Ford Atlanta qualifying

HUT STRICKLIN --90-- Hills Brothers Taurus (Qualified 30th)
"We really had a good race car there, but I screwed up really bad in three and four. The thing turned a lot quicker than I was expecting it to and I went in below the white line going into three and I kind of hurt myself. I'm pretty tickled to run that quick after messing up like that, so I feel pretty good."

JEFF BURTON --99-- Citgo SUPERGARD Taurus (Qualified 41st)
"We haven't been fast since we've been here. The car is real insecure in the center of the corner and it just slows down me being able to accelerate the way I want to accelerate. You need to be almost wide-open here and whenever I try to go wide-open I'm gonna hit something really hard, so I can't get it to do what I need to get it to do. I put Mark in it a little while ago and he struggled with it the same way. I don't know, we just couldn't figure it out."

RUSTY WALLACE --2-- Miller Lite Taurus (Qualified 20th)
"That was the fastest we ran since we've been here. We ran a .23 in bonzai practice I call it and we ran an .11 just then. I was too loose coming off of turn four, so I'm sure that hurt me about a tenth. I think I could have run about a flat, but we'll see what happens. Last time, believe it or not here in the first race, we qualified 30th. I mean, that was one of my all-time worst, but the car handled so good we drove it right up to second, so I think I've got a great car here."

BILL ELLIOTT --94-- McDonald's Taurus (Qualified 44th) --
"That's the same I've been all day. We keep gaining on it, but we just haven't been that good since we unloaded. I can't figure it out. We were a bit loose earlier and now we're a bit on the tight side, but we'll worry about it tomorrow."

DALE JARRETT --88-- Quality Care Service/Ford Credit Taurus (Qualified 3rd)
"We made some changes and Todd made the right call there and got the front end sticking a lot better. I probably got turned into three a little bit too quick and that got me up the race track coming out of the corner. It wasn't two-tenths worth, though. Jeff put up a great lap. I just can't hold my breath as long as he can. He's still too young for me."

YOU ANNOUNCED A NEW SPONSOR TODAY?
"Yeah, we've got a great four-year package with UPS and we're excited about that, but right now we're excited about our last race of a five-year deal with Ford Quality Care and, hopefully, we can get it into victory lane. We had a good qualifying lap, just not quite as good as a couple of Chevrolets right now, but I think we can race 'em on Sunday."

STACY COMPTON --9-- Kodiak/Cougar Taurus (Qualified 27th)
"We worked awfully hard ready to get this car ready to go here. We got it torn up here last weekend at Homestead, but they got together and thrashed to get this car ready and I think we picked up seven-tenths in qualifying, so a lot of hard work paid off. I'm awfully proud of the guys. We're building right now. We've got a lot of new people in the shop and a lot of people putting in a lot of hours and it's gonna pay off for us."

ROBERT PRESSLEY --77-- Jasper Engines Taurus (Qualified 34th)
"That's not what we wanted. I thought that I would be better than that right there, but we'll just take it and go race. We've been struggling in one and two all day and on our last lap we got it through one and two real good, but three and four wasn't quite right. The same thing happened in qualifying. I got through one and two real good, but got down in three and four and we were off again."

MATT KENSETH --17-- DeWalt Tools Taurus (Qualified 23rd)
"The car drove good. I didn't expect it to drive as good as it did and I just didn't do a good job of driving. There was at least two-tenths left in the car and I just didn't get it. The car drove great, if that's any consolation. The changes we made improved it a lot. We probably could have had a top-10 car, I just didn't drive it that way."

@JEREMY MAYFIELD --12-- Mobil 1 Taurus (Qualified 7th)
"This is a great car. All of these cars are getting good. Everytime we run. My 9 car runs good. My 10 car runs good and my 12 car runs good, so we've got two brand new ones being built right now just like 'em and we're gearing up for next year. This is a good, solid race team and we've got everything behind us. We're ready to race."

WHAT ABOUT YOUR LAP?
"We've been fast, but that's all we had. That's all we had in practice and we came back and got all we could. We backed up what we ran in practice and that's all you can ask for."

