NASCAR Winston Cup Series ACDelco 400: Post Race Quotes (Ford Drivers)
28 October 1997
NASCAR Winston Cup Series Ford Race Quotes ACDelco 400 North Carolina Motor Speedway October 27, 1997 ROCKINGHAM, NC - The following provided by Ford Motorsports Public Affairs: MARK MARTIN (#6 Valvoline Thunderbird) - Started 3rd, finished 6th - "We were going to finish fourth but Trickle ran into the back of me and got back by me. I passed him clean and he got into me. At least I didn't wreck. We lost some points. We'll go to Phoenix and get 'em back. Today is over with. We didn't run good enough, but maybe we will at Phoenix. Who knows? "It was just a little off. We just never really got it dialed in. It was kinda one of those days when you are off just a touch and it seems to come and go real bad. Today, we were better and worse, better and worse with each set of tires and adjusting around and stuff. We didn't run bad, we just didn't run good. We did a good job with what we had to work with today." DICK TRICKLE (#90 Heilig-Meyers Thunderbird) - Started 12th, finished 5th - "You've got to give everybody involved credit. Heilig-Meyers for having the faith in Dick Trickle and the Junie Donlavey team. We're just getting a rhythm going here. We've had some good runs, we just haven't got the deserving finishes because of mechanical problems or getting caught up in somebody else's mess. But it's showing. It's communication with Tommy (Baldwin), the new crew chief, and all the guys on the team. No single man, not Tommy or Dick Trickle, did it. It's the team all coming up to bat. They have all stepped up to the plate. "It was kinda fun racing Mark (Martin). Mark shook his fist a little bit and shook his finger at me. That's fun. He doesn't realize I'm hungrier than he is. He should have just moved over and let me go. It was terrible loose there at the end, and Mark was getting me loose. He drove a great race. I didn't hit him hard, just enough to make him move up in the second groove. I thought maybe he didn't like that groove anyhow. You would rather not have that done to you, and he was a little unhappy about it, but after a while we will giggle about it, because he didn't need a fifth as bad as I did. "It was a great weekend. We finished second Saturday and fifth today. It just shows what the team can do if you are all working in one direction. There's no one man doing it. It's everybody from the team manager to the guy who bolts spindles on. We're pumped up. Them young guys have got me pumped up, too." RICKY RUDD (#10 Tide Thunderbird) - Started 13th, finished 40th - Involved in accident with Jimmy Spencer on lap 113 - "Spencer bounced off the wall and I tried to miss him, but I couldn't miss him. That's the way it's been going. It was a case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. We were running on pretty decent, making some adjustments and not panicking. We were somewhere in the top 10. I was following Spencer and getting ready to pass him. It looked like something happened to his car. He blew a tire or something and hit the fence and I was right behind him. I thought I had him missed, but I got into the back of him, and that knocked us out." RICK MAST (#75 Remington Arms Thunderbird) - Started 22nd, finished 42nd - Retired car with a broken camshaft after completing 178 laps. Mast fell from 29th to 32nd in the point standings. - "I don't know. We were running along pretty good. I kinda got in a mess up there around the lapped cars. I was just trying to keep cool. We were going good, it just cut off. It missed for about half a lap, then the thing shut down. It was something under the hood. That's the way it goes, man. At least they knew the Remington bullet was here today." JEREMY MAYFIELD (#37 Kmart/RC Cola Thunderbird) - Started 24th, finished 15th - Mayfield moved from 13th to 11th in the point standings. - "Believe me, it's a whole lot more fun picking up spots in the points than losing spots. We're working hard on that top 10. We worked hard all day today. We kept working and adjusting, getting the car the best we could. All in all, not a bad run for this team. Rockingham's not been one of my better tracks, but we're really looking forward to Phoenix and Atlanta." JEFF BURTON (#99 Exide Batteries Thunderbird) - Started 11th, finished 38th - Involved in single-car accident in turn two on lap 271. Led once for 21 laps. - "I got under Ward (Burton) and I thought he was going to let me go and I drove in there too hard, thinking I was going to use the whole race track and he ran in there with me. I just drove in there too hard for somebody to be on the outside of me. It was just one of those deals where you race with your brother and it's hard racing with your brother. He did what he was supposed to do, and I did what I thought he was going to do. It's hard, but when you wreck, it's your fault no matter what. It's my fault. It hurt us a lot, but the only reason we got back there was because we got penalized (for speeding on pit road), and I don't understand that. I looked at my tach, and my tach was where it was supposed to be. That's all I know. "If it would have fallen right (we had the car to beat). We would have had to get a run with 30 to go or 50 to go, depending on what my car liked. If we would have got that, we had the car to beat. We had a good race car. We were really good from lap 25 to lap 45. We were really good right there. That's the kind of run we needed. If we had had track position and that kind of run, we would have had a chance to win." BILL ELLIOTT (#94 McDonald's Thunderbird) - Started 8th, finished 12th - "It was pretty good. We had a lug stud mess up there and it slowed our pit stops down. That was on the last two or three stops. We kept having trouble with the right front. We had a problem on the caution stop, and that got us in the back, and we kept having problems with it. It's just kinda one of them days. We came out of here pretty decent and gained a few points on some of these other guys. We'll just get out of here and go wherever we go next." JIMMY SPENCER (#23 Camel Thunderbird) - Started 40th, finished 43rd - Involved in accident with Ricky Rudd on lap 113. - "I feel real bad for my guys. We had a good race car again, but we ain't had no damn luck. I don't know what we've got to do to fix it. Something happened. I don't know if I got too high. I don't know what happened. I sure hope this season is over so we can get on to next year." ERNIE IRVAN (#28 Texaco/Havoline Thunderbird) - Started 39th, finished 28th - "We had one set (of tires) that just didn't handle very good, then we had a flat on another set. We had two unscheduled stops. That doesn't help things. I think we had a top-10 car, and that was about it. We could wish for more, but I think that was about it." ROBERT PRESSLEY (#77 Jasper Engines/Federal Mogul Thunderbird) - Started 27th, finished 13th - "We ran good all day. This team had some horsepower today and a good handling car. These guys did a great job. We've had some good race cars, but this is the first time we've got to run the whole thing without taking a break in the middle. I'm happy. This is just things to come for next year. We're just building right now. It's coming around. We're qualifying decent. We're racing a lot better than we're qualifying. Everything is going good. One thing about it, they're giving me some horsepower, and that makes it easy."
