Gordon Kicks Off Daytona With 6th Place Finish In Shootout

Daytona Beach, FL - Prior to starting 23rd in the Budweiser Shootout Saturday evening, Jeff Gordon first attempted to qualify the No. 24 DuPont Chevrolet Impala on the pole position for next Sunday's Daytona 500. Gordon ended up 10th on the grid and will race on Thursday in the Gatorade Duels.  He later went to finish 6th in the Shootout that evening.  Below are his post-qualifying quotes and his post-race notes.

JEFF GORDON, NO. 24 DUPONT IMPALA - Qualified 10th: "When your teammates are further up the board there and you ran so well in practice yesterday, you get your hopes up.
"I'm really proud of Hendrick Motorsports and the effort that's been put out to come down here and be strong. And we were hoping for a little bit more than that. But we'll take it and get ready to go race with the DuPont Chevrolet."
 
THE SUN HAS COME OUT. HAS THE TRACK GOTTEN HOTTER AND MAYBE SLOWER?
I don't know. We'll see when Bill Elliott goes. I think he's going to be pretty fast. But you hope for the gust of wind and a lot of things here at Daytona that could be a factor. But we'll go back and look at everything. I feel like we could have had maybe a little bit more oil pressure and didn't just quite get the RPM that we were hoping for. The car was real loose through the corner yesterday, which I felt like was good to get it through the corner. It wasn't quite as loose today. So, just little things here and there that made a big difference."

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JEFF GORDON, NO. 24 DUPONT IMPALA-- Finished 6th in the Budweiser Shootout
WHAT IS YOUR TAKE ON GETTING TOGETHER WITH GREG BIFFLE IN THE END?
"Oh, man, just a green-white-checkered flag race and the DuPont Chevrolet was good. I got myself in position there a couple of times to where I really thought we might have a shot at it. And then I got shuffled back. I was pretty disappointed. But right there, Steve (Letarte, crew chief) made the right call and we got a great run down the back straightaway. Matt Kenseth was pushing me. I got to Greg and I was just pushing and pushing and pushing; almost had to move to the inside of him; he kind of closed the door there and I was just pushing. We went into the corner and he just spun right out. I don't know if he had a tire go down of just the fact that he was on old tires and couldn't take that kind of a push. They said that bump-drafting is okay now so that's what it's going to take to win the race. He was thanking me for the push and I was trying to push him up there to win the race or finish right there behind him anyway."
 
HE SAID HE THOUGHT HE MIGHT HAVE HAD A TIRE GOING DOWN. BUT WHAT I WANT TO KNOW IS AFTER SEEING HOW THIS RACE PLAYED OUT, HOW ARE THE DUELS AND THE 500 GOING TO BE NEXT WEEK?
"I think guys are going to be a little smarter in the Duels. That's your 500 car. You can't really do much bump-drafting in here at Daytona. You can do it down the straightaways on a two-or-three lap shootout like that. So I would think if there's a caution with a few laps to go, you'll see it. Once we get to the 500, that's a totally different deal. Man, it's the Daytona 500 and everybody is going to be going for it and you're going to see a lot more risk being taken and for good reason. That's an important trophy that we all want. You'll see plenty of action and plenty of bump-drafting."
 
WHAT DID YOU THINK OF THE BIGGER PLATE?
"The cars were pretty out of control, which was fun at times. You know, you had to really drive them. But we've got to get our car handling maybe a little bit better and the plate was good though. I liked the plate."
 
DID YOU NOTICE THE FIN AT ALL?
"No, no. I don't think you really notice that until you start to spin out. You can ask somebody that did that. I didn't quite do that. It didn't seem to help Greg a lot (laughs). But it kept him on the ground, so that's a good thing."
 
HAD BIFFLE SLOWED UP AT THAT POINT, OR WERE YOU JUST PUSHING HIM?
"No, I just had so many guys stacked up behind me, pushing me, and I was just pushing him. It's hard to say really in that situation without seeing it on camera whether he had a tire going down or not. He made it through Turns 1 and 2 okay and we were pushing him real, real hard. And the fact that they stayed out of there on old tires was definitely going to make his car not handle quite as good. At that point, you don't have a choice. They're pushing you from behind and you're pushing the guy in front of you and when that's the situation, you hope that in Greg's position that you get in there and the car sticks; and in that situation it didn't stick for whatever reason."
 
HE THOUGHT HE HAD A FLAT TIRE OR JUST OLD TIRES. HE DIDN'T PUT IT ON YOU AT ALL.
"It came around in a hurry, that's for sure. I was wanting to push him; I wasn't wanting to spin him. I hit him real hard one time and it made him go up the track down the straightaway and I almost got to the inside of him. If I could have done that, I think we might have had a shot at the win."