Driver Notes & Quotes For New Hampshire Sylvania 300

DALE EARNHARDT JR. ON NEW HAMPSHIRE: “I like running at New Hampshire, and I traditionally feel like we are a top-10 team there every time we show up. New Hampshire is a flat track and can be a one-groove track. It’s tough to pass there so qualifying is at a premium. We’ve had a couple of tough weeks, but we’ve been working hard and going back to basics. We’ve also done some testing lately.”

EARNHARDT JR. NEW HAMPSHIRE CHASSIS: Crew chief Lance McGrew and the No. 88 engineers will unload Hendrick Motorsports Chassis No. 88-589. Earnhardt last raced this chassis to an eighth-place finish at New Hampshire in June.

MATT KENSETH ON RACING AT LOUDON: “This weekend as we head to New Hampshire, I’m really happy that we’re a part of the Chase this year. Now our focus has to be to make sure that we go out and perform the best we can so that we’re able to close up some of the point difference between where we’re at versus the leaders. New Hampshire is a track that has always been a challenge for me, and I feel like it hasn’t been one of my better tracks on the circuit, but we seem to be pretty consistent here statistically speaking. New Hampshire is a track where it’s fairly difficult to pass, so you’ll see teams use pit stops and pit strategy to advance their way through the field on Sunday.”

KENSETH CHASSIS SELECTION: Primary: RK-704 (brand new chassis)

CARL EDWARDS ON RACING AT NEW HAMPSHIRE: "I think Loudon is a good race track. I really enjoy it and have had some success there. I think the biggest challenge this weekend will be getting our setup right. It’s a short race without a lot of cautions, so qualifying will be important. It’s just the regular stuff we deal with at Loudon trying to get track position, but we’ve been qualifying a lot better lately and our set-ups have been pretty good so I’m very optimistic that we will be contenders at Loudon. We need to start off the Chase on the right foot and not get behind from the start.”

EDWARDS CHASSIS SELECTION: RK-647 Raced Loudon in June, finished 25th; Also raced Phoenix in April, finished 7th

bOWYER ON POSSIBILITY OF WINNING AT LOUDON LIKE 2007: “It’s possible. Anything is possible with the way races have ended this season. We’re bringing a brand new car with us. All of these new cars that Shane Wilson (crew chief) and the guys have been building are running well. If we can get a good qualifying effort and stay with the leaders, like we did last weekend, we could have a shot at it.”

BOWYERS' CHASSIS SELECTION: Bowyer will pilot Chassis No. 320 from the Richard Childress Racing NASCAR Sprint Cup Series stable. This is a brand new Chevrolet Impala that will be put through its first paces this weekend.

JEFF BURTON ON DOING ANYTHING DIFFERENTLY IN THE CHASE: “First of all, this is the most fun 10 weeks of the year. This is what you live for. Every time I get in the Chase, I tell myself I waited my whole life to be in this position, so that’s a hell of a cool thing. We tend to get caught up in the pressure of it, but man, we’re playing a game and it’s supposed to be fun. My deal is that I’m going to go race as hard as I know how to race. I’m going to ask my team to work as hard as they know how to work. We’re going to work together and try to defeat problems, but we’re going to have fun at it. It’s going to be intense. When you waited your whole life for something and it’s in front of you, it’s going to be intense, full of emotion, and it should be. There is going to be disappointment. There is going to be happiness. I can’t really say I’ve changed a lot other than my family knows that it’s go time. Racing is going to come first here for the next few months. My team members understand if we have to build cars in a week-and-a-half, we’re going to build a car in a week-and-a-half. Whatever we have to do, we’re going to do to. I can’t really say that I’ve changed a whole lot. We ask that of everybody every week.”

BURTON'S CHASSIS AT LOUDON: Jeff Burton will pilot Chassis No. 319 from the Richard Childress Racing NASCAR Sprint Cup Series stable. This is a brand new No. 31 racer that will be put through its first paces of competition in this weekend’s Sylvania 300.

KEVIN HARVICK ON HIS CHANCES OF WINNING TITLE NOW: Barring things that we can’t control, I think we have as good a chance to win as we have ever had, and it is in our best interest to concentrate on ourselves. I want to do our own thing and concentrate on what we are doing.”

HARVICK'S CHASSIS SELECTION THIS WEEK: Harvick will pilot Chassis No. 322 from the Richard Childress Racing NASCAR Sprint Cup Series stable. This Shell-Pennzoil Chevrolet is a completely brand new car which will see its first laps on the track during Friday’s practice session.

KASEY KAHNE'S THOUGHTS ON RACING AT LOUDON: “It’s a track that has very long corners, so it’s going to be important that we get our Budweiser Ford to roll really well through the center of the corners. The straightaways are long for just a one-mile track and the turns are extremely flat, so having good brakes that will last you to the end is important if you want to run well.”

GREG BIFFLE ON NEW HAMPSHIRE: “It would obviously be great for us to come back and start the Chase with two wins like we did in 2008 but a solid top-five run would work too. We’ve had a couple of bad races but I still feel really confident about our chances in the Chase. We’ve been running well since Chicago and I think that should carry over into the Chase. We can hopefully learn something from what happened in Richmond and make sure the problems we had there don’t happen again. This is going to be a busy week with the trip to New York and Boston but I’ll be glad to get into the racecar on Friday and see what we’ve got.”

BIFFLES' CREW CHIEF GREG ERWIN ON LOUDON & CHASSIS: “We’re taking a brand new car to the track this weekend. We obviously missed the mark in Richmond so we are looking forward to getting a fresh start in the Chase with a new car. Greg knows how to win there so if we can give him a car that he can run up front with, we know he’ll do everything he can to get the 3M Ford to victory lane. We just need solid runs to stay in contention for the championship but a win or two would definitely help.”

JEFF GORDON'S NEW HAMPSHIRE CHASSIS: Crew chief Steve Letarte has chosen Hendrick Motorsports Chassis No. 24-616 for Sunday’s race at New Hampshire. This is a new chassis that has not been raced, but the No. 24 team tested it at The Milwaukee (Wis.) Mile earlier this month.