COLE CUSTER, No. 00 Haas Automation Ford Mustang — Finished 1st — VICTORY LANE INTERVIEW
“At these low grip race tracks it is a little bit of everything and that is a testament to our whole team and everyone at the shop that set up the car. When you go to these low grip race tracks and can be good through a whole run it isn’t easy to do. I want to thank everyone at Haas Automation and Stewart-Haas Racing because we are going to be taking it to ‘em in the summertime.”
WHAT DOES THIS WIN SAY ABOUT YOU FOR THE REST OF THE YEAR? “We can run good anywhere. Short tracks are something we want to get better at but we are knocking on the door there. I think we are the ones to look out for right now. I think we have done it quietly so far, but we are going to do it.”
GENE HAAS SAID YOU NEEDED TO WIN CONSISTENTLY HERE AT THE XFINITY LEVEL. WHAT DOES THIS SAY ABOUT WHERE YOU THINK YOU HAVE MATURED AND WHERE YOU ARE RELATIVE TO YOUR CAREER RIGHT NOW? “I think it is just a matter of getting everything a little better. There are still things I can get better at. It is just a matter of trying to perfect things a little bit. I tried to get better at the high line today. I am just trying to get better every time I go out there.”
JOEY LOGANO, No. 12 Snap On Ford Mustang — Finished 2nd
“We just weren’t quite good enough. Cole and that whole Stewart-Haas team just beat us. They were faster in every department. We just weren’t quite good enough overall. After practice I was able to look at Cole’s times and it was obvious that he was the fastest car. You just had to hope that we made some good adjustments to keep up. We did. We got closer but Cole did a great job running up near the wall like he did. That was impressive. He is a good up and coming talent and he proved that to me today at least. When you are following him you can see that stuff. We were just too far off in practice when we unloaded and we had to swing at this thing with big changes. It is hard with only a couple of 50-minute practices to get where you need to when other teams are fine tuning. We need to get a little closer to fire off in practice and maybe we could have tuned the car to get all the potential out of it. Overall, I am proud of this race team. We had good pit stops and all that which is good for tomorrow. We will try to win one tomorrow. It is really cool to get a Ford in victory lane today, we hope to do the same thing tomorrow.”
AUSTIN CINDRIC, No. 22 Discount Tire Ford Mustang — Finished 6th
“I came on the radio at one point after we had the window come out under green and got a lucky caution, I said, ‘Guys, adversity is the spice of life and it is about to get spicy.’ We were up to the top-10 again about three laps after the restart. We got the car right, made the right adjustments. A couple guys were pretty clever with strategy there at the end. We probably should have been fourth or fifth on the day but I am happy with it. It is probably one of the best executed races we have had in the last month.”
Ford Performance Notes and Quotes
NASCAR Xfinity Series (NXS)
Saturday, June 29, 2019
Page 9
Camping World 300 Post Race Winning Team Press Conference
COLE CUSTER, No. 00 Haas Automation Ford Mustang — DID YOU THINK COMING INTO THE SEASON THAT HALFWAY THROUGH THE SEASON YOU WOULD HAVE THIS MANY WINS? “I knew we were going to be good, it was just a matter of how long it was going to take us to get there. We both have won a lot of races before and it was just a matter of how long it was going to take for us to learn each other and the cars and I think it started at Fontana. It really started off good. I think we will just get better and better throughout the year.”
MIKE SHIPLETT, crew chief, No. 00 Haas Automation Ford Mustang — TALK ABOUT THIS WIN HERE TODAY FROM YOUR POSITION: “The philosophy is to just make the next car better than the last car that we had. Every week we try to make the car a little better than we had the week before. Everybody believes in that and works and strives to try to make the car better. We will have the best car that we have ever had when we get to Homestead.”
COLE CUSTER CONTINUED — DID YOU HAVE ANY ADJUSTMENTS YOU WANTED MADE ALONG THE WAY TODAY? “Our car was pretty good all day. The problem is it is never going to be absolutely perfect here. The track is so slick and everything. You have to have it the way you want and manageable. It changed a lot through a run and I really worked the brake bias a lot today trying to help the handling a little bit and that helped us a lot. We had a great car. I don’t think anybody had anything for us. We made little to no adjustments all day.”
MIKE SHIPLETT CONTINUED — “We just tweaked on it every stop to make it just a little bit better knowing what Cole was going to face and what the track was going to do. This race has been at the same time of day for the last two or three years so the track goes through a certain transition and we kind of knew that and we just kept up with the race track all day long.”
COLE CUSTER CONTINUED — “The last two years we competed with Mike’s car here at Chicago the last two years with Larson driving it. They always got me, so it was nice to drive his car this year.”
HOW MUCH CONFIDENCE DOES THIS GIVE YOU FOR HOMESTEAD? “I think the low grip tracks have always been good for our team. I think now we are the most well rounded team that we have ever been. When we go to short tracks and mile-and-a-halfs and superspeedways and everything we go to. It is just a matter of getting everything a little better and I think we are. It is just about doing your homework every weekend I guess.”
MIKE SHIPLETT CONTINUED — CAN YOU REALLY APPLY THIS TO HOMESTEAD WITH THE WEATHER AND THINGS THAT WILL BE DIFFERENT WHEN WE GET THERE IN NOVEMBER? “Really you have Homestead and Darlington, those are the two tracks that you run up against the wall. I wouldn’t say that the track prepares you for Darlington but what it does is it prepares you for running up against the wall. You get two opportunities, here and Darlington to do that before Homestead.”
COLE CUSTER CONTINUED –JOEY LOGANO HAD HIGH PRAISE FOR YOU AFTER THE RACE: “That is huge. Joey is a series champion and it was fun racing with him today. I think we had the better car and that was a huge part of it. I think it is fun racing against those Cup guys. They set the bar high. It is good now how they have it. I think we put on better racing when we are by ourselves but you still get that benchmark for when the Cup guys come down to know where you are really at.”
Ford Performance Notes and Quotes
NASCAR Xfinity Series (NXS)
Saturday, June 29, 2019
Page 10
Camping World 300 Post Race Winning Team Press Conference Continued …
WHAT WAS YOUR MINDSET WHEN THOSE GUYS STAYED OUT AND THEN GOT THAT CAUTION AND HOW THAT UNFOLDED? “We were so fast that I wasn’t really that worried about it. It was just a matter of I knew we were going to probably get by them because we were faster compared to them all day. It was a matter of not wanting the 12 to get the lead before me because then I would have been in his dirty air. I wanted to get the lead as fast as I could so that I could have clean air.”
MIKE SHIPLETT CONTINUED — WILL THIS CAR BE YOUR CAR AT HOMESTEAD? “It is way to early to decide what car is going to Homestead. The next car we build we try to make better. This car, usually we have about a five-week rotation. This car will probably go somewhere around Darlington. That will be the next time you see this car. Cars are cars, we just make the next one better than the last one.”
COLE CUSTER CONTINUED — HOW DID YOU HANDLE THE HEAT TODAY? “I don’t know if I did a better job cooling myself down or what but it wasn’t really that bad for me. It was hot out there but last year I was dying. This year it wasn’t too bad except for when I stopped and all the smoke came in, that wasn’t the best. It could have been worse I think. I don’t know what everybody else thought.”
TALK US THROUGH THAT FINAL RESTART AND WHAT YOU WERE ABLE TO DO AND WHAT YOU WERE TRYING TO DO: “I think the final one was with the 9 and 1 in front of us. I just wanted to get by those guys as fast as I could. I think we definitely had a better car than them, it was just a matter of whether me or the 12 got the lead first and I wanted the lead because I wanted the clean air.”
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