Brian Vickers, who made it clear in an article on USAToday.com that he believes he did nothing wrong on Saturday, reiterated his view again Friday after qualifying.
Q: "How do you and your team move forward after this week?
Vickers: "I think it's really up to -- my perspective of the whole situation is I think that the team is going to move forward just fine. I think how things have been handled are wrong. We acted in accordance to the rules. We played by the same standards that everyone else has played by since the day I entered the sport. We did nothing different than what I've done with other teams or what I've been asked to do with other teams in my past, or when I started my career with Hendrick. I feel fine. I think it's a shame how MWR has been made out to be the 'bad guy' in the situation. And then the other teams involved got away 'scott free.' I hate it for the employees. I hate it for everyone at MWR. There's a lot of great people at this company and I said that in my article -- the column that I wrote (for USA Today). I stand by these guys. They're a great group of guys. If someone doesn't like the results -- that's fine. They're entitled to their opinion. But, we don't race opinion -- we race the rule book. And to my knowledge, there's no rule in the rule book that said we couldn't pit for the reason we're choosing. We don't race public opinion. If public opinion wants the rules changed -- then they should change the rules and we'll race by those rules. Until then, I'll say it again and I said it in the column, I'm proud to be a part of this team. I'm proud of how hard they work. I'm proud of their efforts and the way they work and I stand by that. I'm proud of our partners for sticking with us and I just really hate it for this team. Unfortunately, they got the raw end of the stick and it seems like no one else did."
You can read Vickers' USA Today article here.
