Ford Performance NASCAR Notes and Quotes
Daytona 500 Advance – Daytona International Speedway
Saturday, February 25, 2017
Raj Nair, Executive Vice President of Global Product Development and Chief Technology Officer for Ford Motor Co., was part of a press conference today at Daytona International Speedway that also featured owners Roger Penske, Jack Roush and Tony Stewart. A transcript of that session follows:
RAJ NAIR, Executive Vice President of Global Product Development and Chief Technology Officer, Ford Motor Co. – YOU HAVE A NICE DISPLAY OUT FRONT AND A LOT OF MOMENTUM FOR 2017. CAN YOU TALK ABOUT THAT? “First off, on the display it’s great to see all those great Ford cars and trucks out there. We’ve got everything out there. We’ve got the new Mustang out there, the new F-Series out there, Shelby GT 350. Probably the one that is getting the most attention is the Ford GT. I’ve got all three guys on my left asking me about that. It would be a great opportunity for the fans. I think we’ve had 10,000 fans register with us, so it’s a great opportunity for the fans.
“Momentum, we’re really looking forward to the weekend. We’ve done a lot of work in the off-season with the teams on the cars, but obviously we’ve got a few more bullets in our gun this year with the addition of Stewart-Haas, Penske, Roush-Fenway, RPM, Wood Brothers, Front Row, we’re feeling pretty good about our chances on track this weekend.”
ROGER PENSKE, Owner, Team Penske – TALK ABOUT YOUR EXPECTATIONS THIS SEASON: “First thing that I see is that (Tony) Stewart has a black shirt on, that’s a little disappointing this morning (laughs). We’ll get him in gear here before long. My white one may be too big.
“On a serious note, I think the opportunities that we now have with the additional team is tremendous. Working with Jack over the last few years, the Roush Yates engines have proven to be probably elite down here this past week or so. With Stewart-Haas and the guys working together, you can see the Roush cars, certainly with Kevin (Harvick) and Brad (Keselowski) the other night, it’s great to have more people out there from the standpoint of working together, especially on these plate tracks.
“I think the engineering side as Raj mentioned, we’ve had a tremendous amount of support. The simulator for our drivers has been a big help to us and just the technical side with the aero perspective. Over the years, people say ‘how do you work together, not work together?’ Both with Roush and Stewart-Haas, we’ve had our cars in the wind tunnel, so we have some idea where each of us are from an aero balance perspective. That doesn’t me that you’re not going to do your own tweaking day in and day out. I think the opportunity to lift the whole Blue Oval together here, as Joe Hinrichs said, “Ford One”, is going to be important to us as we go forward this year. Obviously, the win the other night was good. I guess we have to give Kevin (Harvick) a big thanks to help get us that win the other night. So the partnership, Raj, has really paid off.”
JACK ROUSH – Co-Owner, Roush Fenway Racing – “For 50 years I’ve enjoyed Ford support in my racing for all kinds of things and certainly never had more tools in the toolbox than we’ve got this year. I would second what Roger said with regard to the value of the simulator and the fact that simulation works as well as it does today. The challenge for me and my team looking from ’16 to ’17 is to figure out more quickly what is the right thing to do and even more quickly than that, figure out how to get it in the race car. We’ve got talented people that have a lot of great ideas and we’ve got to be more competitive in getting our good ideas to the race car. I welcome Tony, but I want Tony to know that I’ve forgiven him. I don’t bear a grudge. Back years ago when Clint Bowyer, of course Clint is in your camp now, but when Clint Bowyer and Carl Edwards were both rookies, Tony got frustrated with both of them at Pocono and he went after Clint and he got Carl. It’s OK. I forgive you for that day (laughter).”
TONY INTERJECTS. “Is that the only time I did anything? (laughter) If that’s it, I’m good with that. I appreciate it.”
JACK ROUSH CONTINUED – “But 2017 looks great for Ford. People ask me how do the Ford teams work together and, of course, the last thing I tell them, which is the most important thing, is that we race in the margins for things beyond the sheetmetal and beyond the support that we get with the simulator and the simulation. We’ve got to hold close to the vest the things that the drivers want to do within the cockpit by themselves, but the cooperation over wind tunnel and cooperation for rules with NASCAR, the cooperation on the engine things that Doug Yates benefits greatly from the input he gets back from the drivers, and I can’t be the only guy that’s out there saying, ‘Doug, we need to be thinking about this or we need to consider this other thing.’ I appreciate all the support I get from Roger and his drivers. Roger initially thought he might be making a mistake by not doing his own engine thing. Are we doing OK with that, Roger?”
ROGER INTERJECTS. “I think it’s the best move we ever made. I worry about somebody else.” (laughter)
JACK ROUSH CONTINUED – “Anyway, 2017 looks rosy for Roush Fenway and rosier yet for Ford with Tony and his bunch and Roger with his championship teams. We look forward to delivering back to Ford the results that they deserve for all of their time of being in this business and all the support that they give.”
