Ford Performance MENCS Notes and Quotes
ISM Connect 300 – New Hampshire Motor Speedway
Sunday, September 24, 2017
Ford Finishing Order:
4th – Brad Keselowski
7th – Clint Bowyer
9th – Ryan Blaney
10th – Joey Logano
15th – Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
18th – Danica Patrick
24th – Trevor Bayne
25th – Landon Cassill
26th – Aric Almirola
29th – David Ragan
31st – Matt DiBenedetto
36th – Kevin Harvick
37th – Kurt Busch
KURT BUSCH – No. 41 Haas Automation/Monster Energy Ford Fusion – THERE WAS NOWHERE TO GO. “Wow. No. I mean, I don’t know what to say. It’s tough when you’re running where we were. We were just trying to limp it to the end of stage two and I heard, ‘Car spinning off of two’ in my ear. I saw smoke up ahead. A lot of times they’ll come back up, and I tried to leave the high side or the low side and then, boom, as soon as the smoke cleared I’m looking at Harvick’s door, my teammate. We’re both running for the Playoffs and it’s a shame that the handling is off and we’re both running where we were, but we were still going to fight all the way to the end, but now we don’t have a chance. I cannot understand the bad luck that we’re having.”
DOVER IS A GOOD TRACK FOR YOU. “It’s all-in. We’ll go there with everything we’ve got like we have been. We’ve got to find the setup that will make that car cut, that will make it go through the center of the corner and carry that speed on exit and give it our best.”
KEVIN HARVICK – No. 4 Mobil 1 Ford Fusion – ANY REASON FOR THE CONTACT FROM THE 3? “I don’t know. I know as I got sideways there I tried to get thing whoa’d down and pointed in the right direction and it snapped back the other way. I tried to lock it down and it was too far up across the race track. I knew I was probably worse off at that particular point, so once it turned back right and I was in trouble I should have just tried to keep it left, but I couldn’t really tell where I was with all the smoke and everything that was happening, but just got hit from behind and spun out.”
IT SEEMED YOU MIGHT BE ABLE TO CONTINUE, BUT YOU HAD TO GET OUT OF THE CAR WHICH MEANS THE DAY IS DONE, CORRECT? “Yeah, we couldn’t get them unlocked from each other for whatever reason. The cars were locked together, so our Mobil 1 Ford was stuck and we couldn’t get her to back up anymore. I ripped reverse out of it trying to get it to go backwards and it was just stuck together.”
CLINT BOWYER – No. 14 Haas Automation Ford Fusion – “It really wasn’t a strategy race. We just kept digging and were just off a little bit. The same cars are kicking everybody’s butt every week.” WHAT DID YOU SAY TO JAMIE MCMURRAY AFTER THE RACE? “I got into him back there. I was under him and kept poking under him and it’s just a product of the VHT and having to come back across. I clipped him and didn’t mean to.”
RICKY STENHOUSE JR. – No. 17 Fifth Third Bank Ford Fusion – “I think it went as expected. It was a struggle for us all weekend. I told my guys I felt like we were in a boxing match with Floyd Mayweather all week. We just couldn’t find speed, couldn’t find the handle on the car. We made a lot of adjustments for today and was surprisingly a little bit better than we were in practice. I didn’t think we were as capable of a car to finish where we did, but we did what we needed and had some good breaks and some good pit stops and ended up gaining some points. That was our goal, so I feel really good about that. I’d say we’ve had two sub-par weeks and we’re still in this thing, so we’ll regroup and get focused and go to Dover.”
HOW DO YOU ATTACK DOVER NOW? “It makes you feel good. We needed to make up a little bit and made up a little bit at a track that I didn’t think we were that great at all weekend. We were fast at Dover, but we did blow a right-front at Dover, so we have to make sure we don’t make any mistakes – bring another fast car like we did last time and see if we can gain a few more.”
JOEY LOGANO – No. 22 Shell/Pennzoil Ford Fusion – “We worked our way up into the top 14 or 15 the first run from last and that was the highlight, and then we just kind of stayed right there around 10th the rest of the day and finished there. I don’t know, you can say if we started a little closer to the front we could hold a few of them off, but we’re just not fast enough really. I sound like a broken record, but we’re just not fast enough.”
RYAN BLANEY – No. 21 Motorcraft/Quick Lane Ford Fusion – IS THIS SOMETHING YOU CAN HANG YOUR HAT ON? “Yeah, I think so. We were kind of in that fifth to 10th range all day and we ended up with a decent finish. We worked hard on this race track. It definitely has not been one of my best, but it’s nice to see a decent run here. We finished OK and go on to a place like Dover, where we run pretty decent. Hopefully, we can survive next week and move on.”
HOW DO YOU LIKE YOUR POSITION HEADING TO DOVER? “You’re never really comfortable with your position, unless you have a win. Like I said, Dover has been a decent track for us and it’s just a matter of finishing it and seeing what we can do.”
WHAT DO YOU TAKE AWAY FROM HERE? “We just survived it. I know some people had trouble and I’m glad we stayed out of it. I had a decent run there at the end. This is one place we need to get better at and I’m proud that we did that today.”
ARE YOU DEHYDRATED? “I’m just tired at this place. I’ve always been worn out at this race track for some reason.”
HOW WOULD YOU DEFINE THE RACING? “It was good racing until the 19 just about took us out coming to the white for eighth. I don’t know why he did that. That’s twice in two weeks he’s done that to me. That wasn’t very cool, but, other than that, the race was really good. The people we were racing with in the Playoffs seemed to race each other with respect, which is nice to see.”
YOUR THOUGHTS ON DOVER. “You never know what could happen. We can break or get in a wreck, so we’ll just go and have a solid day and see what we can do.”
