Sebastien Bourdais Wins at Milwaukee

Team Chevy Drivers Capture Four of Top-Five and Eight of Top-10 Finishing Positions on the Milwaukee Mile

 WEST ALLIS, WISC (July 12, 2015) – Sebastien Bourdais now has 34 Verizon IndyCar Series wins to his credit, but the victories on an oval track have been minimal when compared to his impressive road and street course resume. In fact, the four-time champion’s last oval track win came in 2006 on the Milwaukee Mile

With a dominating performance in today’s Wisconsin 250 at Milwaukee IndyFest.. leading three times for 118  of the 250-lap race, Bourdais again pulled into Victory Lane at Milwaukee, and added one more win to increase his total to 34, and the number of oval track wins to five.

“Today was a great win for Sébastien Bourdais and his KV-SH Racing team at the Milwaukee Mile,” said Chris Berube, Chevrolet Racing Program Manager for Verizon IndyCar Series. “Seb held a commanding lead and the team made some solid strategy calls. Team Chevy was well represented in the top 10 and we hope to carry that momentum into Iowa next weekend.”

It is the second victory of the 2015 Verizon IndyCar Series season for the driver of the No. 11 Team Hydroxycut – KVSH Racing Chevrolet, his first coming in Race Two of the Chevrolet Detroit Belle Isle Grand Prix in late May. This win ties Bourdais with Al Unser Jr. for seventh place on the all-time list.

Bourdais win is the ninth win for the Chevrolet Aero Kit with fully integrated V6 2.2-liter, twin-turbocharged, direct injected engine fueled by E85 in the 12 Verizon IndyCar Series races run thus far in the 2015 season.

Team Chevy drivers claimed four of the top-five and eight of the top-10 finishing positions.  After having to start last in the 24-car field for an infraction of qualifying procedures, Helio Castroneves and the No. 3 Hitachi Team Penske Chevrolet team rallied to finish second behind Bourdais.  The strong run now has Castroneves tied for third in the standings.

Juan Pablo Montoya, No. 2 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet, finished fourth to increase his points lead with a fourth place finish in today’s race on the famed one-mile oval.  Pole winner Josef Newgarden, No. 67 Hartman Oil CFH Racing Chevrolet, completed the top-five finishers.  Graham Rahal (Honda) finished third to fill the podium.

Tony Kanaan brought the No. 10 NTT Data Chip Ganassi Racing Chevrolet, to the finish in sixth place followed by his teammate Scott Dixon in the No. 9 Cottonelle Chevrolet in seventh place. Dixon is second in the standings with four races remaining in the season.

Simon Pagenaud, No. 22 Penske Truck Rental Team Penske Chevrolet, was the ninth place finisher, and Ed Carpenter brought the No. 20 Fuzzy’s Vodka CFH Racing Chevrolet, to the checkered flag in 10^th place.

An accident on lap 130 relegated defending series’ champion Will Power, No. 1 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet, to the 22^nd finishing position, and dropped him to fifth in the standings.

Next on the schedule will be another oval track race at Iowa Speedway on July 18, 2015.  Live television coverage provided by NBCSN.  Fans can listen on the IndyCar Radio Network, Sirius 212, XM 209, IndyCar.com, indycarradio.com and on the INDYCAR 15 app.

An Interview with Sebastien Bourdais and Helio Castroneves

THE MODERATOR:  We are joined by Helio Castroneves, our second-place finisher.  This is Helio’s 38th career second-place finish.  Since 1946, only Mario Andretti has more second-place finishes.  .

HELIO CASTRONEVES:  When you don’t take first, you take second.

THE MODERATOR:  What are your emotions this weekend, having to start from the back of the field, all the way up to a second-place finish?

HELIO CASTRONEVES:  Yeah, no, it was very frustrating unfortunately.  It was a miscue on that situation.  We were 10 minutes late on showing up to the line for the field.

Certainly I think the weekend at Fontana somebody else had the same issue.  Those are the rules that are really reinforced.  Very disappointed because we know how tough it is over here to pass.

But I guess, you know, we changed a little bit of the race strategy.  The Hitachi car was actually very good.  A little difficult in traffic.  I never quite had a good chance to have a clear lap.  Obviously it’s tough to have it here.

