  “We haven’t quite gone over, but I know we can run that well because we have done it and we did it tonight. We just have to figure out how to do it every week. I hope this is something we can go back on Monday and talk about why our car was so much different this week than it has been. We have some tracks like this coming up the rest of the season that will be really important tracks, so hopefully we can apply this to those races.”

Ragan, who posted his top non-restrictor-plate finish of the season, was also encouraged with what he saw from the cars at Chicagoland.

“We see it (the light at the end of the tunnel),” said Ragan. “I don’t know if everyone else sees it, but we do. Certainly our engineers and everybody back at the chassis shop and engine shop are working hard and we had the new Ford engine tonight. We’re making progress, but at the same time, everyone else is also making progress. It was good to see some Fords up there in the top 10. We’ll have the week off to think about this race and then we’ll head to Indy to try and get one.”

While everyone admits that there is still much work to be done before Roush Fenway returns to the type of dominance that saw the team win 11 races in 2008 alone – the organization appears to be on the right track, and with three teams currently occupying the coveted top-12 positions, Roush Fenway could find itself in a perfect position to peak at just the right time in 2010.

Roush Fenway Racing is NASCAR’s largest team operating eight motorsports teams.  Four in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series with drivers Matt Kenseth, Greg Biffle, Carl Edwards and David Ragan; and four in the Nationwide Series with Edwards, Ricky Stenhouse, Jr., Colin Braun, Brian Ickler, and Paul Menard.  For more information on any of the Roush Fenway Racing teams, log onto www.RoushFenway.com.  Become a fan of Roush Fenway Racing on Facebook by going to http://www.facebook.com/roushfenway and follow us on Twitter @roushfenway.  For sponsorship inquiries please contact Robin Johnson at 704.720.4645.

For more information contact, Kevin Woods, kwoods@roushfenway.com or 704-957-1138.

- Roush Fenway Racing, Press Release

NASCAR Logo

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (July 14, 2010) –

McMurray, along with crew chief Kevin “Bono” Manion and the No. 1 pit crew, captured the Coors Light Pole on Friday, moving to the top of the season charts with three poles. Additionally, the team picked up the DirecTV Crew Chief of the Race, MAHLE Clevite Engine Builder of the Race, Tissot “Pit Road Precision,” and WIX Filters Lap Leader awards.

The awards are part of the NASCAR Prize Money and Decal Program, also referred to as the contingency program, which provides teams prize money and weekly awards based on performance in several categories.

McMurray, who led Saturday’s 43-car field to the green flag, also led 72 laps during the 267-lap event, earning the WIX Filters Lap Leader of the Race Award, given to the eligible driver who leads the most laps during each week’s race.

With a powerful engine for the No. 1 team, Earnhardt Childress Racing (ECR) Engines was awarded the MAHLE Clevite Engine Builder of the Race honor based on qualifying and finishing position. This is the second straight week ECR has captured the engine builder honors.

“It was a great weekend for us,” said Richie Gilmore, COO of ECR. “We captured the pole in four series over the weekend including the No. 1 car in Chicago. We couldn’t do what we do without the great partnership with MAHLE Clevite. We started out of the box winning with the No. 1 car at the Daytona 500 and to have the success we did in Chicago is a great testimony to the hard work we put in here at ECR.”

McMurray’s fifth-place finish marked the team’s fifth top five of 2010.

“Really a good run for our McDonald’s Chevrolet,” McMurray said post-race. “I thought the first half of the race we had one of the best cars … us and the 48. Bono did a really good job adjusting on the car and getting it tighter. It is really cool to get runs like this in the McDonald’s car here in Chicago.”

The No. 1 pit crew, who produced fast pit stops all night, picked up the Tissot “Pit Road Precision” Award for spending the least amount of time on pit road (189.002 seconds) among lead-lap cars.

Manion, who brought the same chassis that captured the Coors Light Pole and finished second at Darlington in May, racked up the DirecTV Crew Chief of the Race Award for displaying the best qualifying and race effort as determined by the average of qualifying result and race finish.

“All of us at Earnhardt-Ganassi Racing are extremely proud to have brought home the numerous contingency awards from Chicagoland,” Manion said. “While we strive to bring home victories each week, I can’t say enough about how hard our guys worked to have the kind of success that we did at Chicago. I take a lot of pride in winning the Coors Light Pole, it just says something that we can set our car up to run the fastest lap out of all the other great competitors out there.”

After enjoying a NASCAR Sprint Cup Series open-weekend, McMurray, the reigning Daytona 500 winner, will head into the Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway on July 25. He’s 18th series standings, 181 points out of 12th.

Official winners of this week’s NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Prize Money & Decal Program special awards include:

• COORS LIGHT POLE AWARD: Jamie McMurray (183.542 mph)
• DIRECTV CREW CHIEF OF THE RACE AWARD: Kevin Manion (crew chief for Jamie McMurray)
• GOODYEAR GATORBACK BELTS FASTEST LAP AWARD: Jeff Gordon (177.983 mph, Lap 190)
• MAHLE CLEVITE ENGINE BUILDER OF THE RACE AWARD: ECR Engines (engine builder for Jamie McMurray)
• MOBIL 1 “COMMAND PERFORMANCE DRIVER OF THE RACE” AWARD: David Reutimann
• MOOG CHASSIS PARTS PROBLEM SOLVER OF THE RACE AWARD: Shane Wilson
  (crew chief for Clint Bowyer)
• O’REILLY AUTO PARTS POSITION IMPROVEMENT AWARD: Matt Kenseth (21 places)
• RAYBESTOS ROOKIE OF THE RACE AWARD: Kevin Conway
• SUNOCO DIAMOND PERFORMANCE AWARD: David Reutimann
• TISSOT “PIT ROAD PRECISION” AWARD: Jamie McMurray (189.002 secs)
• WIX FILTERS LAP LEADER AWARD: Jamie McMurray (72 laps)

About the NASCAR Prize Money & Decal Program

The NASCAR Prize Money & Decal Program, commonly referred to as the contingency program, is administered by the NASCAR Automotive Group. The program strives to build strong relationships with high-quality, performance-driven brands that are leaders in their respective categories and award money to NASCAR teams via per-race and year-end postings. Competitors become eligible for awards money by displaying partner decals on the front fender of their race vehicles and, in some instances, use of a sponsor’s product. National series contingency sponsors will contribute over $8.8 million to NASCAR Sprint Cup Series, NASCAR Nationwide Series, and NASCAR Camping World Truck Series teams in 2010.

2010 NSCS No. 1 McDonalds Chevy PitCrew - Earnhardt Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates

It was the second Tissot win of the season for the No. 1 McDonald’s crew, which also took top honors at the May 8th Cup race at Darlington (S.C.) Raceway.

McMurray No. 1 McDonald’s Chevrolet spent the least amount of time on pit road – 189.002 seconds – during the LifeLock.com 400. The fast and accurate work by the McDonald’s crew helped McMurray to a fifth-place finish.

For the second straight week Clint Bowyer’s No. 33 Cheerios crew came in a close second (190.819 seconds). Finishing third was Martin Truex Jr.’s NAPA crew (191.086).

“We had a very good weekend on pit road and continue to be a consistent and efficient team,” said Adam Mosher, the No. 1 team’s pit crew coach and rear-tire carrier. “We’re looking forward to a week off and then right back at it going into the Brickyard. Congrats to the guys, and we hope to duplicate this effort at the Brickyard!”

McMurray’s over-the-wall crew consists of: Cory DeMarco (front-tire changer), Doug Riepe (front-tire carrier), Chris Taylor (rear-tire changer), Adam Mosher (rear-tire carrier), Tracy Duncan (jackman), Benjy Grubbs (gasman) and Eric Hoyle (catch can). The team’s crew chief is Kevin Manion.

Jeff Gordon’s No. 24 crew leads in the Tissot standings with four wins. McMurray’s crew along with the crews for Truex and Matt Kenseth are tied for second with two wins.

The winning pit crew in each Sprint Cup race will earn $5,000 and a Tissot V8 Quartz Chronograph watch. The team with the most Tissot Pit Road Precision Award wins at the completion of the 36-race schedule will receive a $105,000 bonus plus Tissot watches for the over-the-wall crew members and driver.

Tissot has been the official watch and timekeeper of NASCAR since 2006. The company is also the official timekeeper for a number of other sports, including the MotoGP World Championship, the Ice Hockey World Championship and the Cycling World Championship.

