Kevin Harvick — Winner: “That last restart I knew I needed to pick the top. I wanted to be on the bottom to be safe because the top got such a good sidedraft getting into one and the outside groove got rubbered up. I thought if I could keep him from finishing the corner I could drive back by him. It all worked out. Everything went well today on our Mobil 1 Ford and we were able to get to victory lane.”
Ryan Blaney — Finished 2nd: “We got by (Kevin Harvick) on that one restart but I just couldn’t hold him off. He was really good. I kind of missed (Turns) 1 and 2 by an inch and he took advantage of it. We needed to be mistake free and then some and I just couldn’t be that. Then we had another shot at it. The last one (restart), he took the top, like I knew he was going to and he motored around me. It was a strong showing by our Carlisle team. I thought we were a second-place car all night really. I thought the 4 was head and shoulders above everyone else but I thought we were second best for sure. That was a fun race for sure.”
Joey Logano — Finished 3rd: “We had a top-five car. We got out front where we could lead laps for a little bit and just when the front tires would give up that is when (Harvick) was just stellar. He was stupid fast. He was able to do a lot. Congrats to them. That is two Fords in and two to go.”
Erik Jones — Finished 4th: “It was good. Our SportClips Camry was pretty fast and had okay speed. Just didn’t have the fire-off speed that we needed to contend there the last short runs, but a good day for us. Running top five, top 10 – we kind of know what we need to work on to get a little bit more to get up there with the 4 (Kevin Harvick), the 12 (Ryan Blaney) and those guys. We’ll go to work. Texas has been a good place so hopefully we can come back in the spring and get a win.”
Kyle Larson — Finished 5th: “We made some good ground that first run and then we had that issue there under the pit stop and then it was just hard to get track position after that. Our car was really loose on the short runs and it would build really tight, but we got that better. Still had to fight the looseness early in the run, but didn’t get quite as tight as the run went on, so that helped me and then we had some good restarts. I felt like we would gain a spot or two every time and then we had a good one there when we got from eighth to fourth and then we had a yellow and fourth to third. I was just kind of hoping it was going to stay green there… then that last restart just got loose underneath people and fell back to fifth. Top five, good run, but just didn’t have anything to compete with the front few.”
Chase Elliott — Finished 6th: “Yeah, just a really frustrating race track ever since they ruined it two years ago. I hate that. … I feel better about Phoenix than I did about today, for sure. Yeah, we’ll see. I mean, I don’t know till we get there. Yeah, tough spot to be in. But ultimately you got to be in a must‑win situation at Homestead if you ever make it down there, so you might as well get used to it and like it.”
Kurt Busch — Finished 7th: “I just didn’t get the restarts nailed at the end. I was on the loose side. We thought we were going to be loose but each restart just got worse and worse and we had no right-rear grip. I don’t know what really leads to that other than just heat cycles on the tires. We are in a good position. There are a lot of other people I would like to be right here. We just didn’t have the speed (Harvick) had today and hopefully we will get it next week.”
Aric Almirola — Finished 8th: “We were a third-place car and that restart there where we finally were in position we fought all day from the back and started at the tail and worked diligently all day to get up to the front and finally got ourselves in position to at least have a shot and race with those guys. (Joey Logano) just went down in Turn 3 and put it right on my door and about wrecked us both. I am not sure. I will have to talk to him. He just continues to make things harder on himself. If that is the way he wants to race me when he is already locked into Homestead and we are out here fighting for our lives, that is fine. When (Miami) comes around if I am not in, he will know it.”
Martin Truex Jr. — Finished 9th: “I’m telling you, God is testing us. There’s no question. Had to start at the back, got to the front, hung around there for a while and then had a loose wheel there again. Just a tough day. Overall, a good day. Luckily we were able to get up front and get some stage points in the first two stages and then we had trouble, but we had it at least in time to recover. Proud of everybody on this Bass Pro/5-hour Energy Toyota and feel like we’re in decent shape going to Phoenix. We’ll go there and race hard again and see what we can do.”
Alex Bowman — Finished 14th: “Overall, it was just a frustrating weekend. We were off in practice and then didn’t qualify great. (Crew chief) Greg (Ives) and the guys made some good adjustments throughout the race, but we had an issue there at the end that just didn’t help us. Hopefully next week goes better. I have been looking forward to getting back to Phoenix.”
Jimmie Johnson — Finished 15th: “There is no format for the teams to communicate to the tower. So, whatever the tower says is the way it is. This is just one of a few calls that have been wrong due to that situation. I don’t know how they do it. Here we have a minute-and-a-half under caution, but at Bristol you’ve got 30 seconds. I don’t think it’s a perfect environment for them to get it right all the time. Stuff happens.”
William Byron — Finished 16th: “We just kind of started in the back and then worked our way forward from there and we kind of fought a little bit of the same things we saw in practice, but I thought we had a couple of better runs. A couple of runs not so good, but then, at the end there we tried to put on tires and make up a few spots and it just didn’t work out. Overall, pretty solid day. We needed a solid day. Good to finish one off.”
Ty Dillon — Finished 22nd: “This weekend overall was solid for us. We had good practice sessions, advanced to the second round of qualifying and then had a decent car during the race. Our Geico Military Camaro ZL1 was really good in the beginning and it got even better as the run went on. The strategy and cautions didn’t fall our way, but I’m proud of my guys because that was our best mile and a half race all year. With two races to go, our Germain Racing team will keep pushing forward to finish strong.”