But once I was having less turbulence here, the car was definitely fast.  I was trying just different lanes out there.  At one point we were catching the 11 car.  We were doing a great job.  Unfortunately he moved the line up once, and that took my air out.  I had a huge moment.  Unfortunately, that was it for us.  I knew he would do something like that as I was getting closer.

It’s one of those things that’s great.  I’m not taking for granted second place.  It was very tough, great work, great job from Roger, from Travis, Jonathan.

Q I think Helio came in on 47.  Was that a little bit of a surprise that some guys came in early?  Helio, was that part of the plan?

HELIO CASTRONEVES:  Yeah, for us, we had to do everything we could to be different than everybody else, especially the conditions.  That’s what we were trying to do, just trying to throw it out there and see what happened.

1. Helio, when you look at Team Penske overall, your teammates were sort of down in the grid, as well.  Juan had a pit road speeding penalty.  Looked like a rough day, and here you are, Juan finished fourth.  Does it speak to how resilient you are?

HELIO CASTRONEVES:  Certainly, as I said, I think all of us, I mean, Juan Pablo finished fourth, Will was up there.  We were running together, as well.  Simon might have a little bit of a problem.  At one point he was up there.

I understand qualifying, took a little bit of a gamble.  We thought it’s going to be one way, with the warmup pretty fast, and it turned out to be a different one.  It was an issue on the setup, it was just an issue of taking too much risk.

But in the end of the day, we knew we had strong cars.  All four of us were a little bit tough in traffic.  But we knew we had very strong cars.  It turns out to be harder when you start from the back, no question.  But the team delivered the pit stops that I wanted and that put us in a position to fight for the win.

1. Helio, you’re an emotional guy.  Can you describe sort of the waves of emotions throughout the day from having to start in the back to maybe winning this thing?

HELIO CASTRONEVES:  In the car, you can’t be emotional unless there was issues with other drivers, which you get used to.  Maybe you not get used to it (laughter).

But the point is, we never give up.  Honestly many times I didn’t know the position I was.  They didn’t tell me.  I was trying to drive as hard as I can.  We knew we had plenty of tires because of not qualifying.  It gave us an extra set.  That could be an advantage for us.  We knew putting new tires would be better.

You know, the strategy was to passes a many cars as possible.  But I want to pass when I knew that I have an opportunity.  Sometimes I was just checking to make sure my car was okay to go inside, outside, things like that.

It work out really good.  I think experience definitely paid off.  Great job for the entire team.

1. (No microphone.)

HELIO CASTRONEVES:  Yeah, just in the end.  I didn’t know what position I was until lap 220.  218 was the yellow.  I glanced in the pagoda, I saw my name up there.  Oh, I am doing well (laughter).

At one point in the race I was by myself.  Actually, there was one car.  I didn’t know where was everybody.  I look in the mirror.  Nobody front, nobody.  What happened?  I must be doing really bad or really good.

When the yellow came, I thought, Now we got a chance to win because now we got good tires.

The 11 was just too quick.

1. (No microphone.)

HELIO CASTRONEVES:  No idea.  How he was able to pull away?  When somebody told me he was a lap ahead of everyone, I mean, then I understood that’s why he was so good.

For me, I was catching him for sure.  But as soon as you move up, it took the air from me.  It was very difficult to come back.

I wish you wouldn’t have traffic.  It would give us a little bit of a chance.  But, man, we were trying.  I want to win so bad.

We’ll keep working very hard and we’re going to get it.

THE MODERATOR:

We’ll continue with our post-race press conference.  We’re pleased to be joined by the winner of today’s race, Sebastien Bourdais.  This is his 34th career win.  It ties Al Unser, Jr. for seventh on the all-time list this career wins.  Also his 51st career podium finish, his second in 2015.

Another win in the books for you this year, what are your thoughts?  A very dominant race for you, especially towards the end.  I believe you had a lap over the entire field for a while.

SEBASTIEN BOURDAIS:  Yeah, I don’t think it’s sunk in yet.  It’s one of those days where just everything works out.

We knew we had a really good car this morning.  In traffic we felt strong.  We could run the bottom, move forward.  They were bubbling up on the outside.  I thought maybe we could do something today.

Then in qualifying, just messed up.  The car hit the ground so hard, it picked up the wheels.  An easy top five turned into an 11th-place start.  From there I knew it was going to be a different race.  It’s not easy.  You got some good guys at the front.  It’s hard to pass here.