TONY STEWART – Co-Owner, Stewart-Haas Racing – “We’re obviously very excited. It was a long off-season for us, well, actually, it seemed very short because we needed more time than what we got. But everybody at SHR did a great job with the switchover, and everyone at Ford Performance did an awesome job just helping with that transition. Like Jack and Roger already mentioned, the simulation, the wind tunnel, the simulator – all those tools that we have available to us – have really, really helped bridge that gap and shorten the learning curve for us. Coming down here to Daytona it’s been pretty nice up to this point to have four drivers that are really happy with their cars. We’ll need to check about halfway through the race and see how happy they are, but, up to this point, they’re really, really excited. Kevin, Kurt, Clint, Danica, they’ve all been really, really happy and pleased with what we’ve got this year. The only time we’ve had a new Ford on the track, other than here, was at Phoenix with Kevin and he was real excited about the test, so I feel like we’ve got a lot to look forward to. We’ve been working really hard to get caught up and get everything prepared for this year, but I think everybody did a great job, obviously with what we’ve seen so far down here in Speedweeks we’ve been really happy with the results. We’re really excited about our partnership with Ford now and everyone at Ford Performance has done an awesome job of really kind of helping us get caught up and get through the off-season and get up to speed. Working with Jack’s team and Roger’s team, it’s good to have some good allies out there on race day and I think we’ve already seen with Roger’s bunch how good that relationship is working out so far on the race track, so we’re looking forward to a great weekend.”
QUESTION AND ANSWER SESSION
TONY STEWART CONTINUED – HOW DOES IT FEEL TO COME HERE AS ONLY AN OWNER? “I’ll be honest, it’s been kind of nice. If I’m late to practice, nobody yells at me. If I leave practice early, nobody yells at me. And if I don’t show up for practice at all, nobody yells at me (laughter). That side has been kind of nice. Really, the only drama I’ve had so far is Roger picking at me on the color of shirt I wear, and I guess Jack has kind of given me the pardon already, so it’s been a pretty good weekend so far. If all I’ve got to worry about is my shirt color, I’ve got it made right now.”
TONY STEWART CONTINUED — WHAT WOULD IT TAKE TO GET YOU TO RUN LE MANS? “Raj is looking down in his lap, and Raj doesn’t have anything in his lap right now (laughter). I don’t know. Le Mans is something that’s a bucket list item for me. The thing about running the GT cars, that’s probably the toughest division to run both Daytona and Le Mans – and I’ve talked to a couple guys that do that. There’s so much more than just trying to drive a fast lap. The thing with the GT cars is that you’re always constantly looking at the LMP2 cars in your mirror, so figuring out the timing of when to let cars go, and then still race the GT cars that you’re racing against, that’s probably one of the hardest challenges, and the guys that do that all the time are really, really good at it. I like challenges, but, like I said, I like being able to come into practice late and leave early, and I’m kind of enjoying this side for now. I think right now the biggest thing is just making sure that we’re focused on what we’re doing here and I still have other races that I’m running, but I’m close to home with all of it and not too far away.”
DO YOU STILL PLANNING ON DOING AS MANY RACES AS ORIGINALLY PLANNED? IT LOOKED LIKE YOU MIGHT BE CUTTING BACK SOME. “No, I’m still gonna run just as many. I cut back last week, but we’ve been racing this week and we’re gonna stick to our schedule, so we’re full steam ahead.”
ROGER PENSKE CONTINUED – REPORTS FROM WALL STREET JOURNAL AND FORBES EXPRESSED CONCERN OVER THE STATE OF MOTORSPORTS. WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS ON WHERE THE SPORT IS GOING INTO 2017? “I certainly saw the Wall Street Journal article last week and was really disappointed in the outcome of that because they talked about inside the France organization, which really is not pertinent to what’s going on on the race track or in the stands. When I look at the sport, and I go back to 2006 when I ran the Super Bowl in Detroit. We were lucky to have 70,000 seats and to think about every weekend we have better than a Super Bowl 38 times. People need to take that into consideration, and then as you stack the media and the social media on top of that, I think the connection is amazing and with the disruption we’re gonna have now with these three different segments, certainly when we announce a sponsorship like Shell yesterday for seven years and you see Fed Ex, I think that there’s never been more competition on the race track. I think what we have to do as a group, the people in this room, we have to take a little different look at this. Certainly, we built these stadiums – we had Michigan and we had California – and we just probably built too many seats because after the financial crisis, there’s no question the spendable income that people had just wasn’t available to do things like this two or three times a year. It’s not just in our sport. The NFL was down seven percent and no one is talking about that, so I think we need to move on and talk about the racing. There are a lot of young kids coming up in this sport. We’ve got great sponsors and certainly the TV guys have connected with the drivers and the car owners on this format, the rule changes, and I think we’ve got to go racing.”
