Race 10 of 36 is now in the record books, and I have to say that I am real proud of the entire AT&T Racing team for all their efforts in helping us post an 11th-place finish.

After qualifying 33rd for yesterday's 400-lap race, I knew I would have a lot of work cut out for me. Passing cars at Richmond isn't an easy task. You have to enter the corners deep and keep your car on the bottom while exiting the turns. But I was confident my crew chief Scott Miller had our AT&T Chevy dialed in.

For the majority of the race, we were lacking rear grip, which caused us to have a loose-handling car. Miller made adjustment after adjustment during our pit stops and, at one point, our car was as best as it was all night. I made some gains and by the halfway mark, I was in the top-15.

On Lap 229, a lot of cars were involved in a [big] pileup, and unfortunately, we were caught up in it. During the red flag NASCAR displayed to clean the track for debris, Miller and the rest of the AT&T crew guys strategized on what we needed to do to repair the car without losing any laps to the leaders. Once the caution flag was displayed, we immediately came down pit road for fresh tires and the team pulled the fenders away from the tires to make sure there wouldn't be any tire rubs when the race returned to green.

We maintained a steady pace in running in the top-15 all night, and after the green-white-checkered finish, we ended up 11th. Although we always strive for a better finish and fell to second in the point standings, it was a good points day and we are only 18 points out of the lead.

My teammate Clint Bowyer captured his second career win and first of the season. I'm so happy and excited for the No.07 Chevrolet team. They truly deserved that victory.