Ford Racing NSCS Notes & Quotes:
Coca-Cola 600 – Charlotte Motor Speedway
Sunday, May 25, 2014
Ford Finishing Order:
4th – Carl Edwards
10th – Brad Keselowski
11th – Aric Almirola
12th – Joey Logano
20th – Trevor Bayne
21st – Greg Biffle
26th – Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
29th – Marcos Ambrose
31st – David Ragan
43rd – David Gilliland
DAVID GILLILAND – No. 38 Love’s Travel Stops Ford Fusion – “We blew a right-front tire there. We did the wave-around trying to make up some track position, but just blew a right-front. It got real tight the lap before and just blew a right-front. It’s a tough way for this to end. We were looking forward to finishing it off, but we’re not gonna do it tonight.”
CARL EDWARDS – No. 99 Fastenal Ford Fusion – IT LOOKED LIKE YOU PLAYED THINGS PERFECTLY. “That’s Ford fuel mileage right here. You talk about Fords getting great fuel mileage and they did today. Our car finished fourth and that was probably as good as we deserved to finish, but Jimmy made that call and I thought we were gonna win it. That would have been great for right here on the hood where it says Fastenal, that’s 630 Fastenal members who also serve our Armed Forces, so I would have loved to have won for those guys, but we did have a good run. I had a lot of fun with Jamie. He’s really good. I pushed him right to the limit and he pushed my bumper and just slid me down the front straightaway at 180 miles an hour as perfect as he could, so it was pretty awesome.”
DID YOU THINK YOU HAD A CHANCE TO GET THEM AFTER PITTING FOR FOUR TIRES AND RESTARTED FIFTH? “Yeah, I thought we had it if we didn’t get the caution then. The fact those guys stayed out and we got four fresh Goodyears I thought we would get our Fastenal Ford to victory lane, but it wasn’t meant to be. I had a great time racing Jamie, though. After last week, we both had better tires than the guys in front of us and I thought, ‘I’m gonna be really aggressive,’ and he pushed my rear bumper and slid me down the front straightaway and that was it. It was really cool to be able to race that hard with a guy as good as Jamie.” HOW IMPORTANT WAS CLEAN AIR TONIGHT? “Clean air was really important but it did seem like some of the cars could pass regardless of their position on the race track, so I don’t want to whine about it too much because I feel like some of the guys had it figured out. We just need to do a better job. We executed the race perfectly, we just have to keep working on our cars.” IT WAS CRAZY HOW THE STRATEGY FLIP-FLOPPED FROM FUEL TO TIRES. “Yeah, the strategy was all over the place. It was fun. We didn’t have a way to really win it on pure speed, but to have a shot based on that strategy was really good.” WHERE IS YOUR PROGRAM OVERALL? “We’re moving forward, but we wanted to get a win for these guys and we want to win on these mile-and-a-halves because the Chase is filled with those race tracks. We’ve got to keep working. Everybody is working as hard as they can and hopefully we can get some wins.”
BRAD KESELOWSKI – No. 2 Miller Lite Ford Fusion – IT LOOKED LIKE YOU HAD A STRATEGY TO WIN. WHAT HAPPENED? “We had the strategy and very close to having the speed to win the race and then on that late-race pit stop we left the right-front wheel loose and that ended our chance to win. We rebounded to finish 10th, which I guess isn’t bad all things considered. The crew gave me a great car. I drove my butt off, but we just didn’t get it done on pit road.” YOU DIDN’T GET TIRES ON ONE SPOT. HOW IMPORTANT WAS THAT TO HAVE CLEAN AIR? “Clean air is always pivotal, but we hit it there at that one mark and I thought that was gonna be what we needed and it was. We got there and settled into third or so and cycled through the pit stops and got ourselves some track position. Some other things threw us back off sequence and we fought back again to get track position and a shot at winning the race with strategy or not with strategy, I think we had a shot at it. Unfortunately, those were the cards we were dealt there with the loose wheel and it was out of contention.” HOW STRONG WAS THE CAR TO CATCH THE 48? “We mowed them down a little bit that one run and I thought we had a shot at it. When we put new tires on after the loose wheel we were really fast and we were really mowing them down. He was fast. The 4 car, I think, was the best car but the 48 was pretty strong too.”
ARIC ALMIROLA – No. 43 U.S. Air Force Ford Fusion – “We were gonna try and stretch our fuel. We actually ran out getting onto pit road and I had a hard time getting the car re-fired, so that got us behind a little bit. All in all, it was a great night for our U.S. Air Force Ford Fusion. We were decent. I’d say we were a top-10 car all night and we finished 11th, so I’m proud of everybody. We’ve been working really hard. Our mile-and-a-half stuff has not been very good and we’ve been getting it better. We went to Kansas and ran eighth and came here and ran 11th, so we’re getting respectable. We just have to find that little bit more, so we’ve got a two-day test in Michigan coming up this week and we’ll look to keep building on our momentum and run better and better.” YOU BATTLED BRAD FOR 10TH DOWN THE STRETCH. “I got really loose that run before and when the caution came out we tightened our car up and I was just too tight at the end and Brad ran me down and got by me. I was struggling to get the front tires to turn.”
