Ford Racing Notes and Quotes
NASCAR Cup Series
Anduril 250 Media Availability — Naval Base Coronado
Friday, June 19, 2026
Brad Keselowski, driver of the No. 6 BuildSubmarines.com Ford Mustang Dark Horse for RFK Racing, held a press conference today at Naval Base Coronado before practice to talk about this weekend’s inaugural event.
BRAD KESELOWSKI, No. 6 BuildSubmarines.com Ford Mustang Dark Horse – YOU GOT TO TAKE A TOUR OF A SUBMARINE YESTERDAY. WHAT DOES THAT SPONSORSHIP MEAN FOR THIS WEEKEND? “I’ve had a chance to work with the United States Navy off and on now for the last 18-19 years, and I got to come to this island in 2008 and went underway on the Asheville, which is a nuclear submarine. It’s a little bit full circle to be back here for a NASCAR race. It’s not something I would have had on my bingo card in 2008, but I’m still glad to be here for it. This year, our partnership isn’t directly with the Navy, but indirectly with Build Submarines, which is a huge initiative for the Navy to build the submarines that they need to keep up for the fighting force that’s required for tomorrow’s Navy. They gave me a chance to go on the Greeneville, which was great. I met the crew and the commanding officer and all those guys and had a chance to engage with them. Of course, they think it’s really neat that there’s a NASCAR race in their backyard, which is great. We think it’s really cool that they get to work on a nuclear submarine, so we’re trading some envies, but the weekend itself is just so unique. It means a lot to our military. I think what I see in this weekend is obviously a chance to race and do what we love to do, but also to celebrate our country and the military by being really integrated with them in ways that we’ve never, at least in my time in the sport, done before. So, a lot of opportunities this weekend to celebrate and to have a good time and do innovative things for our sport and for our military that hopefully leave a lasting impression for years to come.”
WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO YOU PERSONALLY TO COMPETE ON A BASE LIKE THIS WHEN YOU HAVE FAMILY MEMBERS WHO HAVE SERVED? “I had some family that served. My cousin served and was based very close to here, so that was a neat story to talk to him about when they announced the race. A lot of respect for our military and what they do. I will tell you that all of them have told me if there’s a place to be stationed, this is one of the best, so there’s that going for it. But I was very fortunate to make a career in motorsports and to be where I’m at and do the things I’ve gotten to do. There was a time where I wasn’t sure that was possible, and I certainly had some thoughts of being able to do some things with the military never knowing what that would be. I’m thankful my life and career turned out where it is, but certainly have a lot of respect for those that have made the choice to serve and are willing to do those things that our country needs to provide our freedoms to do events like this. I always think about our sport and its founding from 1948 and a lot of World War II veterans, people who have served and how deep that runs in the blood of our sport, and how there will always be a connection. You hear the moonshine connection all the time and not that that’s not accurate. There’s certainly a lot of truth to that, but I think of the military connection as being one and the same with those who had served and came back from combat and World War II and decided to create our sport and to professionalize it. So I really respect that heritage of our sport and I respect the fact that this sport hasn’t lost that, that it keeps that legacy going and in some ways has even, at least in my time, heightened its connection to the military and kind of that legend.”
THE LAST THREE WEEKENDS HAVE BEEN DIFFICULT FOR YOUR TEAM. HOW DO YOU GO INTO THIS WEEKEND KNOWING IT’S GOING TO BE HARD FOR EVERYONE? “The last four weeks have been kind of hell for the 6 team, for sure. Nothing has gone right. We’ve caught a lot of bad breaks and made some of our own along the way, so we’re eager to correct that cycle. I’m fully expecting this to be a very, very high attrition race weekend for all three series. You’ve probably already seen that with the trucks practicing and qualifying. We’re not immune to that if we’re not careful. We can only control certain aspects, but we need to control them and be running at the end for sure.”
CHRIS BUESCHER SIGNED AND EXTENSION THIS WEEK. WHAT DOES HE BRING TO THIS ORGANIZATION? “Chris right now is obviously a cornerstone of our company. He’s delivered results. He puts us in a position to win and compete that I’m really proud of. He’s doing all the work he needs to do to be successful. He’s taken his lumps, paid a lot of dues, and we just want to give him the best car we can give him so he can win races. There was a lot of competition for Chris and a lot of teams in the garage area that wanted him. It was not a layup for us to re-sign him, but we feel fortunate that he felt our commitment was strong enough to want to stay with us.”
YOU HAVE BEEN COMPLIMENTARY OF PRIME AND ITS COVERAGE. WHAT HAVE THEY DONE FOR NASCAR? “I think Amazon has come in with a fresh set of eyes and they’ve really brought something to our sport. Certainly, we can find any issues to pick them apart with, but I’m really proud of their flexibility and really proud of their professionalism and willingness to push our sport and the other broadcast partners to be better. I think they’ve been very good for our sport. I have a lot of empathy for them because I think when it was announced that NASCAR was gonna have a three-headed media rights deal between broadcast, cable and streaming, there were a number of people that came down on Amazon and there was a lot of negative sentiment, and I think they somewhat took that to heart and have made sure they delivered a product that was so fantastic that that sentiment has been quickly turned down and they deserve all the credit in the world for having that mentality and executing on it.”
