Ford Racing Notes and Quotes
NASCAR Cup Series
Talladega Media Availabilities
Wednesday, October 15, 2025
A pair of Ford Mustang drivers conducted separate Q&A sessions with the media this afternoon as Ryan Blaney, driver of the No. 12 Menards/Dutch Boy Ford Mustang Dark Horse, and Chris Buescher, driver of the No. 17 Kroger Ford Mustang Dark Horse, spoke about this weekend’s race at Talladega Superspeedway.
RYAN BLANEY, No. 12 Menards/Dutch Boy Ford Mustang Dark Horse – WAS YOUR TEAM ABLE TO DIAGNOSE WHAT HAPPENED TO THE TIRE? “No, I don’t really think we found anything that really stood out that we could point to and say, ‘Oh, yeah. That was it.’ So, whether it got cut or was low air over the bumps and it just kind of worked through it, we don’t really know. It’s not inconclusive, but the result was the same, unfortunately.”
DO YOU FEEL YOUR PREPARATION OR STRATEGY IS DIFFERENT NOW GOING INTO TALLADEGA BECAUSE OF YOUR POINTS SITUATION? “No, I don’t think so. It stinks where we are on points, but we’ve still got two races left and I don’t personally think we are in a must-win quite yet. At Talladega, you never know what can happen. You can go have a massive points day and be short of the win, but maybe a couple other guys don’t have as good of a points day and you go into Martinsville maybe in a spot where you could point your way in if you go have another good day short of winning. Our prep is really no different. It’s how do we try to be efficient through the stages and gather up all the stage points. That could change. Let’s say the first two stages don’t go our way and, alright, maybe now it’s a must-win type scenario. That might switch up a little bit, but as far as our prep this week, it’s kind of business as usual and try to go gather the most points we can and go try to figure out a way to win the race, so pretty similar.”
WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS ON TALLADEGA’S SPOT IN THIS ROUND OF THE PLAYOFFS? “When they came out with the schedule and I saw that Talladega was in the Round of 8 as opposed to 12, I didn’t really think anything of it. It’s still Talladega in the playoffs and it’s gonna be just as important as always. Honestly, my mind was like, ‘OK, I only have to worry about seven other guys as opposed to 11.’ It’s just less guys to keep your eye on and have to worry about winning or racing for points, so it didn’t really change my outlook. You should have a superspeedway race in the playoffs. I fully agree with that. You’ve got to have all forms of racetracks in the playoffs, but I didn’t really think anything of it with the round change.”
DID OTHER DRIVERS SHARE THE SAME OPINION OR DID THEY VARY? “I’m not really sure, honestly. I wish I could give you an answer on that, but I don’t really know what everyone else’s thoughts were.”
YOU REFERENCED THE QUOTE ‘UNJUSTIFIABLY IN A POSITION I’D RATHER NOT BE IN,’ AND I’M CURIOUS HOW LONG HAVE YOU RELIED ON THE PHILOSOPHICAL SAYINGS OF RANDY ‘MACHO MAN’ SAVAGE? “I don’t think there is a person before or after him that could cut promos quite like that guy. If I’m sitting at home and I’m bored, and maybe I’ve had a couple drinks, I will go watch Randy Savage interviews, just because I think he was amazing (laughing). What was going through that man’s head, but that’s my favorite one. He keeps pulling out the creamer and unjustifiably in a position I’d rather not be in, but the cream will rise to the top, and I hope that is what we can use for this weekend. I thought that was a perfect comparison to my situation, so, thank you, Mr. Savage.”
