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Concord, NC - Ryan Newman, No. 39 U.S. Army Impala SS, started on the pole and finished second in the delayed and ultimately shortened Coca Cola 600. After rain forced postponement from Sunday night to Monday afternoon, the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series' ...

Published: Jun 19, 2009, 7:56 PM

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Concord, NC - Ryan Newman, No. 39 U.S. Army Impala SS, started on the pole and finished second in the delayed and ultimately shortened Coca Cola 600. After rain forced postponement from Sunday night to Monday afternoon, the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series' longest race continued to be plagued by weather issues until it was ruled completed with 227 of the scheduled 400 laps run.

The runner-up run for Newman is the fourth consecutive top-five finish for the Team Chevy driver from Stewart-Haas Racing. He moved up to seventh in the standings.

The race was red-flagged three times for rain before being declared official after a 2 hour, three minute and 44 second final wait on the weather. Jeff Gordon, No. 24 DuPont Impala SS, finished 14th as a result of a variety of pit strategies that emerged due to the weather and maintains the top-spot in the standings with 12 races in the record books.

Juan Pablo Montoya, No. 42 Target Impala SS, finished eighth today after running in the top-five and top-10 all day. Montoya inched closer to the top-12 Chase standings, now sitting in 14th place, just 31 points out of the 12th spot.

Team Chevy has six drivers in the top-12. In addition to Gordon and Newman, Tony Stewart, No. 14 Office Depot/Old Spice Impala SS, is second in the order. Jimmie Johnson, No. 48 Lowe's Impala SS, is fourth in the standings with Jeff Burton, No. 31 Caterpillar Impala SS, in the eighth position. Mark Martin, No. 5 Kellogg's/CARQUEST Impala SS, is in the 12th points position.

Chevrolet continues to lead the Manufacturers' Cup standings by 19 points.

David Reutimann (Toyota) won the race with Robby Gordon (Toyota), Carl Edwards (Ford) and Brian Vickers (Toyota) finishing third through fifth respectively.

***

JUAN PABLO MONTOYA, NO. 42 TARGET IMPALA SS -- Finished 8th

"Our Chevy was solid all day. We ran within the top 10 all day and I really thought we'd be racing for the win. We had to pit under that caution, but didn't think we'd end it that way. Another top 10 is good. We normally don't run well here, so it just shows how much we continue to improve. We'll head to Dover and hope to get the Target car another great finish."

***

TONY STEWART, NO. 14 OFFICE DEPOT/OLD SPICE IMPALA SS -- Finished 19th:

NOT THE OUTCOME YOU WOULD'VE LIKED, BUT OVERALL, A PRETTY GOOD SHOWING FOR STEWART-HAAS RACING THE LAST TWO WEEKS. "It's a long two weekends here and a lot of stuff during the week that the drivers, the crew chiefs and the teams have to do. And on a day like this, it's not a normal outcome. But a good guy (David Reutimann) won the race and they won it because they made the right call at the end. They put themselves in that position and you can't take anything away from that. It won't win you races consistently, but you're going to get something that way. It's good for David to get his first win and congratulations to him and his guys. And we're happy that Ryan (Newman, teammate to Stewart at Stewart-Haas Racing) got a good finish out of it and ended up with a good day with the hurdles he and his team had to overcome. Obviously, it wasn't the outcome we wanted, but overall we've had a good showing here at Charlotte. To have Ryan get the pole and run second in the 600 and for us to win the All-Star Race, it's been a pretty good two weeks for us."

***

JEFF BURTON, NO. 31 CATERPILLAR IMPALA SS -- Finished 25th:

"Well, this isn't the way we wanted to end the Coca-Cola 600. The Caterpillar Chevy handled okay until I made contact with the wall. That made it really tight and, unfortunately, lost some track position because of it. I wish the rain would have held off so we could fix it and go back racing, but we'll just save it for Dover."

***

JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 LOWE'S IMPALA SS -- Finished 13th

"It wasn't quite how we wanted things to turn out. We were up front for most of the race but battled loose and then tight the last run. I think we would have been fine if we would have had some more laps. I know we did everything we could to get it in. I appreciate the fans who stuck around and watched on television. We really wanted to get the Lowe's Impala into victory lane for Memorial Day and especially for the more than 12,000 Lowe's employees who were on our car."

***

KEVIN HARVICK, NO. 29 SHELL-PENNZOIL IMPALA SS -- Finished 41st:

"What a day. It just wasn't our weekend. I got together with the (No.) 77, like, 10 laps into the race. Then a tire went down and I hit the wall and messed up the fender. Later on, we got a speeding penalty. I was asking myself, 'What's next?' I'm sorry for the fans that they didn't get to see 600 miles, but I'm not sad this day's over."

***

JEFF GORDON, NO. 24 DUPONT IMPALA SS -- Finished 14th -- red flag rain comment:

ARE YOU ANXIOUS TO GET BACK OUT AND RACE? "Boy, I sure hope that's the plan because the DuPont Chevrolet is coming. We made that two --tire stop held our own there and were actually making a little bit of ground right toward the end of that run. And then we got four fresh Goodyears on there and I think we can really get ourselves into contention, and it wasn't looking like that during the early stages of this race. So I give a lot of credit to (crew chief) Steve (Letarte) and the guys for making some great adjustments."

IT'S BEEN A LONG DAY. HOW'S THE DRIVER? "I'm doing good. I'm always better when I'm out there in the race car and not thinking about anything and just trying to get the car to the front. It's certainly been a struggle today with that. We started off really, really tight, but the last two adjustments, man the car was taking off. We're having fun now."

***

DAVID GILLILAND, NO. 71 TRG MOTORSPORTS CHEVROLET IMPALA SS -- FINISHED 27TH:

"We had the best car of the year here today. The car could turn really well and it was fun to drive. We were making very small adjustments on the pit stops setting ourselves up for the end of the race. The guys were doing great pit stops and it was looking like a great run for the team. The rain cautions were helping us because we took two tires early and things were falling into place."

REGARDING DRIVE-THRU PENALTY FOR SPEEDING ON PIT LANE: "That was my mistake. I came in too hot and got some wheel hop in the car and it jumped out of gear. We had ourselves positioned to make up the lap when NASCAR decided to call the race. Ending the race early really was a blessing for us, as I had only high gear left and I would have been a sitting duck on restarts and out of the pits."

-credit: gm racing

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