NASCAR Cup

Waltrip wins his second Daytona 500

JIMMY SPENCER (No. 7 Sirius Satellite Radio Dodge Intrepid) "Jeff Green cut a tire, and I was right behind him. I didn't have anywhere to go. It was just my luck. The car hadn't been handling real good, but we were going to keep working on it and ...

Published: Feb 18, 2003, 9:16 PM

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JIMMY SPENCER (No. 7 Sirius Satellite Radio Dodge Intrepid)

"Jeff Green cut a tire, and I was right behind him. I didn't have anywhere to go. It was just my luck. The car hadn't been handling real good, but we were going to keep working on it and I think we could have salvaged a good finish."

WARD BURTON (No. 22 Caterpillar Dodge Intrepid)

"We cut a right rear tire. It was fine. I was real loose going through one and two. I told them on the backstretch that I might have a tire going down. I got in the middle of three, and I thought I'd saved it, but it went down a little bit more and that was it. It's just bad luck. The rain could have saved us, but it didn't happen quick enough.

"The 12 car moved up into me, and I moved up into Schrader. I don't think the 12 knew I was under him. It was just one of those things. I'm glad no one got hurt.

"At times the car ran real good. Later on, I don't know if something in the cowl broke or what, but it was taking it seven to 10 laps to get up to speed and the handling wasn't as good as I thought it needed to be. I don't know what was wrong with it.

"We need to have some luck. Just like what just happened, we didn't have any control over it. We cut a tire. We were really loose in one and two, and I thought I might have a tire going down. I thought I could hold it, but once I got into three the tire went down a little bit more and I couldn't hold it.

"It's disappointing when you fall out of any race, it doesn't matter if you're the defending champion or not. It's real disappointing with all the effort we've put into it, but it was just something beyond our control. The 12 car didn't know I was up underneath him, it appeared to me. I had to move over to the right. I was getting out of the throttle, but I must not have gotten out of it quick enough.

"We didn't have the Dodge running like we wanted to, but we were starting to gain on it. I can't get home tonight because ice is all over the runways in North Carolina and Virginia. I couldn't go home last year because we won the race. That was a much better reason to stay here another night."

JEREMY MAYFIELD (No. 19 Dodge Dealers/UAW Dodge Intrepid)

"We're running in the top 10, so if it rains it out, we'll take what we've got and go home. If we go back racing, hopefully our Dodge will stay in the top 10. Before we got here, we felt good about the chemistry and how everybody is working together. This is the best chance I've had in a long time, and I feel good about it. Sometimes you can have the best people in the world and they don't work together well. This is probably the best situation I've been in in a long time."

-dodge motorsports-

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