After starting on the pole, Brian Vickers was unable to hold the lead and managed to finish in seventh place.

At this time last year the No. 83 Red Bull Racing team would have been thrilled with the outcome but this is a new organization, Vickers was not in the least bit happy with his performance on Sunday afternoon.

“Obviously, last year we would have been ecstatic to have this finish,” Vickers said. “Now, we are disappointed – or at least I am.  It’s a double-edged sword – we’re happy about having a good points day and a solid run in the top five all day, but we’re disappointed we didn’t have a shot at the win at the end.”

Capturing his organization’s first pole effort, Vickers can’t deny that his car was fit to win. Vickers noted that the track continually became looser and looser as the race proceeded.

“We felt like we had a car capable of winning,” Vickers said. “We chased the track a little bit. I think everybody did. We didn’t chase it quite fast enough. The track continued to get looser and looser and we didn’t keep up with it quite as fast as we needed to.

“The last two stops we decided to go with two tires and go for it. We over-adjusted for the two tires and it was just too tight at the end to really do anything.”

The finish, although not pleasing to the driver, bumped him up two spots in the point standings to 15th. Now the chance to grab a seat in the Chase is more attainable, with Vickers only 166 points away from the 12th spot occupied by Denny Hamlin.

“It was a good points day,” Vickers said. “That’s one thing that we can walk away being happy about.  It’s frustrating – you want to win one of these races so bad and you think you have an opportunity to, and you don’t capitalize on it. I’m really proud of the Red Bull Toyota team. We did a good job all day. It was a great points day. We just have to go get them next week.”