DID YOU GO OUT TO BALLAST POINT YESTERDAY AND ACTUALLY GET ON THE GREENEVILLE? “I did, yes sir. I got on the Greeneville and did a nice little tour, which was fantastic. I met some of the crew members and learned more about nuclear submarines. There’s a lot to learn. I’ve done a few different trips with them and been on a few submarines and every time I learn something new and fresh. It’s just an amazing piece of machinery.”
THAT’S A TOUGHER BASE TO GET ON THAN THIS ONE. “The bases have their different levels. We were very fortunate to be able to do it.”
DO VETERANS HAVE AN ADVANTAGE COMING TO A TRACK FOR THE FIRST TIME LIKE THIS, OR DO ROAD COURSE DRIVERS HAVE AN EDGE? “You mean besides Shane? I think Shane’s background is the ideal background, which is V8 Supercars. This is kind of what they do. Similar cars. Similar types of tracks. That’s really what you look for is those experiences that gives them the best opportunity to be successful for sure. Short of that, I think Trans-Am experience is pretty good. That seems to be the go-to now for the younger drivers. We’re seeing a lot of success with that, but the experience being in Cup is good, but not as good as it is having time in either one of those two series.”
IS THERE ANYTHING THAT HAS SURPRISED YOU SO FAR FROM WALKING THE TRACK OR WATCHING THE TRUCK SERIES PRACTICE AND QUALIFY? “I think all of us knew from our simulator time how the track was gonna play out, or had a great feel for it, I think. I’d say it’s very similar to that. Simulators are good, but they’re never perfect. I think that the biggest challenge as a whole with this track are the different surfaces and the grip levels that are associated with them. It appears that the tarmac area of the track has a lot less grip than we anticipated and some of the older asphalt areas probably have a little more grip than we anticipated, so that’s probably the only significant surprises for me. Like I said, we expect it to be high attrition and that seems to be playing out. I would be surprised if it’s low attrition Sunday afternoon when this race is over, but, for right now, not a lot of big surprises.”
CAN YOU TALK ABOUT WHAT YOU SEE WITH NASCAR AND THE BALANCE BETWEEN RISK VS. REWARD ON SOME OF THE TRACK DECISIONS THEY’VE MADE IN RECENT YEARS? “I think NASCAR, when I started racing in the Cup Series, was very schedule risk averse. They’d pick a set of tracks, we ran at them, maybe a date changed year to year, but basically they were all the same tracks. Occasionally, we’d add a track or two, and now it feels like the culture has just flipped 180 and we’re just major schedule innovations. I welcome that. I think it’s important for our fans, important for our industry to keep it fresh, but I also say there’s a caveat to that with certain events. I think we learned some lessons as a sport on where not to innovate. The Daytona 500 always needs to be where it is. The Southern 500 needing to be on Labor Day. Our crown jewel events feel very fixed, as they should, and our opportunities lie outside of those, and I think the sport is doing a good job of recognizing that to be the case. My bigger struggle as a whole is that when we tend to take on new venues it seems to always be road courses. I would like to see us take on new venues that are ovals and more in line with this sport’s success. There are a number of opportunities to do that, but, as a whole, I’m really on board with the idea of the sport innovating the schedule and doing so in such a way that fixes our legacy crown jewel events or cements them in while looking at the rest of the weekends as opportunities.”
YOU TALK ABOUT SOME OVALS OUT THERE YOU WOULD LIKE TO SEE. WHAT REALISTICALLY IS OUT THERE ON THE OVAL SIDE THAT NASCAR CAN GO TO? “I think that the first answer that is underway or developing is clearly the Nashville Fairgrounds. There’s a lot of energy inside the industry to make that happen. There are some challenges with local governments to execute that. There are some other opportunities that, I have to be careful because I sit on the scheduling committee. There are some other opportunities that I think are really compelling and interesting, though, that are not public and probably don’t need to be at this time.”
IT SEEMS THERE HAVE BEEN A LOT OF OTHER EVENTS AROUND THIS WEEKEND. YOU CAN’T DO THIS KIND OF THING EVERY WEEK, BUT CAN YOU TAKE A TEMPLATE FROM THIS AN APPLY IT TO SOME OTHER RACES MORE FREQUENTLY THAN IT IS NOW? “The industry is just trying to find a balance. We could not do this every weekend. I think everybody knows that. It probably still needs to be stated, but as an industry if we had to pull off weekends like this all the time, we just couldn’t do it. The cost and the workload is extreme, which doesn’t mean we don’t like doing it, and I think there’s a lot of reasons to do events like this, we just have to be in balance and find that moderation to the tracks that we know are established, dates that we know are meaningful to our fans and the ones that give us some wiggle room. I always view that as a line that you walk and sometimes you get a little too far to the left and sometimes you get a little too far to the right. I think we’re walking it reasonably well right now, but we still need to be cognizant of it.”
LOOKING BIG PICTURE, YOU HAVE THIS RACE, YOU HAD CHICAGO AND MEXICO CITY. WHAT IS NEXT? “There’s other opportunities. Stay tuned. We’ll find them, but there will be more.”
FORD ANNOUNCED THE VETERANS DAY RACE. BEING PART OF THAT GROUP, HOW SPECIAL IS THAT AND IS THERE ANY PLANS FOR YOU TO PARTICIPATE IN THAT EVENT? “Honestly, I don’t know that much about it. I read the same press release and that’s probably the extent of my knowledge at the moment, but it does seem interesting and compelling. I know Ford has some fun ideas that they’re putting out there and that one hasn’t materialized enough for me to speak articulately about, but I do respect the idea of the industry coming together to do things of that nature.”