WHAT HAS THIS YEAR BEEN LIKE FOR YOU WITH EVERYTHING GOING ON IN YOUR LIFE? “It’s definitely been a challenging year from that side of it and having a lot of DNFs. I wouldn’t really point the DNFs at anybody, it just kind of is what it is and we’ve just had a little bit more than we would have liked, but, I look at our team on the 12 car and I’ve been really, really happy with how we’ve been going about things, how we’ve been able to bounce back from bad weeks and just go do our job the next weekend and not really let it change our outlook on things and go to the racetrack confident every single week. I think it’s just the thing of getting older and having more experience and understand you’re gonna have ups and downs and it’s just how do you not really let them get to you. How do you learn from down times, if there was anything you can do about it, and you move on. I told myself like, ‘Hey, you can be upset with the Vegas deal Sunday, but when you wake up Monday, we’re gonna be full-on looking forward and heads-up looking forward to Talladega and then what challenges come at Martinsville.’ So, I think it gets easier as you get older and you’re outlook on things change and you’re just trying to look ahead a little bit more. I think some of it come naturally and just natural growth, but other is just having these conversations with myself years ago of, ‘Hey, I want to kind of change this up about me,’ because early in my career I would stew on things a little bit longer and now I try to just drop things and move on from them, so it’s a little bit of both, but I think that’s the healthiest way I’ve been able to deal with it.”
YOU’RE CLOSE TO BEING A FIRST-TIME FATHER. HOW HAS THIS EXPERIENCE CHANGED YOUR PERSPECTIVE ON WHAT A GOOD VERSUS A BAD DAY IS? “If I have a bad day in my job, that’s one thing, but it has put it into perspective for me watching my wife go through having a child grow inside of her – of things that she has to deal with too from that level. The way that she’s been able to overcome things that her body is changing and things that maybe aren’t ideal that come up through her pregnancy that she has to deal with and just how do we move forward together. I think you just realize that there are bigger things out there. Your job is obviously important, but other things are just as important if not more, so Gianna has honestly been amazing. It puts it into perspective for me like, ‘Hey, if I have a tough day, it’s nothing compared to if she has a tough day’ because she is having to deal with this and making sure that our child is all good and that she is being healthy.’ It definitely changes your outlook and then when he arrives it’s gonna change your outlook even more.”
WITH YOUR SUCCESS AT TALLADEGA AND MARTINSVILLE IS THIS A BEST-CASE SCENARIO THAT THESE TWO TRACKS ARE NEXT FOR YOU? “Yeah, I try to go into every weekend with optimism and thinking we can go compete no matter where we go, but, yeah, looking at Talladega a lot of things can happen that can benefit you or hurt you, or benefit your competitors or hurt your competitors. I think the points thing at Talladega, why I say it’s not a must-win yet, is the same thing can happen to somebody. A couple guys get tore up early who are in the playoffs and you can go have a big day and big point swings can happen at these type of racetracks. And then our history at Martinsville we’ve been able to do a really good job there the last couple fall races and I hope that trend can continue to where we can go compete there as well. So, I like the next two tracks, for sure. We’ve definitely had a great track record at those two, and I think we can go into either one of those and run well and hopefully compete for the win, but that’s kind of everywhere. I have so much faith in this team with the guys that I’ve got working around me and the level of trust in each other, I just love going to the races every single weekend. It’s definitely nice when you’re in that spot, so hopefully we can dig into some previous success and experiences that we’ve had and can lean on those the next two weeks and see what happens.”
WITH THE NEW DVP POLICY THIS YEAR, COULD WE BE LOOKING AT A RACE WITHIN THE RACE THIS WEEK, WHERE IF SOMEBODY GETS IN TROUBLE AND HAS TO GO TO THE GARAGE, THERE’S A RACE TO GET BACK ON TRACK? “Yeah, that could definitely come into play. You never know what your damage is until you can assess it and ‘hey, can we repair this thing to get back out?’ You might see that, for sure. So that changes it in that way to where, like as before, if you got in a little accident and you can’t fix it on pit road, you’re done. Now, you at least have a shot, which I think is the right way to be. So, yeah, you could definitely see a little race within the race like you said depending on what goes down throughout it.”
