Ford Performance Notes and Quotes
NASCAR Cup Series
Daytona 500 Media Day | Wednesday, February 12, 2025
NOAH GRAGSON, No. 4 Rush Truck Centers Ford Mustang Dark Horse – HOW WERE YOUR FIRST LAPS HERE? “It was all right. We were gonna try to go for a single car run, but then right when I was rolling the 43 was rolling down pit road, so we were kind of in qualifying trim and were sitting on all the stops and it doesn’t handle like it would in race trim, and I was tucked up behind the 43, so it was interesting to see how the car drove in qualifying trim behind a car, but I wouldn’t say we learned a ton. We only did one lap, so I just have to get ready for the Duel. We’re pretty focused on having a good race car for handling and maneuvering in the draft rather than having one speed lap for qualifying.”
WHAT ARE REALISTIC EXPECTATIONS FOR YOU AND THE 4 CAR THIS YEAR? “We want to just minimize the mistakes and I think that’s the goals that we have. Maximize the opportunities and minimize the mistakes. When you get to week 20 of this deal, the motivation tends to get lost a little bit no matter who it is – the driver, team members, pit crew. It wears and tears on you, so just being able to stay motivated each and every week and we want to have strong runs, obviously. We go to the racetrack to win every race, but sometimes that’s not in the cards for that given weekend, so with that being said, we want to just maximize the opportunity that we have each and every given weekend.”
WHAT HAS THE PROCESS BEEN LIKE GOING TO FRONT ROW AND HAVING IT EXPAND TO THREE CARS? “It’s been really smooth on my side of things. I know trying to get cars and haulers and all that stuff starting up a third team has been a little bit of a challenge for the team in itself, but for myself personally it’s been really, really smooth – much smoother than it’s ever been and a lot of that is I have the same crew chief so we’re already on the same page. We’ve worked with each other. When I get inside the race car all of my interior stuff, where the wheel is located, all the measurements, that’s all the same, so when I sat in the Bowman Gray car and went out for first practice, I feel like I didn’t even skip a beat from how we ended the season in Phoenix with how comfortable I was behind the wheel and what-not. With all that being said, we do have some new crew members on our team, so I feel like there’s a lot of energy that we’ve got, a lot of passion with our group and it’s exciting stuff.”
WHAT’S THE DYNAMIC LIKE WITH YOU COMING FROM SHR AND ZANE COMING FROM SPIRE? “A little bit of it is everyone is kind of bouncing ideas off of each other on past organizations and the feel of the car that they’ve had or how their car handled. Granted, we are in the first week, but it’s, ‘Hey, did you have this when you were driving over at Spire last year? Todd, did you have this feeling? I know I’ve had this feeling when I was at Legacy or at Stewart-Haas.’ So, I think it’s definitely productive to have three drivers in those situations where they’ve been at different organizations and seeing how they operate, but, at the same time, we do have a really good balance of us three drivers are really good friends off the racetrack and we have fun, but when we’re at the shop and we’re in a post-race debrief, we’re locked in and really focused. It’s been good.”
DOES IT MAKE THAT COMMUNICATION EASIER AND SMOOTHER WHEN IT’S TWO TEAMMATES YOU KNOW SO WELL? “Yeah, I feel like it doesn’t make it easier, but it’s not hard in any way. Being teammates with whoever, everybody kind of talks about and diagnoses the car a little bit differently, so just trying to figure out exactly where they’re at on things and how they communicate. I haven’t been teammates with Zane since we were in Legends cars or a few races at Junior Motorsports in 2019, but it wasn’t as serious and it wasn’t a job back then in Legends cars, so we would get out of the car and say, ‘Hey, I’m tight or I’m loose,’ and then we would go throw the football. Now we’re really honed into our process and communicating all that stuff. That’s a great question. I think it’s just a different group of guys that we all have to learn each other and it will get easier throughout the year.”
WHAT DOES THE DAYTONA 500 MEAN TO YOU? “It’s certainly special and an opportunity. That’s the most important thing is we have an opportunity and I’m very grateful for that. There are only gonna be 40 or maybe 41 people in the world that get to run this race this year and it’s pretty surreal to be able to have the opportunity, not only to run this race once or even to make a lap at Daytona, whether it be in NASCAR Racing Experience cars to say you’ve been able to do that, this is a dream of mine to just make a lap here and it’s everybody’s bucket list. It’s our biggest race of the year, the Daytona 500, so to have an opportunity to race for the win is special and it’s something that I’ll forever be grateful for.”
