Ford Racing NSCS Notes & Quotes:
NSCS Ford EcoBoost 400
Wednesday Nov. 12, 2014
Championship 4 Press Conference
WERE YOU EXPECTING THAT FROM HIM AT ALL? “With him you never know what the heck he is going to say. I just go with it.”
WHAT DID YOU SAY TO HIM WALKING OFF THE STAGE? “I told him it was nice. I thought it was good. I told him that was a good one.”
DO YOU FEEL LIKE THE KID IN THIS GROUP? “Yeah, I am the youngest one here by a few so I would say yeah, I must be. At the same time I don’t feel like I am a kid anymore either. I have been doing this awhile and gone through a lot. Making the Chase last year for the first time and then now having a shot at winning my first championship is just insane. I am making sure I enjoy this opportunity because it is amazing and at the same time I am trying to make the most of it also. It has been cool so far.”
THESE OTHER GUYS HAVE BEEN IN THE HUNT BEFORE, DOES THAT GIVE THEM AN EDGE? DOES IT MATTER? “No because like I said up front, none of them have been ahead or tied in the last race. They always come into this race with nothing to lose and race as hard as they can and whatever happens, happens. They aren’t in that position anymore. I have never been in that position either but neither have they. It is the same thing for all of us. It is cool. It will be entertaining, I promise you that.”
WHEN YOU APPROACH THE RACE, CAN YOU PUNISH YOUR CAR TOO MUCH EARLY AND RISK AN ENGINE PROBLEM? DO YOU THINK ABOUT THAT OR JUST GO RACE? “Just go race. Our team motto all year has been Do What You Do. What we have done is go out there and raced our guts out and gotten the best finish we can no matter what the race deals us. We have been able to do that. We have fought hard and last week we had a little mishap and were able to overcome that. I finished sixth after all that. This week we can’t make mistakes but if we do, we do whatever we can to overcome them. We take whatever the race will throw at us and find a way to make it happen. That is the same thing we have been doing all year. We won’t change a thing.”
WOULD IT MATTER IF THE SPORT HAD A WIN LESS CHAMPION? “Well, I plan on winning the championship and I have five wins.”
HARVICK TAKING JABS AT YOU, SOME WILL SAY THAT IS HIM ACKNOWLEDGING THAT YOU ARE HIS BIGGEST COMPETITION. WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT THAT? “You have a good point. I kind of take it as a compliment. If you think about it, I am up here with three of the best drivers this year and teams and that is really cool and a privilege to be here. To have one of them nervous about you means even more. I am not here to play head games. I am here to win a race. They can play around as much as they want. I am having fun with this. This is really cool. It is an amazing opportunity to be here. I want to make sure I enjoy that. I feel like not just myself but my whole team has been enjoying this and having fun and still working really hard like we have been.”
DO YOU EXPECT KEVIN TO DO SOMETHING? THAT IS KIND OF HIS PERSONALITY? DID YOU EXPECT HIM TO PICK ON SOMEBODY LIKE THIS? “I don’t know. You saw what happened a few weeks ago. Why? I don’t know. You know what; it is not up to me to figure it out. I am not a psychologist. I know enough about psychology to know why he did it I guess but it doesn’t bother me. I am not going to focus on that stuff.”
IF THERE WERE SOMEONE YOU COULD HAVE HERE ON SUNDAY TO BE A PART OF THE CHAMPIONSHIP CELEBRATION IF YOU WIN IT, WHO WOULD YOU WANT TO BE HERE, LIVING OR DEAD? “If you win the championship you want everybody there. I don’t care if I know you or not, I want everyone there. Probably the most would be my grandfather Sal. He passed away a few years ago. When I started racing he was not a race fan. He didn’t know much about it and didn’t think it was a sport. He was an amazing athlete but didn’t know much about racing. I started racing quarter midgets and I would have him check out my trophies and by the end he was a huge race fan. I would love to be able to win this. Unfortunately he won’t be there but I am sure he will be at the same time.”
DID HE END UP GOING TO RACES? “Yeah, he went to quite a few. He was my biggest supporter by the end of it. He was just an old Italian guy wondering what this racing stuff was but by the end he loved it.”
HYPOTHECIAL, 20 LAPS TO GO AND YOU ARE FIFTH AND THE OTHER GUYS ARE NOT IN THE TOP-10. ARE YOU TRYING TO WIN THE RACE OR JUST THINKING ABOUT THE CHAMPIONSHIP AT THAT POINT? “I want to try to win the race. I don’t want to share doing burnouts with anyone. Call me selfish but I want to be the only one doing burnouts at the end of the race. It will be a big one, I can promise you that. Something big is going to break on the car, that is for sure if we start doing burnouts.”
