Ford Performance Notes and Quotes
NASCAR Cup Series
Southern 500 Qualifying
Saturday, August 30, 2025
Ford Qualifying Results:
3rd – Josh Berry
10th – Austin Cindric
12th – Ryan Blaney
14th – Joey Logano
15th – Chris Buescher
18th – Cole Custer
24th – Zane Smith
27th – Ryan Preece
28th – Todd Gilliland
32nd – Brad Keselowski
34th – Noah Gragson
36th – Cody Ware
38th – Timmy Hill
JOSH BERRY, No. 21 Motorcraft/Quick Lane Ford Mustang Dark Horse – “I’m super proud of that effort. Our big focus was trying to qualify better here and the guys did a great job. I feel like our car is really strong and I’m excited for tomorrow. The biggest thing I feel like I’ve fought here is starting position, so starting up front I think we can just manage the race easier and obviously score some stage points. That’s going to be important, so just having a mistake-free day by taking care of the car and having good pit stops will help keep us in the hunt.”
AUSTIN CINDRIC, No. 2 Discount Tire Ford Mustang Dark Horse – “It was a solid day. I feel like I left a little bit out there for my qualifying lap, but, overall, I had really good long run speed. I feel like we have a good window of where to work on our Discount Tire Ford Mustang for 500 miles. It takes total focus and total execution for the whole race. It’s one of our longest and most mentally challenging of the year, so we were able to step through everything today with good execution. I’m happy with that, but tomorrow is a big goal.”
RYAN PREECE, No. 60 Trimble Ford Mustang Dark Horse –WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS NOW AFTER LAST WEEK DIDN’T WORK OUT FOR YOU? ”We spent the last two months trying to put yourself in position, but, at the same time, worried about points in case that cut line was never moved up. Now, it’s just try to win.”
WHAT IS THE BIGGEST THING YOU LEARNED ABOUT YOURSELF THIS YEAR? “There’s a lot of things, but, at the same time, it’s just been a nice change. I feel like there’s a whole bunch of things. I feel like Derrick’s done a great job leading this team. Brad did a great job, along with Josh Sell and everybody over there to put together a solid team for us. We went out and I feel like, for a first year team, we executed really well. Outside of winning right now, I feel like we’re hitting lot of the things that we need to hit on and I would say the last 10 races is all about continuing to build momentum for next year. We’ve put ourselves in position to capitalize, it just didn’t work out.”
DO YOU FEEL LIKE THIS SEASON CAN STILL BE VIEWED AS A SUCCESS FOR THE 60 TEAM? “First off, I think it’s really challenging with the way the format is. Look at Chris, he was top 10 in points and didn’t make the playoffs because he didn’t win a race yet. If you looked at Dale Jarrett or Bobby Labonte in the 2000s and said, ‘Hey, man. You finished 10th in points, would you consider this a successful year?’ What would you say? I don’t know. It just depends. For me, I think we have goals that we want to accomplish and, don’t get me wrong, going into the season we all said it wouldn’t be successful if we didn’t make the playoffs. We had to win, but this is the situation we’re in and we still have 10 races moving forward to do that.”
