MONSTER ENERGY NASCAR CUP SERIESMICHIGAN INTERNATIONAL SPEEDWAYCONSUMERS ENERGY 400TEAM CHEVY RACE NOTES & QUOTESAUGUST 11, 2019
TOP TEAM CHEVY UNOFFICIAL FINISHING RESULTS:POS. DRIVER3rd KYLE LARSON, NO. 42 MCDONALD’S CAMARO ZL17th RYAN PREECE, NO. 47 KROGER CAMARO ZL18th WILLIAM BYRON, NO. 24 LIBERTY UNIVERSITY CAMARO ZL19th CHASE ELLIOTT, NO. 9 KELLEY BLUE BOOK CAMARO ZL110th ALEX BOWMAN, NO. 88 AXALTA CAMARO ZL1TOP FIVE UNOFFICIAL FINISHING RESULTS:POS. DRIVER1st Kevin Harvick (Ford)2nd Denny Hamlin (Toyota)3rd Kyle Larson (Chevrolet)4th Martin Truex Jr. (Toyota)5th Daniel Suarez (Ford)
The Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series season continues next weekend at Bristol Motor Speedway with the Bass Pro Shops NRA Night Race on Saturday evening, August 17th at 7:30 p.m. ET. Live coverage can be found on NBCSN, PRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.
RACE NOTES & QUOTES:
KYLE LARSON, NO. 42 MCDONALD’S CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 3rdCOMING BACK FROM A SPEEDING PENALTY TO FINISH 3rd IS NOT A BAD DAY AT ALL, IS IT?“No, I guess if you’re going to get a speeding penalty, the first run of the race is the time to do it. But yeah, I was surprised when they said I was speeding because I hadn’t hit a read light at all until after leaving my pit stall. That was the only time I hit a red. I was conservative on my lights the rest of the day and maybe I don’t know if we just misjudged a little bit or maybe I just was a little too fast. But anyway, our race was good. Our car handled really well, so I was happy about that. And, we had a great points day. So we saved just enough fuel there at the end to get to the finish line and now we’re well above the cutline. So, I’m happy about our day.”
RYAN PREECE, NO. 47 KROGER CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 7th“It was a good day. Expectations-wise, it was a top 20 or 15 would be fantastic. Well, we ended up with a top 10 and we made the car better and better every lap. It was good. We had a good race car. Track position, like fuel helped, but we were still going to end up anywhere from 12th to 10th, so it was a good day.”
WILLIAM BYRON, NO. 24 LIBERTY UNIVERSITY CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 8th“Honestly, I thought we tried a little different approach today and our car was just really hard to handle. We struggled in traffic a lot. But, to come out with a top 10 is good. I feel like we ran in and around there. We just struggled on restarts. But, not bad overall. I think we made up a lot of points. Just kind of needed a couple of different things to play a little bit differently for us to have a better finish.”
WHAT DID YOU LEARN?“Just how to time the runs and I feel like I was a little more patient than the previous race here. So, patience and just timing the runs to where I could complete the pass was the biggest deal.”
YOU ARE SOLID WEEK AFTER WEEK. YOU MAY NOT BE THE WINNER BUT YOU’RE SOLID“Yeah, I think so. Besides last week. I think we’ve finished in the top 10 in a two out of three, I guess. That’s great. And we can really build on that. It seems like Chad (Knaus) just calls really solid races. I think if we get our practice structure to be a little bit better, I think we’ll be in good shape.”
CHASE ELLIOTT, NO. 9 NAPA AUTO PARTS CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 9th“We finally got our car going pretty good there at the end and then ran out of gas on that last lap. I just needed to save a little better after the caution.”
ON THE CHALLENGES OF THIS RACE“I need to be better, for sure. I just need to be a little faster. I needed to do a better job of saving.”
ALEX BOWMAN, NO. 88 AXALTA CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 10th“We had a really good car in practice and just took off really right there in the race and nothing touched it. It was really tight. It was on the splitter all day. Track position was so key. A lot of opportunities to take a big swing at it and Greg did a good job calling the race. Strategy kind of bit us a little bit there getting buried. We didn’t have it today.”
JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 ALLY CAMARO ZL1 – Finished 34thWHAT HAPPENED EARLY IN THE RACE“The right side tires went into the PJ1 and as soon as I got my tires in it, I went straight into the wall. When you’re aggressive, it doesn’t work and then sometimes you’re cautious and it doesn’t work. It was a great car. That hurt, for sure. We’re just going to have to rally on and these guys are doing an amazing job. We’ll keep digging.”
CLINT BOWYER HAD TROUBLE, SO YOU’RE PROBABLY ABOUT 12 POINTS BEHIND HIM FOR THE PLAYOFF SPOT. DANIEL SUAREZ GAINED A TON OF POINTS TODAY, TOO. WHAT’S YOUR ATTITUDE NOW?“To just fight hard for every point. The guys around that cutoff point, all seem to be having bad luck. If one of us could just string together some good races and get in the clear and get away. I think that’s what the No. 24 (William Byron) has been able to do is just have some good, consistent races and built a nice gap. You’ve just got to keep fighting for every point.”
IS IT ‘HEARTBREAKING’ OR IS IT JUST ‘THAT’S RACING’ WHEN IT COMES TO SOMETHING LIKE THAT?“No, it’s super disappointing. It’s a little easier when it’s not on you and you can call it a mechanical or a flat or get caught up in a wreck. But, I’m behind the wheel and I’m the one that got us in the fence.”
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