TALK ABOUT THE INITIATION IN YOUR YEARS WITH GIBBS, WHAT YOU LEARNED THERE AND WHAT YOUR LINGERING MEMORIES OF THAT ASSOCIATION ARE AND HOW IT HAS HELPED YOU DO WHAT YOU ARE DOING NOW? “Going to Gibbs at the beginning of my career was a blessing. I went through a lot over there and learned a lot about how to become a man and how to become a racer. You definitely can see the results coming out now. It took awhile but as it should. I was 18 years old. That was hard. Look at Chase Elliott, winning the championship in Nationwide at 18 years old. That is awesome. He is obviously a very mature kid and you have to be to b e doing that. Obviously he has got a great support group behind him. For me, I was a little bit – I don’t want to say on my own but I didn’t know so what was coming to me so much. My dad and mother were awesome but as far as the racing side you learn stuff as you go along and I learned with them and I wouldn’t change that for millions of dollars. I think it is an amazing experience we had. It does get a little different because you learn this all together instead of knowing going into it. I feel like that is what took me awhile, to figure that stuff out, but now to see the results coming from it and standing here today as one of the four guys racing for a championship in a few days is awesome. That is an amazing opportunity.”
AS A YOUNG GUY, YOUR EXPECTATIONS HAD TO BE AS HIGH OR HIGHER THAN EVERYBODY. WAS IT A SHOCK TO THE SYSTEM AT ALL TO NOT RUN WITH THE BALL IMMEDIATELY BACK THEN? “My whole career, racing was easy. When you are the best one out there it is easy. When you get to the level where you aren’t the best one out there and you are against the best of the best and all of a sudden you have to take a step back and ask where you are the worst and what you have to work on. That was step one, figuring out where you aren’t good and then working on it from there. It has been quite a few years of a process. I am still not done with it. You always try to find that next bit. It has been an adventure so far and I am loving every minute.”
IT MUST HAVE FELT GOOD TO HAVE PENSKE EAGER TO HAVE YOU IN HIS CAR. “Team Penske has had legends drive for them, not just championship drivers but legends in the sport. When you drive for an owner like that it is a special opportunity. We have the opportunity to put my name as the driver that won a championship for Roger Penske and Team Penske, that is awesome.”
DOES IT OCCUR TO YOU THAT IN THE OLD SYSTEM YOU WOULD BE DEFENDING A HELL OF A POINT LEAD? “Yeah, it has occurred to me. I feel our team deserves to win it because our team has scored more points these nine weeks thus far but that isn’t the case. It is an equal playing field.”
WHAT HAPPENED WITH TEXAS AND A LITTLE IN PHOENIX, WHEN IT REALLY COMES DOWN TO IT YOU GUYS ARE GOING TO DO WHATEVER IT TAKES TO WIN RIGHT? “We are racers and we want to win. Like I said up there, we all have one common goal. We are going to race to see who is the Sprint Cup champion. Not just the best driver, but the best team. We have seen through this Chase you can’t do it on your own as a driver. I honestly feel like I have the best team out there. From pit crew to road crew to guys at the shop building my cars, I have the best team. That gives me a lot of confidence, knowing that. At that point it is up to me and Todd (Gordon) to try to build the fastest car we can and go out there and execute.”
DID YOU EXPECT IT TO BE THIS INTENSE WHEN THEY ANNOUNCED THIS CHASE FORMAT? “Of course. You have a third down situation every three races. It is a do or die situation. We watch Richmond and how intense that has been in the past to get into the Chase. This is for the championship every three races with points so close and not being able to get a big gap between people in that short of a time. Yeah, the intensity level is there. Knowing you can still win and get in, there is a lot of intensity there. When you have four guys racing for a championship and one race, anyone could have seen that one coming. It is going to be a race that is for sure.”
THE LAST 10 YEARS THERE HAVE BEEN THREE FIRST TIME CUP CHAMPS. WHAT WOULD IT MEAN FOR YOU TO ADD TO THAT LIST? “It would mean everything. To be the first winner in this format would mean a lot. I look at where we have been in the last nine weeks. We have scored more points than anybody. We would be in really good shape if it was last year. That gives me a lot of confidence going into this. We still have a 25-percent chance to win this thing and in my eyes way better than that because I feel our team is unbelievably good from top to bottom.”