__________________________________________

2010 Tissot Pit Road Precision Award Standings

Pos  Team No.    Pit Crew For        Wins   Prize Money

 1   24          Jeff Gordon         4      $20,000

T2   56          Martin Truex Jr.    2       10,000

T2   17          Matt Kenseth        2       10,000

T2   1          Jamie McMurray       1       10,000

T5   42         Juan Pablo Montoya   1        5,000

T5   12         Brad Keselowski      1        5,000

T5   33         Clint Bowyer         1        5,000

T5   88         Dale Earnhardt Jr.   1        5,000

T5   00         David Reutimann      1        5,000

T5   39         Ryan Newman          1        5,000

T5   18         Kyle Busch           1        5,000

T5   2          Kurt Busch           1        5,000

T5   26         Boris Said           1        5,000

2010 Tissot Pit Road Precision Award Winners

Daytona, 2/14       Juan Pablo Montoya Team
Fontana, 2/21       Jeff Gordon Team
Las Vegas, 2/28     Martin Truex Jr. Team
Atlanta, 3/7        Martin Truex Jr. Team
Bristol, 3/21       Brad Keselowski Team
Martinsville, 3/29  Clint Bowyer Team
Phoenix, 4/10       Matt Kenseth Team
Texas, 4/19         Dale Earnhardt Jr. Team
Talladega 4/25      David Reutimann Team
Richmond, 5/1       Ryan Newman Team
Darlington, 5/8     Jamie McMurray Team
Dover, 5/16         Matt Kenseth Team
Charlotte, 5/30     Jeff Gordon Team
Pocono, 6/6         Kyle Busch Team
Michigan, 6/13      Kurt Busch Team
Sonoma, 6/20        Boris Said Team
Loudon, 6/27        Jeff Gordon Team
Daytona, 7/3        Jeff Gordon Team
Chicago, 7/10       Jamie McMurray Team

- DMF Communications for Tissot Pit Road Precision Award, Press Release

NSCS Red Bull Racing Teams No. 82 & No. 83

Scott Speed, driver, No. 82: “The car’s handling was not too far off all night, however we are still missing something. It was a tough night for us and hopefully the off weekend will help us regroup and find what we need for the second half of the season.”

Reed Sorenson, driver, No. 83: “The second run was what put us behind. We over-adjusted a bit on the first pit stop not knowing there was a rightrear tire going down in the first run. The car was a little tight in the middle of both sides and snappy off. The back of the car was the main issue we had tonight. I’m really proud of the guys for not giving up all race. They did a great job today and all weekend. I hate that we didn’t get a better finish out of it, but that was all we had.”

+ UP NEXT

Brickyard 400, Sunday, July 25, Indianapolis Motor Speedway

- Red Bull Racing Team, Press Release

WIX Filters

Gastonia

Following his first NASCAR Sprint Cup Series win in the 2009 Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte (N.C.) Motor Speedway, Reutimann listened to questions about his victory in the rain-shortened event.  Reutimann was leading the race under caution past the halfway point when a steady rain ended the event, giving him the win.

That will not be the case Reutimann’s second victory.

Reutimann led the final 32 laps and held off Carl Edwards to win the LifeLock.com 400 Saturday night at Chicagland (Joliet, Ill.) Speedway.  Cars equipped with WIX Filters, a member of the Affinia Group family of brands, have now racked up 12 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series wins in 2010 (in addition to winning the Budweiser Shootout and Gatorade Duel special event races).

“I heard so much stuff for winning a rain-shortened event (at Charlotte last year) that everybody said we didn’t earn it,” Reutimann said after the race.  “I don’t know what they can say about this one.  We took a lot of heat for how we won the first race.  Tonight, we just had the car to beat.  We were struggling that last half a little bit, the most we struggled all night.  We just held on, had a good enough lead where we could just ride a little bit.  I knew the 99 (Carl Edwards) was coming, I was hoping he’d run out of time and thankfully he did.  Tonight we earned it and it’s a total team effort — everyone at Michael Waltrip Racing did a phenomenal job.”

Michael Waltrip Racing General Manager Ty Norris said after the race that Reutimann’s victory was “a huge statement” for the organization and gave the driver a bit of redemption.

“I’ve probably not seen anyone have to walk around for a year-and-a-half and apologize about winning a race,” Norris said.  “Winning that Coca‑Cola 600 because of rain, everyone sort of like had the asterisk next to that win.  Tonight was a huge statement.  It was largely, I feel, some of the Toyota Racing Development, the work that they put in, we came here with a little bit better package than we’ve seen over the last few months.  We had a few issues at the beginning of the year running fifth a couple times and second at Bristol.  When they were able to step up the package and come here, the car was right, the driver was right, the engine was right.  It takes all three of those things to beat Carl Edwards and Ji mmie Johnson, that crowd.  I think, more than anything else, it’s redemption for David (Reutimann).  I’m probably most proud of that.”

Crew chief Rodney Childers said that the No. 00 Toyota was so good that he and the team made very few changes during the entire weekend.

“We had a good car right off the truck,” Childers said.  “Really we just tried not to do anything during practice that would get us off base.  We tried a few things and knew that the track would come to us at night.  We kept talking about that.  It kind of did the same thing at Charlotte.  We stuck with what our gut thought there.  We never touched the track bar or the jack bolts.  That tells us how good it was from the get‑go.”

The victory was Reutimann’s second in 118 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series starts and his first in four races at Chicagoland Speedway.  He scored his fourth top-five finish of the 2010 season and is 15^th in the series championship standings, 96 points behind 12^th-place Clint Bowyer and a spot in the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup.

Reutimann averaged Harvick averaged 145.138 mph in a race that took 2 hours, 45 minutes and 34 seconds to complete.  The race was slowed by four cautions for 21 laps and featured 10 lead changes among seven drivers.

Since 1939, WIX® Filters, a member of the Affinia Group family of brands, has been an innovator in filtration products. WIX designs, manufactures and distributes products for automotive, diesel, agricultural, industrial and specialty filter markets. Its product line includes oil, air, cabin interior, fuel, coolant, transmission and hydraulic filters for automobiles, trucks and off-road equipment. WIX, a member of the Affinia family of brands, is the number one filter in NASCAR and an exclusive NASCAR Performance Product. Its NASCAR relationship also includes the WIX Filters Lap Leader Award, which recognizes the drivers leading the most laps in each race. For more information, visit www.wixfilters.com.

Affinia Group Inc. is an innovative global leader in the design, manufacture, distribution and marketing of industrial grade products and services, including extensive offerings of aftermarket parts for automotive and heavy-duty vehicles. With more than $2 billion in annual revenue, Affinia has operations in North and South America, Europe, Asia and India. For more information, visit www.affiniagroup.com.

*Affinia Group Inc.’s affiliated companies include Brake Parts Inc. WIX Filtration Corp LLC, Affinia Products  Corp LLC and other high quality manufacturers of the Affinia family of brands.

- Camp & Associates, Inc., for WIX Filters, Press Release

Bill Elliott No. 21 Motorcraft/Quick Lane Ford Fusion - Wood Bros. Racing

“I cut a tire and from there I was just along for the ride,” Elliott said after climbing from the car and being checked out at the track’s infield care center. He said the impact from the collision with Gordon, one that knocked the wheels of the Motorcraft/Quick Lane car off the ground, wasn’t as bad as it might have seen to those who saw it.

“It was no easy day, but it wasn’t that bad,” he said. “I am OK.” Elliott, who wound up 37th in the finishing order, said the real pain he felt was for his David Hyder-led crew, which worked hard to give him a competitive car. He was running just one lap behind the leaders when he was knocked out of the race. “I feel bad for the guys,” he said. “We have worked hard, but we have missed something, whether it is the spoiler or whatever, we just can’t get where we need to be. “We are just OK out there. Everybody is really working hard and trying to help us out, then something like this happens, and it is just really unfortunate.”

Team co-owner Eddie Wood, looking for a bright spot on an otherwise disappointing night, pointed out that while the team’s No. 21 suffered a rare DNF [Did Not Finish], it wasn’t related to the reliability of their Ford Fusion. “We really haven’t had any mechanical issues in a while,” Wood said. “The cars have been really good.”

Elliott, Hyder and the rest of the Wood Brothers crew now turn their attention to their next appearance, in two weeks in the Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, which historically has been one of Elliott’s better tracks. In 15 career starts there, he has a win, in 2002, and five top-five starts, including a fourth-place qualifying run last year in the No. 21 Motorcraft/Quick Lane Fusion.

- Wood Brothers Racing, Press Release

Ryan Newman in car - Photo Credit: Jerry Markland/Getty Images for NASCAR

Ryan Newman struggled with an ill-handling racecar for much of Saturday night’s LifeLock.com 400 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race at Chicagoland Speedway in Joliet, Ill., resulting in a disappointing 22^nd-place finish.