HOW DO YOU GUYS AT PENSKE CIRCLE THE WAGONS AS YOU HEAD TO THESE LAST TWO? IS THERE MORE SHARING OR CONVERSATION? WHAT IS IT LIKE? “I feel like, no matter what situation that we are in as an organization we’ve always had an open notebook of sharing info, the drivers getting together and just talking through things, crew chiefs and engineers all working together. We’ve always had that, so I don’t think there’s gonna be any more or any less of that. A great example is Joey and I were both in the championship race last year and there was no difference in our communication. There were no secrets being held. It was, ‘how do we all be better to where the two of us can run for this thing and run one-two,’ and we were able to do that. So, I just think that’s the culture that Roger has built over there. What’s the point of having three or four cars on your team if no one talks to each other. Then you’ve just got three or four separate teams in your building, so we’ve always really made it a highlight and he always has made it a highlight of, ‘let’s lean on each other and let’s learn from each other,’ and that part, I think, is very strong and doesn’t waver.”
DO THE LINES OF COMMUNICATION OPEN EVEN WIDER, OR ARE YOU GUYS ALL-IN THE WHOLE TIME IN THAT REGARD? “Yeah, I’d say we’re all-in the whole time. No matter if we were way to the good on points or in the position that we are in, I think that’s wide-open all the time.”
CAN YOU TALK ABOUT THE MENTAL SIDE OF NOT OVERTHINKING A PLACE LIKE TALLADEGA THIS WEEKEND, AND HOW QUICKLY DO YOU HAVE TO THINK AND MAKE DECISIONS IN THE MOMENT? “I think it’s really important to be as prepared as you can. Preparation is a massive thing, but, like you said, on overthinking, I think it can eat you alive and everyone looks at everything differently, but, in my mind, it’s like, ‘Alright, let’s try to gather all the information that we can to be as prepared as possible for all these scenarios,’ but not try to drive yourself crazy doing it because it is, at the end of the day, Talladega. Things can happen. Things can change outside of your control and it’s how do you adjust to that, so I think it’s important to keep an open mind in that and not get set in your ways, but not just being fully free and going in and like, ‘Oh, yeah. We didn’t plan. We’re just gonna go see what happens.’ You have to prepare the best you can, but it’s a fine line of gathering all of the info and prep work that you need, but also not overthinking it and chewing your fingernails off, which it is stressful. It’s an important race. It’s your season, but, at the same time, you can’t go crazy thinking about it. You’ve just got to get in the zone that you need to be in from a crew chief and driver and spotter mentality and that’s all you can do. I hope that we’ve done that correctly.”
DID YOU OVERTHINK IT EARLIER IN YOUR CAREER BECAUSE THEY FEED YOU A LOT OF INFORMATION AND YOU HAVE A LOT OF TEAMMATES? “I think I used to overthink it, for sure, because there’s a lot going on and it’s easy to get overwhelmed when there’s so much information being thrown at you, but, at the end of the day, you just kind of do. You don’t have time in the moment at these places to think on something, contemplate it, and then make your decision. You just kind of have to do, and sometimes you make the wrong decision and sometimes you make the right decision. That’s just kind of the way it goes. You’re not gonna make the right decision every time, but do what you think is best in the moment, and I’d say I used to sit around late at night earlier in my life and just run through all these different scenarios and drive myself crazy of, ‘well, if this happens, that happens, and it can go downhill like this,’ it’s kind of a spiral, so I think it’s a getting older type thing of, ‘hey, I can only control so much and let’s just try to do the best job we can at controlling what we can control,’ and the rest of it, good or bad, is gonna play itself out and you just hope the stars are aligned for you. So, yeah, I think it’s just a product of getting a little older and a little bit more experienced. Those things come a little bit easier and things like that.”