I just had a very aggressive start.  I went on the inside.  I was on the outside for a couple of laps.  By the time it was all said and done, we were seventh.  At that time I was like, Okay, maybe it’s not all over yet.

The car felt pretty good.  The rear tires were showing signs of not being too happy pretty quickly.  It was pretty much a surreal day.  We were free, free, free the whole time.  As soon as the car kind of took a set, it was just tough.

It was just about managing that, managing traffic.  Then that crucial yellow situation where we stayed out because we didn’t think the rears were going to take it.  Jimmy was coming on the radio saying, Do whatever the leaders do.  Too late, passed pit lane.  I guess we’re not coming in (laughter).

In the meantime, I was like, Boy, only did 10 laps, running in clean air, we’re going to be able to go quick.  I was thinking, Not so bad.  Sure enough, another yellow came out.  I’m thinking, Boy, that’s not looking very good.

At that point I just said, All right, I’m going to have fun in the car, enjoy the clean air, run quick, and we’ll see what happens.  And that worked out pretty good.

The next sequence was the crucial one.  When I came out of the pits, boiling, on a mission.  They all had to save fuel.  They had significantly older tires than me.  They didn’t have the pace at that time because they had to drive a pace to save fuel and make it.  There was no more yellow to make their life any easier.  At that point they were trapped in their own strategy.

So I just run like hell and start passing one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight.  Here we go, leading the race again.  I was like, Man, that’s just awesome.

Yeah, after that never looked back, was pretty much in control from there.  Not making mistakes.  We didn’t have time to make an adjustment for the last stop, we were really free at the end.  At that point I was running in front of the pack and I really didn’t need to do anything crazy to make anything happen.

Car was strong and I could just ride it.  It worked out really good.

THE MODERATOR:  Questions for Sebastien.

1. Sebastien, that’s your 34th career victory, seventh on the all-time win list.  Do career accomplishments and your place in American open-wheel racing, is that something that’s meaningful to you or maybe you’ll look more back on when it’s all said and done?

SEBASTIEN BOURDAIS:  I respect the stats because you put yourself on a very special list with very respected and great drivers.  But I don’t live for stats.  I don’t look and contemplate myself.  It’s not me.

I just enjoy the moment, have fun with it.  You know, that group gave me a chance to finally get me back in a car that’s something able to contend for wins.  Not every weekend, but it’s a very competitive field.  When you look who can win every weekend, it’s actually not so easy.

When you see Penske dominating last year, us struggling like hell, like just driving another series compared to these guys, then today, you know, we’re just really starting to make progress on the ovals.

Obviously the big thing is it’s always a two-day event.  Every oval is different.  There is no testing.  So continuity is the key.  That’s where it takes time to get back in the groove.  Even for me, to sharpen your game.  I have not been driving ovals for a while.  Then I came back in ’11.  I still didn’t drive the ovals.  I didn’t drive the ovals in ’12.  Then ’13 was the first time.  Last year the first time with KV.  We kind of set things in motion a little bit, but didn’t get it right most of the time.  Actually, never really on the ovals.

Now it’s starting to come together.  (Indiscernible) is helping us understand a few things.  Olivier is getting more information he needs to kind of chase what I need from the car.  We’re going against guys who have their own shaker rig, their own resources to go to the wind tunnel, do everything.  We’re just going out there with our guts and our feelings and our energy.  It’s a small group, but it’s a heck of a group, and I’m really enjoying my time.

I’m 36 years old, and I don’t feel I’ve been any better than I am right now.  I’m just hoping it lasts as long as I can.

1. Do you kind of feel like you’re getting closer to the Sebastien Bourdais that was so dominant in Champ Car?

SEBASTIEN BOURDAIS:  I mean, you’re only as good as your car is.  You can only dominate as much as the field allows you to.  Certainly I’ve dominated series and seasons when there were five, six cars that could really give me a run for my money.

Now it’s like 15 cars can win every race.  So you really got to step up your game.  It’s a much more danger field, higher-quality field.  It’s a heck of a lot harder to win races, especially when you’re not in the big buck team anymore.

I think we’re doing a great job.  Now to be able to step it up on the ovals and make it kind of complete, because we’ve been strong on street and road courses, really what we need is to step up our game on the ovals, especially the superspeedways, because obviously now it seems like we got a pretty solid baseline for Milwaukee.