DO YOU FEEL LIKE THIS IS A FRESH START FOR YOU? “Absolutely. It’s like playing poker. You’ve got chips on the table and you have an opportunity to get dealt a good hand, and I feel like we have good hand over here at Front Row Motorsports. We’ve got three great crew chiefs. We’ve got three great drivers. We’ve got three great teams and a lot of fire and a lot of passion and excitement, so it’s been fun throughout this offseason. I know things are starting to get ramped up and we’ve already had one rep at it at Bowman Gray, but to go into the shop and see everybody’s focus and determination, it makes me motivated to go to work each and every day.”
IS VICTORY LANE A PLACE YOU FEEL LIKE THIS TEAM CAN REACH? “Yeah, I absolutely think here especially you have an opportunity to win the race. They showed a graphic during practice of the past Daytona winners and if you look at where guys finished in the points last year, it’s a mix up throughout the whole entire lineup, so it’s certainly doable to win the race. Now, once we get to Phoenix and Vegas, I don’t know yet. I haven’t been on tracks like that. You ask me this question in six or seven weeks from now I’ll probably have a different answer, but, right now, I’m just so focused on our process and having the excitement to see where we’re gonna stack up against these guys, but having the opportunity to come out here each and every week, we’ve got great resources with Team Penske. We have great resources within our own organization. It’s just about working hard each and every day and getting closer to our goals and that’s winning races on a consistent basis.”
WHAT’S IT LIKE COMING THROUGH THE TUNNEL HERE? “I kind of forget that I’ve won here as silly as that sounds. I don’t know if that’s just me being so focused and that’s probably part of my problem is I’m always looking for what’s next and you kind of forget about the past, but I always try – when I won my first K&N ARCA West Series race back in 2015, I didn’t fully take it in as much as I wish I would have. I was laying in bed months later and I was like, ‘Man, if I could just go back to that moment and stand on top of the car, that would just be the coolest thing ever to win again and feel that emotion and all the excitement.’ So, from that point on, I’ve really tried – it goes by quick. You win these races and it goes by super quick. Even if you don’t do as good, you’re always focused on the next race. I’ve tried to take different moments throughout the race weekends and say, ‘Hey, man. This is really cool stuff.’ Pre-race. ‘This is awesome.’ In the middle of the race, ‘This is really cool.’ Just try and take that in and take a second or two to realize how cool this is, but certainly winning here in the Xfinity Series, although it is a different car and different specs and they drive a little different, winning those races you can’t teach experience of leading races and being out front, so certainly taking that experience from the past and utilizing it each and every lap when I’m in the race car.”
AUSTIN CINDRIC, No. 2 Discount Tire Ford Mustang Dark Horse – WHAT ARE THE EMOTIONS LIKE COMING HERE AFTER WINNING A FEW YEARS AGO? “It’s clearly a special place for me for a number of reasons, but I think my emotions going into 2022 is that I thought the coolest Daytona 500 memory I was gonna have for quite a while was in my first one being pushed out to the lead tandem drafting with Joey and obviously then the next year we win it, so you kind of have to reevaluate those memories. It’s certainly a huge event for the year. It still always feels like the first day of school, kind of above everything else, but by the time that wears off as the week goes on by Sunday on race day it’s by far the biggest day in our sport.”
FORD HAS DONE A GOOD JOB CONTROLLING THIS RACE THE PAST FEW YEARS. WHY IS THAT? “I think you can sit here and say there is so much you can’t control, but there’s also so much that you can control, and I feel like as a team and as an OEM we do a very good job of that.”
WHAT WILL IT BE LIKE TO RACE IN THE 500 WITH HELIO IN THE FIELD? “Super cool for me. He’s definitely one of my racing heroes and get to really meet those people much in life. Obviously, a very unique relationship for me and him. I’ve raced in races with him before with Rolex and things like that. We were in the same class once, but this is definitely on another level, no doubt, with how big this race is in our sport. Rolex means a great deal to me, but with this being my full-time thing and him coming over, I’d love nothing more than having a Victory Lane picture with one of the two of us holding that trophy up. I saw him this morning and we laughed. I called him Wendy, so he asked me if I wanted some fries, so I’m excited to have him here.”
HOW DO YOU THINK HE’LL ADAPT TO THIS STYLE OF RACING? “That’s a great question. He’s got IROC experience. He’s done drafting tracks. Obviously, nothing recent and probably nothing that’s this close and tight for that long, but I’m excited to get his take on everything. It’s definitely a different world for sure.”
