Ford Racing Notes and Quotes
NASCAR Cup Series
Ford Racing Media Zoom Call
Wednesday, July 15, 2026
Ryan Preece, driver of the No. 60 RFK Racing Ford Mustang Dark Horse, is currently in a battle to qualify for the NASCAR Cup Series Chase, which will begin at Darlington Raceway on Sept. 6. Preece goes into this weekend’s race at North Wilkesboro Speedway in 18th place, 26 points below the cut line for the final spot. He spoke about that and Sunday’s first points race at the track in 30 years during a Ford media call this morning.
RYAN PREECE, No. 6 RKF Racing Ford Mustang Dark Horse – IS THIS A BIG OPPORTUNITY FOR RFK TO CAPITALIZE ON ALL OF THESE SHORT TRACKS COMING UP? “Yeah. I’m biased, for sure, when it comes to short track racing and the racing that it provides, especially with the way the tire and all of that has gone. So, I feel really good about it. North Wilkesboro, Iowa, New Hampshire, those are all places that I’ve had success at and I look forward to going to, and I feel like attrition and taking care of your tires and the things you learn throughout the steps to get to Cup level, these are where they really come into play. I did a little bit of studying last night watching the Open and the All-Star last year and what you’re gonna really have to focus on, so one week at a time and feeling prepared.”
DO YOU EXPECT A LOT OF ATTRITION THIS WEEK WITH A LONGER THAN USUAL NWS RACE AND A BIGGER FIELD? “Yes. I think that there’s nowhere to hide at North Wilkesboro. It’s not Bristol, but it’s very similar. In the pack, the front of the pack is gonna be coming. The nice part that we saw in the All-Star and in the Open is it got really wide, so we’re not gonna hear, I mean dirty air is a thing, there’s just a lot of groove at North Wilkesboro to navigate and try and get out of somebody’s way can make speed, so with that comes the potential of guys lapping very quickly and if you’re struggling, it’s gonna be a long, long day.”
WHAT IS THE DYNAMIC IN THE CUP SERIES RIGHT NOW WITH WHAT DRIVERS SHOULD AND SHOULDN’T SAY ON THE RADIO OR RESPECT ON THE RACETRACK? “That’s a great question. Listen, everybody on this call as well as a lot of people who know who I am as a race car driver, and, really, the way I was raised to be and race. By no means am I saying I’m a saint because I’ve made mistakes like many, many others. I think the thing for me is I race on the racetrack with a level of respect. I came into the Cup Series and I really didn’t want to get into Martin Truex or your Kevin Harvicks, your Denny Hamlins. Like, you made it a point to not do anything stupid around them so that when you were racing around them you felt like you earned a level of respect back. So, for me, I race people the way I want to be raced. Now, can I take my gloves off and get rough? The background that I come from racing against the Ted Christophers and the many others from the weekly side up here in the northeast, yeah, I’m fully capable of getting rough and doing those things, it’s just that you don’t need to do that. So, for me, I don’t know how to correctly answer this, to be honest with you, but I would agree a lot with what I guess Chase said about you’re punished for honesty and not punished for lying. For me, I know how I want to be as a race car driver. I know how I want to be raced and if you race me like I feel like we all should, there’s not gonna be any problems, but I do believe in the best way that we as a sport need to be is – you’re not gonna hook somebody down the straightaway. You’re not gonna do those things, but what I’ve seen over the past few years is accidents and somebody saying that, ‘Hey, man, I made a mistake.’ At the end of the day, when somebody gets out and apologizes and it repeatedly happens, it’s not OK, so the guy who ends up getting wrecked is really just, how do you ever end up getting that one back? I’m not sure, so I think, yes, there’s a lot of things that I’m unsure about, especially over the past week, but all eyes are focused on North Wilkesboro and going into that, race hard. This is my background. That’s why I’m going up to Stafford Speedway tonight racing with a lot of these guys and rub nerf bars.”
WHAT IS YOUR THOUGHT ON A CARSON HOCEVAR, WHO PEOPLE LOVE THE AGGRESSIVENESS BUT ON THE OTHER SIDE YOU HAVE THE VETERANS AND OTHERS WHO KNOW HE GETS TIED UP IN STUFF. “Here’s what I’m gonna say, Carson and I have certainly had our run-ins. There definitely have been times where we won’t have a run-in and I think to myself when I watch I’m like, ‘OK, maybe he’s figuring it out.’ Carson hasn’t done anything wrong to me since Texas last year, and I feel like him and I have an understanding right now, so I’m not gonna come in here and slam him at all because I feel like he’s earning my respect back. But, what I will say is when I see him do things to others, it’s harder to keep gaining that respect and to be treated like you want to be raced a certain way one day, you’ve got to earn it. As much as he’s entertaining for the fans, I would agree with Denny that you’re not racing the fans, you’re racing us and we’re all very, very capable of doing some of the things that he does and I’m sure with time, maturity, age, he’ll figure it out, but how much time? That’s the question.”