We’ll just keep working at it.  But I don’t think I’m any better or worse than I was in my best years at Newman/Haas.  I’m a more experienced driver and a more composed guy.  I think it’s just all about feeling comfortable and not feeling like you got to overachieve whatever you’re trying to do behind the wheel, trying to compensate for a car that’s only good enough for a top 10.  When I came back, I did a lot of that because people just were expecting me to be Sebastien Bourdais from 2004 to 2007.  It was just impossible.  I tried to do the impossible.  I made a lot of unforced errors and looked like an idiot for a long time.

Now I kind of feel like we are running consistently at the front, we got a good thing going on, I don’t need to do anything special to get good results.  I sure have a lot of fun with these guys.

We got great package with Chevy, giving us great engines, aero package.  It’s working.  So we just got to keep on doing what we’re doing and look for more of that.

1. You mentioned you knew you had a good car.  When did you know you had ‘the’ car?

SEBASTIEN BOURDAIS:  Once the race was over (laughter).

I mean, you never know because sometimes on ovals, these races are long enough that you got a bad car, you got a great car, you got a not-so-good car, it goes either way from there.

You have a good car, it’s fun to race.  I knew there was something.  I thought we had something for a top five, like I said.  If we’re starting with top five, we can really have a great race.  But we started 11th.  It’s not the same thing.

So once we got in the groove, I could see the leader, then we were third, anything can happen from there.  The car is either going to fall to pieces or stay together and get a lot stronger.  That’s what happened.

I think for us, the key was we could run the battle and make moves in traffic.  A lot of guys didn’t feel comfortable doing that.  That was really crucial to our capacity of going through the field once we went on that ultimate strategy because they were sitting ducks and having to save fuel and everything.  They were all kind of nose to tail.

At that point they were just spaced enough that I could just pick them up one by one and not be too affected by the turbulence because I was running a different line.  That really worked in our favor.  That’s when this place is magical when you’re behind the wheel.  When the car is responding like it did today, it’s awesome.  But I’ve been there where it’s just going wherever it wants to go and you’re just along for the ride, and that is no fun.

1. Sebastien, as far as remembering old races, what do you remember about your previous win here?  Did today compare in any way?

SEBASTIEN BOURDAIS:  It’s very funny because it didn’t happen the same way, but it’s pretty much the same thing all over again.  In ’06 we started from pole, ran away, got a flat, went a lap down, lapped ourselves, went through the field, almost lapped the field again to go and win the race.

It was obviously quite a bit harder than today, but we had a bit of a rollercoaster ride the same way.  In ’06 the difference is, like I said, there were not as many strong cars, so it was easier to go through the field.  First of all, there were only 18, 19 cars.  Not so many of them are as good as we’ve got them right now.

1. Sebastien, what did you think about the format?  You won at Toronto last year.  It was a weird schedule.

SEBASTIEN BOURDAIS:  I’m just glad I didn’t stall the car in qualifying.  I don’t know the shortcomings, the tiny constraints and everything, but it’s risky.  When you do that, nobody has fast cars.  If anything goes wrong and you stop the car, you’re not making the race.

I think everybody got into qualifying thinking, I want to start at the front, but I want to start, period.  It’s tough enough I think with these two-day events.  Don’t give you a lot of time to turn around and get your stuff figured out.  When it turns into a 24-hour thing, it’s challenging for sure.

I don’t think it’s good or bad.  It doesn’t make it easy for anybody.  It kind of blocks yourself in if weather comes, too.  I guess we’ll see.  I won here in ’06.  They told me there were a thousand people in the stands.  It’s good to see this place kind of getting a rebirth, a lot of enthusiasm in the paddock, a lot of people in the stands.  I think Andretti Promotions doing a great job.  I hope it keeps going.  It’s the roots of IndyCar.  It’s that special oval that nobody likes in the racing business except IndyCar because it fits our racing style.  It’s something different.

We don’t need the banking to make exciting racing.  I think we proved that today, unlike other series, so that’s quite cool.

1. (No microphone.)