Like a pendulum, the handling of Newman’s No. 39 Haas Automation Chevrolet swung from one end of the spectrum to the other during the course of the 267-lap race, as the it went from loose during the early stages of the race to tight in the middle part of the event and then back to loose in the closing laps.

“That’s definitely not the kind of night that we wanted,” said Newman, who fell one spot to 16^th in the championship point standings, where he’s now 99 points outside of the 12-driver cutoff for the Chase for the Championship. “We didn’t ever get a good handle on the Haas Automation Chevy tonight. We went from too loose to too tight to too loose. It just didn’t work out for us.”

Newman qualified deeper in the field than he had expected, and started Saturday night’s race in 19^th position. However, the team felt they had learned a lot in practice on Friday that would help them in the race, and they were confident that Newman would be able to continue his streak of top-10 finishes at Chicagoland, which stood at three entering the LifeLock.com 400.

The handling issues began early for Newman and the No. 39 Haas Automation team. By lap 20, Newman told crew chief Tony Gibson that his car was a little too free and it was getting looser as the run went on. A caution flag at lap 38 gave the crew its first opportunity to work on the loose-handling racecar, which was running in the 20^th position. The pit crew changed four tires, added fuel and made track bar and air pressure adjustments. Newman restarted the race in 19^th place at lap 43.

The adjustments appeared to help Newman’s efforts during the early stages of the run, but by lap 70 he told Gibson that the car was once again “really loose.” Newman explained to his crew chief that the car was so loose that it felt like it was “jumping sideways in the middle of the turn.”  The car’s loose-handling condition caused Newman to fall back in the running order to 23^rd.

At lap 92, Newman made his first green flag pit stop of the night. He took on four tires, fuel and the team made wedge and air pressure adjustments in hopes of improving the car’s handling. Again just a handful of laps later, Newman radioed his crew and said the changes had not helped his racecar enough. The No. 39 Chevy was still way too loose.

The handling issues continued to hamper Newman’s progress on the racetrack and by lap 115, he was in 24^th place and fell one lap down to the leaders. However, a timely debris caution helped Newman get back on the lead lap, and under the caution flag Newman told his crew that the loose racecar was preventing him from exiting the turns the way that he wanted, which in turn hampered him on the straightaways.

Newman came to pit road under the caution flag and once again, the pit crew went to work in hopes of improving the No. 39 machine. The crew placed a half rubber in the left rear, made a track bar adjustment, changed four tires and added fuel. Newman restarted the race at lap 135 in 24^th.

The changes appeared to work as Newman reported the loose handling condition was fixed. However, as the laps ticked off the board, Newman’s car began shifting and by lap 160, he was now fighting a tight racecar though the turns. Again, Newman’s crew went into action to formulate a plan to help the now tight-handling racecar. Newman pitted under caution at lap 183, and the team changed four tires, added fuel and made a wedge adjustment. Newman returned to the track in 21^st.

On the lap-188 restart, Newman jumped from 21^st to 18^th in one lap, but his tight-handling condition persisted and forward progress stalled.

At lap 232, the team made its final pit stop of the night. Newman pitted for four tires, fuel and wedge and air pressure adjustments. Unfortunately, the adjustments drastically changed the handling of the racecar as the car’s balance went from being too tight to being “the loosest (the racecar) had been all night.”

The No. 39 machine became a handful on the racetrack in the closing laps, as it was once again nearly sideways in the corners. Newman slid back a few spots before stabilizing in 22^nd place, where he finished the race.

Newman’s teammate, Tony Stewart, driver of the No. 14 Office Depot/Old Spice “Back to School” Chevrolet Impala for Stewart-Haas Racing, finished ninth. It was Stewart’s eighth top-10 finish in 10 career Sprint Cup starts at Chicagoland and his ninth top-10 of 2010.

With round 19 of 36 complete, Stewart remained ninth in the Sprint Cup championship standings. He has 2,389 points and is 356 markers behind series leader Kevin Harvick and 118 points ahead of 13^th-place Dale Earnhardt Jr., the first driver on the outside looking in at the 12-driver Chase with seven races remaining before the Chase begins.

David Reutimann won the LifeLock.com 400 to score his second Sprint Cup victory, his first of the season and his first at Chicagoland. Reutimann’s only other victory came in the 2009 Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte (N.C.) Motor Speedway, which was rain-shortened, with only 227 of the 400 scheduled laps completed.

Carl Edwards finished .727 of a second behind race winner Reutimann, while Jeff Gordon, Clint Bowyer and Jamie McMurray rounded out the top-five. Kasey Kahne, Jeff Burton, Denny Hamlin, Stewart and Paul Menard comprised the remainder of the top-10.

There were four caution periods for 21 laps, with eight drivers failing to finish the 267-lap race.

The Sprint Cup Series takes a rare weekend off before heading to Indianapolis Motor Speedway for the July 25 Brickyard 400. The race begins at 1 p.m. EDT with live coverage provided by ESPN beginning with its pre-race show at noon.

- True Speed Communication for Stewart-Haas Racing, Press Release

Date: July 10, 2010
Event: LifeLock.com 400 (Round 19 of 36)
Series: NASCAR Sprint Cup Series
Location: Chicagoland Speedway in Joliet, Ill. (1.5-mile oval)
Start/Finish: 3^rd / 9^th (Running, completed 267 of 267 laps)
Winner: David Reutimann of Michael Waltrip Racing (Toyota)

Tony Stewart drove his No. 14 Office Depot/Old Spice “Back-to-School” Chevrolet Impala to a solid ninth-place finish in Saturday night’s LifeLock.com 400 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race at Chicagoland Speedway in Joliet, Ill. It was Stewart’s ninth top-10 finish of 2010 and his eighth top-10 in 10 career Sprint Cup starts at Chicagoland.

“Throughout the night, we didn’t totally miss it, but we didn’t totally hit it either,” said Stewart, referring to a new chassis setup he and crew chief Darian Grubb elected to try out on the 1.5-mile Chicagoland oval. “I think there were some positives to it, but I’m not sure it was exactly what we wanted, but we’ll keep working at it. We’ll try to figure out where we missed it and what we can do to make it better. We’ve got some data from this package and we’ll just keep working forward.”

The package worked extremely well in the race’s opening laps, where from his third-place starting spot, Stewart advanced to second and ran lap times nearly identical to those of race-leader Jimmie Johnson.

A slight hiccup came during the race’s first round of pit stops when the caution flag waved at lap 38. In what should’ve been a routine, four-tire stop, it went awry when the rear wheels of the jack caught in the seam on pit road that separates the concrete pit boxes from the asphalt. The fluke event stole precious seconds, as jackman Mike Casto had to force the jack out of the seam and underneath the right side of the Office Depot/Old Spice Chevy. He was finally successful, and upon an unhindered change of the left-side tires, Stewart was on his way, albeit in 17^th-place.

No problem, for after the lap-44 restart, Stewart was back in the top-10 as the race hit the 50-lap mark. It’s there where Stewart would stay for the remainder of the 267-lap race, as his car was good, but not quite good enough to get back to mixing it up with the leaders. Nonetheless, Stewart and Grubb’s collaborative efforts yielded the team’s sixth top-10 finish in the last eight races.

Stewart’s teammate, Ryan Newman, driver of the No. 39 Haas Automation Chevrolet Impala for Stewart-Haas Racing, finished 22^nd.

David Reutimann won the LifeLock.com 400 to score his second career Sprint Cup victory, his first of the season and his first at Chicagoland. Reutimann’s only other victory came in the 2009 Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte (N.C.) Motor Speedway, which was rain-shortened, with only 227 of the 400 scheduled laps completed.

Carl Edwards finished .727 of a second behind race-winner Reutimann, while Jeff Gordon, Clint Bowyer and pole-sitter Jamie McMurray rounded out the top-five. Kasey Kahne, Jeff Burton, Denny Hamlin, Stewart and Paul Menard comprised the remainder of the top-10.

There were four caution periods for 21 laps, with eight drivers failing to finish.

With round 19 of 36 complete, Stewart remained ninth in the Sprint Cup championship standings. He has 2,389 points, 356 markers behind series leader Kevin Harvick and 118 points ahead of 13^th-place Dale Earnhardt Jr. Newman fell one spot to 16^th. He has 2,187 points and is 99 points back of 12^th-place Bowyer, who holds the final spot in the 12-driver Chase for the Championship with seven races remaining before the Chase begins.

The Sprint Cup Series takes a rare weekend off before heading to Indianapolis Motor Speedway for the July 25 Brickyard 400. The race begins at 1 p.m. EDT with live coverage provided by ESPN beginning with its pre-race show at noon.

