Ford Performance NXS Notes and Quotes
Kansas Lottery 300 – Kansas Speedway
Saturday, October 17, 2015
Ford Finishing Results
3rd – Joey Logano
6th – Chris Buescher
11th – Darrell Wallace Jr.
12th – Elliott Sadler
17th – Ryan Reed
20th – Dakoda Armstrong
JOEY LOGANO – No. 22 Discount Tire Ford Mustang – “We were really bad. I don’t think there’s any way to put it any better than that. We were a seventh or eighth-place car and that was it. We never had any speed, so taking a third-place out of today is what we’ve got to do. That’s good for the owner’s championship. We’ve got a nice cushion and we need to continue keeping a decent-sized cushion like we did today. We lost a little bit. We gained some on the 60 and lost some on the 54, but overall that’s what we had to do. We really just want to win. We raced really hard and restarted there sixth at the end. I was able to get three real quick, but that was kind of it.”
ELLIOTT SADLER – No. 1 OneMain Financial Ford Mustang – “We can’t seem to keep the car off the splitter. We have a really hard time with that and when you’ve got to go on restarts and you’re killing the splitter, you just can’t go anywhere. You’re really just in the way and I was just in the way. It’s a shame. I did not want to see that caution come out. I knew we were gonna be in big, big trouble with a restart. It’s just not the finish we wanted today.”
CHRIS BUESCHER – No. 60 AdvoCare Ford Mustang – WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO HAVE A TOP-6 RUN HERE? “It definitely helps. This is a place where we’ve had speed several times and I just haven’t been able to get it done. It’s kind of like Darlington. It’s my favorite race track, but we couldn’t get the finishes and finally did this year. That’s been the name of the game – consistency. We need to go out here and we need to knock down these top-5’s really. When you look at the points battle, they can get one or two points a weekend but that’s just not gonna cut it in the end.”
RYAN REED – No. 16 Lilly/American Diabetes Association Ford Mustang – “We started off horrible. We were really loose to start the race and then about halfway Chad got the thing tightened up. We took the wavearound and were actually pretty fast. I felt like we were running some top-10 lap times and the car got pretty decent. We drove up to 12th or 13th and then pitted on that last stop to put on tires. We felt like we could trap a few of those guys because we were the last car on the lead lap, but on the last restart we ran out of fuel. The thing stumbled and that was unfortunate, but I felt like the guys did a good job of making adjustments throughout the race. I’m proud of the they battled back to put us in position for a decent finish.”
CHRIS BUESCHER PRESS CONFERENCE
CHRIS BUESCHER – No. 60 AdvoCare Mustang – “It was an eventful day. I’ve got a couple things I’ve got to clean up on my end. The pit road speeding penalty was not helping anything, so trying to make up that and then stalled it once leaving pit road and those are things I’ve got to do better with, but the guys did a nice job. The car was pretty good all day. We were a top-5 car and just had to use up a lot to try and get back up there, and was not looking for that last yellow. That last restart we got a good start and got down in the corner, but just got real tight right behind the 3, so didn’t end up exactly where we wanted, but, overall, it was a good day for us. It was a good points day, as much as I hate to just talk about points days, but it’s the best run we’ve had here at Kansas and best mile-and-a-half we’ve had in a while, so I’m glad our program is getting better there.”
DO YOU FEEL LIKE YOU CONTROL YOUR DESTINY OVER THE LAST THREE RACES AND FEEL LIKE IF YOU RUN THE WAY YOU HAVE THAT YOU SHOULD WIN THE TITLE? “Ultimately, yes. It’s up to us to go out here and run top-5 and, if not, as close as possible to that for these last three. If we can do that, then they’re not gonna get there. When they run within one or two spots of us like they have the past couple weeks, that’s also not gonna help them get to where they need to be. So from that aspect, yes, we need to focus on our own racing – worry about ourselves and go out there and make sure we have days like we have the last several weeks. We’ve had top-10s the last four or five weeks here, maybe a little further, but that’s gonna be a big thing for us. We’ve got to go into Texas, which has been a pretty good track for us. I feel pretty good about that one. Going to Phoenix and that’s gonna be a place where we just need to make sure we end up with a top-10 and as far up as possible, and then Homestead was a track where I actually felt really good at last year. We had a top-5 there at the end of the year and was starting to get something that was working for us, so we’ll see. It’s gonna be tough all the way to the end, but every point is gonna count. If we can keep them right where they’re at right now, there’s a pretty good chance we can get it.”
THE INITIAL START SAW YOU GET SANDWICHED. DID THAT SURPRISE YOU AND WERE YOU WORRIED THE CAR MAY HAVE HAD SOME DAMAGE? “It’s not surprising. We go through that on starts and restarts every week. Everyone is so desperate to get all they can right there and right then and now, and it’s led to a lot of torn-up equipment this year. Surprised? No. Frustrated? Yeah. I thought that was a little bit ridiculous to be that early in the race on lap one to try and do that. The damage is what it is. It wasn’t smoking. It wasn’t hard enough contact where we thought we’d have any issues with tires. I’m not really concerned about it, it was just early.”