YOU WERE 13 POINTS ABOVE THE CUT TWO WEEKS AGO AND NOW YOU ARE 26 BEHIND. HOW ARE YOU FEELING NOW? “I’m fine. I’m going to three short tracks, Indianapolis, where we finished really well last year and Daytona, my favorite place that I’m gonna try to keep all four tires on the ground. For me, like you said, 26 or 28 or whatever, I don’t know, to me I look at every week as an opportunity to go out and have strong runs and ultimately you go out and get a lot of stage points and a win or top five, you’re talking about being above the cut line. It took two weeks to get plus-13 or plus-whatever, so I’m looking at it for sure, but all it is is just helping me understand what our goal needs to be that week. Right now, I don’t want good luck, I don’t want bad luck, I don’t want any luck. I just want to have a solid week and North Wilkesboro is a place that we can do that, so I feel good about it. In owner’s points we’re only about two points or whatever it is out, so we’re gonna work hard to get back above that cut line.”
WHEN YOU LOOK AT THE POINTS EVERY WEEK ARE YOU STRESSED OR IS IT JUST WHAT PROFESSIONAL SPORTS IS? “You just answered it. It’s what professional sports is. I’m used to the highs of highs and the lows of lows and I’ll be honest with you, nothing in life – I’ve been through championship battles, I’ve done all that. Just because I’m racing to get in the Chase, this isn’t any different from the feeling of when you’re 22 years old and at the time the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour is your Cup Series and you’re in an absolute grind with whoever it is you’re racing. We’ve been through these scenarios before, it’s just that this one is on a national stage. When I think back to 2017, I risked a lot of money financially to bet on myself, so I’m used to it. I’m numb to it. So, moving forward, every week is an opportunity to go out and succeed. I love when people bet against me. That’s what I live for, so I’m looking forward to the next few weeks.”
DID YOU LEARN ANY SPECIFIC LESSON COMING THROUGH THE RANKS THAT SHAPED THE WAY YOU SEE SITUATIONS? “I think a lot of it comes from your background or the style of racing. Everybody looks at me as a modified guy. I was born and raised in the northeast and that’s primarily what I raced when I was 15 years old and on, but before that I raced micros on dirt a little bit. I raced out in Indianapolis at the Indianapolis Speedrome in a Kenyon midget and I ran some midget stuff, so the open-wheel background of you try not to hit each other because you go flying is something that’s engrained in me, but, to the flip side, I grew up in the northeast where I raced against Ted Christopher, Keith Rocco, Woody Pitkat, Doug Coby, Ron Silk and many other guys that it’s a battle, where nerf bars are used to move people out of the way. You don’t use what we call the chrome horn, but it’s there. I kind of prided myself for 2011 and so on that we wouldn’t replace bumpers. I went an entire season with the same front bumper on the car, so, yes, I’ve gone through lessons. I remember what we call using somebody up – when you driver it into the corner and have no intention of giving them a lane through the outside and you just kind of move up and take it on him. It’s like the northeast slide job the only difference is you’re not sliding in front of him, you’re sliding with him. They joke that eight tires are better than four. Well, I did that to Ted Christopher in 2011 and he completely moved me the next corner, and I lost more than I gained by trying to go by him that time. There was that. There was Mike Stefanik. In 2009 at the Ice Breaker, and this is almost 20 years ago. This is crazy, I’m dating myself. But I was running down the leaders and he was second and I didn’t want to waste time and I used him up. I did the whole northeast slide job thing and after the race I looked at him like most young kids that were 18 or 17 and I looked at him and said, ‘Hey, I’m sorry, but my guys, I had to go.’ And he looked at me and said, ‘Well, what about my guys?’ And, very much, that resonated with me and I thought to myself, ‘You know what, you’re right.’ I think that’s what we see in interviews a lot now is we hear the I’m sorrys, but you’re not really sorry, you’re just saying it to the guy to his face. So, from that day forward, I’ve wrecked people. I’ve made mistakes, but my intentions are never to do that. I think that’s the difference, where you can see and watch when people are racing a certain way and you know what their intentions are at that moment. I’ve learned a lot along the way and I’ve made my mistakes. The difference was is it was at a weekly level, a regional level, where I feel like a lot of those things should be made. Once you get to a national stage in the Truck Series, the O’Reilly Series or the Cup Series, you’re expected to be a professional. You’re not really supposed to be learning at that point. You’re learning the car. You’re learning the aerodynamics, but not the fundamentals of racing.”