- True Speed Communication for Stewart-Haas Racing, Press Release

2010 NSCS Regan Smith - Photo Credit: Sam Greenwood/Getty Images for NASCAR

When the first caution waved on Lap 39 of 267 Smith’s No. 78 Chevrolet had already gained 10 positions on the 1.5-mile oval. Smith patiently bided his time as the race wore on and moved into the top-20 on Lap 190.

“There were a lot of long faces yesterday after we qualified 41st,” said Smith, who tied Matt Kenseth for the biggest improvement of 21 positions from start to finish. “But tonight was different — we made a nice recovery to finish 20th. We made a lot of changes overnight and looked at everything. I also looked at everything that I was doing and watched last year’s race about 25 times. We’re not overly happy with the result, but considering the tough times we had the past three weeks we are feeling a lot more upbeat.”

Speaking of the last three weeks — Sonoma, New Hampshire and Daytona — Smith endured two accidents, a fractured wrist and finishes of 38, 33 and 33.

“We’re back to where we belong and we can once again start focusing on getting to the next level,” said crew chief Pete Rondeau. “It was really gratifying to see the fight we had tonight after yesterday’s disappointment. Regan did a great job wheeling the Furniture Row Chevy tonight. Our pit crew also did a good job. It was a great team effort overall.”

The Chicagoland result was the sixth top-20 finish of the season for Smith and the Furniture Row team.

The race winner was David Reutimann. Rounding out the top-five in order were: Carl Edwards, Jeff Gordon, Clint Bowyer and Jamie McMurray.

The Sprint Cup circuit will have next weekend off and resume action Sunday, July 25 in the Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

- DMF Communications for Furniture Row Racing, Press Release

NASCAR on TNT

Countdown to Green

Lindsay Czarniak (host), Kyle Petty (analyst) and Larry McReynolds (analyst)

McReynolds on the challenges of racing at Chicagoland Speedway: “The biggest reason that (the track) wants to play mind-games is that (NASCAR) only comes here once a year.  I don’t think you can look back and say, ‘this team ran well here’ because so much changes from one July to the next.  The set-up changes, the track changes, the cars change and of course, we’re racing for the first time here with the rear spoiler so that’s why we’ve had nine races with seven different winners (at Chicagoland Speedway).”

No. 29 Kevin Harvick joined the TNT pre-race show.

Harvick on his win at Daytona on July 3^rd: “It doesn’t hurt to be lucky sometimes.  Last week, we had a good car and we were able to run up front all day and stay ahead of the wrecks.  If you could turn back the clock to a year ago, we would’ve been in all of those wrecks.  Things go in cycles and right now, everything is going well.”

TNT’s Pride of NASCAR featured a tribute to legendary driver Alan Kulwicki.

Former business manager Don Hawk on Kulwick’s mentality: “The guy was absolutely driven.  He was focused and intense.  He knew what he wanted and he absolutely knew when you had your first communication with him, if you were talking nonsense, he wouldn’t talk to you.”

Petty on Alan Kulwicki: “(Kulwicki) didn’t have a big budget but he had a huge heart.  Until the day when I stopped driving race cars, I had an ‘AK 7’ patch on my sleeve in memory of Alan Kulwicki.  We were friends and he was an incredible person and an incredibly focused individual.  He drove (cars) hard and he drove them hard for a purpose…to win championships.  He was a really good driver, a great guy and would still have an impact on the sport today.”

No. 18 Kyle Busch joined the TNT pre-race show live on the set.

Busch on his intensity during races: “You’re here to win.  You’re here to win every single week and that’s the first and foremost thing you want to do.  The second thing after that is…nothing.  You go home and go on to next week.  I’ve been fortunate to be in the position I’m in and to have the people with Joe Gibbs Racing who have worked so hard and given me great race cars this year.”

Busch on if he’s matured over the years: “I feel like I’ve been trying but probably not getting too many high remarks or results.  For me, it’s just to go out there, do what my job is and win the race.”

Busch on his rivalry with his brother No. 2 Kurt Busch: “We had a sibling rivalry and it was tough growing up with him.  I was seven years younger so I was trying to be like him.  But he was always starting everything before I was so I was always trying to get into it and try to be better than he was.”

No. 88 Dale Earnhardt Jr. on not believing in momentum going from race to race: “We just want to keep working hard and it builds our confidence a little bit.  I don’t know if I believe in momentum because there are just too many variables during the race but we feel pretty good and we worked on the car really hard yesterday.  We’ll see what we’ve got.”

*****   *****   *****   *****   *****   ******

NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Racing from Chicago

Announcers: Adam Alexander (play-by-play), Wally Dallenbach (analyst) and Kyle Petty (analyst); Larry McReynolds (analyst) contributes from the in-field with the TNT Offtrack Robotic Car (TORC) with Lindsay Czarniak (host)

Pit reporters: Marty Snider, Ralph Sheheen, Phil Parsons and Matt Yocum

Petty on drivers racing side-by-side: “The funny thing about racing 50 or so laps into the race is if you end up racing a guy side-by-side for three or four laps, you lose a lot of time.  These guys are smart enough to know that they don’t want to lose time to the leader or let those guys behind them catch up.”

Dallenbach on how every race is different: “One race makes a difference.  You think you’ve got the stuff figured out and then you show up like (No. 29 Kevin) Harvick does this weekend and I know that restricter plate (racing) is a different deal but still, those guys have been running good all year and all of a sudden, they’re out to lunch tonight.”

Dallenbach on how drivers are stepping up with No. 48 Jimmy Johnson falling out of contention: “All of a sudden these guys have a little more step in them.  With the No. 48 (Jimmy Johnson) out of the picture, all of these guys think they have a chance now.  When you see a guy like that have problems, everyone else seems to step up more.”

Dallenbach on No. 16 Greg Biffle: “(Biffle’s) car looks really, really good after they make a pit stop and about halfway through the run.  The last couple of times, they look like they’ve lost some ground towards the end of their run.  If they can make the car better, especially towards the end of the run, I really think they’ll have a good finish tonight.”

Petty on drivers knowing when to run down under another driver: “When you run down under somebody, you don’t want to run lap after lap because you use your stuff up.  (No. 24) Jeff (Gordon) isn’t using his stuff up, he’s just running his line but you use your stuff up trying to get around him.  You have to fall back in line, let your stuff cool off and then come back and try it again.”

Dallenbach on certain race teams focusing on winning races instead of winning the Sprint Cup:  “There are a lot of teams that are saying, ‘Even if we get into the Chase (for the Sprint Cup), we’re not good enough to win the championship’ so they are focusing in on winning races.  I think that’s what they should be doing.”

Petty on No. 99 Carl Edwards: “This might be the best run (No.99) Carl Edwards has had all year long.  They have struggled off and on but this might be their best run.”

Petty on No. 00 David Reutimann’s pit crew rising to the occasion: “I’m going to give Reutimann’s pit crew a huge shout-out because when you get in this position (as leader) for the first time, and this is one of the first times that Reutimann has had a shot at winning a race like this, you have to perform under pressure.  His pit crew hasn’t been in this position any more than Reutimann has.  The whole team is in this position and they have all risen to the occasion.”

No. 99 Carl Edwards on his second place finish: “The biggest positive is that we ran this well.  Our guys have been working hard.  The guys at the shop have kept with it and are working so hard.  We were coming on strong at the end (of the race).  I just needed a couple more laps.  I honestly needed a couple of more points so I could go up there and risk it really hard on the high side but I was really loose.  I ran that last lap hard and fast and I wish I could’ve run all the laps like that but it’s a good points night.”

Dallenbach on the importance of wins to drivers who aren’t in position to qualify for the Chase for the Sprint Cup: “I think it’s really important for these guys because wins matter right now.  It’s not so much about being in the Chase because winning the championship is tough and a lot of these guys aren’t at that level.  The win column is really important and these guys did a really good job tonight.  They earned it.”

Unofficial NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Racing from Chicago Results:

1. No. 00 David Reutimann

2.      No. 99 Carl Edwards

3.      No. 24 Jeff Gordon

4.      No. 33 Clint Bowyer

5.      No. 1 Jamie McMurray

6.      No. 9 Kasey Kahne

7.      No. 31 Jeff Burton

8.      No. 11 Denny Hamlin

9.      No. 14 Tony Stewart

10.  No. 98 Paul Menard

- Turner Sports, Press Release

Team Chevy Logo

Gordon led twice for a total of 47 laps while Bowyer led once for one lap and McMurray led once for 72 laps. Two-time NASCAR Sprint Cup Series champion Gordon remains second in the point standings. Bowyer now sits 12th in the standings while McMurray, who started on the pole, moved up to 18th in the points order.

