STEVE LETARTE, CREW CHIEF, NO. 24 DUPONT IMPALA SS
YOU HAD A PROBLEM WITH YOUR LEFT REAR AND A FEW STOP, BUT STILL PULLED OFF A DECENT FINISH:
"Yeah, that’s how this team has done it all year long. Even when we make mistakes we fight through them and we came back with a top five. It was a great day nonetheless. It was a great car. Jimmie (Johnson) had a little bit better car on the short runs. We had a little better car on the long runs. The race just didn’t fall our way."

HOW PLEASED ARE YOU WITH YOUR PIT CREW TO DEAL WITH ADVERSITY?
"Well there is no doubt. They are definitely an experienced team. They make great pit stops all year long. They got us out there in the lead on the last pit stop. We can’t keep getting lucky and come from behind. We’ve got to work on mistakes. But you know, I’m proud of the car and proud of the effort and think we have a 50-some-odd point lead and I’m excited for the last four races."

JEFF GORDON, NO. 24 DUPONT IMPALA SS –
ON BEATING AND BANGING WITH RYAN NEWMAN AT THE END:
"I wasn’t very good on short runs there and I just couldn’t get down into the corners; and Ryan (Newman) looked like he was pretty good there on the shorter runs. I kind of held him up. He got me up the race track and then I gave him room and we slammed pretty good there. I wasn’t real happy about it. But it’s no big deal. He didn’t mean to do that and he understands why we were upset and that’s all good. It was a great race for us. We had some trouble on pit road and to be able to rebound from that and come back and get a top five finish, we’ve got to be real happy about that. I think Jimmie (Johnson) had the car to beat really for most of the day if not all the day. And he certainly had it there at the end on those short runs and we just didn’t need those short runs. We needed longer runs. I felt with about 100 (laps) to go we were going to see green all the way. But that wasn’t the case."

RICK HENDRICK, OWNER, HENDRICK MOTORSPORTS:
"This race has a lot of emotion for me. It is hard to come up here, but it is better to be here than to be at home. This race is the first Cup race my Dad every brought me too. I got Richard Petty's autograph in turn four I believe it was on the grass.

"I am real proud of our organization, this has been a good track for us. We have four more to go and hopefully don't have any bad races. I told everybody this morning, there are just as many races left, as we have run so we could be just like some of the other guys if luck isn't on our side. We don't need any good luck right now, we just don't need any bad luck."

ON KEEPING TEAM UNITY AND MORALE ON NO. 24/48 TEAM: "About 60% of the guys in the No. 24/48 shop work on the cars together, the road crew is the only difference. They are in there together all the time. They are proud, sure everybody wants to beat the other guy; they see us all getting better and better and better. I have told them this year, last year, year before that, you won't get beat from the outside in this business once you get the momentum, it is going to happen from the inside, so big challenge here the next four races, hopefully it is down to the two of us, I hope it is. But whether it is one of our cars or two of them, we just have to stay focused and do what we do every week and not panic, not change any thing. Just like our motor guys before Talladega, they worked the weekend before Talladega, they tore down every engine we had because we found one oil ring that didn't look right, so we went back to something that we knew was safe. We gave up six horsepower, nobody complained, everything made it.

"The whole group is focused on finishing the races, trying to be there at the end. I have been here before when Jeff and Terry (Labonte) went down to the last race. I got the guys all together the week before and told the guys, I tell you what I am going to do first, I am going to the loser first then after that I am going to go to the winner. Know it before you see it, and don't think I am playing favorites going to the guy that didn't win, I just want you to know what I am going to do.

"I think it helps the guys to know I feel I am real proud of them because the No. 24 guys came over and congratulated me after today's race. Casey (Mears) came to victory lane,
Kyle (Busch) came to victory lane in Charlotte, they see what is special about our crowd so I hope we can keep it."

ON HIS FEELINGS WHEN THE 24 AND 48 WERE RUNNING HARD TOGETHER: "You don't want to see them wreck each other. We want to see them race clean. I think you saw that, Jeff didn't try to hold Jimmie up, when Jimmie got there and he was quicker and got to the inside, Jeff didn't try to muscle him or anything like that. They are racing for a championship and they have to narrow it down to just one or two more cars, then that is to Jeff's advantage. People are going to remember who won the '07 championship, they might not remember who won the race or who finished third here when we are in New York. You want to win, that is why we are here, but you have to think big picture all the time. It is gut-wrenching deal. I would rather be here than out of it and just trying to get to the end."

