Ford Performance NSCS Notes and Quotes
Brickyard 400 – Indianapolis Motor Speedway
Sunday, July 24, 2016
Ford Finishing Order:
7th – Joey Logano
12th – Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
14th – Chris Buescher
17th – Brad Keselowski
20th – Landon Cassill
25th – Aric Almirola
27th – Brian Scott
30th – Trevor Bayne
34th – Patrick Carpentier
36th – Ryan Blaney
39th – Greg Biffle
GREG BIFFLE – No. 16 Performance Plus Motor Oil Ford Fusion – “We blew a right-front tire and went straight into the fence. We were either real loose or real tight, and we just couldn’t get the balance right. We’ve just got to get them to turn a little better.” HOW WAS THE CAR FROM A HEAT STANDPOINT? “It wasn’t that bad, really. I was doing pretty good.” WHAT HAPPENED? “I don’t know what happened. The right-front went down at the end of the straightaway. That’s the worst possible place, but unfortunately it happened.” SOME OTHER GUYS WERE SAYING THE TIRES WERE FALLING OFF PRETTY HARD HERE. “Yeah, tire fall off is good for racing. It slows down and the speed gets competitive, but that there was something different. We were a little tight bit tight on that run and it’s just toast.”
BRAD KESELOWSKI – No. 2 Miller Lite Ford Fusion – “It was a long, hard day. We just weren’t quite as fast as the Gibbs cars, but we were competitive. I had a shot at it at the end when we came in and put tires on, but got caught up when the 19 spun out. I thought we actually had a shot at winning it and kind of stealing one on tires, but when that wreck happened it took away any shot we had. There was too much damage, but that’s just part of it. There was nowhere to go, but that’s definitely not the result we wanted for sure.”
JOEY LOGANO – No. 22 Shell/Pennzoil Ford Fusion – THE FIRST RESTART IS LOOKED LIKE YOU HAD SOMETHING FOR KYLE, BUT WHAT HAPPENED ON THE LAST RESTART? “It just was not good. I had a decent restart the first time, and the second one I probably had just as good of a restart, but the 20 got underneath me and I was kind of stuck from that point and kind of fell into the clutches of the tires behind me. I was trying to stay down and be where I needed to be to get in front of them, but they just kept turning underneath me. I hate that we finished seventh, but it’s probably where we deserved to finish from a speed point of view. I thought our execution went very well today to give us an opportunity to win, but we couldn’t quite get it done when it mattered.”
RICKY STENHOUSE JR. – No. 17 Sunny D Ford Fusion – “It wasn’t a bad day. This was definitely our best Indy performance across the board – qualifying, practices, the race. We still have a lot of work to do. We know where we need to work, we just have to make sure we get that and I think it will translate to all of the other race tracks we go to. The flatter race tracks we struggle at, so at Pocono next week we can hopefully get some ideas to help with turn two and turn three because that’s the biggest key for us is to get our car through the corner and off. I felt good with everybody on entry and through the center I just need to get a little bit better, but it was nice to come home with the Sunny D Ford in 12th.”
RYAN BLANEY – No. 21 Motorcraft/Quick Lane Ford Fusion – “I didn’t really see much. I unfortunately got back there, and I didn’t see who got together. I thought I was by it and then the 31 spun out and I didn’t have anywhere to go. I’ll have to rewatch it on replay, but it stinks. I thought we had a decent car. We kind of put ourselves in a hole and we were trying to fight back from that and this just made a bad day worse. We’ll just go to Pocono next week and try to get better.” THAT’S THE KIND OF THING THAT HAPPENS ON A LATE-RACE RESTART. “Yeah. People get racy and, unfortunately, we got caught up in it.” HOW DID YOU HANDLE THE HEAT INSIDE THE CAR TODAY? “I’m fine. It was warm, but not too bad.”
CHRIS BUESCHER – No. 34 Dockside Logistics Ford Fusion – “It was a good finish for us. We had a couple things finally go our way and stayed out of the wrecks in front of us. It is nice to have a little bit of luck and decent speed. We worked hard this weekend and got it close. It got better through the weekend and it is my first time in a Cup car here at Indy so we will definitely take that finish.”