The Chicagoland Speedway race started in the daylight with second place qualifier Jimmie Johnson, No. 48 Lowe’s Chevrolet, jumping to the lead and setting a blistering pace at the front of the field. But as day turned into night, the track changed dramatically as did the complexion of the race.

After leading for 92 laps, Johnson was involved in an on-track incident that sent him spinning into the grass and relegated the four-time defending champion to a 25th place finish. He remains third in the standings with seven races remaining to the start of the Chase.

Points leader Kevin Harvick, No. 29 Shell-Pennzoil Chevrolet, suffered an equally disappointing night when he spent several laps in the garage to repair a faulty fuel pump assembly. He finished 34th but remains in the points lead with 103 points over second place Gordon.

Jeff Burton, No. 31 Caterpillar Chevrolet, moved up one spot in the Chase standings to seventh with his seventh place finish in tonight’s 267-lap/400-mile race.

Two-time NSCS champion Tony Stewart, No. 14 Office Depot/Old Spice Chevrolet, finished ninth in the race and remains ninth in the standings.

David Reutimann (Toyota) was the race winner with Carl Edwards (Ford) in second).

After a weekend off, the Series resumes competition in the Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway on July 25, 2010.

JEFF GORDON, NO. 24 DUPONT CHEVROLET, FINISHED 3RD:

DID THE HANDLING GO AWAY FROM YOUR CAR IN THE LATE LAPS? “We tried to tighten it up; we just didn’t tighten up our DuPont Chevy enough. When the sun went down, we were really good. Had good grip but we fought loose off all night. Then we started fighting loose-in, loose-off condition. But all-in-all, it was a great effort by the whole team. We have to give David Reutimann (race winner) a lot of credit. Hats off to him. Great job and I’m happy for those guys. We just came up a little bit short.”

HOW WAS YOUR RUN TONIGHT?

“You know to be able to get up there at different times and at times it looked like our Dupont Chevy was the car to beat but I knew David was really, really strong and we got the lead that one time and he ran us down and I knew we were in a little bit of trouble.  We made some adjustments in that last pit stop but unfortunately it didn’t go the right way for us so we fell back to third.  We are trying some new and different things, trying to get to victory lane, trying to get ourselves ready for the Chase so to come out here with a third place finish and have a solid car like that all night is something that we are all very happy with.”

I AM SURE THE GUYS MADE YOU AWARE OF THE FACT THAT KEVIN HARVICK OUR POINT LEADER HAD TROUBLE

“I had no idea.  I saw that we got by him.  You know right now it is more about the wins and those bonus points than anything else.  We are pretty solid in the points but you can never be solid enough so happy to make some gains there but it is all about the wins for us until we get in that Chase.”

ENJOY YOUR WEEK OFF

“I am looking forward to that.  Can’t wait to get home to Ingrid and Ella.”

CLINT BOWYER, NO. 33 CHEERIOS/HAMBURER HELPER CHEVROLET, FINISHED 4TH: TALK ABOUT YOUR RUN TONIGHT: “We just kept working on it a  little bit, kept getting it better and better. Shane (Wilson, crew chief) made some great calls. All weekend long the Cheerios/Hamburger Helper Chevrolet was good. This is exactly what we needed to do. We need to string together a bunch of these and we’ll find ourselves in the Chase and have a shot at this championship. We just got way too loose there at the end. We tried to adjust on it to get to the No. 24 (Jeff Gordon) car, just couldn’t do it. Got just a little bit too loose, but we’ll get them next time.”

YOU NEEDED A GOOD SOLID RUN HERE TO MAKE SOME GROUND UP IN THAT CHASE

“Yes absolutely, it felt good.  You know our car’s been good here all weekend long.  Our Cheerio’s Hamburger Helper Chevrolet……we unloaded a good car and that’s exactly what we have got to do to get ourselves back in this Chase hunt.  You know I know there’s still seven races to go but to get that monkey off your back….. it seems like we have fast race cars but can’t get the finish but to get the finish and the caution didn’t come out at the end, it felt good.“

YOUR TEAMMATE KEVIN HARVICK HAD SOME SORT OF A FUEL PUMP ISSUE WAS THAT ANY KIND OF CONCERN FOR YOU GUYS

“I just found out.  Nobody told me.  I guess it wasn’t a concern to the boys up on the box.  But it is a bummer, you hate to see mechanical failures like that but the guys in the engine shop do a good job and they will have the problem fixed.”

JAMIE MCMURRAY, NO. 1 MCDONALD’S CHEVROLET, FINISHED 5TH:

TALK ABOUT YOUR RUN STARTING ON THE POLE: “I thought we had one of the best cars at the beginning and as the sun went down, the track just got tighter and tighter. Bono (Kevin Manion, crew chief) did a really good job adjusting on the car and getting it tighter. We just didn’t have the grip that we did at the beginning.

“When I saw the No. 48 (Jimmie Johnson) miss pit road and get in the accident, I thought we had a legitimate shot to win. But the No. 24 (Jeff Gordon) and the No. 00 (David Reutimann, race winner) really came on there the second half of the race, we just didn’t have the speed we needed. We practiced and really worked hard to make my car work on the bottom and 10 laps in I was up against the wall.”

JUDGING BY THE RIGHT SIDE OF YOUR CAR YOU SPENT A LOT OF TIME ON THE HIGH SIDE TONIGHT

“Yes, I worked really hard to make our car work well on the bottom and never really went to the top but when they dropped the green flag our car was a lot tighter than it had been in all of the practices.  Really a good run for our McDonald’s Chevrolet.  I thought the first half of the race we had one of the best cars…  us and the 48.  When Jimmie missed pit road and got caught up in that accident I thought we had a legitimate shot to win but David Reutimann and Jeff Gordon came on there at the end.  It is cool to see David Reutimann….he is a very deserving driver and that will be a popular win among all the guys here in the garage.

THEY WILL SAY WHAT A NICE RUN FOR YOU AND THIS TEAM.  THIS TEAM CONTINUES TO EVOLVE AND IMPROVE AS THE SEASON WEARS ON.

“Yes our car certainly has enough speed…. I feel like we are a car that needs to be in the Chase we already have a win and we seem to run well enough.  I will let Bono worry about that because every time I pay attention to points something bad happens.  It is really cool to get runs like this in the McDonald’s car here in Chicago because we have all kinds of McDonald’s folks here so it was a good night and I have to say hi to Johnny Morris.  He sent me a text message last night. He is in Wyoming and he sent it from a random number.  Hey Johnny.””

JEFF BURTON, NO. 31 CATERPILLAR CHEVROLET, FINISHED 7TH:

ON HIS RUN TONIGHT AND HAVING A TOP-10 CAR: “We got what we deserved tonight I think. We gave up a little bit of spots there at the end with a little bit of a bad pit stops. But, you will have those things in racing every now and then. I just messed us up. I thought we were good enough yesterday and I made the call on where we were with the car. We just weren’t as good as we needed to be. We needed to be working more yesterday. I just didn’t see that, I just missed it.”

DID TONIGHT NEED TO HAVE LONG RUNS AND CLEAN AIR? “I don’t know why, but this race track is really sensitive to clean air. I saw that yesterday in practice. We were pretty free and I knew we were pretty free, but I thought the track would get tighter and it never really came to us. We got better, they made the car a lot better, but I just kind of got us in the wrong direction yesterday. Thanks to all of our supporters for sticking with us and all of our sponsors, Caterpillar, Prilosec OTC and just everybody. They are awesome.”

TONY STEWART, NO. 14 OFFICE DEPOT/OLD SPICE CHEVROLET, FINISHED 9TH:

YOU TRIED SOME NEW THINGS WITH YOUR SETUP TONIGHT, HOW DID THEY WORK FOR YOU? “I think there were some positives to it, but I’m not sure it was exactly what we wanted, but we’ll keep working at it. That’s the good thing – throughout the night we didn’t totally miss it but we didn’t totally hit it either. So, we’ll try to figure out where we missed it and what we can do to make it better. We’ve got some data from this package and we’ll just keep working forward.”

REGAN SMITH, NO. 78 FURNITURE ROW CHEVROLET, FINISHED 20TH:  ON TONIGHT’S RACE: “There were a lot of long faces yesterday after we qualified 41st, But tonight is different. We made a nice recovery to finish 20th. Pete (Rondeau, crew chief) and the guys made a lot of changes overnight. I also looked at everything that I was doing and even watched last year’s race about 25 times.