HOW IMPORTANT IS THE HOMESTEAD TEST YOU DID A FEW WEEKS AGO NOW? “It is important for sure. All four of us guys tested so all things should be about equal. It is good though to get more laps around it because we only race once and don’t have a huge notebook. Tood and I have only raced together here once and so being able to test and get an idea of what we need is a good advantage for us as a newer combination of driver crew chief.”
WERE YOU HAPPY WITH THE TEST? “Yeah, of course. We had decent speed and typically when we test we don’t have a lot of speed. To be somewhat good I felt like coming back we would be really good. I feel we also learned some really valuable things that different parts and pieces did for our car.”
IF THERE ARE 20 LAPS TO GO AND A CAUTION COMES OUT, DO YOU WANT TO BE THE LEADER OR ONE OF THE GUYS BEHIND? “Anytime I can be in the lead I want to be in the lead. Todd has done a great job with our strategy and has done a great job for the years I have worked with him. My job is to drive the car as fast as I can to pass as many cars as I can. His job is to use the strategy and make the fastest car. I have 100% confidence in him every week and he has the same confidence in me. We understand what our strengths are. Him knowing what my strengths are help him make the right call. We talk about that before the race and that is a good thing. If we make the right call, great. If not, we tried.”
IS IT WEIRD TO ONLY HAVE TO RACE AGAINST THOSE THREE OTHER CARS? “I am racing against 42 other cars. The guy that wins this championship is most likely going to win this race. So for me, it is like any other weekend. The goal is to win this race. You have to look at it as you are racing everybody.”
DO YOU EXPECT WEIRD STRATEGY? “If you get to the point where you are out of it and your car is not fast then yeah. If your car is fast and you can recover from things then no.”
WERE YOU DISAPPOINTED YOU COULDN’T MAKE A FIRE SUIT COMMENT TO HARVICK BECAUSE DELANA DOESN’T WEAR A FIRE SUIT ANYMORE? “The funny thing is that now I drive the Shell car and that is funny because DeLana has that suit. I have to get that suit from her so Brittany can wear that. I will ask him. Maybe I will ask him. I should ask DeLana and not him I guess.”
YOU ARE GOING UP AGAINST A TEAM IN GIBBS THAT GAVE UP ON YOU AND TWO DRIVERS IN HARVICK AND NEWMAN THAT YOU HAVE HAD ISSUES WITH. WOULD THAT MAKE A CHAMPIONSHIP ANY MORE SIGNIFICANT OR SPECIAL? “No, I just want to win a championship for me. I am not going to go rubbing it in someone’s face and go ‘look at me now’. I am just going to take my trophy and go home and that is it. I am not doing this out of spite. I am winning a championship for myself, my team and my sponsors. Not to get someone back. That is not what it is all about.”
YOU JUST LET THOSE THINGS BE BYGONES? “It is in the past. The past is the past and you can’t change it. I don’t really worry about it. I was never very good at history.”
DID HARVICK SAY SOMETHING TO YOU AT TALLADEGA? “It was just him playing head games. That is all it is. He has talked to me about Talladega, yeah. I just shrugged my shoulders. What am I supposed to do? I tried to win the race and tried to help my teammate win the race, yeah, of course I did. It is Talladega. If you have a teammate you can work with you pick him. Duh. Sorry the guy he didn’t want in got in. It isn’t my fault. I was trying to help my teammate. Of course I was. Whatever.”
IS THAT JUST KEVIN BEING KEVIN? “Yeah, we have all seen what he does the last couple weeks. Whatever.”
WHAT IS IT ABOUT THIS ORGANIZATION THAT YOU HAVE LEARNED TO BE READY TO BE THE LEADER OF YOUR 22 TEAM? “When I left Gibbs and went to Team Penske, I was able to kind of be whoever I wanted to be. I could be any person I wanted to be. Any driver I wanted to be. I walked in there saying I wanted to be a championship driver and that I needed to believe it myself and obviously that is hard to do when I didn’t have the stats behind me. I kept working hard and the harder you work and more you understand what it takes to win races and the more races you win the confidence just keeps building and it builds through your whole team. It isn’t just the driver, it is the whole 22 team. That is something we are very proud of. We don’t want to stop now.”
IS THAT A CONFIDENCE YOU HAVE BUILD THROUGH THE YEAR OF BEING A CHAMPIONSHIP CALIBER DRIVER BECAUSE OF YOUR SUCCESS ON THE WEEKENDS? “At first it is hard to do that but once you prove it to yourself it is easy. It is easy to say, ‘I am a championship caliber driver’. We have scored more points than anyone in the Chase so far, we won five races this year. That is second only to our teammate. That is something to be very proud of.”
