CHEVY MENCS AT DOVER 1: Post Race Notes and Quotes

JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 LOWE’S FOR PROS CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 9th

“All in all, it’s been a really good day for our Lowe’s for Pros Chevy. We had a couple of restarts being in the wrong lane. We pitted and we expected a lot more (cars) to come but they didn’t, so we had to start in the teens and start all over again. It’s a good driving car. I’m was really happy with it. It’s amazing how much faster I was when I was up in third and fourth; just had a half a second of speed on our side just due to the cleaner air."

WHEN YOU’VE WON HERE 11 TIMES, WHAT’S THE LEVEL OF EXPECTATION FOR YOU AS THE DRIVER WHEN YOU ARE KIND OF MIRED IN THAT FIFTH TO 10TH SPOT?

“It’s fair to say they’re pretty high. I just try to fall into a rhythm and go to that place that I know and the car usually drives more efficiently that way and I start moving forward. Just over the years it’s gotten so hard to pass and the cars are so aero-dependent that starting 19th like we did wasn’t helpful and then there were a couple of other things that put us back haven’t been helpful. If we can get our Fridays sorted out and start closer to the front, we’ll have much better finishes.”

KYLE LARSON, NO. 42 CREDIT ONE BANK CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 10th

TALK ABOUT YOUR DAY AND REBOUNDING AFTER HAVING TO START IN THE REAR: 
“Yeah, it was a hard-fought top 10 for sure.  We were three laps down at one point.  I guess happy about the top 10.  I was hoping we could pick off some cars there that last run once we finally got on the lead lap, but it was just so hard to pass.  Everybody was the same speed until the very end of the run and then you could kind of move around.  Found a little bit of time and was catching a few of them in front of me, but just ran out of time.”

WILLIAM BYRON, NO. 24 AXALTA CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 14th

“It was hard for us to get track position.  We had a couple of times we had to go to the back, but overall once we got up there it felt like we were a 10th to 15th kind of day.  We kept making the car better, we just kind of needed to end on a short run there on the last run and also have some rubber in the race track.  Long race, it was good to get all 400 laps in and hopefully we can definitely come back stronger here in the fall.  I think we have a lot of ideas on what to work on, so looking forward to that.”

CHRIS BUESCHER, NO. 37 KROGER CLICKLIST CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 20th

“It wasn’t a bad day for us, but I wish it could have been better. Just got a little off on the last run of the day as you would have it. Unfortunately, we lost rear grip there. During the weekend, we made some good progress from practice and qualified good. There’s a lot of positives, but still a lot to work on yet.” 

AJ ALLMENDINGER, NO. 47 KROGER CLICKLIST CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 21st 
“Thanks to my guys for always working hard. It was a tough day overall for us. We started off comparable to where we had been all weekend. Then the end of the second stage the car got really loose. It jumped sideways on me so quick I thought something broke. I don’t know what happened there, but I killed the right side of the car. It was just really loose and it took the side force we had away from it. Chris (Buescher) and I were pretty comparable during the race. We would kind of go back and forth. We still have got to keep working on stuff. I didn’t help us at the last half of the race. It was just survival at that point and we got what we could.”

ALEX BOWMAN, NO. 88 NATIONWIDE CAMARO ZL1- Finished 23rd

“Just got off on pit sequence there and there was no coming back from it. I feel like we had a solid top 10 race car, but you just can’t make up two laps without some help.  There weren’t very many cautions today and it’s a bummer because we had a decent race car.  Proud of my guys.  We were really bad yesterday in practice and we made a lot of gains, but it’s just part of it.”

YOUR DAY PRETTY MUCH WENT UPSIDE DOWN DUE TO FAILING INSPECTION AND HAVING TO GO TO THE BACK

“Yeah, I started in the back. That didn’t help us any. We played some pit strategy and got the lead and led for a while on older tires and we just had to pit and nobody else had to pit, so it just got us off-sequence and got stuck two laps down. We worked really hard to try to make progress, but just wasn’t able to make it happen. So, we have a decent race car. I feel like we’re an easy top 15 or top 10 race car, it’s just hard to get that track position back.”

TY DILLON, NO. 13 GEICO CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 24th 
“Today was a challenge for our GEICO Racing team. Dover is such a tough track to get a handle on, and we struggled with overall grip and speed throughout the weekend. Our GEICO Camaro ZL1 certainly wasn’t perfect, but we kept working at it and made the most of what he had. This Germain Racing team has been gaining momentum over the past few weeks, and this weekend will not get us down. We are always building and improving our program so that we can keep growing as a team each and every week.”