“We’re not overly happy with the result, but considering the tough times we had the past three weeks we are feeling a lot more upbeat. We’re kind of back to where we were three weeks ago. We’re building and this Furniture Row team will get better during the second half of the season.”

DALE EARNHARDT, JR., NO. 88 AMP ENERGY/NATIONAL GUARD CHEVROLET -FINISHED 23RD: ON HIS RACE: “We had just a really shitty, shitty driving car all night. We made it worse at times and made it better at time. We just weren’t very good. There aren’t any excuses, we just weren’t very good.”

DID YOU THINK THERE WAS A CHANCE IT WOULD GET BETTER IF YOU KEPT WORKING ON IT? “We tried all the way to the end, we just didn’t have any chances that really responded. We wore out every right rear tire we put on my car to the cords. So what are you going to do?”

DO YOU WORRY ABOUT MAKING CHANGES? “No, I just let Lance (McGrew, crew chief) rip away, man. I let him swing away trying to get the car as good as we can get it. I believe what he does is right. Tonight some adjustments didn’t respond like we thought they should of, but, sometimes this car doesn’t behave like you think it would. Some things you do to it don’t really turn around and do what you think. Oh well.

“We are pretty disappointed, little bit devastated about how we ran tonight. We got nobody to blame but ourselves. We worked really hard in practice trying to get better because this was about how we were going to run. We just couldn’t make it better all night.”

JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 LOWE’S CHEVROLET – Finished 25^th

WHAT HAPPENED WITH YOU AND THE NO. 56 (MARTIN TRUEX JR.)? IT LOOKED LIKE YOU GUYS MIGHT HAVE NOT EVEN MADE CONTACT

“Yeah, I followed Jeff into the corner and got tight being behind him and the No.56 was trying to squeeze in there on the white line and I just think the air, being that close to me, disrupted my car and I just couldn’t catch it I got turned around.”

IS THERE ANY RELIEF IN KNOWING JUST HOW GOOD THIS CAR WAS?

“Oh, that makes it worse (laughs).”

WHAT WAS GOING ON WITH THAT MISSED PIT STOP?

“Well, coming to pit road I hit the brakes to slow down and the car had a lot of rear brake percentage in it that I didn’t expect it to have. It didn’t have that in my practice runs when I was trying to get to pit road. I just didn’t expect the car to try to rotate around on the brakes coming to pit road like it did and I almost spun out so I missed pit road that time. We recovered and got back to the No. 1 (Jamie McMurray) car and that’s just kind of how it was. It was not a bit deal. And then we got turned around on the backstretch and then after that we were coming through the field and I felt like we could still salvage a top five or something and I cut a right front tire down and then just got in the wall. I think between sliding through the grass and touching the wall, it messed up the body and the nose started dragging pretty bad for the final run or two.”

ON HAVING A GOOD CAR BUT NOT GETTING THE FINISH YOU WANT

“Yeah, it makes it a lot worse. At the beginning of the race we had a great race car and a thought we had a shot at a win tonight. But stuff happens and we’ll just come back in a couple of weeks.”

WHAT HAPPENED WITH YOU AND MARTIN TRUEX JR.?

“It was really just a racing thing. He was trying to squeeze his way in between me and the white line. I came up off the white line a little bit and the air flow changed as he got close to me. I could feel it when he got close and it just started my car into a slide and at that point I was just hanging on and it finally turned around on me.”

KEVIN HARVICK, NO. 29 SHELL-PENNZOIL CHEVROLET, FINISHED 34TH, RETAINS POINTS LEAD: ON TONIGHT’S RACE: “We had a fuel pressure issue, and we had to go to the garage to repair the fuel pump assembly, so that ended our chance at salvaging a good finish.  But we missed the setup on our Shell-Pennzoil Chevrolet, too.  We were just extremely loose for most of the race. Tough night for us, but we have a strong race team and we will bounce back at Indy.”

POST RACE PRESS CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPT:

JEFF GORDON, NO. 24 DUPONT CHEVROLET, FINISHED 3^RD

KERRY THARP:  We’re joined by Jeff Gordon.  Jeff, talk about your run out there.  Certainly you had a car that looked like it could have got into Victory Lane.
JEFF GORDON:  Yeah, no, at times I thought we were really, really strong.  We struggled earlier in the day with the car being real loose.  We seemed to fix that and became a top three or four car.  We were able to chase Jamie down that one time when he was leading, get by him.  I was pretty optimistic.  I noticed in my mirror the 00 was following me and gaining on us.  I knew he was the car to beat.  He proved it those last hundred laps for sure.
We just didn’t have anything for those guys.  We tried to make some adjustments on that last pit stop.  We got really, really loose.  I was just kind of hanging on for third there at the end.
KERRY THARP:  We’ll continue with questions for Jeff.

Q.  Jeff, you made a comment middle of the race, Greg Biffle had lost a cylinder, you said 24 lost a driver, something like that.  What did you get behind on that you didn’t feel you had control?
JEFF GORDON:  I said the 34.  Hadn’t been there all year, but for some reason he keeps making the races.

Q.  What do you take from tonight on what you guys got behind on where you couldn’t stay with Reutimann?
JEFF GORDON:  We just fought between loose and tight all night long.  Early in the race, we were just real loose on throttle on the exit.  We tightened the car up.  Didn’t really help the exit.  Seemed to tighten it up everywhere else where it was at least drivable.  When that top groove came in, that worked pretty good for me.  There at the end, that top groove just wasn’t working for me.  I had to run around the bottom.  Then we got loose everywhere.
The last run, Carl was saying the same thing.  They got loose, too.  I don’t know if the track loosened up, what it was.  Everybody seemed like they were really fighting loose at the end.

Q.  Wondered if your performance here tonight gives you a lot of confidence that you can go to Indy in a couple weeks and contend there.
JEFF GORDON:  I mean, you certainly hope so.  I mean, our team’s been consistently running up front.  A little bit different than Carl where they haven’t had the consistency.  Tonight he had a fast racecar.  We’ve had the consistency.  We just haven’t had the car to win or all the pieces as a team to get ourselves into Victory Lane.
At times we’ve had the car, for whatever reasons, blame it on me, blame it on incidents, I don’t like to point fingers, but we haven’t gotten to Victory Lane.  We’re very optimistic.  We got a great package going to Indy.  We’ve been working really, really hard on everything that we can to find speed.  We think we’ve got some things up our sleeve for Indy.  But I’m sure that’s what a lot of guys out there are thinking.  It’s a place where everybody goes all out and have been probably on their seven posts and their simulation, wind tunnel and everything else from the Pocono race on to try to get what it’s going to take to win at Indy.

Q.  Jeff, saw you go to Victory Lane.  Carl was talking about what a neat and cool guy David is, how everybody kind of respects him.  Can you talk about David, why you decided to visit him.  And, Carl, we haven’t seen Reutimann in here, haven’t seen you much in here after races this year.  Is it kind of fun to see some different faces?
JEFF GORDON:  I usually have a three or four pole win kind of deal.  After they get more than three or four poles, I stop sending them texts.  After they get three or four wins in a season, I stop going to Victory Lane (laughter).
David is a neat guy.  I just know that that win that he had in Charlotte, you know, while he took it, not going to throw away the trophy, earning it the way he earned it tonight is the way he wants to do it.  They’ve been close at times, just haven’t had all the breaks.
You know, I think that he just drove a great race and had a good racecar.  I think he deserves to be congratulated.

Q.  Jeff, does it matter how many laps a driver runs for a victory, his first career victory, or is a win a win?  Then talk about your 600th career start tonight, November 15th, 1992 seem like a long time ago?
JEFF GORDON:  It sure does, when you put it that way.  I was joking with somebody earlier that I was looking at some of the stats because I was being reminded of 600 races, all the things that happened over the years.  You know, there was a few years when we were winning every third or fourth race.  Now we win three every 100.  I’d like to get back to some winning ways.
We’ve done some amazing things over those 600.  I’m proud of it.  I’m proud 600 in we’re still competitive enough to win races like we were tonight.  Put up a heck of a fight.
You know, I mean, I think it matters to a driver when they go home and think about the win, you know, that they didn’t just kind of luck into it or lead one lap.  I mean, it’s great to have a green white checkered and win a race by starting third or fourth and driving by guys, that’s cool.
But to me the style in which the 00 did it tonight was about as good as it gets.  They were solidly in there all night long and when it really counted, man, they picked up the pace and took the lead and never looked back.

