Ford Performance Notes and Quotes
NASCAR Cup Series
Toyota Owners 400 | Sunday, April 2, 2023
Ford Finishing Results:
5th – Kevin Harvick
6th – Michael McDowell
7th – Joey Logano
10th – Brad Keselowski
12th – Chase Briscoe
13th – Aric Almirola
15th – Todd Gilliland
18th – Ryan Preece
19th – Harrison Burton
26th – Ryan Blaney
28th – Austin Cindric
30th – Chris Buescher
34th – Cody Ware
36th – JJ Yeley
KEVIN HARVICK, No. 4 GEARWRENCH Ford Mustang – “We didn’t have a very smooth day and the car didn’t really do anything that I wanted it to do to have a shot at winning, but we fought hard all day. We were definitely expecting to be a little bit better, but that’s the way it goes.”
WHAT DID YOU THINK ABOUT THIS NEW SHORT TRACK PACKAGE HERE? “I don’t think there was really any difference, honestly, compared to a lot of the things that we had last year. I think we definitely handled a little bit worse than we did at the last race here, but there was a lot different on the car, too.”
MICHAEL MCDOWELL, No. 34 Love’s Travel Stops Ford Mustang – “I think the strategy was a good call. A lot of that was our car was really good on the long run and I think we were gonna be 15th or 16th, so you might as well go for it and see if you can’t come up with something good and it worked out. I thought it was a great call by Travis Peterson. The Love’s Ford Mustang was pretty good all day. We needed a little bit more speed on the front end and not lose so much track position early on, but the long run speed was great. Had a couple of those runs gone a little longer, I think we would have actually been a little bit better yet, so I’m proud of everybody. Phoenix was a good race for us and this obviously being a good race, so I feel like our short track program is turning the corner, at least I hope so. I’m optimistic about that.”
JOEY LOGANO, No. 22 Shell/Pennzoil Ford Mustang – “We had a really good car. Our Mustang was fast, maybe definitely could have won. It felt pretty good. That loose wheel set us back, but it was so early in the race we thought we could recover. We started to recover and did recover, and then we were trying to split it halfway and get the track position, but we had two untimely cautions that just didn’t work out for us. Typical Richmond it does work out, but more cautions today than typical.”
THOUGHTS ON THE PACKAGE? “I thought it was a fun race. I had fun. It’s a tricky track. It’s fun. It’s one of my favorite tracks, probably my favorite track to run and manage your tires and when you run hard and all that it’s really fun for the driver. It’s probably the most fun track for the driver.”
ARIC ALMIROLA, No. 10 Smithfield Ford Mustang – “We struggled a little bit. I feel like this is one of my better places and I just thought we were a little bit off of where we needed to be. We’ve got some work to do before we come back, but proud to finally get out of a race with a decent day where we didn’t have anything catastrophic happen. We didn’t have everything go perfectly, but we were able to get out of here with a race car that’s still in one piece and go forward from here. Hopefully, this is the start to turning our season around.
CHASE BRISCOE, No. 14 Mahindra Tractors Ford Mustang – “We were just like a 12th-place car all day. The whole day we ran between 10th and 15th and just kind of depended on restarts and pit road. That kind of determined where we would fall out. The long run speed wasn’t probably as good as what we needed it to be, and our short run speed was kind of just OK to kind of hang on, so for how our season has been going this was honestly a good day – just to kind of run 10th to 15th all day long and not have anything crazy happen. I’m looking forward to next week going to the dirt track for sure.”
