NASCAR CUP SERIES
BRISTOL MOTOR SPEEDWAY
FOOD CITY SUPERMARKET HEROES 500
FORD PERFORMANCE DRIVER – POST RACE QUOTES
SUNDAY, MAY 31, 2020
BRAD KESELOWSKI TAKES MUSTANG TO VICTORY LANE AT BRISTOL
- Brad Keselowski won his second race of the season today.
- The win is the 32nd of his Cup Series career and 23rd with Ford.
- The win is Mustang’s fifth of the season in nine starts.
- Today’s win is Ford’s 691st all-time in NASCAR Cup Series competition.
- Of Team Penske’s 75 MENCS wins with Ford, 48 have come since rejoining Ford in 2013.
FORD FINISHING RESULTS
1st – Brad Keselowski
2nd – Clint Bowyer
11th – Kevin Harvick
13th – John Hunter Nemechek
14th – Michael McDowell
15th – Ryan Newman
21st – Joey Logano
23rd – Chris Buescher
28th – BJ McLeod
29th – Aric Almirola
30th – Gray Gaulding
31st – Matt DiBenedetto
32nd – Corey LaJoie
35th – Cole Custer
BRAD KESELOWSKI, No. 2 Discount Tire Ford Mustang — VICTORY LANE INTERVIEW — RIGHT PLACE AT THE RIGHT TIME. “I think everybody on this Discount Tire Ford Mustang team is gonna go to Vegas. Is it open yet? Because things have been going our way from the luck of the draw on the qualifying to the last few laps there. We couldn’t get anything to go our way at the start of the race with cars staying out and I kept getting the bottom lane on restarts and nothing was working out and then right at the end we came in and put two tires on the left and drove up to, I guess fourth or sixth, I don’t know, something like that and put ourselves in position. I could see Joey and Chase were getting really racy there and I didn’t know what was gonna happen, but I knew if I kept my eye open something good might happen and, sure enough, it did. An incredible day. I’m so happy for the team. This was a never-give-up effort. That’s what we’re becoming as a team.”
UNEXPECTED FINISH, BUT IT’S IN YOUR FAVOR. WHAT HAPPENED? “We kind of got a Christmas present here in Bristol. We’ll take it. We’re in position and able to strike when it counted with the Discount Tire Ford Mustang. Joey and Chase got together there. I don’t know what all caused it, but we were just in position to strike and here we are in victory lane.”
HOW DOES IT FEEL TO WIN TODAY AT BRISTOL? “It’s great. Bristol is a tremendous track. I wish there were all these fans here to see it, but that’s how it goes.”
HOW ARE YOU GOING TO CELEBRATE? “I’m gonna go home and see my wife and daughter. I think she’s got some arts and crafts I’m supposed to play with her, and maybe some brownies to eat. I wish I could celebrate with my team, but you know how everything is right now. There’s so much going on in the world I’m just so thankful to get to be a race car driver and get to do this.”
JOEY LOGANO, No. 22 Autotraderl Ford Mustang — WHAT WAS YOUR TAKE? “He wrecked me. He got loose underneath me. The part that’s frustrating is that afterwards a simple apology — like be a man and come up to someone and say, ‘Hey, my bad.’ But I had to force an apology, which, to me, is childish. Anyways, man, we had a good recovery with our Autotrader Mustang and had a shot to win. That’s all you can hope for. I passed him clean. It’s hard racing at the end, I get that. It’s hard racing, but, golly, man, be a man and take the hit when you’re done with it.”
CLINT BOWYER, No. 14 Built Ford Proud Ford Mustang — HOW DID THAT HAPPEN? YOU WERE ALL OVER THE TRACK, BUT WAS THERE WHEN IT COUNTED. “We actually struggled pretty bad with our setup. I don’t know, it was floating the nose really bad up off the corner all day long. I could gain and make some ground up in the center of the corner in, and in the middle, but if I had to pass somebody and turn underneath of them I didn’t have the real estate. The outside was no man’s land for me. I couldn’t get my front end to turn at all. The 2 car hit the 6 car into me and clobbered my whole left side. I was needing that 2 car to be a little bit closer. I wasn’t gonna feel bad about moving him, but it just didn’t materialize.”
RYAN BLANEY, No. 12 Menards/Richmond Water Heaters Ford Mustang — WHAT HAPPENED? “I was running up there for a little bit. I didn’t think I was that high and all of a sudden I hit a slick spot. I was way high and that’s obviously not where I wanted to be, but I didn’t think I was that high getting in there. It might have just been trying to get too much and got in the marbles and spun out. I thought we were gonna be okay and then we got destroyed about six seconds later, so that’s just Bristol and a part of Bristol. I probably shouldn’t have been pushing that hard, but trying to get back to the lead. I thought we found some speed up there, just a mistake on my part. I hate it for Menards and Richmond and everybody on this 12 team. After having two strong weeks, you go and you wreck not even halfway, so that’s just a bummer. We’ll go to Atlanta and see what we can do.”
WHAT DID TY DILLON SAY TO YOU? “Just how he was trying to get slowed up. It’s just one of them things at Bristol. Things happen fast and just couldn’t get slowed up enough and turn and miss me. I think we’re both out of it, but I shouldn’t have been sitting there sideways on the track anyway. That stinks, but I thought we were gonna be okay and just can’t seem to avoid things here. It’s hard to do, but I hate it for everybody on our crew. We had a good car and I just kind of overstepped it and cost us.”
COLE CUSTER, No. 41 HaasTooling.com Ford Mustang — “Well, that stinks. We were getting our car a lot better and then caught up in the wreck. Just so little time to react so you get caught up in them pretty easily here at Bristol. That’s just how it is here. I thought our HaasTooling.com Ford Mustang was getting a lot better. I felt like we could’ve run in the top-10. We were a lot better than where we were running. We were going forward but our pit stall wasn’t helping us either. We were getting blocked in about every time and that hurt us too. We’ll move on to the next one, but man, I thought we were going to have a good day here.”
ARIC ALMIROLA, No. 10 Smithfield Ford Mustang — “Man. We had such a good car today. We would have had a shot at a top-three finish. That’s Bristol. I felt like I had a tire going down at one point, so we pitted and even came back to the top-10 from that pretty quickly. We had a loose-wheel later and had to pit under caution that put us 10th. We were definitely making our way back towards the front and had a promising finish if we didn’t get caught up there. It looked like the 19 got into me. The car just took off towards the wall and we were done. I hate it for this Smithfield Ford team. We’re flirting on the edge of some really good runs. The good news is we came to Bristol with a setup that can win, so we’ll have confidence coming back.”