ON SUCCESS HERE MAKING IT EASIER TO COME HERE: "I stayed home I think it was last year, I came back the first year. Actually, sitting at home is tougher than being here with the guys because that is what Ricky (Hendrick), John (Hendrick), Randy (Dorton) and all of them would want me to do. It is hard to do, but as soon as I walk in here and get with the guys, they are my family too, all the fans, the media-I am with people who care about us. We can't undo what was done. This week we dedicated a children's hospital in Ricky's name, did that Thursday night and cut the ribbon on Saturday morning. It has been a hard week, but every week is a hard week. We miss all those folks. Just being with these guys and supporting them is real important to me. I want to be here. This track has been unbelievable. Geoff Bodine won our first race here our first year. We have won a ton of races here, I don't know how many but it has been a bunch. I grew up 60-miles from here and watched the modified run here with Ray Hendrick. My Dad had cars here, pulled for Rex White in a convertible. That is really telling you how old I am now."

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Jeff Gordon, No. 24 DuPont Impala SS met with media after the race and talked about his third place finish, racing with Ryan Newman at the end, how he knew his car was good on long runs based on the frequent cautions, Jimmie Johnson’s success at Martinsville, on green-white-checkered finishes, did he think it would come down to a final race with Jimmie Johnson, how the team reacts every time it returns to Martinsville and the tragedy of the Hendrick Motorsports plane accident, on David Regan and when NASCAR should throw the yellow in certain situations, on losing some points, but holding the lead, on what makes him successful at Martinsville, on running with Dale Earnhardt Jr as a teammate next year, on if Tony Stewart is out of the Chase, and battling with his teammate and friend, Jimmie Johnson.

"Oh man, it was all over the place for us. Obviously it started out great. We were just up front really cruising and the car was fantastic. We were just trying to fine-tune on it. And then we had one problem in the pits and had to come back again and that pretty much made us play catch up all day long. I was also trying to be careful because we were just in a lot of traffic trying not to get ourselves caught up in anything. So that worked out really well. And then (crew chief) Steve Letarte did another fantastic job of calling the pit strategy. We got the lead but couldn’t maintain it. I don’t think that affected whether we were going to win the race today or not because we had the lead. I was real good on the long runs but just not that good on the short runs so those cautions certainly didn’t play in our favor. But looking at what it could have been at one point, I’m very, very pleased to come out of here with a third place finish."

"I understand he said he got in there too hot and made a mistake, but that mistake almost cost us the race. And so I was pretty upset about it, obviously. He was faster than me and he basically told me by his front bumper hitting my rear bumper down in the middle of (Turns) 1 and 2 on one of those restarts. I basically had to give him the inside because I couldn’t afford to let him hit me any harder than that, and he was faster than me. So I gave him the inside and we raced down into Turn 1 and all I know is I gave him a lot of room; I was going to get in behind him and try to maintain third or go back after him because the longer we ran, the better we were.

"And all of a sudden I felt him just slam into me. And it almost spun me out. And so I was pretty upset about that. I showed him my displeasure when the caution came out. Obviously that probably made him upset as well. But we talked about it when the race was over. I went over to him. We were both calm. I explained to him why I was upset and he explained to me why he was upset. And it’s a dropped issue and we move on."

"Because the long runs that we did have, we were really good; like the one where we ran Jimmie down. I’m not sure how long of a run that was. But you can tell the handling of a car at the beginning of a run, whether it’s going to be good toward the middle or the end of the run or not. My car just really didn’t turn very good getting in and was real loose off on the short runs. And that’s how it was on every run, basically. But when we had the longer runs it came to us. With this car, once you set the car up, you can’t do anything to it. There is just hardly anything you can do to it, other than air pressure, that affects this car. So, you’re pretty much stuck with it. It’s not that we didn’t know it was like that. There just wasn’t anything we could do about it. We were just keeping our fingers crossed that we would have more green flag runs.

"And the other thing is the way this track is, it builds up rubber. You could see sometimes how it builds up rubber in the middle of the grooves at both ends of the track and that changes your line. You can start running through the middle of the corner and diving in the corner getting a straight shot off, and that played to my set-up. And on the restarts, you don’t have that rubber that you can use to hook the middle of the corner and get the straight shot off."

"Yeah, I think we should just have more cautions and more spins and more wrecks and maybe they’ll like that. I mean, c’mon. Cautions breed cautions. And when you stack us up and you give us one to go, people are going to crash. And it’s rare that doesn’t happen. So if you stack us up and do it again, we’re probably going to do it again. I think that’s the reason why the rule is the way it is which is one green-white-checkered. But I thought it was still a great finish even if it came down to the white flag, you look at the runs prior to that and me and Newman were bumping and banging for second. I got inside Jimmie a couple of times prior to that and that was pretty exciting. So, I’m still not a fan of this car. If you put me back in 26^{th or whatever with one of the best cars and it’s everything I can do to pass the 25th place car. And to me, there’s a problem. And if we can’t pass at Martinsville, how are we going to pass at other tracks? I just think that either we’ve got to do something to the track or we still need to make some adjustments to this car. But the only thing that got me where I was, was the fact that we had a good car and we just got track position and pit strategy saved the day for us. But no, I don’t think they should change anything. I kind of like the way it is."}