WOULD YOU BE TEMPTED TO GIVE HIM A PUSH IN THE RIGHT HYPOTHETICAL SITUATION? “Honestly, he’s not a points earning car, so it’s not taking away a playoff spot and as long as I’m not pushing him past a Ford or a teammate, sign me up. I’m your guy.”
DO YOU FEEL THE POINT FOR HAVING THE FASTEST LAP COULD ALTER STRATEGY ON ROAD COURSES OR SUPERSPEEDWAYS? “You get one point for every spot, so you’re basically promoting yourself one position from a points perspective, so I think the bonus point definitely plays way more in the playoffs than it would probably in the regular season, but if you’re left out there with nothing left to do in the race, if you’ve got some damage, if you’ve gone back to the garage and fixed your car, why not go try and get one more point. That does seem to matter as we go down here or maybe even fighting for a regular season championship or positions in the regular season to stack yourself up for the playoffs. I’m not saying it doesn’t matter, but it’ll definitely carry a lot more weight once you get into the playoffs.”
WHAT CAN YOU CONTROL IN THESE TYPE OF RACES? “The fuel is important. The strategy of how you go through the pack is important. Pit stops. Race strategy. There’s quite a lot of small details that go down into what make these races what they are. The one thing you can’t control are the wrecks in those races, but where you end up in the pack before those happen are certainly in your control.”
IS IT FRUSTRATING WHEN YOU KNOW AT SOME POINT YOU HAVE TO GO INTO FUEL SAVING MODE? “Yes and no. It’s a different race. I think that’s the only way you’ve got to look at it is it’s a different part of the race and a different way for you to separate yourself.”
WHAT MINDSET DO YOU CARRY INTO 2025 AND HOW DOES IT DIFFER FROM THE PAST? “Honestly, I’m super energized. I’ve never really felt this excited about a race season ever in my career, just from the standpoint I know who I’m working with very well. I feel very confident that we have all the right pieces to go out and be a successful race team and myself as a driver. It’s my fourth year in the series and it ties how long I’ve ever stayed in a racing series in my career, so I feel very confident in what I need out of my car, how to race in the series, the guys that I’m racing. I don’t want to use the word comfort because I feel like that is tied with complacency in this industry, but I feel very comfortable with where I’m at and what it’s gonna take to be the best and I know what those things are and I feel confident we can do those things.”
HOW MUCH OF THAT STEMS FROM THE SPEED YOU SHOWED AT THE END OF LAST SEASON? “I think our playoff run definitely reaffirms how I feel about that. I don’t think it changes, but I think I’ve always felt from the beginning of last year to to the tailend of last year that it was possible, you just have to commit to the part and to have that process result in that type of speed and that level of potential, I didn’t want the season to end last year just because of where we were at, but I feel really refreshed and energized and ready to go.”
HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT THE STYLE OF RACING AT ATLANTA NOW? “I think every Atlanta race we’ve done since the repave has looked different each time, so I can’t sit here and confidently tell you that I know exactly what the race is gonna look like. From a generalization, yeah, it’s gonna be a drafting style race, no doubt, and handling is gonna be somewhat important, but to the levels of which and how it changes the racing, I think it’s been an unknown each time, which as been fun to kind of react and adapt on the fly and understand what your car is gonna need as the race goes on, and hopefully you have enough time to work on it and do those things and have that opportunity, but it’s been an exciting race, no doubt. I think the only one I didn’t leave either with a smile on my face or wanting to go back and do it again was the first one. Past that, they’ve been pretty exciting events for me.”
HOW DIFFERENT IS THAT RACE FROM OTHER 1.5-MILE TRACKS? “I think what really separates it is it’s not like you’re gonna lose the draft at Atlanta. I think the only reason you’re further back is if you have handling issues and have to start lifting more and that’s the thing that maybe you look at and go, ‘Oh, this looks exactly like a superspeedway,’ but the only guy that’s probably not lifting is the leader and there’s a lot of how do you manage yourself and how you manage lanes and how you manage your position on the track when you’re in one cars worth of traffic, so I think there’s a lot more going on behind the scenes for the drivers and for the spotters and the teams than kind of what really meets it because it’s really easy to associate it with the racing we do at Daytona and Talladega, which is full throttle. The only reason you’re lifting is to not hit the car in front of you, whereas the handling element plays a much bigger role than I feel like what you’re able to tell.”
WHAT ABOUT CHANGING THE COURSE AT COTA? “I think it specializes the track a little bit more with making it smaller, just from a numbers standpoint when you reduce the number of corners on the racetrack the corners that exist now have a heightened importance, whereas there’s a corner I might not have sacrificed setup items on or passing zones or so on that are now much more important because they’re a higher percentage of the lap, just from a numbers standpoint it does change things. I can’t say with certainty what those corners are exactly going to be and how important they’re going to be until we get there. There’s been some paving that’s been done as well, so there’s gonna be a bit of a learning curve there, but it’s definitely gonna change the race for sure.”
