What the drivers had to say after the NASCAR Cup race at Pocono Raceway

What the drivers said after Sunday’s Cup race at Pocono Raceway:

Ryan Blaney – Winner: “I think things are falling into place for us. I feel like especially in the last two months we’ve reached a great place in terms of momentum. I feel like we missed some races, to be honest, that I thought we had a good chance of winning. It was good to stick to the plan today and our plan was to have track position at the end. I knew our car was pretty fast. I am very proud of the entire 12 team. The Wabash Ford Mustang was amazing. …It’s great to win here again. “I won here seven years ago for my first Cup win.”

Denny Hamlin – finished second: “Track position is a huge thing. When (Ryan Blaney) jumped on that platform when we won, it put him in front of us. It was definitely going to be difficult to go through this. By the end there weren’t enough gaps of greenery.

“Salute to him. Great run. He maintained a very high pace towards the front. It’s really hard for me to even try to get close to trapping him.”

Alex Bowman – finished third: “We had to struggle a lot with our car in the dirty air. Once we finally got clean air there, I think most of our adjustments hurt us a little; Just got a lot more free. I’m proud of our No. 48 Ally’s Best Buddies Chevy Team. It was a good run; We just needed a little bit more to get to No. 12 (Ryan Blaney). Once I abused the right rear tire for so long, it made Denny (Hamlin)’s job easier for me. But yeah, it was a solid third-place day.”

William Byron – finished fourth: “We were absolutely fine. Sure he had a nice No. 24 Raptor High Heat Chevy. Really good execution and everyone did a good job of focusing on it. Not every situation went our way with the strategy, but we were able to start well, especially at the end, and maintain it till the end. Obviously there are a lot of things to analyze, but really proud of the team and it’s definitely nice to finish in the top five.”

Joey Logano – 5th: “Overall, top five, you have to be somewhat happy with that. By the end of the race we had momentum and I think we could have run in the top two. I don’t know if we could have been better than Ryan, but it took us a long time to find the right balance. Once we got the track position and balance, I ruined it on restarts. Those spots there ultimately cost us the chance to win it, but overall I’m proud of the speed we brought to a track like this. It makes me a little more anxious for Indy where we have some long straightways again and it seemed like our car was good on the straightways this time.

Tyler Reddick – sixth place: “Stage 1 and Stage 3 were good for us. Stage 2 was a bit of a struggle. Unfortunately, in the middle part we did not have any good restarts and we gave up some points. But overall, it was a solid day and we closed the gap on the points lead. And obviously, Denny (Hamlin) got a little bit closer to us. “Overall, solid day and great points day.”

Bubba Wallace – 10th: “It’s about the points, so we didn’t take advantage of the points, but (Ross Chastain) had a bad day, (Ty Gibbs) had a bad day. It was a good rebound. Usually, it is the opposite. We start really well and falter at the end and give up a lot of track position. Here, we were able to make a good strategy and stick to it. We didn’t even have a car. 6 (Brad Keselowski) dropped it in (turn) one and I was going to sprint to get past him and I realized I was going to crash and he kept going. It’s an eye-opener how far apart we are. There is going to be a good discussion tomorrow. Overall, I was trying to enjoy the first step, I said that’s what I’m going to do. I was working my butt off and here we are.

Chase Briscoe – 15th: “It was kind of a good day. From a pace standpoint, really the whole weekend we weren’t good – like I didn’t think we’d be good enough to win. But I thought we improved our car a lot throughout the weekend, which is really encouraging. I thought we had a pretty good balance. We didn’t really have the intense pace like some of the other guys. I thought for the most part we made the most of our day. We were probably a little better off. Overall, it wasn’t a bad day. No good day, no bad day.”

Daniel Suarez – finished 16th: “It was an up-and-down day for the No. 99 Worldwide Express Chevy team. We didn’t have as much pace as we thought we would have. We were fine in clean air, but in traffic, for some reason we struggled a lot… I feel like it’s more about competition. Overall, there were some things we could have done better, but we finished 16th. We will take it as the car we had and the pace we showed today. Yesterday, I thought we were going to be a little better, but we’ll go back; Analyze everything and be better for next time.”

