ALL-STAR RACE
Christopher Bell — Winner: “North Wilkesboro, how about that one? That right there was absolutely incredible. North Wilkesboro is the best short track on the schedule. Let’s go. (The No. 20 pit crew is) the best. There’s nothing else to say. This sport can be so humbling because behind the wheel you’re just a small part of the success. These boys right here, Adam Stevens (crew chief) on the pit box, all the mechanics, all the engineers that put this thing together – they’re the big picture. I’m just the guy that gets to stand up here and talk to you and take the pictures, but without them I’m nobody and I owe it all to these guys.”
“North Wilkesboro – the best short track in NASCAR. It is absolutely incredible. I had so much fun last year. I sucked in the race, but racing here last year was so much fun. As this place continues to age, it’s just going to get better and better. Man, that was an amazing race. There were so many guys up there racing for the lead. We saw two-wide, three-wide for the lead. It’s just a pleasure to race here, and especially whenever you get to drive this Camry. These boys have done such a good job on this thing. I told them going into it, this was the best car we’ve had in a long time. Joey was fast. He gave us a lot of competition and (Ryan Blaney) was really good there and (Chase Elliott). They had competitive cars. The strategy – we knew it would be all over the place and it fell our way. (Joey Logano) is probably the best. Him and his spotter do such a good job of working together to play the air game. It works, it works really well. Whether you’re at North Wilkesboro or you’re at Kansas or Michigan. He did a great job of trying to keep me behind him, and I knew that once I got that run off turn 4, it was like alright, I’m going to have to be a little more aggressive and kind of leaned on him and got him out of position. I knew once I got the lead, I had the tire advantage so I should be able to cruise, and it worked out that way.”
Joey Logano — Second: “I’m glad you had a blast. I’m pissed off right now. Just dang it, we had the fastest car. The Shell-Pennzoil Mustang was so fast. I’m trying to choose my words correctly on the caution situation. Obviously I got bit by it, so I am the one frustrated. I felt like the falloff wasn’t too bad as the sun went down, and yeah, six cars or so stayed out with us. Thought maybe we could hold him off, but (Bell) had a good enough restart, cleared too many of them too fast. I couldn’t get away in time. It took me six, seven laps to get my car up and rolling again.
“I did all I could do to hold him off and he got under me and released the brake and gave me no option. Kind of just ran me up into the wall, and if I could’ve got to him, he was going around after a move like that, I just couldn’t get back to him. Just too much to try to make up with the tire deficit.
Just frustrated after you lead so many laps and the car is so fast and you don’t win, it hurts quite a bit. … Yeah, I’m all about no gimmicks with the caution. I am all about that. Me and Marcus Smith aren’t seeing eye to eye right now, OK? I’ve got to have a word with him.
“It’s all you’ve got. I was hoping I could just fight him long enough to where the advantage would go away a little bit, but it just never did. I did as best I can blocking my butt off, but once he got under me just released the brake and gave me no option to either fence it and wreck or run up in the marbles and spin out like what happened to Heim in the Truck race. I get it. We’re racing for a million bucks, but things carry over all the time, but it just stings. I’m upset because we had the best car. We had the best car by a long shot and we didn’t win. I don’t know. A lot of things are running through my mind I probably shouldn’t say.”
“It is what it is. I don’t know. I mean, sure. Sure. He did it good enough that I couldn’t get back to him because I was gonna show him what fair was, but I just couldn’t get there. I just couldn’t get there with the tires. I couldn’t get away fast enough. It took me six or seven laps after that restart to get rolling again and then he passed too many cars there the first couple laps and then he was there. I was doing all I can to play defense until my rear tires would come in and it just took too long, and then he was gone. I couldn’t catch back up. It’s frustrating when you lead that many laps, you had the fastest car and a gimmick caution beats you. It just sucks, but it is what it is. You move on and we’ll be happy that we had the best car the last two times that we’ve been here. I wish we had two wins, though.”
“We were gonna put two (Tires) on and then at the last-minute we decided to stay out. I thought six cars was gonna be enough. It was a similar situation to what Brad had in the heat race – 30 or so laps on the tires, he stayed, he was able to manage, but the difference is it’s a heat race to the feature and what are people willing to do in a heat race versus a million dollars for the win at the All-Star Race. That changes the game a little bit and we didn’t fire off as fast as we needed to the first eight laps of that run. We didn’t make the right call. We go down together. We do all this stuff together. We had the best car and we did most everything right. We just made one decision off, so we’ll take second. What does second pay? Not a million, I guess.”
Ross Chastain — Third: “Yeah, we got turned around there early in the race and hit the left-rear and the left-front, so something is bent. It really didn’t drive much different after that, even when the wheel was off. For everyone on this No. 1 Chevy team — we’ve all seen the struggles we’ve had, so just to be able to see the front and be right there with them the last couple of weeks is really cool. We want more of that, for sure, and we’ll keep working. We have a lot of strong things to take away from here this weekend. A lot of effort has already gone into Charlotte, and that continues tomorrow.”
Alex Bowman — Fourth: “I’m just really proud of everyone on this No. 48 Chevrolet team. We were so bad yesterday and the guys made the right adjustments. Our hands are pretty tied on what we can or can’t change, and they made a lot of really good calls to take us from struggling pretty bad to at least having a shot at it there at the end. Really happy for this team. Obviously, fourth doesn’t really mean anything here, but it was a big improvement from yesterday. I think we certainly came here just to try to learn things. It pays $1 million, but honestly winning a regular Cup race, with the playoff implications and everything, it adds up to more than that. So yeah, just came here to learn. Obviously what we had, we struggled with at first, but maybe we have our heads wrapped around it a little bit better.”
