Ford Performance NASCAR Notes and Quotes
Coca-Cola 600 – Charlotte Motor Speedway
Sunday, May 28, 2017
Ford Finishing Order:
6th – Kurt Busch
8th – Kevin Harvick
14th – Clint Bowyer
15th – Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
16th – Trevor Bayne
21st – Joey Logano
22nd – Regan Smith
23rd – David Ragan
24th – Ryan Blaney
25th – Danica Patrick
28th – Landon Cassill
37th – Matt DiBenedetto
39th – Brad Keselowski
BRAD KESELOWSKI – No. 2 Miller Lite Ford Fusion – “Somebody broke and there was just oil everywhere and I couldn’t turn. I ran into the back of Chase. Somebody broke in front of him and then he ran over what they broke and then he broke, so there were two cars broke in front of me and just oil everywhere. You couldn’t stop and turn. You couldn’t do anything. It’s a real bummer four our team. We had a really fast Miller Lite Ford and I think we had a shot at winning tonight, but that’s how it goes.”
MATT DIBENEDETTO – No. 32 Cosmo Ford Fusion – “We were running okay for what we had. Our balance was good and everything was fine. I had no indication of anything going wrong. It’s not like it was tight and plowing the right-front off of it, and all of a sudden I went into one and blew a right-front and killed it. I don’t know where that came from. We had no indication all weekend. Our tire temps were good, so I’m not sure why that happened or if maybe I ran over something.”
KURT BUSCH – No. 41 Haas Automation/Monster Energy Ford Fusion – “We did well. We battled and battled and had fun with out. The balance of our car was too tight to start and too loose on the long run. We saw a little bit of that in the All-Star Race, so we tried to compensate. The track came to us with the rain delay. I thought we were a stronger car in the later half of the race. The short run speed we were tight, the long run speed we were loose, but we tried and tried and tried. Thanks to Haas Automation, Monster Energy and Ford. I’ve got a great group of guys. Tonight was a good run. We finished sixth, but some guy stayed out on fuel and we really gave it our heart tonight.”
THE 3 CAR IS BACK IN VICTORY LANE. WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT THAT? “That’s impressive. To see Austin win is great for Richard Childress Racing and the heritage of what Richard and Austin Dillon and Dale Sr., everybody from RCR deserves a win like this. The kid has been pushing hard. He was fast tonight and they gambled and it worked out perfect, so I’m happy for them.”
MORE POINTS WERE AVAILABLE TONIGHT WITH THE EXTRA STAGE AND YOU FINISHED IN THE TOP 10 OF EACH ONE. HOW DOES THAT MAKE YOU FEEL? “I knew the stages were gonna be important tonight because there were more available. All year we hadn’t gained our stage points and it seems like we’re working the hardest for the least amount of points. It’s like we’re running 8th to 12th and sometimes we gain one point in a stage, sometimes we don’t get any, but tonight it was a really good pit stop that put us up to fifth. Then we had a bad one and got back to 12th, then another good one and got back up to seventh. We had a couple good restarts at the end and give it our best.”
DAVID RAGAN – No. 38 Jacob Companies Ford Fusion – “Our strategy worked great the first half of the race. But we caught a couple unlucky cautions and it got us a couple laps down. I felt like our Jacob Companies Ford was really good while the sun was out for the first half of the race. But after the rain came, I think the track gained some grip and some of the VHT wore off, and our car didn’t respond well. So, we struggled a little bit the second half. But we made some gains from Thursday and Saturday, and it’s something we can learn from and do a little bit better at the next mile-and-a-half.”
CLINT BOWYER – No. 14 Haas Automation Ford Fusion – “We just couldn’t get our Ford to turn tonight. We tried everything we knew to help the front end, but we never got it to where we could race with the leaders.”
