Ford Performance NXS Notes and Quotes
Hisense 250 – Atlanta Motor Speedway
Saturday, February 28, 2015
Ford Finishing Order:
2nd – Joey Logano
4th – Chris Buescher
11th – Darrell Wallace Jr.
15th – Sam Hornish Jr.
16th – Ryan Reed
18th – Elliott Sadler
20th – Dakoda Armstrong
DARRELL WALLACE JR. – No. 6 EcoBoost Ford Mustang – “I think we rode around in the lucky dog spot for about 80 laps, so that’s frustrating but it’s my first, I would say, actual race in the XFINITY Series. It was a good day all in all – no scratches. It’s one spot better than Daytona. It was a decent points day, but I’m thinking if we would have got that lucky dog we would have got a couple more spots, but it is what it is. We’ll go to Vegas next and bring another Ford Mustang ready to win.” DID YOU FEEL LIKE YOU HAD A GOOD RHYTHM OUT THERE? “Yeah, all in all it was good. We were just a little too rough over some spots and that would kind of make it out of balance sometimes, but that’s just me learning and searching around the track. I took a few notes from Harvick and I’m gonna use that. He was pretty fast and I saw what he was doing, so I’m gonna try to utilize that against him next time.”
CHRIS BUESCHER – No. 60 Fastenal Ford Mustang – “This has been a great way to start our season. I’m so proud of these 60 guys. We’ve got a lot more to prove this year, but it’s been a really good start. Daytona was much better than last year and we’ve made pretty big progress on Atlanta. I’m looking forward to our west coast swing and hopefully we can get a couple spot improvement.” WHAT WAS THE KEY TO YOUR DAY? “Just patience and trying to keep the tires underneath it. We were able to do that and get a good finish.” YOU STARTED MIDPACK AND FINISHED FOURTH AFTER A GREAT BATTLE WITH PAUL MENARD. “That was a lot of fun. It was very close competition, but I’m just so proud of my guys. We went through a lot last year and between missing Daytona and coming back this year to finish second and getting our Fastenal Ford Mustang in the top five this week is pretty awesome. I’m just thankful to have such great partners like Cheez-It last week, Fastenal, EcoPower and Ford, so it’s all coming together for us. It’s shaping up to be a really good season, so I’m looking forward to it. I don’t know if we’ve got the points lead or not, but I’m sure we’ve got to be pretty close now.”
RYAN REED – No. 16 Lilly/American Diabetes Association Ford Mustang – “That wasn’t a reflection of what we had there. We didn’t finish where we wanted to, but if that caution wouldn’t have come out for that last pit stop, then we would have been fine. We would have been competing for a 10th-place spot because we were tracking the 62 and the 6 before that last caution came out. We were up there around top-10, which would have been a lot more indicative of how we ran today. We ran 13th for a lot of the race and I felt like 13th to 10th is about the car we had and we need to keep building on that, but compared to the 18th-place finish we had last year and being five laps down we made a lot of gains. I think that shows the effort and the progress we’ve made. Obviously, Chris finishing fourth is a really good example of where this team is gonna be. Give us until about seven or eight races into the schedule and we’ll have top 10 cars and competing for those kind of finished week in and week out. We’re still figuring out the ins and outs of this new platform that we’ve got, but I think we’re headed in the right direction.”
JOEY LOGANO – No. 22 Discount Tire Ford Mustang – PRESS CONFERENCE – “We had a pretty good day. We had a good Discount Tire Ford, obviously. We qualified up front and led a lot early. We lost a little bit on our first pit stop to the 88 and then he was leading for a while, but we made some adjustments on our car and was able to pass him there towards the end of the race to retake the lead before the last pit stop. We came down pit road and lost a spot and then you’re starting on the outside. The outside here has no grip up there. I actually was able to get a decent restart and be able to still be door to door with Kevin and I thought, ‘We’re OK here. I’ve got a shot.’ If I can be door to door with him I’ve got a shot, but then the 9 just gave him a shove and shoved him way up in front of me and that was kind of the end of that. I was trying different lanes and trying anything I could do to catch up to him. I started to make some ground, but then I had this huge vibration and at that point you’re just trying to not have to pit again to fix it. We just came up a little bit short. It seems like I finish second in this race all the time. I want to win it really bad. I want to win at this race track and I’m gonna keep trying to run this XFINITY race until I get it.”
HOW MUCH OF A FACTOR WAS YOUR LOOSE LEFT WHEEL? “A pretty big factor. I couldn’t see where I was going, for one. That was one problem and then obviously when it’s in the back of the car you definitely lose a lot of rear grip, but you keep your foot in it trying anything. Once it got really bad I couldn’t keep up with Kevin anymore. Like I said, we were making ground and then it just kept getting worse and you just keep losing ground because the vibration was so big. Like I said, you lose grip, you lose sight and nothing good happens from there, but the next one is really bad when the left rear passes you.”
HOW DIFFERENT WAS IT WHEN YOU WERE LEADING VERSUS IN TRAFFIC? “It’s typical mile-and-a-half stuff. When the guy gets clean air your car does so much better. I know if we were able to get out front, Kevin wouldn’t be able to pass us. It seems like his lane is very similar to mine. We just both put it on the bottom and let her rip. We can try to the top and make it work for a few and it seems like we both look for the same things in our race cars, which gives us a pretty similar race car apparently. We both need the same thing and I felt like if I was able to get out front, the 22 car would have been able to hang there, but that’s what we’ve had the last few years. It’s the same thing. It’s dirty air and that’s how it works, but like Ty said, obviously the further you are in the back your car never handles good and then your tires wear out more and then the drop off is huge, so being able to keep yourself toward the front at these race tracks is important.”
THIS SEASON HAS SORT OF BEEN YOUR WAY. HOW EASY IS IT TO SHAKE OFF THIS DISAPPOINTMENT BEFORE TOMORROW? “It wasn’t that bad. We still finished second. I know it’s not a win, but it could be a lot worse. We were close and it’s easy to shake off. We learned some things today and I think we learned some things that can actually translate to tomorrow, so I think as a team we’ll grow as Team Penske. We’ll grow after this. I’ll talk to my crew chief, Todd (Gordon) tonight and try to figure out where we can make our Shell/Pennzoil Ford faster and try to finish one spot better tomorrow.
“We’ve had fast cars and are coming off a great win, obviously. Things are going well. I still think they’re going well. I don’t think this takes any wind out of our sails.”
SAM HORNISH JR. – No. 98 Carroll Shelby Engine Co. Ford Mustang – “We need to be better, that’s for sure. We were limited on our practice time yesterday. We had some issues with the front of the car and some vibration and by the time we diagnosed what the problem was it was too late. The guys did a good job giving me a car overnight that was gonna be what we needed it to be for qualifying, but we didn’t get an opportunity to do the long run speed part of it and understand what the car was gonna take. I felt like we were decent for the first 15-20 laps, but past that point there wasn’t enough security in the rear of the car to do much and a lot of today’s race, unfortunately, was holding on but that’s part of why we do this. We’re trying to get better and I feel the next time I get in the car at California we’ll have a little bit better idea of what we need to do and should be better off. You always want a little bit more and 15th isn’t what we came for, but what it was after the first run if you would have told me we were gonna finish 15th I would have been good with that.”