HOW DOES IT FEEL TO HAVE SOMEONE LIKE HELIO ASK YOU FOR ADVICE ABOUT THIS TRACK? “It definitely is cool. I’m glad he’s in a position that he can trust me, but at the same time I do feel like he’s in a position with teammates that are very experienced with Ross and Daniel, and a team that should be able to tell him how to get around and do this and make this race, but he and I have spoken probably in the past couple years kind of more generalizing about this race and the challenges and what it takes to be in a competitive situation at this race, so I’m excited to have him here, excited to see him in a car that’s definitely capable of winning the race and certainly looking forward to racing against him.”
TODD GILLILAND, No. 34 Love’s Travel Stops Ford Mustang Dark Horse – WHAT DO YOU FEEL NOAH HAS BROUGHT TO THE TEAM THAT WAS MAYBE MISSING BEFORE? “It’s hard to say what was missing, but it’s definitely much different with all three of us. With myself, Zane Smith and Noah Gragson it’s much younger. It’s much different energy for sure. With Michael it was very comforting at times, just with his experience that our whole company wasn’t getting too far off of where we should be going and at least the ultimate goal that we’re trying to achieve, where with us it’s a little bit maybe more hectic in the shop. We’ve got Noah running around trying to set people on fire with brake clean and a torch. I’ve never seen Michael do that, but it’s just a lot of fun. It’s much different. I feel both ways are very fun and exciting, and I’m excited about our team’s future. I think that’s the biggest thing.”
SO THERE’S A DIFFERENT ENERGY THIS YEAR? “For sure. It’s a little bit different with Noah bringing a majority of his team from last year over, so those guys know each other very well, but don’t know everyone else at Front Row very well, so it’s been kind of fun to learn that. I know my crew chief coming back, Chris Lawson, very well from working with him in years past. I still know the 38 team really well, so it’s just kind of interesting trying to get everyone together on the same page.”
HOW BIG IS IT TO HAVE CHRIS BACK AS CREW CHIEF? “It’s very exciting. I’m very happy to have him back. Obviously, he got a year of Cup experience under his belt last year over at Rick Ware Racing and then now going into my fourth year I feel like I’m at a point where experience is getting up there and we should be able to do some really good things this year, but, overall, being really comfortable and all that is probably the highest it’s ever been with the team I have this year.”
HOW HAS THE COMMUNICATION BEEN SINCE YOU KIND OF KNOW EACH OTHER? “I definitely think that’s true. It’s really easy to say communication is one thing or another, like having a number system, but a lot of times it’s the tone of your voice, how fast you say something, especially in the heat of the moment. It’s easy to debrief after practice or qualifying and sit there in a quiet room, but during the heat of battle it’s about the tone and the voice and everything, so I think we understand that very well in each other. It’s just really hard to replicate that with years and years of experience.”
DO YOU FEEL LIKE THE VETERAN AT FRONT ROW? “It’s kind of odd because I’ve been there the longest, I’ve been running Cup the longest, but I’m still the youngest physically of the three of us, so it feels odd to say that, but it’s really nice, just relationships with Jerry Freeze, our owner Bob Jenkins, and a lot of people at the shop. It’s been cool and I feel like we’re all leading the ship in the same direction, but it’s nice to have the most experience, for sure.”
HOW HAS IT BEEN TO HAVE DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE FROM THE OTHER GUYS? “I probably have a different perspective because I’ve only been with Front Row in the Cup Series and only been with Ford and just kind of experienced how we do things, but at least from our side of Front Row Motorsports I feel like we’ve been taking huge steps as far as media presence, but also manufacturer-wise. We’ve moved up a lot, so it’s hard for me to really say on that, but I know we have good relationships with everybody.”
WHAT DOES THE DAYTONA 500 MEAN TO YOU? YOUR DAD WON THE POLE IN 2007. “Personally, this race means the most by far of anything. I think it’s the biggest race in the whole world, in my opinion. I do think a lot of that comes from growing up around the racetrack and I think one of my earliest memories is my dad being on the pole in that 2007 Daytona 500, so just feeling the energy being down on pit road at such a young age made me think that was a feeling I wanted to feel one day, and then once I ran my first Daytona 500 it was amazing. It was everything I ever hoped for, so just to be able to come back. It’s really hard. There’s so much pressure and so much anticipation and more times than not, at least for myself, I haven’t had good finishes here or good runs, so it’s disappointment, but it’s kind of about balancing all that knowing that there’s a great chance for us to do something cool this weekend and enjoying the race and enjoying the whole environment of it, but, at the same time, we have a long season ahead of us.”