Josh Berry – Finished 20th: “It was just up and down. We made some mistakes that set us back, lost some track position, just got out of order. At times it felt like the car was strong, but it needed to be a little better and a little more consistent to get a good overall finish. But we survived and had a good day.

AJ Allmendinger – Finished 21st: “A day of hard struggle. I thought we were good midway through the race, but we never got on the right side of the strategy to gain track position. Getting caught in that wreck at the end damaged the racecar a bit and slowed us down a bit. “We did everything we could to save the day.”

Justin Haley – Finished 22nd: “What we started with over the weekend ended well. We faced a tough time in practice and qualifying and it had a bit of an impact on the race. It felt like maybe we didn’t have the speed of some of the other guys so we had to look at that. But Chris (Lawson, crew chief) and the team did a good job of getting the car to a place where I could make something of myself that day. I wish we could have gotten another top 20, but we’ve got one more race before the break and a chance to enjoy a good finish during the break.

Austin Dillon – 23rd: “It was a long day at Pocono Raceway for our Boot Barn Chevrolet team, but I’m proud of everyone at RCR and ECR for not giving up during challenging conditions and working hard to try and make adjustments throughout the race. Worked hard. We had the fast Chevy, but we lost our brakes in Stage 1. It was frustrating because we were faster than the cars in front of us, but we couldn’t do much without the brakes. We’re not exactly sure what was going on. We did the best we could with what we had and somehow managed to finish 23rd. We will go back to the shop and evaluate.”

Daniel Hemric – finished 25th: “We battled the No. 31 Poppy Banks Chevrolet hard. I brushed the wall, causing my toe to curl. Unfortunately, that part ultimately failed and our day ended a little early. I’m proud of our team’s fight that will continue until the end.”

Cody Ware – Finished in 26th place: “I felt like we made some really good progress with the handling of the car and I felt pretty comfortable with what we had, especially as we started to get more cautions and chances to keep our adjustments. Unfortunately, we escaped all the carnage on the track, only to have a piece of rotor or something put a hole in our radiator. The team did everything possible to get us back there and we made the best of our situation till the end.”

Ryan Preece – 30th: “All I know is we had a great car, we had a good day, then we put it back into the pack and that’s what you get in the end.”

Kyle Busch – Finished 32nd: “I just want to thank all my colleagues. Everyone at RCR, ECR, Zone, Cheddar Scratch Kitchen, Lucas Oil, Chevrolet… everyone who supports us. We’re getting a chance to go out there and have some fun; Try to continue working on our program and get everything ready. It’s just unfortunate circumstances. Thank you to Rowdy Nation, all the fans and everyone for their continued support. “We’ll get back to work and get ready for Indianapolis.”

Ricky Stenhouse Jr. – Finished 33rd: “I have no idea what happened. I was in the top lane. My team said the No. 8 (Kyle Busch) somehow got stuck in the grass and came across the track. I don’t know how this happened. I feel like our strategy was good from where we started the day. The speed was good in our No. 47 Sugarlands Sippin’ Cream Chevy. We were actually inside the top-20 for the entire second half of the race. I thought we were in good shape. We were there on four tyres, while there were a lot of people on two tyres. I was hoping this would come into play later, but we didn’t really get a chance to see how it would work.

Todd Gilliland – 34th: “We faced a bit of a brake shake problem during practice and at the beginning of the race. About five laps before that, my brake pedal started getting a little long. Then it burst right in the middle. I’ve never had anything like this before. We’ve been really lucky. We have had some very well built Ford Mustangs coming from Front Row Motorsports and have not had many mechanical problems over the last three years. I thank those people for giving us great cars. We will keep fighting. “Definitely not the best start for us and we have a lot of work to do but we will try to learn from it.”

Ross Chastain – Finished 36th: “I became completely silent. We were all slipping here and there, but I came out. “It felt like it happened in slow motion. Yes, obviously I’m disappointed in myself, but can’t take it back now.

Noah Gragson – Finished 37th: “I just got loose on a turn. We were struggling and just loosened up. No one came to me. I was completely alone. I was just trying to make it work until we were careful and could make it a little tighter but it got to me. It’s definitely disappointing to be eliminated so early in the race, but thanks for that overstock.com, and this entire 10 team. It really hasn’t been the weekend we had hoped for through practice and qualifying and now being out of the race so early.”