SEBASTIEN BOURDAIS:  Let’s look at the upside.  It was a good crowd today.  I know everybody’s trying to make it work.  There’s a lot of money and energy put together to keep that event.  There’s a lot of energy put together to come twice in Wisconsin, to Road America, where we should have never left.  Obviously the difference between the sporting side and the financial side is always very challenging.  I understand everything.  But you got to be true to your fans and to your sport.  It’s our roots.  It’s very deeply anchored in IndyCar.  I know the organization will try as hard as they can to keep it on the schedule.

Hopefully it all works out and we come back to race.

1. Today you weren’t sure how the setup would be in the race.  How pleasantly surprised were you?  A few hours earlier you didn’t know what to expect about your race setup.

SEBASTIEN BOURDAIS:  I was pretty comfortable.  The race setup was good, the setup in general was good.  It was just when we went out in qualifying, hit the ground so hard, didn’t know what the balance was like because the wheels were not touching the ground.  I was bummed.  I was like, Man, we just had an easy top-five start and we just made a mess of it.  We didn’t even touch the car.

So I don’t know what happened, but we’ll definitely look at it and try not to repeat it because that was not a nice feeling.

I wasn’t too worried about our performance in the race, I was just afraid it was going to be a big burden for a better result because maybe we were able to get close to the top five with that starting position.  For a long time it looked like the dynamic of the race was going to be very hard to pass.  Why I know if we were going to be good enough to make moves.  It just so happened that we did.  It was a different game from there.

There was no guarantee we were going to be able to do what we did, you know.  But I wasn’t worried about the setup or the quality of the car.  I was just worried about anybody could make big moves like that.

THE MODERATOR:  Congratulations.  See you in Iowa.

SEBASTIEN BOURDAIS:  Thank you.

——–

TEAM CHEVY DRIVER POST RACE QUOTES
JULY 12, 2015

SEBASTIEN BOURDAIS, NO. 11 TEAM HYDROXY – KVSH RACING CHEVROLET, RACE WINNER: HAVE YOU EVER HAD SUCH A DOMINATING WIN?“Yeah, here! Nine years ago. It was just like that, today. It’s just unbelievable. We were talking about it yesterday, at these places. Sometimes you’ve got it; and when it’s right, boy, it’s really, really good.”

YOU SAID WHEN YOU CAME BACK TO THE INDYCAR SERIES; YOU WERE OVERCOMPENSATING FOR YOUR DRIVING, AND THAT YOU WERE TRYING TO DO BETTER THAN THE CAR. DID YOU HAVE A FIRST-PLACE CAR TODAY?
“I think that’s pretty clear (laughs).”

YOU ALSO SAID YOU LIKE BEING THE UNDERDOG IN TAKING IT TO THE BIGGER TEAMS. HOW GOOD DOES IT FEEL? “Oh, it’s pretty sweet. Like we say all the time, when we get the job done and beat all these guys with what we’ve got, a great group of guys with great sponsors, you’ve got to feel good about it. And, today, we just executed and overcame what looked like a messed up break for us, and we just made it work on the track.”

JIMMY VASSER, TEAM OWNER – NO. 11: YOUR DRIVER SEBASTIAN BOURDAIS BROUGHT YOUR CHEVROLET HOME FOR THE SECOND VICTORY OF 2015, HOW GOOD DOES IT FEEL?“It’s just awesome, especially here at Milwaukee because it’s such a historic place. It was one of my favorite tracks when I was racing here. In the fashion he did it….we put ourselves on a different strategy to be able to let him go when he could and then in the box saving fuel. He lapped the field. It was awesome.”

KEVIN KALKOVEN, TEAM OWNER – NO. 11: ON BOURDAIS VICTORY:
“It’s just amazing how he drove through it. When he came out with his new tires he came out in about eighth place and he was in first place in I think eight laps. It was just an amazing piece of driving.”

HELIO CASTRONEVES, NO. 3 HITACHI TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET, FINISHED 2ND:: ARE YOU HAPPY ABOUT A SECOND PLACE FINISH AFTER STARTING AT THE BACK“Yeah, it certainly was a tough one and was very difficult to pass. I was trying, I was forcing, I was pushing and doing anything I could. I didn’t mind running that close to a guy with experience, it was no problem, but I was moving. Will (teammate, Power) was the hardest one (to pass) to be honest. He gave me a hard time. But at the end of the day it was a great race and my No. 3 Chevrolet was great, but the 11 car seemed to be really fast. I heard that he lapped everyone in the field, but at one point I said, ‘man, those guys in front of me don’t have the tires and I have got to push,’ and I pushed as hard as I could. Disappointing but at the end of the day we got a few points toward the championship and we should probably move up a little bit.”