HAVE THE EXPECTATIONS RISEN WITHIN THE TEAM? “I think so. I think our expectations just slowly keep climbing. I think you’ve seen that with Front Row in the past as far as probably one to two spots better in points year after year, but I think at this point, where we’re at right now, it’s a massive jump to the next level. We’re 22nd and 23rd in points and, really, the next guys are Kyle Busch was right in front of us. The playoff bubble guys who are running inside the top 10 every single week. I feel we did a really good job of maximizing our weekends and getting good finishes at the end of the races, but we still have a long way to go as far as racing inside of the top 10, getting stage points every single week, but those are definitely our goals and what we want to achieve. I think we’re definitely getting closer than further, so that’s a good feeling.”
YOUR DAD HAS A CAR HERE AS AN OWNER. WHAT’S IT LIKE TO SEE HIM TAKE THAT PROGRAM INTO THE CUP SERIES? “For me, I’m very proud of what he’s done with the whole Tricon Garage team. It’s very hard to see the process of him kind of getting into the Cup Series, having great goals and ambitions and, in probably the nicest way possible, probably not reaching the highest of goals he’s had set, but then to pivot and still make such a big impact in the sport with five full-time Truck teams and just to see how proud he is of all of it is what’s really special to me. He always wants me to go over there, especially when they were first building everything up, seeing them build their own chassis and building their own bodies, winning a lot of races. That’s the side of it that I feel people don’t see, but he really enjoys the behind the scenes and the building of a car. The bare bones of it is what he loves, so that’s really cool and then now, to field a car in the Daytona 500 is a massive step, so that’s really cool. Hopefully, they make the race and hopefully we can feel that excitement of the 500 together on Sunday.”
HOW DOES IT FEEL TO HAVE THE LOVE’S SPONSORSHIP? “I think that’s probably the coolest part, to me, of moving into the Front Row Love’s car. It’s a much more identifiable car, I feel like, whether it’s the actual visual brightness of it on the racetrack and on myself, too. It’s a very bright suit, but just having that consistency is great. I think they’re on the car for 19 races this year, so about half the season and it’s a recognizable car. There’s a lot of support from the brand and higher ups in the brand, so that’s what it takes to be successful, especially to start building my own brand with the car number and a big sponsor. It’s definitely gonna be fun and cool for me to represent them.”
AND THAT CAR HAS WON A DAYTONA 500. “Absolutely, yeah. The 34 Love’s car has won before, so no reason why we can’t do it again.”
DO YOU FEEL LIKE YOU CAN CARRY THE BANNER FOR THIS TEAM? “Definitely. I think last year was a massive step for us, at least for me and the 38 team. Last year was a big step to be right there neck and neck with the 34 in points. My first two years, the 34 was head and shoulders better than us week in and week out, and it definitely showed in points position and everything else. For us, we passed them in the last race and, to me, that was kind of the moment of like, ‘All right, we can compete and be the leader of this team,’ so, obviously, it’s still sad to see Michael go because I feel like he’s always a benchmark guy. He’s done so much. He’s gonna get the most out of his car, but I feel very confident that we can do the same. At first, I was a little bit sad to move numbers. It was cool to run 38, but with Love’s and the 34 and everything and the perception of it being the flagship car at Front Row is definitely a good opportunity.”
JOEY LOGANO, No. 22 Shell/Pennzoil Ford Mustang Dark Horse – WHAT IS THE CONFIDENCE LEVEL LIKE AFTER WINNING THE CHAMPIONSHIP? “Your confidence is higher, but that’s the only thing that’s different. You’re coming off a good year, so you obviously feel solid about it, but we don’t have a lead on anyone anymore. We’re back to zero. The goal is no different. Our mission is still to win the championship. That doesn’t change, so I don’t see much different.”
WHAT CAN YOU CONTROL IN THIS RACE? “I think you can control all of it. I don’t see what part you can’t. If you understand the probabilities and the chances of what’s going on around you and who is around you and what they’re most likely to do, you can control most of your destiny. I mean, I kind of look at it as a card game. You can win with any hand if you play it correctly. Maybe you don’t have the best hand, but you can probably figure out how to do something with it. That’s kind of how I see it.”