WHAT IS THE PERFECT ZONE FOR YOU TO BE IN AT TALLADEGA? “Blinders on, I guess. Always wanting to go forward, but if you’re in a spot you have to defend, you have to defend. Superspeedway racing is such a different mentality than everywhere else. The way the drivers and crew chiefs and spotters approach it is way different just because it’s a different style of racing, so I always try to be patient there in moments. I feel like it’s super easy to get, ‘I’ve got to go now. I’ve got to go now.’ And there are sometimes where, OK, yeah, time is tight and you’ve got to get going, but I’ve always tried to be, and Denny Hamlin has talked about this for a long time, is I try to keep in my head that I’m gonna have another shot, so don’t try to get super antsy and get in your head that you’ve got to go right away. Just try to let everything play out and just be patient and hopefully it lines up for you. He was talking about that years ago and I kind of took that to heart, and I try to apply it to what I do.”
HOW DO YOU LIKE TO BE FED INFORMATION IN THE CAR? “I would say outside of superspeedway racing I’m not a huge wanting information type of guy. I just try to do my own thing and stuff like that. Through the week, I look at where everyone is at on points. Then I look at it once or twice and I don’t really look at it again. I might ask updates through the race like, ‘Hey, what is the point scenario,’ just so I know what I have to do. Do I need to really try to get a lot more points? Is this guy kind of out-pointing me?’ You know that. You see everybody out there, but at superspeedways I like a lot of information. I want to know everything around me, gaps, lanes that are coming or going, opportunities that might have been presented. I’ve always thought at superspeedway racing that over-information is good, but at other places I always try to keep less information. Like I said, there’s just such a different style of racing that I try to change up my mentality a little bit. Here, I like to know as much as I can what’s going on. It just helps me process everything.”
MARTINSVILLE IS NEXT WEEK. WHY DO YOU GUYS PERFORM WELL AT SUCH A HIGH-PRESSURE RACE? “I think we do a really good job. It’s a track that’s been good to us. We understand what it takes to go fast there and then you build off of that. I think that’s always been good. Every race has its pressure. That one, obviously being the last race of that round to get to Phoenix, is always kind of amplified, but I just think we do a good job of keeping a cool head and knowing the spot we’re in having to go in there. Like in ‘23, we understood like, ‘Hey, we’ve just got to go have a good night.’ That wasn’t a must-win for us. We just happened to win the race and that was a big exclamation point on it, and then last year we went into that race with one goal, we have to win to get in and we were able to do that. So, I just think we understand the situations that we’re in and go into it level headed like, ‘Here’s the goal. Here’s what we have to do, so let’s just go have a good night.’ Everybody at the shop can rally around each other, which is great. It’s an amazing culture over at Team Penske and everybody learning and picking off each other of how do we all get better as a group. I think it goes back to that open notebook and the culture that Roger has built around that place, and I think we can do that pretty well. So, we’ll see what happens. It would be cool to go get another clock, but we’re gonna do the best job we can to make that happen, so we’ll find out.”
CHRIS BUESCHER, No. 17 Kroger/Thomas’ High Protein Bagels Ford Mustang Dark Horse – YOU GUYS HAVE BEEN THE MODEL OF CONSISTENCY THE LAST THREE YEARS. “Yeah, there is certainly some good to internally discuss on that front. Unfortunately, consistency isn’t rewarded very well in this format, so, for us, we’ve been good. We haven’t quite been great and we’ve got a couple little steps to take here or there, but we’ve certainly been able to be a lot better rounded and enabled to be more competitive at any different style of racetrack and that’s been a lot of fun throughout the years, whether it’s been short tracks, road courses, superspeedways, and mile-and-a-halves. I think we’re close on all of them and some are a little stronger than others, but we just have this small step to take forward across the board to be in the hunt to win consistently, I guess, is when it really starts to pay off. So, there’s nothing to be ashamed about, for sure, and proud of the work we’ve done. Everybody has done a great job. Our pit crew has been fantastic. We’ve had a handful of races that really had excellent shots to win and weren’t able to pull it off and get all the details right on that weekend, so as it winds down we’ve got a couple more opportunities ahead of us here and a couple of good racetracks, so I’m excited about that. As we go into Talladega we know our RFK Fords will be working together and able to be up front and have speed, it’s just a matter of executing correctly and having a little bit of luck on our side.”