Q.  You said something on the radio about how strong Reutimann was.  How strong did he look to you?  Is that just engine related?  What is that, power?
JEFF GORDON:  It wasn’t power.  We got plenty of power.  He could just drive deep in the corner, and he could keep it down on the bottom, he could arc it in the corner.
I felt like there were times when I nailed one and two, and he’d still gain on me.  So, like I said, we were trying some things.  You know, I’m not sure if what we were trying is the best combination.  So, you know, one of the ways we learn, not only with trying things that we’re doing, but we go over there and look at them inspect those cars and see what they’ve got in there.  That’s part of NASCAR racing, how you learn.  When you get beat, you try to see as much of the parts and pieces.  That’s what the competition does to us.  That’s what we do to others.
We never feel like we’re the best.  Every week we got to prove it.  You got to look at all the details.  That’s one of the ways you do it.

Q.  Jeff, you’ve gone from being the kid to the old man.  You don’t feel like an old man, do you?
JEFF GORDON:  Man, I do when I get out of that racecar and everything aches.  No, you know, I mean, I’m still enjoying the sport very, very much.  I feel like I’m way more comfortable with where I’m at in the sport today.  That’s fun.  I like that.  I like all the years of experience that now I get to benefit from.
But, like I said, the only thing I’d change right now is getting some of those wins back.  It’s tough.  It’s very competitive.  We know we got to pick up the pace.  Yeah, 600, that’s a lot of races, that’s for sure.
KERRY THARP:  Congratulations.  Enjoy your week off.  Thank you.

FastScripts by ASAP Sports

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- Team Chevy, Press Release

2010 NSCS Carl Edwards - Photo Credit: Sam Greenwood/Getty Images for NASCAR

CARL EDWARDS – No. 99 Aflac Ford Fusion (Finished 2nd) –

HOW MANY MORE LAPS UNTIL YOU WOULD HAVE CAUGHT THE #00? “Three more laps and we would have been right there, but you never really know I guess because it depends on how hard he is running too, but I feel like with three more laps things would have gotten really interesting.”

IF YOU ARE GOING TO LOSE, REUTIMANN IS PROBABLY AN OKAY PILL TO SWALLOW ISN’T IT? “Yeah, he is just such a nice person. He is the first guy to congratulate me on something and the first guy to apologize if he feels he did something wrong. We all have to hang out with each other every week, but he is the guy you would hang out with if you had an off weekend. He is a good guy.”

HOW DOES IT FEEL TO FINALLY BE UP AT THE FRONT WHERE YOU WERE SO USED TO RUNNING BEFORE? “It is nice. It is great to run up front. Guys are so nice and quiet up there in the front of the race. It is just fun. It is good to have a fast race car and it felt good to focus on little things like my line and how I was driving the car rather than how I was going to stay on the lead lap. Hopefully we can apply what we learned tonight and go forward and be faster more often because that is a lot more fun.”

IS THIS A QUANTUM LEAP TONIGHT OR STEADY EVOLUTION? “We are definitely on the horizon. We haven’t quite gone over, but I know we can run that well because we have done it and we did it tonight. We just have to figure out how to do it every week. I hope this is something we can go back on Monday and talk about why our car was so much different this week than it has been. We have some tracks like this coming up the rest of the season that will be really important tracks, so I hope we can apply this to those races.”

GREG HAD AN ENGINE PROBLEM, ARE YOU CONCERNED ABOUT THAT? “Well, I am not sure what broke and what the differences were in our engines. Jack Roush did come by and tell me that Greg had a failure and that we would have to think about what we are doing going forward. The Yates guys are very smart guys and hopefully we can keep that to a minimum. I have been taking for granted that our engines run so well and we won’t have trouble. We can’t have that kind of trouble if we are going to make the Chase.”

CAN YOU TALK ABOUT YOUR SHARING RELATIONSHIP WITH THE #9 CAR AND HOW IT MAY HAVE HELPED YOU TONIGHT? “Well, Kasey is a hell of a guy. He is a very good race car driver and Kenny Francis is very good at what he does. That team has been helping us and this week they helped us quite a bit and it paid off. Right up until the driver intros I was talking to Kasey about his car. He is a very even keeled guy that has given me a lot of help. The parts and the help from Kenny Francis are probably what made the difference for us tonight.”

KNOWING THAT THIS CAN BE A TRACK THAT IS A PRE-CURSOR TO THE CHASE BECAUSE OF THE SIZE, CAN TOO MUCH BE MADE OF THAT OR DOES THIS MEAN THAT SOME GOOD TEAMS ARE NOT AS GOOD AS WE THOUGHT? “That is a good question, but it looks like their teammates ran well. Most likely they were trying some stuff. I wouldn’t count any of those guys out.”

ON JEFF GORDON’S THIRD PLACE FINISH ON THE NIGHT OF HIS 600TH CAREER START “I remember I was at the grocery store, probably in 1993, with my Mom and I picked up a racing magazine on the rack and remember thinking how this guy had it made.  There you were on the cover of the magazine standing next to your race car. You had a cool race car, driver suit, mustache and mullet. I was thinking that I couldn’t even grow a mustache. It is so cool to be sitting up here with you and on the night of your 600th career start. Congrats man, it is a great milestone.”

- PCGCampbell for Ford Racing, Press Release

Dodge Motorsports 2010

BRAD KESELOWSKI (No. 12 Penske Racing Dodge Charger) Finished 18th

WHERE WAS THE BIGGEST STRUGGLE TONIGHT? “We were just off a little bit everywhere.  It was definitely a struggle.  There wasn’t really one area that you can specifically identify.  We have to be better a little bit in the corner and down the straightaway.  We were just a little off on our car everywhere.”

WAS IT A DIFFICULT TRANSITION WHEN THE RACE WENT FROM DAY TO NIGHT? “For us, it wasn’t.  We did a good job of being prepared for the transition.  We were pretty consistent throughout the night.”

TRAVIS GEISLER (Crew Chief, No. 77 Mobil 1 Dodge Charger) Finished 24th
“You look at COT cars in general, when you miss it (the setup) by a little bit; it shows up huge because everybody is so close.  It’s tough.  I wish we could be putting on better races for the fans in general.  It was a tough night for the Mobil 1 Dodge, but I wish we could put on a better show.

“The track changes so much here throughout the race.  When you start, it’s sunny out.  Then it goes to cool conditions in the night.  I think another part that makes this a difficult place is we only come here once a year, we practice from 11:30 to 1:30 and race from 6:30 until 10 o’clock.  It’s a pretty major change from what you do during practice.  Some cars respond well to it and some cars don’t respond well.”

KURT BUSCH (No. 2 Miller Lite Dodge Charger) Finished 26th
“It was just a tough night for our Miller Lite Dodge.  This one has us scratching our heads a bit since we’ve been so strong on the mile-and-a-half tracks.  We just missed it tonight.  There was just something off on our Miller Lite Dodge and we couldn’t get to the bottom of it.  We were tight, loose; there was so much drag in the car that it was just slow.  I told Steve (Addington, crew chief) that we need to put this car on the chassis dyno and back in the wind tunnel to figure out what went wrong.  It’s just strange.  We got bad-loose and everything that we threw at it didn’t make it better.  We threw wholesale changes at it including front shocks midway through the race and that’s about as good as our car was all night.  We’ll take our lumps tonight.  We’re still a strong team and our Miller Lite Dodge is really solid.  We’ve got the off-week next weekend and then head to Indy.  I’m confident that Steve and the team will have us ready to go for the Brickyard.”

- Darnell Communications for Dodge Motorsports, Press Release

Ford Racing

KASEY KAHNE – No. 9 Budweiser Ford Fusion (Finished 6th) –

PAUL MENARD – No. 98 Mendards Ford Fusion (Finished 10th) - “It was solid. We were very close when we unloaded and did some little things all through practice that helped. We were able to run top-10 all night. It was pretty uneventful really but it was a good car and I am really happy with that.”

AJ ALLMENDINGER – No. 43 Best Buy Ford Fusion (Finished 14th) – “It wasn’t very good. I thought we would be better than that. This place usually loosens up. The last couple of years I have been here you get loose the beginning of the race and then as the night goes on it gets looser. We were just way too tight the whole time. I hit the wall there and got way tight off turn two and that hurt us for a little bit. The guys did a great job to get it back to pretty much where it was. We just were fighting tight all night and struggling with that. I was breathing in carbon monoxide which was tough too. Finishing 14th for not a very good day, I will take that. One of my goals the last 18 races is to be in the top-15 every race. If we do that I think we will keep making up points. We are going to have bad days, like this, but to get a 14th out if it is good. I am proud of the guys. We all deserve better and I feel like we should have been better, but we will keep working at it.”

