"I knew Joey was going to come with a run. I knew somebody was going to come with a run, I figured it would be Joey. He's really good at that stuff. I saw him back up a couple times just to kind of see and gauge what he had, where his run was going to
come.
"I knew he would come with a run probably at one to go. It's too risky to do it much earlier than that. I just knew I wanted to try to move around before he started his run to try and mess up his run or get him off on thinking which way he was going to
go.
"I was able to do that to where I could at least get him going in a direction that I knew he was going to go opposite of me rather than me guessing where he was going to go.
"I felt like I did everything I could. I knew I wasn't going to be able to stop his run. I wasn't going to be able to just blatantly block him. That would probably cause a wreck. Our race car was way too fast. I wasn't going to concede the win, but I certainly
wasn't going to get my really fast Smithfield Ford Mustang tore up trying to be overly defensive." - Aric Almirola, Duel No. 1 winner
"I never felt so small in my life (laughter). I felt like I did all the hard things right, all the things I didn't know how to do.
"I just launched a little too early leaving the pit road. From there tried to merge into the pack knowing the 37 was my only chance. Not my only chance but my best chance of getting in. My only other chance of getting in was the 36 beating everybody else in the
second Duel.
"Once I got lined up behind the 37, whether he knew it or not I was going to push him as hard as I could. Locked on down the back straightaway. Got him on the line by a couple hundredths. Some days it's your day, I guess." - Austin Cindric, finished 16th in
Duel No. 1, qualified on speed for Daytona 500
"It's a reaction. It was like a flick of the wheel. I knew his momentum when he was going up the track, he wasn't going to be able to switch lanes with me to block it. So I waited till as long as I possibly could. A couple years back Matt Kenseth made I think a
move trying to block that way, too. It's just not good when the guy behind you has a head of steam.
"I knew if I cut across fast enough, it was going to kill a lot of his momentum. He came back left faster than I thought he could. It almost gives you a boost.
"I haven't seen the replay. I can't wait to look at it. I think it's probably going to look pretty cool. Yeah, that's just feeling the car tonight. I felt really good in it, trusted it, my spotter and I were kind of one most of the night. We felt like the moves
we were making, when he said something, that's where I wanted to go. It worked out." - Austin Dillon, winner of Duel No. 2
"I tried to keep my emotions as checked as possible. I like to think of myself as a pretty calm driver. I'll tell you, that was the most stressed I've ever been in a race.
"I think as a driver, naturally you're most calm when you feel like you have something in your control. Superspeedways are already stretching that as far as what all is in your control. Then when we're a lap down and we've got damage from an incident that
started behind us, then you're really out of control and you're hoping for something to work out in your favor.
"I knew who we were racing against. I knew what happened was possible, so I tried to keep everybody boosted up in high spirits to know we weren't out of it yet, and evidently that was in fact the case.
"Really proud of everybody at Kaulig Racing. They brought an excellent car that has gotten a little bit beat up tonight. I'm sure we'll be able to get it fixed or pull out an equally good car for Sunday.
"Yeah, the Chevy was good. Did everything I asked it to do early in the race before the incident. I'm really optimistic about our chances for Sunday." - Kaz Grala, finished 14th in Duel No. 2, qualified for Daytona 500 on
speed
Phil Allaway is the Frontstretch newsletter manager. He can be reached at phil.allaway@frontstretch.com. The above photo is courtesy of Nigel Kinrade Photography.
