Ford Finishing Results:
3rd – Brad Keselowski
5th – Ryan Blaney
7th – Kevin Harvick
8th – Joey Logano
10th – Ryan Newman
11th – David Ragan
15th – Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
18th – Corey LaJoie
21st – Paul Menard
23rd – Michael McDowell
25th – Matt Crafton
31st – Daniel Suarez
35th – Clint Bowyer
37th – Aric Almirola
ARIC ALMIROLA, No. 10 Smithfield Ford Mustang – “We just got together. I got inside of him getting down in turn three and he chopped me, and I got in his left-rear and moved him up a little bit and got inside of him, and then we hooked and got tangled up off of turn four. It’s disappointing. I had a really good Smithfield Ford Mustang and felt like we were maybe one adjustment away from being maybe a second or third-place car, so I’m proud of my guys, proud of the effort and we’ve got three more weeks.”
JOEY LOGANO, No. 22 Shell/Pennzoil Ford Mustang – WHAT HAPPENED WITH HAMLIN FROM YOUR PERSPECTIVE? “I got fenced down the straightaway and just went to talk about it. I was a little frustrated by the situation and I went down to talk to him and didn’t really get the answers I was looking for.”
WHAT ABOUT THE RACE? “I felt good about it. We weren’t as good as the 19, nobody was, but I felt like if you set us second, we’d run second or you set us eighth we’ll probably run eighth. Overall, it was as good as we were gonna do.”
DENNY THOUGHT YOU GUYS HAD IT SETTLED, SO HOW DO YOU LOOK AT IT? “I was frustrated about the situation, obviously. I really wanted to go over there and talk to him and get his side of the story on what happened and he just said, ‘I ran you up in the wall, basically.’ He wasn’t as apologetic as I was looking for and that probably escalated the situation too much. I shouldn’t have shoved him. For all the kids watching that wasn’t the best thing to do, but I was frustrated, tempers are high. It’s the Playoffs, so that’s what happens.”
IS IT PAR FOR THIS TRACK, PAR FOR THE COURSE? “Most of the time, yeah.”
WAS IT THAT TONIGHT? “Yeah, I don’t know. I don’t think it was necessary. There were plenty laps to go. Race for the win and you’re coming off the last corner, all right, I get it, but I don’t totally understand the situation and why he had to do that.”
DID YOU GET IT SETTLED? “Sure.”
HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT TEXAS AND YOUR POINTS SITUATION? “I don’t know. I think I’m fourth from what I hear, but we still need to grab more points obviously. We can have better days than that, but we weren’t that bad. We can run up in the top five most of that race We were close, we were in the hunt, just couldn’t get it all there at the end.”
HAD YOU BEEN ABLE TO TALK WITH DENNY BEFORE? DID THIS SURPRISE YOU? “Denny is Denny. He’s a little bit arrogant sometimes and I should be stronger than let that get underneath me when he does that.”
DID THE CREW GUYS KIND OF ESCALATE IT BEFORE YOU COULD HAVE A CIVIL CONVERSATION? “No, we had a fine conversation. I shoved him.”
WHY DID YOU SHOVE HIM? “I was made. I got fenced.”
WOULD YOU TAKE BACK THE SHOVING? “Yeah, I would take that part back. Like I said, that wasn’t as professional as I should be. I wanted to have the conversation, but, like I said, the answers he was giving I felt wasn’t good enough and made me more mad.”
RYAN BLANEY, No. 12 Menards/Richmond Ford Mustang – “We were in the top five all day and I thought we had a good shot at second. We weren’t good on short runs. We were terrible for probably 30-40 laps and then we’d come alive and be great, but just didn’t have the speed.”
YOU GOT CAUGHT ON THE OUTSIDE LATE. WAS THAT JUST BAD LUCK? “No, we just couldn’t go on short runs. That’s really all it was. We couldn’t get going for 30 laps and then just really struggled, so we just have to figure out what to do better there. We’ve got some big changes we need to make on that side, but long runs we were fantastic. We couldn’t go on the short run and that hurt us.”
YOU HAD SOME RUN-INS WITH TEAMMATES. WERE YOU SURPRISED WITH THAT OR IS IT JUST MARTINSVILLE? “The one with the 2, he kind of dove in there late. He gave me the spot back, actually, so that was nice of him. The 22 just hit me five times as soon as he got to me. He tried to pass me for five laps and then he just started running me over, so I didn’t appreciate that but all of that stuff comes around. It’s just part of Martinsville racing.”
WHAT’S YOUR OUTLOOK FOR TEXAS? “Hopefully good. Confident. Our car was really good there in the first race this year. We were leading when we blew up, so looking forward to going there. We had a lot of stage points today, which is nice. We just need to keep ourselves in the hunt That’s what you’ve got to do.”
RYAN NEWMAN, No. 6 Blue Bird School Bus Ford Mustang – “We just out-tired there at the end. Those other guys had tires and we didn’t and it didn’t work out the best for us. It was a challenge. They did a good job. Our pit stops were awesome today. That made a big difference and just came up short.”
KEVIN HARVICK, No. 4 Hunt Brothers Pizza Ford Mustang – “We got our car a lot better in the second half. We made some major adjustments when we got to the end of the second stage and made our car a lot better. We just didn’t quite get back up there.”
HOW ENCOURAGED ARE YOU GOING FORWARD? “It’s just another race. That’s the same thing I’ve been saying for 32 weeks.”
HOW IMPORTANT IS IT TO FINISH LIKE YOU DID ON A DAY THAT WASN’T THE BEST. “They did a good job in the second half of the race and we got a decent finish to minimize the damage.”
BRAD KESELOWSKI, No. 2 Alliance Truck Parts Ford Mustang – “I think that’s about all we had or maybe a little more than what we had. We just kind of kept our head on our shoulders all day and made the most of what we had. I was really proud of our team for that effort.”
HOW BRUTAL WAS IT OUT THERE TODAY? “Long green flag runs, a lot of aggressiveness, a lot of contact. It was really tough to pass. When you get behind somebody you’re way faster than that big spoiler would just kill you, but, all in all, a good day for us.”
YOU MOVED BLANEY AND THEN GAVE HIM THE SPOT BACK. WHAT HAPPENED THERE? “Nobody said anything to me. I had somebody right on my butt and Blaney came down to block and I couldn’t let him in, and I about spun him out. And then I got to the other end and I about spun out and I was like, ‘Just go, Blaney. I about spun you out last time.’ My car ran better behind other cars, so that was it.”
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