Ford Performance Unofficial Results:
6th – Ryan Blaney
7th – Ryan Preece
8th – Chase Briscoe
11th – Michael McDowell
12th – Noah Gragson
13th – Austin Cindric
14th – Chris Buescher
22nd – Justin Haley
26th – Brad Keselowski
28th – Joey Logano
29th – Josh Berry
32nd – Todd Gilliland
34th – Josh Bilicki
35th – Harrison Burton
37th – Kaz Grala
AUSTIN CINDRIC, No. 2 Menards/Monster Ford Mustang Dark Horse – YOU WERE SOLID ALL ROUND. “Absolutely. I don’t know what the average finish is for the round, but two top 10s and a 13th. That’s what we need to do as a team and it’s something we had challenges putting together, but the potential is there. The team did an awesome job this round and I’m proud of that, but everything resets so no reason why we can’t replicate that performance. I’m happy to be moving on. It’s one step closer to racing for a championship.”
YOU STARTED STRONG AT ATLANTA. DID THAT HELP PROPEL YOU TO THIS POSITION? “Absolutely. I mean, getting the stage points there as well as Watkins Glen and having three solid finishes. Our worst finish was 13th and that’s what we needed in this round, racing within our limits. There’s no reason why we can’t do the same thing in the next, and I think that’s what it’s gonna take to move onto the Round of 8. I’m just really proud of my team. It was a solid night from starting as far back as we did and staying on the lead lap as long as we did. Our car was really strong. Thanks to Menards and everybody at Team Penske and I’m looking forward to getting going again next week at Kansas.”
YOU HAVE CONTINUALLY IMPROVED THROUGH THE SUMMER. WHAT HAS HAPPENED TO MAKE THAT HAPPEN? “I think it’s just execution. I feel like throughout the course of the summer there was a lot of times we had speed, but you have one big blow up or one big mistake, whether if that’s on me or on pit road or strategy or performance of the car. One or two things, that’s what it takes in the Cup Series. If one or two things go wrong, it’s pretty hard to recover unless you’re a dominant car. I’m just proud of the effort to bring really solid race cars the first three races and be able to do the right things with them.”
BRAD KESELOWSKI, No. 6 Castrol Edge Ford Mustang Dark Horse – A TOUGH NIGHT. “Yeah, it was just a long night. We ran the best we could, we just didn’t have any pace. We lost lap early and that’s kind of what we had. There was no attrition to the race and tires didn’t fall off and we didn’t have the pace.”
HOW DO YOU DESCRIBE THE DISAPPOINTMENT BECAUSE YOU HAD HIGH HOPES OF MOVING ON? “We didn’t show up in this round, I guess is probably just the easiest way to put it. We didn’t get any results and it’s a results business.”
IT SEEMED LIKE A STRUGGLE ALL NIGHT. “Yeah, I think that’s pretty fair to say. We just didn’t have the pace we wanted out of our Castrol Ford. We ran as hard as we could, but there just wasn’t anything there. We executed what we had to execute with on pit road and took the chances we needed to take, but we just have to be faster.”
WHEN YOU LOOK AT THE SEASON AS A WHOLE YOU GOT BACK TO VICTORY LANE AND CHRIS HAS BEEN STRONG. IS THE TRAJECTORY OF THIS TEAM ON PATH WITH WHERE YOU WANT IT TO BE? “Yeah, we don’t want to just make the playoffs, we want to go deep in the playoffs and obviously we didn’t do that this year. We’ve got to keep working and find more pace.”
CHASE BRISCOE, No. 14 Rush Truck Centers/Cummins Ford Mustang Dark Horse – HOW STRESSFUL WAS THIS RACE FOR YOU? “Honestly, it wasn’t really stressful. I knew our Rush Truck Centers Ford Mustang Dark Horse was really, really good and even when we had that bad pit stop, we came out 13th or 14th and I felt like I could drive back up there. At the end, probably bled three or four spots just trying to not do anything stupid. It felt like both arms got a Tetanus shot. Overall, it was a great night for us. Hopefully, people will start taking us serious. I truthfully feel like we can battle for the championship, so hopefully tonight proved that. I hate that we had to kind of dig ourselves out of a hole after Atlanta, but hopefully can go on to Kansas and start this next round strong. I feel like we can beat anybody on any given day when we put it together from start to finish. Obviously, tonight we had some hiccups, but we were still able to have a good finish and that’s what this championship run is gonna be all about, so go on to the next one.”
