KYLE BUSCH — winner: “I passed one guy on the outside of Turn 3 and that was the only guy I needed to pass, I guess. It was hard otherwise. We kind of got stuck in traffic back there a little bit earlier in the race. We were about fifth or sixth and couldn’t really do anything. But overall my guys on pit road were awesome. We got some spots there, track position.”
BRAD KESELOWSKI: — finished 2nd: “We had decent speed. We didn’t have speed enough to go up and pass guys, but we could run with them. I feel like if we would have got to the front, nobody ever would have passed us. One of those races, with the way the cars are, if you’re the leader you could be a 20th-place car, nobody is going to pass you. You just try to make the most you can and take advantage of the restarts and the pit strategy and do the best you can as a driver to make up for it.
ERIK JONES — finished 3rd: “If we were both on four tires would have been pretty even, but (Kyle Busch) had an advantage on tires there at the end. We needed some track position so we had to take two, and had it stayed green, we were going to run second, and we ended up third. You know, a good day overall.”
CHASE ELLIOTT — finished 4th: “Playing the strategy game was really important. Pitting before the stages was giving up stage points doing that, but ultimately having track position in the back half was where it was worth it. Luckily, (crew chief Alan Gustafson) and our group saw that earlier in the race and we kind of jumped on board with that strategy. It worked out for a top five. I’m proud of the effort. We’ve had some good NAPA Chevrolet’s the last couple of weeks. We’ve been good, just not great and you have to be great to win these things. I’ll go to work and try to do a better job, and we’ll see what we can do next week.”
CLINT BOWYER — finished 5th: “We had a pretty good car. We had a third- to fifth-place car. That is about what we had and we did a good job finishing with what we had. We are just giving up way too many stage points. We have to figure out how to get some stage points. That is all we had today.”
DENNY HAMLIN — finished 6th: “It was a good run. We didn’t hit the wall. That’s a first in about a month. Didn’t blow a tire. That’s about the first in a month. The positives are we got a decent finish out of it there. We had a pretty good car in clean air. I thought the 18 (Kyle Busch) definitely was substantially better. The 4 (Kevin Harvick) was pretty good as well, but I thought we could hold our own there. We were running third and got four tires there at the end. We really - track position was just such a huge deal. I didn’t see many cars out there passing today and we were one of them that couldn’t. You got stuck behind guys and it didn’t matter how old their tires were in front of you, you just got stuck behind them and we were one of those guys. Then we had an inside lane restart on the end that cost us a spot or two. Overall, a decent day. We’re at least back on the train of a good run and not tearing our car up so we’ll build from there and go to Michigan next week.”
JOEY LOGANO — finished 7th: “It was brutal to pass. Really hard in dirty air. Tough. Tough racing here. It was all about strategy and restarts and you saw some chaotic restarts. The last restart was insane. I was in the middle of it and we were four or five-wide down into (Turn 1) and I wasn’t sure where I was supposed to be. You hope it all sorts out and somehow it did. That is where the race is at, trying to get a good restart and then figure out a way to get ahead of everyone on strategy.”
DANIEL SUAREZ — finished 8th: “We had a little bit more speed than an eighth-place car but we struggled through the race at one point in traffic. We got the balance back by the end but it wasn’t easy. I feel like a top 10 is what we deserve today and we have to work on it.”
WILLIAM BYRON — finished 9th: “We had some really good parts of the race. We kind of went for the points, which with the way the strategy was, it was hard to get back there. But we got a lot of points today, which was great. I know it doesn’t sound super good, but we had really good stages and really good runs there. So, we were able to go from 12th to ninth on that last restart and that was nice and we finished with a top 10, so hopefully we can go to Michigan and be able to improve on that even more.”
ARIC ALMIROLA — finished 10th: “I honestly don’t know how well this will translate to the July race, but I feel like we learned quite a bit today. Our car was decent but we didn’t have anything for the 18. Our car was decent and we were pretty competitive, we just fought track position. I got up to fifth or sixth there and just barely brushed the wall off Turn 3 and had bad tire smoke and had to come pit so that I didn’t blow a right rear tire and end our day. I erred on the side of caution there and then we just fought to recover from that the rest of the day. We were buried in traffic and had to be aggressive on restarts to try to get back up through the field.”
DANIEL HEMRIC — finished 13th: “I thought we did a really good job of maximizing our day with this No. 8 Kalahari Resorts & Conventions Chevrolet Camaro ZL1. We struggled a little bit too much on restarts, and I have to figure out how to position myself better to not give up so much track position. In the race, the car took off too loose on corner entry to attack. I thought we would never get that connected to make some decent lap times. As soon as (crew chief) Luke Lambert and this team were able to make some adjustments … we were able to do that and made forward progress. Staying out long on the next-to-last run and pitting late for right side tires and fuel gave us a huge amount of track position and made our lap times much better than the cars around us.”
ALEX BOWMAN — finished 15th: “That was not what we needed today. We had a good car, and we just fought some handling issues off and on. There at the end, it just came out of fourth gear and wouldn’t stay in. I had to hold it in place for the end of the race.
KYLE LARSON — finished 26th: “It felt like our team did a really good job of calling pit strategy the first half of the race for those two stage wins. I felt like our car was really good, especially in that final stage. I just didn’t have the track position, but I could pass people when I felt like other people couldn’t pass. So, I was happy about that. And then, just that restart, I tried to be really aggressive and fit in that hole. I haven’t seen a replay, but am assuming I just wasn’t clear and I turned myself in the wall. I hate that I did that, but I felt like that was a good opportunity to fit in that hole and just get the run and maybe get by whoever was in front of me because I feel like I had a really good car at the time. So, I’ve just got to be smarter.”
RICKY STENHOUSE JR. — finished 32nd: “That was a hard lick. We actually got the car a little bit better but we still weren’t very good all day. We made it better and better and had a little contact early and cut a right rear tire. We were trying to battle back. We were gaining on it. I feel like we could have maybe got three more spots before the end of the race but the tire let go going into (Turn 2). That is about the worst place that can happen. That was a bummer. All in all, we will just try to figure out how to get our cars better here. Us and the 6 were struggling all day.”
MARTIN TRUEX JR. — finished 35th: “I don’t know. We just lost an engine there – dropped a cylinder down the backstretch and figured I might as well pit. I thought maybe it was a possibility we were out of gas, but it started smoking out of the pipes and shut off. Tough day. TRD (Toyota Racing Development, U.S.A.) does a great job of building engines and obviously they’re fast. Probably a fluke deal. I’m not sure, but we’ll go back to look at it. Frustrating day.”
AUSTIN DILLON — finished 37th: “Paul Menard has been doing this for a long time. I was a teammate with him at some point. I don’t know. He still hasn’t figured it out, I guess. I don’t know where I was supposed to go or what I was supposed to do. He just ran into the back of me and missed the corner. He overshot it.”
DIRTY AIR 🤦♂️ We had a very messy day getting hit & spun by the 47 and some other things but team did a good job recovering to finish 17th. Car was decent but couldn’t pass due to dirty air from high downforce so it was all restarts and track position
— Matt DiBenedetto (@mattdracing) June 2, 2019
Very weird day. Could not find the gremlin, but we never gave up. Surprised and happy with an 11th place finish. Good work @Matt_McCall to sort out the best strategy! pic.twitter.com/Z94POHDbpe
— Kurt Busch (@KurtBusch) June 2, 2019