JUAN PABLO MONTOYA, NO. 2 VERIZON TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET, FINISHED 4TH: “It was completely my mistake on the pit road speeding penalty. I had my finger on the (pit road speed) button but it’s really bumpy getting onto pit road so I don’t if I didn’t hit it, or if I hit it twice. That put us behind a bit. With about 120 laps to go I told the guys that I think we can make it on one more stop and we did it! It’s great. Our Verizon Chevy was really good today. We grew our points lead with only four races to go. The crowd was fantastic. We always want to see the stands full when we race. It was a solid crowd today and that made it more fun behind the wheel.”

YOU DID EXTEND YOUR POINTS LEAD BUT DID YOU HAVE A CHANCE TO WIN THIS RACE WITHOUT THE PIT ROAD SPEEDING PENALTY? “Early on we had it and could keep up with Bourdais pretty easy. Then at the end we made some changes and the car wasn’t as good, but everybody at Team Penske did an amazing job and the Verizon Chevy was good again. I don’t know what happened with the pit violation. I got there and pressed the button and it just didn’t click. When I got back on the gas it just jumped and I was like, ‘oh no’ on the radio. Everybody asked what and I said you are going to hear in a second.”

JOSEF NEWGARDEN, NO. 67 HARTMAN OIL CFH RACING CHEVROLET, FINISHED 5TH: “We just had to do too much work later in the week to try and get by people. I could only get so many spots, but our car was fast. It’s been fast all weekend, the Direct Supply guys really put an amazing car together for us. It’s just that I needed clean air, probably more so than other guys. To get that was difficult. When we had it in the beginning, I think we were the fastest car in the field for sure. It was all about track position today, we lost out on that a little bit but it was still a great effort and a great weekend for CFH Racing.

“In clean air it was incredible for sure and was a fast race car. It has been fast all weekend and I think people knew this and knew we were quick. It’s just that when we got in dirty air we just couldn’t make as much happen as others. I don’t think anyone was good in dirty air today though. The Ganassi guys were probably slightly stronger, but even there at the end the same thing that happened to Scott (Dixon) happened to me. I got loose behind (Juan Pablo) Montoya and lost it and he got me and then the same thing happened to Dixon. So no one was good in dirty air and it was all about track position. Today it didn’t really fall in our favor with the way that the track position played out. We got behind Dixon and then we probably pitted at the wrong point, but you can never really predict that stuff and you just try and make the best call. I think the team did a great job in trying to call it right and sometimes it works your way and sometimes it doesn’t.”

TONY KANAAN, NO. 10 NTT DATA CHIP GANASSI RACING CHEVROLET, FINISHED 6TH: “I love racing here at the Milwaukee Mile and today’s race was a fun one to be a part of. The No. 10 NTT DATA Chevrolet was fast and we proved that by running up near the front all day. I think we had a chance to finish higher than sixth, but it just didn’t happen for us. A sixth-place finish is okay, but I obviously would’ve been much happier with a win. It is what it is and now we’ll shift our focus to Iowa.”

WHERE THE YELLOW WORKED WELL FOR SOME, IT COULD HAVE BEEN BETTER FOR YOU “Yeah, but this is racing. You can’t say if-if-if. This is racing. It was a good race. I think this one-day event really worked. There are a lot of people here, so hopefully, we’ll be back again next year. But it was a good race.”

WHAT WAS THE RACING LIKE? IT IS A DRIVER’S TRACK. HOW DIFFICULT IS THIS PLACE? “Oh, especially the first two stints, when the track was a little green and the sun was still out, it was extremely difficult. Nobody could really pass anybody. Even when we caught traffic, we had to drive it. I love this place. I’ve always enjoyed racing here. I had a lot of fun. Obviously, finishing top 6; it’s okay. I would rather have finished a little bit better. But, it is what it is.”