HAVE YOU GUYS FOUND ANYTHING DURING THE PLAYOFFS TO IMPROVE YOUR PERFORMANCE FOR NEXT YEAR? “Certainly nothing we’re gonna share to the public, but let’s go back to the ROVAL. Road racing has been strong for myself and for our team through the years and the ROVAL, I would say, has probably been our weaker road course with the Next Gen car. We were pretty solid there with the previous car, so we turned a big corner this last go-around there, so, yeah, we’re searching and finding stuff that works. It’s another one of those where we needed another step to truthfully be in the hunt for the win, but we were right there in third to fifth all day long. With that, we are looking to try and figure out what we can take into next year. Obviously, knowing we’ve got some changes coming with some recent announcements. There’s a little bit of power coming at some of these racetracks that will make a little bit of a change for us, not a major one to start I don’t believe, but we’ve also had a lot of progress made – not us internally, but NASCAR and Goodyear and everybody with tires that are wearing out more creating a short run and long run race cars, so we’re learning for what that looks like next year, and I believe that is probably gonna be sticking around or maybe getting a little bit more pronounced yet, so, certainly in some form of R&D. We’re hitting on some things and finding some things that aren’t working as well, but with the minimum amount of practice and no testing nowadays, trying to make the best out of our situation ultimately.”
WHAT WAS YOUR REACTION WHEN YOU HEARD TALLADEGA WAS IN THE ROUND OF 8 THIS YEAR? “It’s a little madness (laughing). There is a skill set to speedway racing. There are teams that have handling figured out and speed. There is a strategy to it, but there is certainly a much more elevated luck factor involved as well. With that, we all know that and that’s accepted throughout the year, but it certainly puts a lot on the line for a day that, and not that this can’t happen any given week, but one mistake from a single person can wipe out 10, 12, 15 cars in an instant at Talladega, where that’s much less likely at other places. It’s part of racing and it is what it is, but it certainly makes it difficult to get through all the way to the end and feel like you have the most deserving cars fighting for a playoff at the end. Maybe I’m talking a little bit out of turn because we’re not in it, but certainly I know we’re good at Talladega and Daytona and these style of racetracks, so on one side you want to be selfish about it and say this is just more opportunity, but, at the same time, you want everything to feel like you have the most control possible and you certainly give away a good chunk of that when we go speedway racing.”
ARE YOU AWARE IF YOU’RE RACING WITH BLANEY OR LOGANO ABOUT WHAT’S INVOLVED IN TERMS OF LOYALTY AT THE END OF THE RACE? “You’re always aware of it. We’re aware of it throughout the playoffs. I think there’s been a pretty clear warning set for race manipulation right now, so I think that there’s certainly a finicky way to go about that and I don’t want to be caught up in that, and I don’t want anybody to ever accuse me of laying over for anybody, so ultimately we are still going to the racetrack to win a race. That’s not something that you would pull over or give anything away. It’s just a matter of awareness. If that means not trying to shove right in the middle of four-wide in a bad situation, then there’s an extra thought that goes into your head at that point, but we’re still going to the racetrack to figure out how to win.”
IF IT’S A FORD DRIVER OR NON-FORD DRIVER YOU HAVE TO PUSH AT THE END OF THE RACE, I WOULD ASSUME YOUR LOYALTY WOULD BE TO A FORD DRIVER? “Yeah and that’s always been the case. It doesn’t really matter if it’s the playoffs or not. When we go to these speedway races from a manufacturer’s side, everybody gets their groups together and we try to work together throughout the race – pit cycles, strategy, working to try and save fuel at times, probably too much, but that’s always the case, so it doesn’t change just because we’re coming down to the end here.”