WHERE DO YOU WANT TO BE AT THE WHITE FLAG? “First. All the time. You don’t know when the yellow is gonna come out. Do you know you’re gonna finish the race under the green? No, so I want to be first.”
WHAT DOES THIS RACE MEAN TO YOU AND BEING A PAST CHAMPION? “It’s definitely one that everyone wants to have a Daytona 500 on their resume. It’s been a long time. There have been a lot of close finishes since then to get it, but, overall, this race is one of the big pillars that’s built our sport. It’s the Daytona 500. The Great American Race and being part of it is always special. It never goes away for me. It’s always nice just to be a part of it, but being able to say you’ve won it has been nice, but I really want to do it again. It’s been a long time.”
HOW HAS IT BEEN WITH JOSH BERRY JOINING THE GROUP? “Honestly, we haven’t had much time to work together yet. We ran the Clash. That’s all we’ve got, so you’ve got to build a relationship. It takes time. There are a few things you’ve got to figure out like, one, what does he mean when he says certain things. You’ve got to learn his scale, learn when he’s tight is there like an offset of what I like to what he likes? I don’t know what that is yet. He doesn’t know what that is yet, so we have to learn each other not only from a personal level, but also from a professional level on what he likes in his car so we can actually use each other, but I don’t see being able to actually help each other much until later in the year once we kind of learn what those offsets are.”
HOW MUCH HAS RACING CHANGED AT DAYTONA SINCE YOU WON 10 YEARS AGO? “In every way. It’s changed in so many ways. The cars. The drivers are completely different. I said it earlier, you can put these drivers and crew chiefs and teams in the 2015 Daytona 500 and that race would look completely different. With the same cars it would look completely different, just because that’s how people grow. It’s the evolution. People keep getting smarter and doing things in different ways and because of that it changes, and then you have the difference of what the Next Gen car is compared to then. It’s another huge change.”
IS THE DESIRE TO WIN ANOTHER DAYTONA 500 THE SAME AS IF YOU HAVEN’T WON IT? “Yeah. It doesn’t waver for me. It’s the same as winning the championship. It doesn’t change. I want to do it every year. What’s the point of showing up? What’s the point of leaving home and coming down here if you’re not gonna try with everything you’ve got, so between that and the fear of not being fully prepared, that keeps me pretty driven.”
HOW HAVE YOU SEEN AUSTIN CINDRIC GROW THE LAST COUPLE OF YEARS? “I think he’s come a long ways. At the beginning of his career when he first raced Trucks, boy, he’s come a long ways from there. I think he should be proud of that. He’s made a ton of improvements and I think as he’s raced in the Cup Series more you start to understand what it takes to win and where your strengths and weaknesses are and he works on that. Austin works hard. That’s why he’s the most improved, in my opinion, because he works hard.”
WHAT WOULD IT FEEL LIKE TO JUMP IN YOUR 2015 DAYTONA 500 CAR? WOULD IT FEEL LIKE GETTING IN A 10 YEAR OLD PASSENGER CAR? “It’s definitely different. It does seem a little bit like that. You look at some of the things we did and what we thought made sense, or even the things we got away with then compared to what you get away with now is so different. Everything is different, so it feels different. Probably the part that looks the most different is the safety stuff. What we thought was safe then and now that we know what is better now, you look back then and we thought those cars were safe, and you look at it now and at least from the seat standpoint from where your head was and helmets and all those types of things, we thought we knew a lot then but we didn’t. We learned a lot when this Next Gen car was introduced and we were all getting concussed. We learned a lot about where seats, heads around foam, helmets, seating positions. We learned a lot about all those things that has definitely changed a lot.”
DO YOU SEE THE POINT FOR FASTEST LAP CHANGE STRATEGY FOR ROAD COURSE OR SUPERSPEEDWAY RACES? “Possibly. It’s a regular season point, so it means something. It’s not a playoff point. That would be a huge deal, so that one surprised me. The first I heard of it was when they announced it. I was like, ‘Oh. That’s news.’”
ARE NASCAR DRIVERS ATHLETES? “Yeah. It depends on how you want to classify an athlete. I think somebody, in my opinion, that can handle an extreme amount of pressure in a competitive atmosphere – do or die kind of scenarios with a lot on the line – I consider that an athlete. I look at a golfer. I say a golfer is an athlete. They’ve got to perform and that’s not easy to do. I think sports, more than half of it is in your brain than what you’re physically doing, but if you think about the physical aspect of our sport as well, we’re in the car for three-plus hours and 140 degrees and the physical part of it is real as well, but, to me, the mental part of it is really – I have a lot of comparison to watching other sports and I can understand what a lot of other athletes are going through. To me, honestly, I think it’s a dumb question because I think we are. I don’t see how we’re not.”
