(Photo by Chris Graythen/Getty Images)
Las Vegas Motor Speedway
400 miles, 267 laps
March 10, 2017
TOYOTA STARTING POSITIONS
1st, Brad Keselowski*
2nd, MARTIN TRUEX JR.
4th, MATT KENSETH
8th, ERIK JONES
9th, KYLE BUSCH
11th, DANIEL SUÁREZ
15th, DENNY HAMLIN
34th, COREY LaJOIE
35th, GRAY GAULDING
37th, REED SORENSON
*non-Toyota driver
TOYOTA QUOTES
MARTIN TRUEX, JR., No. 78 Bass Pro Shops/TRACKER Boats Toyota Camry, Furniture Row Racing
Starting Position: 2nd
Can you take us through your qualifying session?
“It was definitely good for us. We’ve had a really good day at the race track. Started out today with it feeling good right off the trailer. We ended up quickest in first practice and felt like we had a good game plan going into qualifying. We felt the track would probably be a little bit faster, thought it would pick up more. After the first round I think we were off a bit and made some tweaks for the second round and even more for the third. All in all to be off a little bit and come back to be just barely short of the pole was good. Really proud of the effort of my guys and felt like it was a good day at the track. I have a good feeling for the rest of the weekend and we’ll continue to work hard on our Bass Pro Toyota and see if we can go after our first win in Vegas.”
Was there any parts of the track where you felt you could have gained to get the pole?
“Not necessarily, I felt like we had a pretty well put together lap, but it wasn’t perfect. Not quite as good through turns one and two with the bumps as I’d like to be and it felt like we hit three and four good. I felt like the bumps in one and two got us. All in all, I felt like we just missed the pace a little bit. We were really strong in practice and thought it would pick up quite a bit of speed tonight, and it didn’t. That threw us a little bit of a curve and kind of hurt our setup. It was a good recovery. We made a lot of changes as qualifying went and got better at the end. That’s all you can ask for.”
Do you feel like the Ford drivers have the upper hand on the competition right now?
“They’ve definitely had a good start, but I think if you look at it, it’s not like they’ve been head and shoulders above everybody on speed. They’ve done a good job of putting themselves in position. With Daytona, that’s it’s own beast and (Kevin) Harvick led most of the Atlanta race, he kind of has done there for the last few years. I didn’t think like either of those were out of the norm. I think we probably haven’t shown the strength we did at the beginning of last year. I think we’ve had the speed, just haven’t hit on it yet. Our Camrys are brand new this year with the ’18 Camry, so it’s a little bit different. We showed some speed today and qualified P2 with missing it a little bit. We’ll stick with the speed in our race team, two weeks is kind of hard to judge.”
What does it mean for Furniture Row Racing to have both race cars qualify in the top-10?
“Really going to two cars has been seamless from my perspective. We haven’t been lost in any areas. In the long run are going to gain from this. I think Chris (Gayle, crew chief) and Erik (Jones) have done a great job coming out strong, already being consistent without making mistakes and having good speed. They were good throughout practice today and were strong in Atlanta. For being a brand new team, I think it’s been impressive. Rookie driver, rookie crew chief in the Cup Series – it’s been really impressive. They are kind of flying under the radar, which is good. Definitely been impressed with what they’ve done so far. The two car deal is working as well as we could have hoped it would.”
MATT KENSETH, No. 20 DEWALT FLEXVOLT Toyota Camry, Joe Gibbs Racing
Starting Position: 4th
How was your Camry in qualifying?
“It was pretty good. We had pretty good speed all day, just didn’t have it quite right to get the pole, but it was a good run for us. It feels good on the track. We just worked on qualifying today and had pretty good speed.
ERIK JONES., No. 77 5-hour ENERGY Toyota Camry, Furniture Row Racing
Starting Position: 8th
How did your car handle throughout the three qualifying sessions?
“About the same. We got a little bit better from the second round, but it wasn’t quite enough to go up there and hit hard laps. Just a little bit too tight in turns one and two, I feel like it would be interesting to go back and watch it to see what really happened. Our 5-hour ENERGY Camry is good, it’s a decent starting spot for us on Sunday. It’s somewhere we can work from. It’s a lot better than last week where we won’t have to be fighting from behind at the start. Hopefully we’ll be good in race trim tomorrow and have a strong day.”
DANIEL SUÁREZ, No. No. 19 ARRIS Toyota Camry, Joe Gibbs Racing
Starting Position: 11th
How was your first Cup qualifying run at Las Vegas?
“We had a rocket out there. I felt like we actually had a shot to win the pole, but for some reason with the scuffed tires we lost a little bit of that. It’s part of it and we’ll go back to the hauler and work on it a little bit more and we’ll be back for tomorrow.”