FROM A BROAD PERSPECTIVE, WHAT GOES INTO MAKING A DRIVER SO WELL-ROUNDED IN THIS ERA OF NASCAR? “If I had the answer, I would have put it into play a lot sooner, I guess. We’ve been good road racing for a long time. I’ve had some really good road racers help fine-tune what I was able to pick up on as a kid. Brad Keselowski is an extraordinary speedway racer among other things, so I’ve been able to pick up on a lot of that now just from having him as a teammate. I think that our race cars are more competitive now than they’ve ever been, so that helps you when you go short track racing or intermediate racing. Ryan is a short track racer and we’ve been able to lean into that side of things, so I think a lot of it comes from who you’re surrounded by and what you can pick up on and learn, and I’m certainly not gonna sit here and say I’ve got it all figured out at any given style of racetrack. We’re always figuring out how to be better, so there’s certainly an openness to keep after it and try to figure out how to improve a little bit more each time we go to these things and been fortunate to be around very talented people as well. A lot of things go into that, but it’s fun to think about where you came from and how you grew up racing and I’m not a road course racer by trade, but we did a handful of Legends car races growing up because we knew we wanted to do something different. We raced ARCA brand road races. We did a handful of dirt tracks growing up. It’s not my background, but if you add them up through the years we’ve done maybe 15-20 dirt races now in total, but it’s something to round you out a little bit and to have experience for different approaches and different mindsets.”
WITH LIMITED PRACTICE DOES THAT PUT A GREATER IMPORTANCE ON THE PEOPLE YOU SURROUND YOURSELF WITH? “Yeah. I mean, you think back and we’ve got to be good off the truck nowadays. One, you don’t even have the tolerance to be able to make any big changes. We’re very much locked into a tight box. Two, you don’t have the time if you did have the allowance. So much of it happens now back at the race shop. Our day is largely set up from Monday to Wednesday or Thursday until that car goes up in the hauler, so, yes, it certainly matters a lot to have good people in all different aspects, so that when you get to the track there’s no guesswork or no trying to dial in from a mile away.”
WHAT HAS MADE YOU SO ACCUSTOMED TO PHOENIX AND GET AROUND THAT TRACK SO WELL? “Man, I’ve wanted to burn Phoenix down for most of my career. I’ve hated that place with a fairly decent passion and it was really tough for a long time. The Next Gen car, something definitely got better in a little way, but the last probably two years at Phoenix now – three or four races – we’ve just made incredible strides to be more competitive there. Scott and our group have done a great job. RFK as a whole has done a nice job of getting to the point where it just clicks better and have studied a lot from there as well. When you have a guy like Kevin Harvick that showed up at that racetrack and just won no matter what, you certainly take notes of what worked for him through the years and try and figure out how to apply that to your certain driving style. We’ve figured out a lot on the car side. I’ve figured out some stuff from my side of things and it’s made it a much more enjoyable weekend. For two years now I’ve been able to truthfully say I’m looking forward to heading to Phoenix, whereas I basically just straight-up lied for a long time.”
HOW DO YOU THINK YOU AND YOUR TEAM HAVE PERFORMED THIS YEAR? “You know what, at the end of the day it’s not been a great season. It’s been a good season. The best way I’ve been able to put that is we’ve had moments that have been really good. We’ve been very consistent, but we have a step to take to be very consistently fighting for wins and that’s the big thing. We had a big goal this season to fire off and win a race in the first eight. We weren’t able to do that, obviously, but also I think what was good for us was the first eight races were way more competitive than we had been in the past also, so we did not have this period where we felt like we were behind and set us up for a lot better momentum heading into the summer, which put us in a place where we were so close to being able to win a Michigan or a Pocono or Texas and we certainly, along with anybody in the field, have had our share of bad luck, but it’s been a good year. It’s just not been absolutely everything we wanted it to be.”
