CHASE BRISCOE, No. 98 — HighPoint.com Ford Mustang — YOU GET TO RUN FOR $100,000 NEXT WEEK AT ATLANTA. “I’m super-excited to go run for an extra 100-grand. Thanks to XFINITY. We were just a fifth to sixth-place car it seemed like most of the night and just was really tight. There at the end restarts kind of went our way and we were able to salvage a second, so I’m really happy for our HighPoint.com Ford guys and just really excited to get to Atlanta. That’s one of my favorite race tracks and race for an extra 100-grand, so you can’t beat it. I’m looking forward to it.”
TAKE US THROUGH THE END OF THE RACE. “Those last couple of restarts were pretty hairy and with Allgaier getting wrecked, that definitely helped. He was definitely the class of the field all night long, and then that last restart I was honestly surprised the Noah gave me the bottom. I feel like the bottom was a little bit better and if I could have just cleared him down in three and four, but that top line was so good for the first lap that he was able to clear me off of four. But, overall, I don’t think we were a second-place race car tonight with our HighPoint.com Ford, but to be able to finish second and go run for an extra 100-grand that’s what it’s all about, so that’s what we’ll try to go do next week.”
CHASE BRISCOE POST-RACE PRESS CONFERENCE
CAN YOU WALK US THROUGH YOUR NIGHT? “It was a weird night for us, at least speedwise. The beginning of the race I felt really good that first run and then I don’t know if the track changed or what, but we just weren’t as good as I felt we needed to be. We really struggled with the center-off turn and we’d get track position and then we’d have a bad restart and lose it. At the end we were fortunate to start on the inside a couple of those runs and was able to salvage a second. I felt like we were probably a fifth to sixth-place race car, but to be able to come home second and, most importantly, go run for an extra $100,000 next week is a huge deal, so I feel like Atlanta we’re gonna be really good. Finishing in the top four was a huge deal tonight if we couldn’t win.”
IS THAT $100,000 IMPORTANT FOR YOUR TEAM NEEDING THE FUNDING? “Yeah, I mean anytime you can add the possibility of $400,000 to your program, I mean, that’s night and day difference just in the amount to go racing. Obviously, that’s like bringing a whole new primary sponsor on board, so everybody right now is struggling financially as race teams, so I’m thankful XFINITY allows us to run for an extra $100,000 four weeks in a row and with the exception of Talladega I feel like, well, we don’t know where the fourth one is, but between Atlanta and Homestead I feel like those are two of our better race tracks as a team and me as a driver, so that opportunity is a huge deal for us and, like I said, anytime you can run for an extra $100,000 or an extra $10,000 or whatever, it’s just an added incentive. I’m looking forward to doing that at Atlanta and hopefully getting the win.”
WHEN THE 9 CAR USED UP THE 7 LIKE THAT DOES THAT OPEN THE DOOR FOR YOU TO DO SOMETHING SIMILAR? “I feel like I’ve always raced pretty clean in general. I’m not gonna go in there and wreck a guy for the win, but Noah is gonna do what he’s gotta do and you know that when you’re racing Noah. I saw what he did to the 7. Obviously, that didn’t affect me so I wasn’t gonna run him any different, but, for example, if I would have been on the outside and he would have been on the inside and he would have went in there and cleaned me out, then obviously that would have been payback coming back. But Noah hadn’t done anything to me, so as bad as we want to win the race I’m not gonna absolutely destroy a guy to do that. In my opinion, that’s not real racing, so I definitely saw what Noah did. I’m sure Justin, even though they’re teammates, he could potentially make life a lot harder on him and hopefully he does it next week at Atlanta and make it a little bit easier on us to win the $100,000. But I wasn’t gonna go clean him out by any means just because of what Justin did. Personally, as a race car driver, I wouldn’t appreciate it if someone cleaned me out for the win when I’d raced them clean, so I wasn’t gonna do that either.”
WHAT WERE YOU THINKING WHEN YOU SAW THE 9 GET INTO THE 7 OFF THE CORNER? “I thought it opened up our opportunity to sneak away with a win just because the 7 was by far the class of the field. He’s been the class of the field the last, especially last year in the fall. He was gonna win the race and blew a tire with four or five to go. So anytime the 7 is out of contention here it definitely opens up the door. We just weren’t that good all night, so even starting on the front row I didn’t necessarily think, ‘Oh man, we’re gonna win this race tonight,’ just because we hadn’t been that good all night. The 9 had been better for really all the night, but when he gave me the bottom I definitely felt like it was an opportunity that maybe I could sneak away with one. In the middle of one and two on the restart he got a little loose or something and I felt like I gained a ton of ground on him, and then three and four the top was just so good for the first lap that he was able to clear me and I got a little loose on exit. There for a second I thought midway through one and two I might sneak away with one, but we just weren’t a winning race car tonight. The 9 car was definitely the second-best car to the 7, so they did a good job and we just have to get a little bit better when we come back to Bristol.”
WHAT WAS THE INTENSITY OF THE RACING LIKE TONIGHT? “I thought it was a really odd Bristol race just from the race track changing standpoint. It seemed like the top never really came in like we typically see it and I think a lot of that was just with no practice the PJ1 doesn’t really have time to come in. They reapplied it after the Cup race and I felt like if they would have left it alone going into tonight’s race it may have been a little bit more two-groove, but it was kind of that old-school Bristol, where we were all on the bottom. It’s different from the old Bristol due to the fact that the PJ1 we’re all so fast around the bottom it’s hard to really gain time or gain speed on guys. It seems like we’re all the same speed, so restarts were super-crucial and after the restart, unless we had a long run, it was really hard to make up any time, and we didn’t get into lap traffic like we typically do. I feel like normally we’re dicing it up and I don’t know why, for whatever reason, we never got into heavy lap traffic.”
HOW DO YOU LOOK AT ATLANTA? “I feel like our 98 car has been really good on the mile-and-a-halves and you throw in the slick mile-and-a-halves and I feel like that’s kind of our bread-and-butter where our program is the best, so Atlanta is definitely a really slick mile-and-a-half and so is Homestead. So those are gonna be, I feel like, two really good race tracks for us. Hopefully, we can capitalize on that with the extra $100,000, but Atlanta is definitely a driver’s track. You’re slipping and sliding around. Hopefully, when we go next week it’s 100 degrees outside and we can move up to the wall and just be slipping and sliding. I feel like that’s when my background comes in the most, so hopefully that’s what we’ll have and hopefully we can just put on another good race.”
WHAT ABOUT THE TRACK FEELING LIKE THE OLD BRISTOL MADE SOME OTHER GUYS LIKE VINNIE MILLER AND BRANDON BROWN HAVE TOP 10 RUNS? “I think anytime you go short track racing it opens up the playing field as far as equipment doesn’t make as big of a difference. So that’s gonna make a difference and then when you throw in the fact it’s hard to pass. If they can get track position and they have good speed, then they’re gonna be able to maintain being up towards the front end of the field. I’m glad those guys had really good runs. A lot of those guys in the back half of the field are great race car drivers. They just don’t get the opportunity that some of us are fortunate enough to get. Josh Williams is a perfect example of a guy, I think, could go win races in top-notch equipment and he just doesn’t have that opportunity, so to see guys capitalize on coming short track racing, certainly it’s a cool thing for the series and I think that’s one thing that’s great about the XFINITY Series.”
Campbell Marketing & Communications for Ford Performance