DO YOU FEEL LIKE YOU ARE KNOCKING ON THE DOOR TO BETTER DAYS? “We are getting there. We definitely have to keep learning. I wouldn’t say we are quite there yet to go steal a win. We need to consistently run in the top-10 more and once we do, we will have better races. To have a bad night and run 14th is a good indication to me that we are getting better.”

DAVID RAGAN – No. 6 UPS Ford Fusion (Finished 12th) – “Our UPS Freight Ford was pretty fast and I was pretty happy with it. We just ran and ran and ran and passed cars and passed cars and we were still 15th each time, so that was a little frustrating. We’ll have to work on our qualifying effort some. The last three or four weeks we’ve had a top-15 car and it was certainly good to see Carl up there trying to win the thing. Our cars were fast tonight, but we still have to get them better.”

IS THERE LIGHT AT THE END OF THE ROUSH TUNNEL? “Yes, we see it; I don’t know if everyone else sees it, but we do. Certainly our engineers and everybody back at the chassis shop and engine shop are working hard and we had the new Ford engine tonight. We’re making progress, but at the same time, everyone else is also making progress. It was good to see some Fords up there in the top 10. We’ll have the week off to think about this race and then we’ll head to Indy to try and get one.”

- PCGCampbell for Ford Racing, Press Release

David Reutimann celebrates in Chicagoland Speedway’s Victory Lane after getting his second series win – first was the rain-shortened win at Charlotte Motor Speedway. (Photo Credit: John Harrelson/Getty Images for NASCAR)

DAVID REUTIMANN, No. 00 TUMS Toyota Camry, Michael Waltrip Racing Finishing Position: 1st

How much does this win mean? “First of all, I have to thank the fans and everyone else at Michael Waltrip Racing. Everybody did such a great job today. Toyota Racing Development and having Tums on the car this weekend, it’s just been a great weekend. I don’t even know what to say. It was probably the lamest burnout I’ve ever seen at this race track, I was tearing up pretty bad. I have to thank all my guys, they did a great job. There was no rain tonight. We earned this one, nobody gave it to us and that feels really good.”

What is happening at Michael Waltrip Racing now? “Every one of these guys you see behind me that works on this car and the guys at the fab shop, Toyota and Toyota Racing Development has given us some great horsepower tonight, it’s phenomenal horsepower and it’s just a total team effort. I heard so much stuff for winning a rain-shortened event (at Charlotte last year) that everybody said we didn’t earn it. I don’t know what they can say about this one.”

What would you tell everyone who said you didn’t earn your first win? “I don’t know. They were watching the same thing I was. Tonight we earned it and it’s a total team effort — everyone at Michael Waltrip Racing did a phenomenal job. I don’t even know what to say. You think about these moments all your life and you think about all the right things to say. I’m about to cry, this is awesome.”

What changed for you the last one-third of the race? “We were just better on the long run. That last run, that was the worst we were all night was the last green flag stretch. The car was really, really loose and I knew the 99 (Carl Edwards) was catching us awful fast. It was a good night, a good effort by everybody. It feels really good to get a second (win) under our belt and get it over with.”

How much sweeter is this win tonight than your first one? “We took a lot of heat for how we won the first race. Tonight, we just had the car to beat. We were struggling that last half a little bit, the most we struggled all night. We just held on, had a good enough lead where we could just ride a little bit. I knew the 99 (Carl Edwards) was coming, I was hoping he’d run out of time and thankfully he did.”

Any worries with lapped traffic near the end of the race? “Everybody is trying to stay on the lead lap — nobody wants to give any room. With that being said, I think everybody ran me really clean. You can’t ask for everybody that is trying to race, you can’t ask for anything more. It’s a great finish and a great feeling to win our Cup race the way this was.”

How important was it for you to get your second career NSCS victory? “It feels great. Glad that part is over with, for sure. We had a really good car from the time we unloaded till now. The worst, we got really free that last run. The 99 (Carl Edwards) started gaining on us. We kept pedaling. Thankfully, he didn’t have enough time to get to us. Rodney (Childers, crew chief) made some great calls. Our team engineer, they just gave me a good car all weekend. Thank Tums for coming onboard. More importantly, Toyota, and Toyota Racing Development, we’ve been beating up on those guys pretty bad this year. They hunkered down and gave us some really, really good horsepower here and good fuel mileage and everything we need to win races. My hat is off to them, they did a tremendous job.”

RODNEY CHILDERS, crew chief, No. 00 TUMS Toyota Camry, Michael Waltrip Racing

What was your view of tonight’s race? “We had a good car right off the truck. Really we just tried not to do anything during practice that would get us off base. We tried a few things and knew that the track would come to us at night. We kept talking about that. It kind of did the same thing at Charlotte. We stuck with what our gut thought there. We never touched the track bar or the jack bolts. That tells us how good it was from the get-go. You just got to have track position. Kept fighting our way up there. You know, we struggled a little bit on pit road, but those guys did a good job. Our jackman (Tony Cardamone) had a little tumble on his bike this week, had a concussion, had to have some guy fill in. Anytime you have one person change, it kind of gets everything off kilter. It was just a fun night and David (Reutimann) did a really good job. Probably had the worst interview ever after the race. He doesn’t know that yet.”

TY NORRIS, general manager, No. 00 TUMS Toyota Camry, Michael Waltrip Racing

How special is this victory at Chicagoland Speedway? “One of the biggest things, I’ve been around for not as many years as most, but I’ve probably not seen anyone have to walk around for a year-and-a-half and apologize about winning a race. Winning that Coca-Cola 600 because of rain, everyone sort of like had the asterisk next to that win. Tonight was a huge statement. It was largely, I feel, some of the Toyota Racing Development, the work that they put in, we came here with a little bit better package than we’ve seen over the last few months. We had a few issues at the beginning of the year running fifth a couple times and second at Bristol. When they were able to step up the package and come here, the car was right, the driver was right, the engine was right. It takes all three of those things to beat Carl Edwards and Jimmie Johnson, that crowd. I think, more than anything else, it’s redemption for David (Reutimann). I’m probably most proud of that.”

DENNY HAMLIN, No. 11 FedEx Ground Toyota Camry, Joe Gibbs Racing Finishing Position: 8th

How was your race tonight? “We are allowed to try some stuff every now and then. I think we really learned a lot at this particular race even though the results show we ran mediocre. It was a good learning experience. We definitely found some stuff that will help us in the future.”

Was tonight’s race a struggle? “Our goal first was to win. We didn’t feel like we had a race-winning car at the end of practice yesterday. Our general objective is, if we’re not going to win, we needed to learn something. Obviously, we tried to put a setup in that we thought was going to be faster than everyone else. There were certain parts of it that were better than what we’ve been at other tracks like this. At one particular part of the corner it was worse. It’s a building process.”

What were you looking at under your race car after the race? “I was just looking to see how much the front end was rubbing the race track. I felt like we were hitting the track too much and obviously it cost us to not be able to go on restarts.”

MARTIN TRUEX JR., No. 56 NAPA AUTO PARTS Toyota Camry, Michael Waltrip Racing Finishing Position: 11th

How was your race car tonight? “I am so happy for David (Reutimann). We should have been up there with him. At night our car just got really loose off. We could have been better than that so maybe we missed it a little on air pressure. Regardless, we got a decent finish and our teammate got the win. I hope he enjoys the celebration tonight. He deserves it.”

KYLE BUSCH, No. 18 Snickers Toyota Camry, Joe Gibbs Racing Finishing Position: 17th

JOEY LOGANO, No. 20 Home Depot Toyota Camry, Joe Gibbs Racing Finishing Position: 19th

REED SORENSON, No. 83 Red Bull Toyota Camry, Red Bull Racing Team Finishing Position: 27th

MARCOS AMBROSE, No. 47 Clorox-Kleenex Toyota Camry, JTG-Daugherty Racing Finishing Position: 28th

SCOTT SPEED, No. 82 Red Bull Toyota Camry, Red Bull Racing Team Finishing Position: 30th

ROBBY GORDON, No. 7 MAPEI/Menards Toyota Camry, Robby Gordon Motorsports Finishing Position: 38th

What happened on the race track? “I guess Bill (Elliott) popped his tire and I started to go around on the bottom side and I thought I was going to clear him and he slid down at the last second. We don’t have many cars so that’s going to hurt us bad. We weren’t running good anyways. We thought we could at least bring the car home but didn’t get to do that either.”

MIKE BLISS, No. 32 Toyota Camry, Braun Racing Finishing Position: 41st

MAX PAPIS, No. 13 GEICO Toyota Camry, Germain Racing Finishing Position: 42nd

JOE NEMECHEK, No. 87 Toyota Camry, NEMCO Motorsports Finishing Position: 43rd

- Toyota Motorsports, Press Release