WHAT IS THE STRENGTH OF THIS TEAM RIGHT NOW? “I think our backs are up against the wall. No other team in this sport can relate to what we’re going through and just how hungry we all are, so I think we all want to go out as winners and we just know that we’re capable of doing it when we put it together. I think, for us, when we finally did win at Darlington we kind of proved that to ourselves and just the confidence that has come with that over the last three weeks has been a lot, so looking forward to the next however many races we’ve got left.”
HARRISON BURTON, No. 21 Motorcraft/Quick Lane Ford Mustang Dark Horse – “Earlier in the race it started to get heavier and then by the last 60 laps I ran it had just zero power steering. It just got to where I couldn’t make corrections and my arms were just so tired that I couldn’t do anymore. It’s a really sad way to end it, but really proud of our guys. They changed the rack really fast and got a new pump in it. We gained a couple spots just from guys wiping themselves out. We didn’t quit, but obviously a frustrating way to go. I’m happy to have been a part of it. I’m proud of our guys for ending our relationship the right way and just hope to end the rest of the playoffs strong because we still have a lot to gain total points wise if we can just get some good races together. We’re not quitting yet. We’ll be back and ready to go.”
BRISTOL AND LOSING POWER STEERING DOESN’T SOUND LIKE A GOOD COMBINATION. “I knew it was starting to slowly go and they normally don’t get better when they’re starting to get worse. I just didn’t say anything on my radio because I didn’t want it to be true. After about 180 laps of it you just can’t do it anymore, so it’s very frustrating and very sad. Even when we got back out there I was just letting guys go when they would get somewhat close to me, but when I was along and just running we were fast, but it just sucks to go out that way. You want to at least go down swinging.”
JOEY LOGANO, No. 22 Shell/Pennzoil Ford Mustang Dark Horse – WHAT DO YOU LOOK FORWARD TO IN THE NEXT ROUND? “It’s just the same stuff. You’ve got to get some points to survive. Kansas will be important. You’ve still got Talladega in there, which is quite the wild card, and then the Roval. It’s a fairly similar round to what we just went through, so you’ve got to be able to score some points.”
WINNING THE FIRST RACE OF THE ROUND IS ALWAYS IMPORTANT AND THAT PROVED TRUE FOR YOU DIDN’T IT? “Yeah, it was good that we got it. I still think we would have been fine because we had a solid run at Watkins Glen, at least scoring a lot of points. We just have to go back to Kansas this weekend and run good. We need to go up there and run in the top five and score stage points and position ourselves solid into the next two races after that.”
RYAN BLANEY, No. 12 Wurth Ford Mustang Dark Horse – “It was a good night overall. We came from not qualifying great and got up to the top 10 that second stage. I thought we had a really good long run car and the long run at the end was so many laps that we were guarding against blowing a tire, so I just kind of rode around the last 100 laps or so for that run and wound up with a decent finish. It was a good effort from not qualifying well. The speed in our car was pretty decent. It’s something to learn from and nice to go to the next round.”
HOW DO YOU VIEW THE ROUND OF 12? “As you move through the rounds there’s just no room for error. It’s just less wiggle room. The Round of 16 you have more of a chance of more guys having problems and if you do, you can kind of make up for it, but as you cut guys those odds kind of go up. If you have a bad day, it’s gonna be hard to recover, so we just have to execute our job, have fast cars, and do a good job on the track and on pit road and execute well, and we’ll see if we can make it to the next one.”
JOSH BERRY, No. 4 Bed Bath & Beyond Ford Mustang Dark Horse – “We were just behind with our setup tonight and couldn’t find the balance I needed to make the top and bottom work. Our guys worked their tails off and tonight was just a tough night. We know we are plenty capable of being competitive, so we will just focus on going to Kansas with a clean slate.”
NOAH GRAGSON, No. 10 Bass Pro Shops Winchester Ford Mustang Dark Horse – “I had a solid Ford Mustang Dark Horse, but we just struggled firing off on short runs. On the long run we were really good and kind of just stayed in that 14th range, so overall, it was a solid day. That’s what our group needed. It was a solid weekend overall and I’m just proud of everyone we’ll just go on next week to Kansas.”
RYAN PREECE, No. 41 Old Armor Ford Mustang Dark Horse – “We passed cars on the long runs and we needed about 75-100 laps before I could start passing. That’s when everybody would start coming back to me. I’m obviously proud with the gains we’ve been making over the past few months.”
Campbell Marketing & Communications for Ford Performance PR
