Ford Performance Notes and Quotes
NASCAR Cup Series
Xfinity 500 (Martinsville Speedway)
Sunday, October 31, 2021
FORD FINISHING RESULTS
3rd — Brad Keselowski
6th — Aric Almirola
9th — Chris Buescher
10th — Joey Logano
11th — Ryan Blaney
12th — Kevin Harvick
15th — Matt DiBenedetto
20th — Anthony Alfredo
22nd — Chase Briscoe
23rd — Cole Custer
26th — Michael McDowell
29th — BJ McLeod
32nd — Ryan Newman
35th — Josh Bilicki
BRAD KESELOWSKI, No. 2 Dent Wizard Ford Mustang — “We gave it all we had. We just needed to be a little bit faster in stage two to get us a handful of points and be closer, and then at the end I was just too loose. I just couldn’t quite get it perfectly tweaked in, but, all in all, a pretty good run.”
DESCRIBE THE LAST FEW LAPS. “We all just threw everything we had at it and nobody really had anything for the Hendrick and Gibbs cars. I felt we were getting closer at the end. Jeremy Bullins and the team really dialed the thing in as close as we could get, but that was just all we had.”
WERE YOU GOING TO TRY TO MOVE BOWMAN ON THE RESTART? “He was so much faster. I mean, he pulled two car lengths from me through the gears, so I was gonna need a lot more help under the hood if I was gonna move Bowman, so we’ve got a lot of work to do for next year.”
HOW TOUGH WAS IT FOR YOU TODAY? “It was a race. I wouldn’t say it was anything out of the ordinary — a little bit warmer than normally in the fall, but nothing big.”
WHAT ABOUT THE CONTACT WITH THE 18 AFTER THE RACE? “I don’t know what he was thinking. I don’t know if he’s mad at himself, mad at me. I don’t sweat that.”
IT SEEMED WITH 50 TO GO YOU REALLY GOT MOVING. “We were throwing everything we had at it. Jeremy Bullins got the car the best it had been, but it just wasn’t good enough.”
RYAN BLANEY, No. 12 Menards/Richmond Ford Mustang — HOW FRUSTRATING WAS IT? “It was definitely frustrating. I was looking forward to today a lot. We had one run where I thought we got going pretty good and drove up into the top 10 and made an adjustment and went right back to where it was. It was kind of a head scratcher today. I wish I could tell you where we missed it at, but I appreciate all the hard work from everybody today. It just wasn’t quite enough.”
DID THE DAMAGE EARLY HURT YOU? “I was going backwards before the damage anyways, so I don’t really think that played a huge role in it.”
WHAT DID YOU NEED? “It was definitely a disappointing day. We started off kind of good and never really got better. We had one run I thought we kind of went forward and then we made a change to try and make it better and it got worse, so I don’t know. I’d love to tell you what kind of went wrong, but we weren’t really any different than where we’ve been here the last three times, just small little tiny changes, but we were just way off today. It’s disappointing for sure. I was really looking forward to today’s race just knowing how strong we run here and it just wasn’t quite enough today and kind of missed it by a long shot. I appreciate everyone sticking with it all day and trying to get better, but it just wasn’t quite enough.”
DID THE DAMAGE HURT EARLY? “I was backing up before that. I don’t know what the 3’s got running into me right now, but apparently he likes it. But that didn’t play any role.”
IS IT BETTER TO LOSE BY A LONG SHOT UNLIKE THE WAY KYLE BUSCH DID? “Losing is losing. I don’t care if you miss it by one point or 20, I mean, it stinks no matter what. It sucks we don’t get to race for a championship at Phoenix, but I appreciate the year everyone has put together and we have one more shot to get Todd another victory. Hopefully, we can do that for him before he hangs it up.”
JOEY LOGANO, No. 22 Shell Pennzoil Ford Mustang — “We just weren’t fast enough. We couldn’t get the car to turn. It was just a struggle all day. We tried different things, but the car just wouldn’t fire off good and ultimately at the end you had to fire off good and we didn’t have that either. We tried compromising to try and make everything better, but all that is is a compromise. The guys that win aren’t compromising and it just wasn’t there.”
HOW WAS YOUR DAY? “It was mediocre. That’s all we were today. We struggled with being tight in two-thirds and tried to fix it. It was kind of the wrong way, so we tried a different way and got closer, but even at that we were just kind of compromising our balance to get decent. Our fire off speed was not very good, which was also a struggle, especially at the end with all those refires at the end. We just didn’t fire off fast enough.”
HOW WOULD YOU SUM TODAY UP? “Not the best of days. Nothing really worked out. The strategy piece that we tried worked out fairly well, but we just weren’t fast enough to really stay towards the front and really do much. It’s kind of a bummer. You go out there in a must-win situation and can’t even see the front most of the day, so we just missed it.”
HOW TOUGH IS THAT TO GO 500 LAPS AND YOU KNOW YOU CAN’T DO ANYTHING ABOUT IT? “You just keep swinging at it. You don’t say there’s nothing you can do about it. It’s never over til it’s over. You keep swinging at the car and trying things. You saw what was going on at the end of the race. Anything could happen being in the right place at the right time, but we were just too far back to be in the right place.”
IS THAT BETTER TO NOT MAKE IT THE WAY YOU DID OR LIKE KYLE BUSCH, GETTING SPUN OUT AND LOSING IT THE LAST COUPLE OF LAPS? “Losing is losing. I don’t think it matters how it happens. Whether you’re close or you lose by a lot, I think they both sting.”