SCOTT DIXON, NO. 9 COTTONELLE CHIP GANASSI RACING CHEVROLET, FINISHED 7TH: “We had a tough day with the Cottonelle car. We went off sequence and led for a while and the race kind of came to us later on with the way the yellows fell. In the end we shuffled back a bit and lost some valuable points which is tough to swallow with just four races to go. We’ll keep fighting though and be ready to make up ground in Iowa next weekend.”

SIMON PAGENAUD, NO. 22 PENSKE TRUCK RENTAL TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET, FINISHED 9TH: “It was a good run. We started 17th. We missed the balance a little bit in qualifying. Milwaukee isn’t an easy place to pass. I’m pretty happy. Once again, it was a really good performance but again, the results don’t exactly show the performance. I’m fairly happy. I think we made a good improvement on the setup for the car and the way I want it. Now, we are working for next year really and we are starting to scratch the surface. We don’t get any testing so it is good we do it during the race. It just takes time to get a team to fully come together. I’m being patient here and we are getting there. The guys were amazing during pit stops today. It is just details to work on. Most of these guys have been with the team for a long time, so I’m pretty happy where we are at. We just need this year to learn and we will come back stronger next year. Congrats to Chevy for winning with my fellow Frenchman Seb (Bourdais). Very happy for him. He is having an incredible season.”

ED CARPENTER, NO. 20 FUZZY’S VODKA CFH RACING CHEVROLET, FINISHED 10TH: “Our finish was a good recovery from where we started. It was a long, tough day. We had a decent shot with the way the pit stops cycled through. We were running third on the last restart, but we were the last car in line on old tires. It was really tough in dirty air in today, we needed to be better in those conditions but I think even the best cars struggled in traffic on old tires. At the end of the day, from what happened in qualifying to get a Top 10 and finally finish a race, I’ll take it as a positive. To have one top five and one top ten today, with Josef’s first pole, all in all it was a good weekend for the entire team.”

CHARLIE KIMBALL, NO. 83 NOVOLOG FLEXPEN CHIP GANASSI RACING CHEVROLET, FINISHED 12TH: “It was a tough race today at the Milwaukee Mile. I was happy with the No. 83 NovoLog FlexPen for most of the race today – we just couldn’t ever get up front. We started the race off really challenging with the handling and it just got better and better throughout the afternoon. I’m happy for my teammates with two of them finishing in the top 10. We’ll just shift our focus to Iowa and make sure we’re ready to go next weekend.”

SAGE KARAM, NO. 8 COMFORT REVOLUTION/BIG MACHINE RECORDS CHIP GANASSI RACING CHEVROLET, FINISHED 19TH : “The marbles are just so bad here. I was trying to make it one more stop to get the fuel mileage the team was asking me to get. We were getting the mileage, but they said don’t lose any positions while doing it too. So I was just racing really hard there with Chaves. And I guess it was just a racing thing. I’m trying to hold my line. He’s trying to hold his. I got on the right side of the marbles and once that happened the car just wouldn’t turn and we had contact with the wall.”

STEFANO COLETTI, NO. 4 KVRACING TECHNOLOTY CHEVROLET, FINISHED 20TH:

WILL POWER, NO. 1 VERIZON TEAM PENSKE CHEVROLET, FINISHED 22nd: WHAT HAPPENED? “I saw Ryan start to spin there so I went out wide to try and miss him, and he clipped me and I went up into the wall.” ON CHAMPIONSHIP: “There is no question it is going to make it tough, but we will keep focused and go on to the next one.”

WILL, IT LOOKED LIKE YOU ALMOST GOT AROUND THE OUTSIDE: “Yeah, I saw him start to spin and I thought that if I gassed it a bit I could get by, but unfortunately I didn’t and he clipped me and ended our day.”

WHAT HAS BEEN THE MINDSET WHEN THIS SEEMS TO BE THE YEAR WHERE THESE KINDS OF THINGS KEEP HAPPENING? “Yeah, you kind of get frustrated but you just have to keep moving on. Eventually it will change and we will have one go right for us. Just got to keep focused and move on to the next one.”

YOU WERE VERY VOCAL ABOUT THE RACING STYLE IN FONTANA, WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT THE RACING STYLE HERE? “Yeah it was actually very hard to pass here. There is the accident (watches accident on monitor)…okay. I did go in head first. I thought I went in backwards. Yeah, it was just difficult to pass and obviously there is a lot more downforce this year. When you get close to pass you lose a lot of it and we were right in the thick of it.”