McMurray encouraged, but 500 may be another matter

Saturday, Feb. 06, 2010

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – There were several leaders in Saturday night’s Budweiser Shootout but only a handful of cars appeared to be able to stay out front for any length of time.

Jamie McMurray was certainly glad to be among the fastest and hopes his third-place finish bodes well for next Sunday’s Daytona 500 at Daytona International Speedway.

McMurray is coming off a tough season at Roush Fenway Racing, finishing 22nd in points, and moved to Earnhardt Ganassi Racing’s No. 1 Chevrolet in the off-season.

“It’s a wonderful way to start my relationship back with (team owner) Chip Ganassi. You never know when you start out if you’re going to like the set-ups they give you or the cars. You’re going to have to work on all that,” McMurray said.

“We pretty much went with the setup built at the shop and didn’t change anything the whole night long.”

While Carl Edwards dominated the entire first 25-lap segment and Kevin Harvick won the race with the help of a late caution, McMurray remained in the hunt and running up front in both segments.

“I thought (Carl) had one of the best cars because we ran the first 25 laps and nobody could really clear him, he could work both lanes,” McMurray said.

“It looked to me like whether it was (Tony) Stewart or Harvick or me or Kasey (Kahne), when we got to the lead, we could only hold it a lap. Carl was able to hold on to it quite a while.”

All but two drivers elected to pit under a caution with four laps remaining and McMurray was the first off pit road and lined up third on the final restart. Greg Biffle and Kahne stayed out but Biffle was passed by Harvick on the restart and ended up getting hit by Jeff Gordon.

“They did a really good job of making the car drive great and that’s what Daytona is all about,” McMurray said. “I could run pretty-much run flat-out all night.”

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