CHRIS BUESCHER, No. 17 Fastenal Ford Mustang Dark Horse – WHAT MAKES WORKING WITH SCOTT SO GOOD? “Working with Scott through all these years, he’s very calculated. His demeanor is very similar to mine. I think that’s what has let us communicate really well. We’re both very passionate about trying to figure out how to make this thing work and how to win races, but also not the most bubbly, outgoing, whatever you want to call it, emotional. It’s kind of held in until those bigger moments. It lets us kind of weed through the fluff, so to speak, some of the unnecessary stuff that’s just filling space and taking up time, and kind of lets us dive into it. I think Scott does a great job with that. I think that the team knows what to expect with him and how his leadership style is. It’s the same thing over again. It’s not belittling mistakes that may happen during a weekend, it’s lift yourself up, do what we know you’re able to do and get back after it. I think that’s helped us be a strong race team front to back.”
THE PENSKE GUYS HAVE WORKED WELL TOGETHER. WHAT WILL IT MEAN TO HAVE A THIRD RFK CAR AGAIN THIS YEAR? “Having a third car here last season was strategic, just even as a part-time car, but for this year we know the importance of it. We know what the opportunity it will give us, not only superspeedway racing but everywhere, but especially to start the year off for the 500 it puts us on the side of numbers. We’re able to help each other more. We’re able to have that confidence and that faith in each other that we’re all trying to achieve the same thing, that we’ve sat in meetings for hours and hours on end together that we know the game plan. You’re not guessing by people’s moves. We’ve worked with Ryan. Brad and I have both worked with Ryan quite a bit the last several years as he’s been at other teams too, so we’ve been able to have a lot of faith in him and confidence in his pushing style, which also just helps us know that we’re gonna be in a good spot. We’ll put him in a fast race car and go out there with our other two RFK Fords and we know we’re gonna be in a really good spot. We’ve had great speed at these things. We’ve just really needed more numbers and this is that step for us.”
HOW MUCH MORE CONFIDENT DOES THAT MAKE WITH RYAN BEING SO GOOD AT THIS KIND OF RACING? “That’s one of the many benefits with Preece coming over. I’ll brag on him a little bit. Preece is a buddy of mine, but he’s also a tremendous racer. He’s a good short track racer. He puts a ton of work into this thing. He is trying to have that breakthrough year and with that it means being good at a lot of different styles of racetracks. Short track races, where we all grew up and where you’re supposed to be good at, but it’s not good enough to succeed at this level. I think he took a quick lesson to be good at superspeedway racing because that’s a large part of it, but we’re not coming down here to try and teach a rookie how to superspeedway race. We have a third driver in another competitive RFK Ford that is very good at this style of racing, that needs maybe some of the direction of a veteran like Brad Keselowski to help him along like Brad has been able to help me at these things. I had my moments of shining of speed here or there and some close finishes, but Brad has really helped dial in the detail work that goes into making these things consistently successful. I think having that mentorship is going to help Ryan come up to speed rather quickly for these things, which ultimately is gonna benefit all of our cars, selfishly. There are a lot of good things coming down the line right now. It’s been a busy offseason, but it’s a great opportunity for all of us at this point.”
IS THERE ANY ONE SINGLE THING OR BIGGEST THING BRAD IMPARTED TO YOU? “No. There wasn’t any one thing. It’s been a lot of little things along the way. It’s been a lot of explaining his thought process in moments, where I didn’t understand at the time. It’s some of the most simple, basic things that I probably should have figured out early in my career, but just didn’t have that teammate that was at that level to give up that knowledge or maybe they didn’t even have that knowledge, I don’t know, but some of the most basic things that I never caught on he just explained and put it on the table. I was like, ‘Oh, that makes sense. That’s an easy thing to fix. I can do that.’ And that’s helped us quickly, and that’s helped me be a better teammate to him to give us opportunities to be faster together and it’s what let us get that big win here two years ago now for the fall race was having Brad behind us and knowing his tendencies and what he was gonna do to push us. I’m under no false illusion that he wasn’t gonna try to pull out and pass us on that last lap if the right run would have come, but it ended up being an easy win for us, basically 80 percent due to Brad in that moment, if not more. So, it’s just been really key in having somebody that is so good at these things help pass on that information that he’s picked up through 15 or more years at this point in the sport.”