DO YOU FEEL YOU HAVE TO STOP THE BLEEDING AND RESET AT ALL OR DO YOU FEEL YOU PUT THE PAST RACES BEHIND AND FOCUS ON WHAT’S AHEAD? “We can definitely move forward. I felt like Chicagoland was gonna probably be a good one for us and we just never made it past the first corner. There are just times in racing where it’s peaks and valleys and you’ve got to manage the good days and the bad days. That’s the thing about racing. The highs are highs and the lows can be really low and this is part of it, so, yeah, moving forward. I feel like I’ve just had it engrained in me that the clock resets at midnight. After Sunday when you get rolling, or in this past case since it was 2 a.m., the clock reset at 3 a.m., but you need to move forward. As good as yesterday could have been, we need to make tomorrow even better, so that’s really where our focus is and North Wilkesboro, going back and watching the Open and how we were last year and moving forward, I felt like it just reminded me that it’s still racing and just understand what we’ve learned along the way and go and make it a really good one.”
DO YOU HAVE A SPECIFIC NUMBER OF POINTS YOU WANT TO GET PER RACE TO GET BACK ABOVE THE CUT LINE? “Some people are very much about analytics and looking at numbers and all those things. I’m very much a fly by the pants guy. If I go out and run top five all day at Wilkesboro or contend for a win or ahead of the guys that I’m racing, the points are gonna take care of themselves. I’ll let the people who try to figure a points per race analysis, I’ll let them worry about that. I’m just gonna drive that car as fast and as hard as I can.”
FANS ENJOYED THE BILLBOARD LAST WEEK. WHAT DO YOU HAVE PLANNED NEXT FOR CHRIS AT NORTH WILKESBORO? “Listen, that whole billboard piece, I didn’t put a ton of thought into it. It was more along the lines of I was with the EchoPark Speedway guys promoting the event the week before and I just casually brought up, ‘Hey, do you know anybody that works with billboards,’ and then they just really helped liaison the conversation and the artist that the billboard company had really made a lot of it possible. We just kind of gave them the idea and the pictures and they made it come to life, so that made it very easy. What I can tell you is Chris has been tagging me and ignoring my phone calls the past 24 hours because he’s put something up about a caterpillar, and then today it was about a butterfly. Well, I’m in Connecticut. I’m not in North Carolina, so I don’t know what he’s done or did with whatever is going on, but he picked a good time to get me back because now I’m having to wait until I get back Friday at midnight to find out exactly what he did. What I can say is he’s been a real champ with how he’s taken a lot of this, so I’m very, very interested to see what. There were points yesterday I was worried that he buried one of my trucks with an excavator or something. I don’t put anything past him.”
DO YOU THINK ECHOPARK IS STILL A ROLL OF THE DICE, OR CAN A DRIVER’S TALENT PREVAIL AT A TRACK LIKE THAT? “There’s definitely skill involved. You need all the pieces there, I will say that. It’s not your Daytona, your Talladega, where you can have an ill-handling car and still kind of make a really good day out of it. EchoPark, as a driver, I can tell you that that place is a handful if you’re struggling in the handling and trying to navigate around there. Is it a wild card? I still consider somewhat of a wild card because there still is a pack and there still could potentially be a big one, so that’s the only wild card part about it. But there’s more of an opportunity to drive from 30th to the front at EchoPark Speedway than there is at Daytona or Talladega, and just because the runs are so big, handling is a really big issue there. You really need to focus on making your car handle well, so it’s really grown into its own. I don’t really know what to classify it as other than we were on a superspeedway style package with an intermediate style racetrack. It makes it challenging. Do I want to see anymore? I don’t. I know it’s exciting for everybody and it’s exciting for us, but that’s all the excitement I need in one year in the Cup Series is twice a year. I enjoy that in our series, in the NASCAR Cup Series, we have road courses, we have superspeedways, short tracks, we have intermediates and then we have EchoPark Speedway, so let’s leave it at that.”
