Racing Newsmaker: Carl Edwards

Carl Edwards won his third race of the season last Sunday to tie Tony Stewart's rookie record. More important, it inched him closer to Stewart in the Chase for the Championship standings.

• Photos

With three races to go, Edwards is fourth in the rankings, 107 points behind. Stewart leads Jimmie Johnson by 43 points.

Edwards talked about his season -- and what's ahead -- during his post-race interview at the Atlanta Motor Speedway. Here are excerpts of that interview.

Question: Is there enough time for you or anyone else to make a run at Tony Stewart?

Edwards: Absolutely we're making a run. That's what we're here doing today -- just doing our very best. We had some bad runs. We ran poorly at New Hampshire and Martinsville, and I'm just not as good as I need to be at those tracks yet, so what we're going to do is take advantage of these tracks that we are good at, and we have great cars for, and we're going to do our best to make a run. If we can pick up 35 points for the next three races I think we'll still lose by two points, but something like that -- 36 points we'll win it by a point. Anyway, that's what we're going to try to do. We're going to go out here and make a run for the championship. I did not expect to be able to pick up this many points today and anything can happen in racing, so we're not going to quit until the last lap of the last race.

Question: You suggested you might dye your hair red if you won the race. Will you?

Edwards: I did say that I would dye my hair green if we won at Charlotte and I have not said anything after that, so I am keeping my hair the same as it is right now. I don't know. If you guys think it would look good red, but I don't know about red. I don't plan on it.

Question: What's your confidence level with three races to go?

Edwards: I feel very good about these last three races. I think we've only raced one race at Texas -- one Cup race. I damaged the car just a little bit. Earlier this season I think we would have had a good race at Texas and I got into a little bit of a hurry and damaged the front of the car and we ended up not running very well. Texas is kind of an unknown. I love Homestead. We ran great at Phoenix this year. We finished seventh and we had an awesome car, so I feel great about our chances coming up to these next few races. But anything can happen. We could run great or we could run awful, but we're going to try our very best. There's still an opportunity to win a championship.

Question: There has been a lot of discussion lately about teammates allowing each other to lead a lap to gain five bonus points. Did you do that at Atlanta with Matt Kenseth?

Edwards: I didn't allow him to pass me. I think he thought I did, which is awesome, but Matt got by me and I saw his finger sticking out. I was like, "Why is he giving me the finger?" I kind of moved over a little bit and I could see his knuckles and he was giving me the pointer finger like, "OK, just give me a minute." I was thinking, "OK, now I see what's going on. He wants to lead a lap." And then he was very gracious and I got up beside him and he didn't fight me too hard. I think we had a better car than Matt after about five or six laps, but he was real fast on the get-go, so he could have held us up and made it harder, but that was very nice of him and I was glad to let him lead a lap. But he thinks I let him lead a lap and that's what's really important. Anyway, Mark Martin and I talked about it earlier before the race. I mean, my teammates have done so much for me that I really think trying to help them in a position when I can help them is the right thing to do.

Question: You said you don't feel pressure from the Chase for the Championship. When will you?

Edwards: I don't feel any pressure. To be honest with you, everything in my life for the last three years has been icing on the cake and that's the truth. I put a lot of pressure on myself. I really do. I'm borderline neurotic sometimes about certain things, but I do not feel pressure from other people -- from anything outside. There just isn't any pressure. I do this because I really love racing and I want to win this championship. I think, if anything, I might be having just a little bit too much fun. Jack agrees with that, but, no, I don't feel any pressure. We're having a good time. Nobody expects us to be here. Nobody expects us to win the championship. We're going to go give it our best and see what happens.