Pepsi 400 Qualifying Quotes -- Chevy Drivers
3 July 1997
NASCAR Winston Cup Series Chevrolet Quotes Busch Pole Qualifying Pepsi 400 Daytona International Speedway July 3, 1997 DAYTONA BEACH, FL - The following provided by Chevrolet Motor Division, General Motors Corporation Public Relations: ROBBY GORDON (#40 Coors Light Monte Carlo) - Did not qualify, 26th fastest - "Skinner slowed down. It's getting real hot out here. The Coors guys have done a real good job getting me back up to speed here. I've been out of the car for six weeks. We'll just hang on and hopefully get in the top 25 today and then work on the race setup. If not, we gave it the best shot we could. I'm ready to go racing. I've been out of the car for a long time and I'm excited to be back. Hopefully we can be competitive this weekend." DAVE MARCIS (#71 RealTree Monte Carlo) - Did not qualify, 38th fastest - "We've had all kinds of problems. The spring package wouldn't work. The shock package seems to be giving us a problem, and really that's the first l've had out there. I went out two times this morning and the first time I tried to run two laps I wasn't very successful at it. The next time I ran one lap, but it's been a rough day. It's been a struggle. We'll be working on the car and hope we get it up to speed tomorrow. That's the goal." JEFF GORDON (#24 DuPont Automotive Finishes Monte Carlo) - Qualified 4th - "I knew Mike Skinner put a great lap out there, and I knew it would be close. By looking at my tach, I thought we might have gotten him, but when I looked on the scoreboard I knew I was second. That's a great run for the DuPont Chevrolet. We're excited about the Pepsi this weekend. We've got a great start and I think we've got a good shot at this race this weekend. Everything went as planned. We hoped we could go a little faster, but this is a new Chevrolet. We came down here and tested this Monte Carlo, and it paid off for us. I ran a real wide lap on that first lap trying to get the car up to speed. We knew our first lap wouldn't be as good, but we made it up the second lap. We just didn't make it up enough. We weren't near this fast in qualifying in February. I think this is going to be a good race car also. Anywhere toward the front is fine. We're always trying to win races. This one will be just as tough as the Daytona 500. Hopefully, we'll be there at the end and have a shot at it." JOE NEMECHEK (#42 BellSouth Monte Carlo) - Qualified 11th - "I'm very happy with that lap. Tony Glover (crew chief) and the guys did an awesome job with this car. Daytona has not been one of my best places in the past. We had some trouble at Talladega this year, too. But Tony Glover knows how to make 'em work at these superspeedays, and I'm ready to go race right now. We seem to have the qualifying package down, now we've got to work on our finishes. We're making progress." STEVE GRISSOM (#41 Kodiak Monte Carlo) - Did not qualify; 36th fastest - "That's not what we'd hoped for, but the guys did a great job getting the car ready. It's hotter and slicker down here in July than it is in February, but you still try to accomplish the same thing. We'll come back on Saturday and try to have a good run." LOY ALLEN (#91 Spam Monte Carlo) - Did not qualify; 35th fastest - "I wish we could have been a little faster. You always want to qualify well and run well in the race at Daytona. I can't say enough about this team. They've really worked hard. We just need some more testing time, but we'll keep working hard and we'll get better." DARRELL WALTRIP (#17 Parts America Monte Carlo) - Did not qualify; 31st fastest - "The car isn't very good. This track is all about shocks and springs and right now we haven't found the right combination. It's frustrating because I've got a great engine, but just can't handle the car. The car is bouncing around like a basketball and at these speeds it's tough to hold on. We'd like to be going to the beach, but we'll be here working on this thing and getting it better. We'll get it together. We've worked on it as hard as we could since Talladega, but we haven't helped it much. We've closed the gap a little bit. We were the slowest car at Talladega from the time we got there until the time we left. We're not the slowest here, but we're not where we need to be." WALLY DALLENBACH (#46 First Union Monte Carlo) - Did not qualify, 30th fastest - "We've had chassis problems all day. The car was basically terrifying to drive this morning. Normally it is here, but the rear wheel were coming off the track in one and two and I found myself pointed toward the wall. We had to stiffen it up more than I would have like to for qualifying. It's a good car, but we got snookered on qualifying. We came here with our Talladega package on it, and it didn't work. It was pretty bad." KEN SCHRADER (#33 Skoal Bandit Monte Carlo) - Qualified 14th - "Andy Petree's (crew chief's) son accused me of not running real hard in practice, so we were trying to figure out if we ran hard or not in qualifying. It wasn't as good as we'd like, but it's a decent starting position for 400 miles. It's taken a little longer than we though it would, but we can see a pretty bright light at the end of the tunnel."
