Bojangles’ Pole Night Results
Tony Stewart (No. 14 Mobil 1/Office Depot Chevrolet, pole sitter, 191.959 mph) – “I knew Ryan [Newman] would put down a good lap. I rely a lot on Ryan because he’s a master at qualifying, for sure. They’re going to have to tell me exactly what we’re doing in [Victory Lane] because I haven’t been here in so long. This is a place where track position is so important, so this is an awesome start to the weekend. That was a pretty cool lap. It’s definitely been a good start to the weekend. The first run we made today was in race trim, and that was the best balance we had.”
Matt Kenseth (No. 17 Fluidmaster Ford, qualified second, 191.918 mph) – “It was a good lap for us. Practice didn’t seem all that great. Was a little bit of a surprise to me, but we’ve been qualifying way above average for us. I left some out there. I wish I could go back, and I wish I could do it again, or I wish somebody had beat me by more. I feel bad about leaving something out there, but it was a good lap, a good place to start. I really need to give most of the credit to Jimmy [Fennig]. I think a lot of it’s him. I think maybe I’ve gotten a little bit better at it. Maybe I don’t stress out as much as I used to. And for some reason our cars just drive really good in qualifying trim.”
Carl Edwards (No. 99 Aflac Now Hiring Ford, qualified third, 191.870 mph) – “I feel really good. If I’d have known how good we were down the back straightaway I would have gone a little easier through three and four. Great start for us. We’ll get a good pit stall selection, and now we can turn our focus to the race. I think the speeds were faster in practice because the temperatures were lower; we had some cloud cover. So, we didn’t have that huge change because it wasn’t blistering hot in practice. I came to the green and had a ton of grip in three and four, so I was real excited to get back there to three and four and do that again. Then on the qualifying lap I just got tight down there. We went back and watched it a little bit, and I was just too aggressive, I think. But I thought the pole was going to be so fast, I don’t know if I could make myself slow down there. You have to go in there and just hope the grip level is there once you get to the corner.”
Dash 4 Cash – Four NASCAR Nationwide Series drivers and four lucky fans will be gunning for an extra $100,000 in Friday’s Dollar General 300 Miles of Courage, the final installment of the Dash 4 Cash program sponsored by Nationwide Insurance.
Elliott Sadler, Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Ryan Truex and Kenny Wallace will race for the money, which will be awarded to the highest finishing driver in Friday night’s race. The four fans chosen by www.nascar.com to be eligible for the bonus money are Christopher Bream (Elgin, Texas), Jason Brecht (Pearland, Texas), Joseph Thornton (New Port Richey, Fla.) and Michael Fender (Jacksonville, Fla.). The fans will be randomly matched with a driver during Friday’s pre-race festivities and the fan matched to the highest finisher will also earn $100,000.
“It’s a race within a race,” Sadler said. “I’ve been in the last two of them, and in both of them we found ourselves kind of figuring what the other guys were doing in the Dash 4 Cash.”
Wallace was pondering his plans to win the bonus money, thinking out loud: “Maybe I can out-fuel-mileage these guys. Maybe I can wreck ’em. I don’t know if I can outrun ’em.”
Asked what they would do with the $100,000, the drivers had widely divergent answers:
– Sadler – “We just added on to my house because we’re about to have a new addition to my family in a couple weeks. And my wife has always wanted a swimming pool, so after the Daytona race, when we were running for the Dash 4 Cash, I told her if we get this Dash 4 Cash I’ll get you a swimming pool. And so I had to go to the hardware store and get an above ground pool because we lost that one on the last lap. So we’ll try again, and maybe I can throw away that pool when I get home.”
– Stenhouse Jr. – “I’d save it and build it up. I don’t even have a house yet, so I need to keep saving.”
– Truex – “I’m gonna go race again. I’m going to try to run Homestead or Texas if I can. That’s close to enough money to run a race, so I think that’d be a good way to spend it.”
– Wallace – “I would save it, too. When Felix [Sabates] fired me in 1993… I’ll never forget that as long as I live. I swore nobody would have me by the throat again. I’m like a gerbil, so I’ll save that money for a rainy day.”
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