he felt Red Bull Racing Team had "the best car" for the race. Stewart's crew chief Greg Zipadelli was disappointed his driver could not take the victory: "If we hadn't had an opportunity to win, I'd say that finishing sixth and leading laps would be awesome, But sitting where we are right now, it seems that everything is stacked against us. We were probably a second- or third-place car at worst, so it's disappointing." Eighth-place finisher Earnhardt said he thought he secured a second-place finish and was unaware the leaders had made pit stops. Nevertheless, he said was happy with the way his team ran the race. After retiring from the race on lap 221, Elliott blamed himself for the collision with Ragan, saying he waited too long to react and was heavily committed to driving down the racetrack. He was also unable to remove his foot from his brake pedal. Ragan said he felt he should have passed Roush Fenway Racing teammate Edwards, who spun up the racetrack. Edwards also said he was trying to avoid wrecking himself. According to Montoya, who was involved in the multi-car collision on the 53rd lap: "I saw a car flying, and as soon as I saw the car flying I checked up. We actually slowed down the car and everything. The ten car or somebody came right in behind us and just pushed us through the whole mess." Jeff Gordon said he was "fine" after the accident and that it "looked a lot worse than it really was... Unfortunate because, man, what an awesome race car we had. I was so proud of Steve Letarte and the guys. When we bring race cars like that to the track, it just makes me have a whole lot of fun. I was having a blast out there and I hate we are out of it. But I am ok." Allmendinger claimed responsibility for causing the crash and asked his spotter to apologize to Johnson's spotter, who relayed the message to Johnson via radio. The result maintained Jeff Gordon's lead in the Drivers' Championship with 1,921 points, ahead of teammate Johnson with 1,789. Kenseth remained in third with his points advantage over Hamlin reduced to thirty-two. Burton remained in fifth place and Stewart kept sixth. Harvick moved to seventh while Edwards gained two positions to eighth. Kurt Busch's non-finish dropped him to ninth and Bowyer