NASCAR Winston Cup Series DieHard 500: Post Qualifying Quotes - Pontiac Drivers
11 October 1997
NASCAR Winston Cup Series
Pontiac Qualifying Quotes
DieHard 500
Talladega Superspeedway
October 10, 1997
TALLADEGA, AL - The following provided by Performance Marketing Group:
BOBBY LABONTE (#18 Interstate Batteries Grand Prix) - Qualified 7th - "It
was really a good lap. It unloaded off the truck quick. It's unfortunate we
didn't pick up another tenth so we could have picked up a few more spots,
but that's not a bad qualifying effort."
DERRIKE COPE (#36 Skittles Grand Prix) - Qualified 5th - "It got hot. We
just missed a bit. We put a little more tape on it and it just got hot. it
got up to 240 in turn three and I knew our day was done at that point."
MORGAN SHEPHERD (#1 R&L Carriers Grand Prix) - Did not qualify; 28th fastest
- "These guys are really working hard on this Pontiac, and Brad and the guys
did a great job. We had to use provisionals in these races before. We're
going to be in the show. That was quicker than what we ran in practice. We
thought it would run a little bit quicker than that."
JOHNNY BENSON (#30 Pennzoil Grand Prix) - Qualified 19th - "Ron Puryear does
a great job with our engines and Doug Hewitt with the car. I wasn't too sure
about that staying in the top-25. We were hoping to be a little quicker."
WARD BURTON (#22 MBNA Grand Prix) - Did not qualify; 36th fastest - "It
slowed down three-tenths. I don't know why. It didn't get up to speed. It
drove good. It just didn't go nowhere."
KYLE PETTY (#44 Hot Wheels Grand Prix) - Did not qualify; 39th fastest -
"We've been pretty much junk since we got here. We haven't been fast. We've
run .70s, .80s, whatever. So a .50 was pretty good for us. I guess everybody
picked up from the first race here to this race, and we didn't. We'll have
to do something different, I guess."
BOBBY HAMILTON (#43 STP Grand Prix) - Did not qualify; 35th fastest -
"That's about what we figured. We ran that in practice and we backed it up
and we don't usually do that here, so I'm pretty happy with that. I don't
know if all the Pontiacs have problems on the superspeedways. Pontiac came
out with the new Grand Prix a couple of years ago and we've been a little
behind on it, but we're starting to pick up on it now."
CHAD LITTLE (#97 John Deere Grand Prix) - Did not qualify; 44th fastest -
"It was about the way it felt in practice. That's definitely not enough
speed for a top-25. It's the best we had in the car. My foot was on the mat
driving around there. We'll keep working. It's a tough deal to figure out
sometimes, but we're not giving up."
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