WHERE DID YOU GET THE MESSAGE FROM NASCAR ABOUT WHAT CAN BE SAID OVER THE RADIO? AND DO YOU THINK IT MADE A DIFFERENCE? “I think it did make a difference. I don’t have any direct communication for what’s been talked about, but I know it has made it through our competition side. I know that it has made it into the media and I think the message we’ve gotten is clear enough to say, ‘Do it at your own risk, but you’re not gonna like the result.’ Ultimately, I think that’s fair. We had a terrible scenario at Martinsville last year with cars just riding and blocking basically and entire racetrack. We’ve had instances where we’ve seen cars just straight-up lift and not push rows at speedway races. I don’t know if that’s blatant enough to be called this time around if there is radio chatter ahead of that, I don’t know. It’s a hard line for anybody to police and you can always say that balance was an issue. I heard one of the things that came from the ROVAL was something that I actually got told in a purely selfish 17 team state of mind was, ‘Alright, save tires here. Don’t push forward in case we have a late-race restart.’ And then I hear that was one of the things that somebody else said later on that almost got them in really big trouble, so I’m sitting here like, ‘Well, alright, we realistically wanted to make sure we had some amount of tire race for a late-race restart.’ That was not to help anybody other than ourselves, so it’s certainly a hard place to officiate from, but I think that the warning is loud enough and clear enough that nobody wants to be on the other side of NASCAR having to make a judgement call.”
DOES THE WARNING MAKE IT EASIER FOR YOU AS A DRIVER OR MORE DIFFICULT? “Probably a little bit easier, but, that being said, I’m very much in my own space most of the time. There’s an awareness when it’s other Fords, basically, but I couldn’t have told you the playoff scenario for anybody at any of these cut races because it didn’t matter to us and what we were trying to do. There’s just a respect thing among certain people and certainly there’s a respect thing on certain people that you’ve had good, clean racing with through the year and those that you feel like you still owe a little bit so you’re gonna run them a little harder. That’s not for anybody else’s benefit other than our own and feeling like somebody is owed one by us, so, for us, it cleans it up a little bit to where you don’t have to guess if others around you are trying to play those games as much. They probably will to some extent, but I don’t think they’ll be very obvious or in the purely blatant moves that we’ve seen in the past.”
HOW MUCH TIME DO YOU HAVE TO EVEN THINK INSIDE THE CAR IF SOMEONE IS IN OR OUT OF THE PLAYOFFS? “As we come down to the end it’s easier to keep track of eight cars, I guess. I say that right now and I could not name all eight right at this moment. We’re still racing. You don’t want to be the storyline on a negative front in any given scenario, but our playoffs are just different than other spots. There are outside factors that affect racing and I don’t know if anybody wants to hear it, but that always came up when we were in the playoffs or when we weren’t, ‘Do your race differently?’ And, I don’t think so. I think you have to run 100 percent and be looking out for your own team because it’s not like we get the playoffs and we run 16 cars on the racetrack for three races. It’s not other sports, and I don’t think we need to have the mindset that we need to try and be treating it like there are only eight cars on the racetrack at Talladega and we all just need to be riding behind that. That’s not how this is gonna go.”
THE SPRING RACE AT TALLADEGA WAS KIND OF MILD. THERE WASN’T THE BIG ONE, BUT DO YOU THINK THIS FALL RACE WILL BE DIFFERENT? “I certainly had my big one in the spring. I hit a ton. You think about the accidents that happen and statistically where the safest place may be. We got wrecked from the front row – us and the 20 – so there’s no safe place and there’s no saying that if that happens this week and it doesn’t wipe out 10 cars. There was still aggression. There were still moments, it just didn’t end up wiping out as many cars, so I would say I don’t expect it to be super tame, no, but I never really do. Sometimes it just works out easier, I guess. One thing this late in the year, I’d imagine we haven’t dove off into weather until later this afternoon in a pre-race meeting, but it’s probably not gonna be hot enough to make handling a real big issue at Talladega, which means we’ll be mostly in control and what that really comes down to is it wasn’t just a handling mishap, it was just an aggression mishap, so I think when you have that, you have less accidents because people are able to control themselves a little bit more in that sense, but there’s gonna be a lot of different scenarios on the line for a lot of different people in their positions and we’re certainly not gonna be able to keep up with what that looks like for everybody, so I think we just expect the aggression level to be a little bit higher this go-around than maybe it was in the spring. I think it was there in the spring, too, but it was two-car accidents, instead of eight.”