TONY STEWART CONTINUED – CAN YOU GIVE US A SHORT VERSION OF THE TIMELINE WHEN YOU AND FORD FIRST BEGAN TO SPEAK? “I can’t remember the date, but Raj was sitting out front begging at the front door (laughter).” RAJ INTERJECTS. “Whatever it took (laughing).” TONY CONTINUES – “That’s why they put us on opposite sides of the table, in case you were wondering about that. I honestly don’t remember when we started talking. I remember that it was a seven or eight-month process of making the decision, but I can honestly say it was a pleasant eight months of working with Raj and his team. It’s been a great experience from Day 1, the first meeting on it’s been a great experience. We’ve had a lot of fun working with them, but, at the same time, we’ve gotten a lot accomplished in a short amount of time and I think that shows the dedication that Ford Performance has to our sport and to our race team as well as Jack’s and Roger’s teams. I’m proud of our relationship with them. I don’t remember who initiated the conversation, but when it came to me I was excited to talk about it and I’m really pleased with the outcome so far. It’s been a great relationship up to this point.”
RAJ NAIR CONTINUED – YOU’RE GOING BACK TO LE MANS AS THE WINNERS. YOU’VE MADE A BOLD STATEMENT, SO HOW MUCH CONFIDENCE DOES THAT GIVE THE TEAM GOING INTO THAT RACE AND WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO TO DEFEND THAT WIN? “I think we’ve got a year under our belts and, obviously, won last year and I think we’ve got a total of seven wins, so we’ve got a lot more experience. We’re coming in with basically the same team, pretty much the same driver lineup. Last year, we had high hopes. We knew we had a good car, but it’s endurance racing. As Chip likes to say, ‘a million things can happen and only one of them is good.’ But this year we’ve obviously started off well with the win at Daytona. The debut race last year was not our best effort. The car had a lot of speed, but it was not reliable at all, so we were all disappointed in that because it had been good in testing, so we felt like we had unfinished business in Daytona, which is why we brought all four cars. We feel like mission accomplished there. We’re gonna bring three cars to Sebring and Le Mans will have all four cars again, so both teams together, but the testing that is going on so far everybody seems to be at the same speed again, so I think the job that IMSA has done on the BOP (balance of performance) has been pretty good, so I think it’s gonna be some really great racing to watch.”
TONY STEWART CONTINUED – HOW SMOOTH HAS CLINT’S TRANSITION BEEN AND HOW ENCOURAGING WAS HIS RUN IN THE DUEL RACE? “It was real encouraging. The transition with Clint, I think once Homestead was over you could see an immediate change in his confidence. He’s been excited all winter. You guys know Clint. It’s like dropping a super ball off the top of a building and watching it bounce around non-stop. The only thing we’re trying to figure out is what size shock collar we need to get to him to keep his attention and keep him focused (laughter). His enthusiasm has been really fun to watch at the shop and around all the guys and around Kurt and Kevin and Danica. They’re enjoying having him around. I’m enjoying having him around and I know the 14 team is excited to have him in the car. I’ve never seen him this excited. Obviously, last year wasn’t the year that he wanted by any means, and this is a fresh start for him so I know he’s excited.”
ROGER PENSKE CONTINUED – DOES THE RTA GIVE INPUT TO NASCAR OR THE DRIVER’S COUNCIL ON HOW TO MAKE THE SPORT BETTER? “I think there’s definitely collaboration with the driver council and certainly the RTA and NASCAR. Our rules package was developed, the whole format change was developed through the amalgamation of content from all organizations and I think we’re all in one direction wanting to move this sport ahead. I think some of the changes and the byproduct for the discussions over the last three months are going to be what we see here on the race track, what we see here in these segments, and the ability for the drivers to be racing for point. I think that’s gonna change the whole dynamic of a race. There’s gonna be a lot more to talk about and there’s certainly gonna be a lot more action, if you saw what happened last night in that first segment. I think we’re in the right direction and we need change. Change is good. We as a group of car owners and certainly the drivers have really bonded with NASCAR and there’s good communication with Steve (O’Donnell) and that whole technical team with us, and I think things are not coming in that we don’t know about, we’re able to put input in – (Steve) Newmark, Jack’s key guy has been really key. We’ve got people from the different organizations from the different brands that can represent on a technical side, which is good, so it’s a real business process, which I think that’s what I like about it and there’s no question I think we’re gonna see the results.”
TONY STEWART CONTINUED – NATURE’S BAKERY FILED A COUNTERSUIT TODAY. HAVE YOU HAD A CHANCE TO REVIEW THAT CLAIM? “Keep in mind, you know I’m not a morning person, right? Just the fact they got me up on time to get here in time was a miracle in itself. No, I haven’t had a chance to and I won’t. I’m focused 100 percent on what we’re doing down here this weekend. We’ve got a business group that will take care of that side of it, but while I’m in Daytona I’m worried about what happens with the Daytona 500.”