Chase Elliott — Fifth: “It looked like a great race for the win. I wish I could have been a part of it. I thought the race was much better this year than last year, so that was cool to see. We had another great crowd here, great environment, for an All-Star race, so hopefully everyone enjoyed that. Our No. 9 Chevy was pretty good. We were in the mix, but we just needed a little bit more to be there with Joey (Logano) and Christopher (Bell). We were solid, better than we’ve been, and it’s just a nice step in the right direction. We just had a good solid night. Obviously needed a little bit more, but overall, it was pretty solid.”
William Byron — Sixth: “All four of the Hendrick Motorsports Chevy’s were pretty fast. For us personally, we just have to continue to improve. We were good to start the weekend and good to start the race, but it just seemed like it kind of went away on us. We just have to figure out what exactly that was, but I’m overall happy with the result. I feel like we did a good job throughout the weekend. I don’t know if I was expecting to win, but I was hoping we’d have a shot to win and I think we were right there. We just didn’t have quite enough.”
Kyle Busch — Eighth: “We had a decent night for our No. 8 Chevrolet. I felt like there around halfway, we jumped to the outside lane and I think we led a lap. We just kind of faded on the long run. I didn’t quite have the complete package with all the grip that I was looking for. I don’t know that all of the Chevy guys did. We’re just a little bit behind on that front, but overall, we made great adjustments all night. The team worked hard overnight to try to find something that would make us better, so that was good progress.”
Austin Dillon — 14th: “We had a fast No. 3 Chevrolet in the All-Star Race at North Wilkesboro Speedway. Our Chevy started with a loose balance and lacked right-rear grip, but crew chief Richard Boswell made solid adjustments throughout the race. Our pit crew was consistent all night, which helped us race inside the top 10 and climb as high as seventh. With 25 laps to go, we made a strategy call to take right-side tires only, knowing it was our best shot at the win. Unfortunately, as the race went green to the finish, the car tightened up, and we didn’t gain the track position we had hoped for. I’m proud of everyone at Richard Childress Racing. We’re making steady improvements every week, and our short-track program is definitely heading in the right direction.”
Harrison Burton — 20th: “– “I had a lot of fun. Obviously, it wasn’t the result we wanted, but I kind of felt like we were better than where we finished. We tried some strategy there at the end to try and have a shot there, but tires mattered more than maybe I thought they would. It was just such a fun time to be back in the Cup Series racing against a lot of my friends and seeing a lot of my friends around the garage. I felt like we made the car better and better throughout the weekend. The last caution, obviously it was the promoter’s caution and that probably took some spots for us, but I’m really proud of the effort and thankful for Rick Ware Racing, Ford Performance and all that for the opportunity. Hopefully, we’ll do it again some more.”
Brad Keselowski — 22nd: “I was just driving too hard. We were all running up towards the wall and I stepped over the cushion and bounced off the wall and broke the right-front shock it looks like. That ended our day. We’re connecting things for sure, we just haven’t connected everything and when we do that we’ll be dangerous.”
ALL-STAR OPEN
Carson Hocevar — Winner: “Yeah, super big for this group, this team. It’s great to win, especially being challenged by tires there. I had my hands full. We definitely have to go to work here on our race car because I didn’t really like it, but it’s a good sign that we didn’t like it and we were still pretty quick there. Hopefully we can take advantage of it. I’ve seen Kasey Kahne win and Dale and others win from the Open and stuff. Maybe we can take that advantage of having this notebook and move forward early and be able to take this Chevy up front.”
John Hunter Nemechek — Second: “We have a shot to go win a million dollars. Hats off to this No. 42 team. We unloaded and we had good two- or three-lap speed, but no longer on pace. Proud of them for the effort they put in yesterday and what they were able to find, and pitting there at that last deal, I knew I couldn’t win from where I was at. We came and got two (tires) and that helped us out. Hats off to the whole 42 team. Proud of the effort.”
Erik Jones — Fourth: :We made progress on our No. 43 Toyota Camry XSE after that pit stop. In the initial laps, we were wrecking loose, but in that final segment we raced our way all the way up into the top five. I’m glad we found that speed. We got put into the wall on the final laps which hurt our chances at racing our way in. We’ll move on to Charlotte.”
Ryan Preece — 11th after restart box violation: “It’s really nonexistent from inside the car. You can’t see it. So I just hooked a hard left going acoss the line, figuring it’s in that area. I’m frustrated because if you have a situation like that, put a cone out there so we can see it. Our Ford Mustang was super fast, could run in the way top, get around guys and I think we were the only one that was making some waves. Frusrated, man. We were in position here. Heartbreaking to have a heartbreaking run like that taken away by someone in the (NASCAR scoring) tower.”
Shane van Gisbergen — 13th after leading 54 laps from the pole position: “I don’t know whether to smile or cry. It’s been a dismal year for us. But I feel like we’re getting better every week. This shows it. It was awesome to lead some laps. I was out front driving like a grandma and felt like it was easy. But I still felt like the tires were going to off. We took four. Once I was back there, no grip, and I put myself in some bad spots, too. It was awesome to lead laps. We’re getting better.”
Noah Gragson — 17th and fan vote winner: “The fans are the GOATs. It’s awesome to be part of this All-Star Race. Thank God for that Open Race, because I feel like we got the balance fixed. … It means a lot. I’m very grateful to have all of the support from the fans and I feel like we’ve got a pretty good race car. It’s such a cool atmosphere here and such a cool experience. I’m very lucky to be able to be a part of it.”
Highlights: NASCAR Cup Series All-Star Open
Watch highlights from the NASCAR Cup Series All-Star Open at North Wilkesboro speedway, where two drivers plus a fan vote recipient will advance to the main event.
