Ford Racing Notes and Quotes
NASCAR Cup Series
YellaWood 500 Qualifying — Talladega Superspeedway
Saturday, October 24, 2026
Ford Qualifying Results:
5th – Chris Buescher
16th – Joey Logano
19th – Ryan Preece
21st – Josh Berry
22nd – Brad Keselowski
27th – Ryan Blaney
28th – Austin Cindric
31st – Zane Smith
35th – Todd Gilliland
39th – Noah Gragson
CHRIS BUESCHER, No. 17 Kroger Ford Mustang Dark Horse – “That’s solid. We had a lot of speed here today. I know it’s single car, but it translated really well at Daytona, so I’m proud of everybody to be able to go into the second round and have a shot at this thing. I’m not sure how far we missed it by, but we were there. I’m proud of everybody. We’ll take this Thomas’ Protein English Muffins Ford and be up in sight of everything that we want to see. We’ll be in good shape for tomorrow. This track has been good to us. It’s kicked us in the throat a few times, but we’ve been running well when it’s happened, so I’m looking forward to it.” A LOT OF QUESTIONS ABOUT THE CHANGE IN PACKAGE. WILL WE SEE MUCH DIFFERENCE? “I hope we have some handling. I do. We didn’t get past stage one in Daytona, but everything was going well until it wasn’t. We’re leaning on our teammates a little bit for that info. I felt like even though it went into night time, Daytona still had some handling come into play. That gives us hope and some confidence that we’re gonna be in good shape here. I hope it’s enough to really make it a problem at Talladega – a good problem. This place is so big. The corners are so banked, so much radius around. It’s been quite a while since we’ve had any real balance issues here, so hopefully this is the start of something more fun.”
JOEY LOGANO, No. 22 Shell/Pennzoil Ford Mustang Dark Horse – YOU HAVE A FULL BASKETBALL TEAM AT HOME. “Yeah, we’ve got a full team now, for sure. We’ve been blessed to be able to do that. The facts are there are a lot of great kids out there that need a home and need somebody to love them and hug on them and tell them about their potential. We’ve had a lot of people that pushed us along to do it and we’ve always came up with reasons why it was too hard and we weren’t ready and all that, and, really, a lot of that is just in our head. It’s tough, but it’s easier than we made it out to be, and I think it’s like that in life a lot of times. So, if you’re thinking about it, do it. I think that’s the message. That’s why I’m talking about it more than anything is just try to encourage others to do the same thing.”
WHAT MAKES IT SPECIAL? “Where do you want to start? You’re giving a couple kids the opportunity to become whatever they want to be, and I think that’s probably the most rewarding part, but also seeing my biological children and how they have shown how big their hearts are. I’ve always kind of wondered about my kids sometimes because when you’re home you always see how your kids can sometimes do things that push you to the edge, but to see how opening they’ve been about helping – they share rooms now and they’ve got to share all their stuff now. It’s just a different life and they’ve been great. My wife is the super hero of this. I feel bad that I get any credit. I shouldn’t get much at all. Really, the kids should get the most of it because they go through the most. It was a very special moment there in the courthouse because the last time they were there was a really bad experience for them, so walking into the same room with a really awesome experience like this was a real tear jerker. I told everyone that we had to rehydrate after that day. There were a lot of tears.”
SO ARE YOU A THREE-TIME CHAMPION OR A FIVE-TIME CHAMPION? “Yeah, I know. I had a trophy for every kid before. Now, I’ve got to win a couple more (laughing). Uh oh.”
CAN YOU EXPAND ON HOW BRITTANY HAS LED THAT PROCESS? “To start, anyone who has gone down this road before they understand that just becoming a foster parent is hard to do like getting your license and all the classes and all the things you’ve got to do. A lot of paperwork. It’s a lot. It’s too much to be honest with you, but it’s a lot. So, that process is a big deal and then getting the placement and then going through the adoption paperwork. Brittany did all the paperwork. She’s done all of it. Like I said, I can’t take much credit. I’d go home and I’d shut racing off and I’d say, ‘What do you need me to do, honey.’ And that’s when I plug in. If that’s playing with the kids or helping around the house cleaning up, whatever it may be, I do it. You’ve got to think that we’re gone a lot and we don’t hire help. We want to raise our own kids, so she’s really doing a lot of it with the school work and all that stuff too. They go to a hybrid type school, so there’s a lot going on. She’s a super woman.”
HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT THIS SMALLER SPOILER CHANGE? IS THERE STILL EXCITEMENT THERE? “Yeah. I think there are still a lot of unknowns on how the draft is gonna work out here at Talladega. Daytona and Talladega are completely different and even if it was the same rules package as we had at Daytona, Talladega is still gonna race differently. So, I think the things I’m looking for more than anything are just the lanes themselves. The third lane has always been pretty touchy here. It could work, but it also more than likely it takes kind of a perfect storm to make it grow. How does this package affect that? Does it make it better or worse? That’s kind of one of the first things I’m looking for when the race starts.”
DO YOU LOOK AT TALLADEGA AS AN OPPORTUNITY TO DO SOMETHING OR ARE YOU MORE DEFENSIVE AND DON’T WANT TO SCREW UP EVERYTHING? “I would say let’s not screw it up if we were 44 points ahead. Instead, we’re 44 points behind and you’ve got to attack at that point. We’ve got to get points every stage and we’ve got to go out there and be in contention to win this thing at the end of the day. It’s just the facts of where we are with three races left and 44 back and you’re sixth. It’s one thing if we were second and 44 back, which we have a lot of cars in front of us we’ve got to pass to do that too. It’s close and it’s very achievable. We definitely can do it, but you can’t afford to be much further back than where we are right now and realistically think you’re gonna pull this off.”