WALLY DALLENBACH --75-- TBS Dinner & A Movie Taurus (Qualified 10th)
"My knuckles are white. This was one of those rare occasions this year where we took the car off the trailer and it was good. We didn't run that many laps and the car felt good. We knew we were gonna pick up in qualifying, so I wasn't concerned about where we were in practice. The guys did good. We're still out here sponsor hunting, so we need a good show this week."

MARK MARTIN --6-- Valvoline Taurus (Qualified 6th)
"That's quicker than we ran in practice and probably better than I hoped to do, but I sure had to work for it. I'll take it. We got back without wrecking and squeezed every bit we had out of it. That's gonna be a pretty good starting spot."

RICKY RUDD --28-- Texaco Havoline Taurus (DNQ)
I'm in a lot better shape than that race car right now. We just probably tried a little bit too hard. We've been running good and I was trying to get up for a pole speed. I went down into turn one and it had been bottoming out down there before and it just bottomed out a little bit harder. When it did that, it just turned sideways and it was over with." WHAT ABOUT YOUR BACKUP CAR? "I don't know. I don't think we've got a bad car over there on that Texaco 28 team, so I'm sure we'll be in good shape. We're just not starting the week the way we'd like to."

TODD BODINE --46-- Route 66/Big Kmart Taurus (Qualified 5th)
"That was a good run for us, about what we ran in practice. The car was so good through one and two I got into three a little too deep and made it push. That was driver error, but that was a good run. We did what we needed to do. First, we needed to make the race and we did pretty well at that. Now, we've got to get a good race setup. I'm really excited. This is our deal for next year. Kmart and Haas Carter Racing. This is a good group of guys. Travis and Carl are both racers and they know what it takes to do this. I'm excited. I can't wait for Sunday, but I can't wait for next year. It's gonna be a long winter for me."

THIS IS A GOOD START TOWARD NEXT YEAR.
"That's what this whole thing was about. We came down here to get me back in a Cup car for one thing and to use this as kind of a test for next spring when we come out in the 66 car. We want to use this as a test so next spring we don't have to waste a test here. We're gonna be down in points a little bit, we need to get our points up right away so we need to run good in the first four or five races. This kind of gets one of them out of the way and, hopefully, this is the start of things to come."

JIMMY SPENCER --26-- Big Kmart Taurus (Qualified 16th)
THIS CAR WAS GOOD LAST WEEK AND IT SEEMS TO BE GOOD HERE TOO?
"Yeah, this is the car the guys built early in the year and it's run really well. It's actually the car that we've been copying cars from. The guys have worked hard all summer working on cars aerowise and stuff. The motor department has been great. It's still not the qualifying lap we wanted, we really felt like we would have been better than that, but, all in all, I think our season has turned around it's just too late. We've got to build on that for next year. That's what we have to do as a race team. All the guys have to look at that and as we go through the winter months, I think we're gonna have an excellent race team next year."

BRETT BODINE --11-- Ralphs Supermarkets Taurus (Qualified 22nd)
"That was a good run. We had a great one and two and then the driver got real greedy in three and four and I just overdrove it. That cost us through the middle and it started sliding out. I had to come off the throttle a little bit and it just killed the lap. The car is really stable. I'm really, really, happy with the car. We've made big improvements with this car since Charlotte and I think it's gonna be good on Sunday. We've been racing a lot better lately and, hopefully, we can do it again here at Atlanta."

ELLIOTT SADLER --21-- Motorcraft Taurus (Qualified 37th) --
NOTE: The 21 had problems with its qualifying motor and was forced to insert its race motor for qualifying.
WHAT HAPPENED GOING ON THE TRACK?
"I goosed it coming off pit road and the thing spun out. Holy cow, I guess the tires were too cold. It's so cold out here I was trying to build heat in the rear tires and built them up too much. I tore my air dam up and that definitely killed us. I don't know. I don't think we're in the race right now, we've just got to hope and pray that we'll get a spot. Something will happen, but that's not the way we wanted to start this weekend off. Hopefully, we can make the most of it."