Ford Notes and Quotes
Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series (MENCS)
AAA 400 Drive for Autism MENCS QUALIFYING (Dover International Speedway)
Friday, May 4, 2018
FORD QUALIFYING RESULTS
2nd — Kevin Harvick
5th — Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
8th — Brad Keselowski
9th — Kurt Busch
12th — Clint Bowyer
13th — Aric Almirola
14th — Ryan Blaney
18th — Joey Logano
20th — Paul Menard
22nd — Trevor Bayne
24th — Matt DiBenedetto
29th — Michael McDowell
32nd — David Ragan
KEVIN HARVICK, No. 4 Jimmy John’s Ford Fusion — Qualified 2nd
TALK ABOUT YOUR QUALIFYING RUN: “We’re feeling good about qualifying well. That’s not been something that we’ve done 100% great here. We’ve qualified okay. It definitely goes a long way in helping get your day started. This is definitely a race track that can take a while to work your way up the field so you don’t want to dig yourself a hole early on. They made the car better all three rounds. We ran our fastest lap at the end. I lost a lot of time in 1 and 2. I got myself hung a little higher and longer than I needed to finish the corner. Still a good lap for us and I’m looking forward to race runs.”
WITH NASCAR CHANGING THE WAY THEY’RE LOOKING AT THE FRONT SPLITTERS, HAS THAT CHANGED ANY DATA OF WHAT YOU CAN USE IF YOUR SPLITTERS ARE DIFFERENT? “I think anytime you do something different on the car it definitely affects something else. That’s the puzzle that we work within every week. It starts from the splitter all the way to the back bumper. Ii think everybody will look at it differently as to how it has affected their car and the thing that it does and what they have to do to compensate for it. When you look at our cars we had a 7 ½ or 8- inch spoiler on them four years ago and the cars have come back to make about the same amount of downforce and drive similar. That’s the world that you live in. I think the best way to explain it and I hear them say it all the time when we talk about what used to be. The thing that you can’t do is unlearn what you’ve learned. We just have a bunch of really smart engineers that work in this garage and work every day pon making the cars faster. It’s definitely a puzzle and it’s definitely not the same. I don’t really think that the teams should be suprised of the things that happen in inspection this morning after Tuesday’s call with NASCAR. I think everybody pushes it and you have to keep pushing it until it’s not there.”
KURT BUSCH, No. 41 Monster Energy/Haas Automation Ford Fusion — Qualified 9th
“We picked up lap time each round and that’s a good checklist item to get. Our speed is a bit off. We’re struggling on entry. We’re just too tight. We’re not landing good. It’s a tough track to gauge on landing and how much packer and spring load you’re supposed to carry. Race trim will be our focus.”
CLINT BOWYER, No. 14 Haas Automation Demo Day Ford Fusion — Qualified 12th
“We were just too tight We couldn’t get the car to turn. We were good all three rounds. We kept freeing the car up and ended up getting loose off and the rear grip was down. Just a little off. Making that third round or qualifying was a positive. If we can keep knocking on that door it’s a step in the right of direction. There’s not secret that qualifying isn’t my be strong suit. I’m optimistic. It’s a fun race track. A hard fought battle out there. It’s a long race. The way practice went, we only got about 10 minutes of practice. We work on the car tomorrow and get it right for Sunday.”
RYAN BLANEY, No. 12 Menards/Duracell Ford Fusion — Qualified 14th
“We were just tight. We were loose on-entry in the first round and pretty tight on exit. We tried to do something to help the car but it just got tighter. I probably didn’t do the best job either. We’ve got some work to do.”
PAUL MENARD, No. 21 Motorcraft/Quick Lane Tire and Auto Center Ford Fusion — Qualified 20th
“Yeah. Dover is a tough track to be fast at early because the track changes so much. After our practice there was some Xfinity practice and Truck practice and the track was a lot different for our qualifying. We didn’t change a whole lot. We just got really tight in qualifying. I know our car has speed, we just need to balance it out in race trim.”