WHAT DOES THE DAYTONA 500 MEAN TO YOU? “I always catch a little bit of crap for this one because it’s obviously a massive race and it does mean a lot, but I try really hard not to put more emphasis or pressure on any specific race. I want to win wherever we’re at this weekend. This race means as much to me as winning the Coca-Cola 400 did here or as much as winning Pocono did in my rookie season. I just want to win races wherever they may be. The 500 has a lot of perks to go with it. You get to put your name on that trophy and it stays forever, but at least in leading up to it I try to treat it like the other races because I promise you we are putting in all the effort for every race to try and win that one and just an opinion of mine that could be completely wrong, but I don’t want to put more pressure on this one and put yourself in a place to potentially make a mistake from putting too much on it. Again, I don’t know if that’s right or wrong, but that’s how I try to go into these things.”
RYAN BLANEY, No. 12 Menards/Peak Ford Mustang Dark Horse – HOW MANY SPOTS CAN YOU MAKE UP IN TODAY’S STYLE OF RACING? “It just kind of depends on what lanes are open. If we all get three-wide, you can’t go anywhere. The track is blocked. Here it is honestly better than Talladega. Here, handling is a little bit more of an issue, so you can actually go to the wall if they’re two-wide, bottom and middle. You can maybe make up a little bit of ground when tires get old, but I feel like they’re just a little bit too draggy. They’re kind of like Trucks to where you’re just taking up more track distance, so you need the handling to come into play. But I feel like you can, but then you might be making good progress and then two cars jump up in front of you and now you’re stopped. It’s way better to try to play defense from the first three rows than you are trying to come from the back.”
IS IT HARDER TO PREDICT A 500 WINNER TODAY? “”Yeah, for sure, and it’s just the way that the cars are. It’s nothing that anyone is doing, it’s just the product of the car and it’s a little bit more unpredictable. The runs and it’s hard to control the race with these cars. Five years ago, 10 years ago especially, you kind of had an air bubble a little bit. It was kind of like a beach ball effect, so the leader could jump between lanes and control lanes, but now there’s none of that and the runs are big, so the leader can’t do that anymore. If they throw big blocks, they’re gonna wreck a lot of people, so it is harder to control. I’d say it is a little bit more unpredictable than is used to be.”
DOES IT CHANGE THE WAY YOU RACE? “Yeah, you’re always changing the way you race. You adapt to the car. You understand what it does different, but now everyone has an idea. ‘Hey, this is how this car races on speedways,’ and you just kind of have to do the best you can with it, so you’re always adapting and trying to find different ways to stand out. That’s the hardest thing because you have 39 other people doing the same thing.”
ARE NASCAR DRIVERS ATHLETES? “Yeah. How do you think we’re not? That question gets brought up a lot because I think it just gets such a bad stigma of sitting in a car and you’re sitting down while you’re doing your sport, or you’re going in circles and that’s not a sport. That’s hard because it’s hard for people to relate, I feel like. It’s not like any other stick and ball sport to where you can go to the park and go play it. As a kid, you can kind of see, ‘Hey, this is tough. This sport is hard.’ These, there’s none of that really out there, so it’s hard to relate to the fan or anybody who has never done it just for that reason, but I think the biggest thing why we’re athletes is every sport has its own special things why the athletes are special, but I think ours is obviously the heat in the cars are immense. The focus for 500-600 miles is just through the roof. You’re trying to go 200 miles an hour and trying to hit your line by like two inches. It’s pretty hard to do. I see people can’t drive the highway at 50 without swerving all over the place, and I feel like you’re always on the edge of control. That, to me, is the most difficult part of racing is you’re guessing every corner ‘where’s the limit?’ while you’re also having to account for tire grip loss every lap. It’s like you’re guessing how deep I can go and how hard I can run in this corner and how fast my cornering speed can be, but it’s changing every lap. It’s like, how do you find that edge without going over it? And you see people go over it all the time and they wreck, so I think that’s the hardest thing about racing is, ‘where is the line and how do you adjust every single corner to find the new line?’ You do that 300 times or 500 miles, that’s really tough.”
CAN YOU CONTROL ANYTHING IN THIS RACE? “I think it kind of goes year to year. I look back at some races and it’s like, I never tried to let speedway racing get to me too much, like if you get caught up in someone else’s mess. It’s like, it is what it is. I’ll look at more of the races like, ‘I should have done this different’ or ‘I didn’t make the right decision here.’ I look back to the ‘22 500 and I had a good shot to win that race with Austin and I look back and say, ‘I could have done something a little different maybe.’ So I just try to lean back on all of those previous experiences and ask, ‘OK, could you have made a better choice? Probably.’ So let’s change it if I’m in that spot again. I just try to learn from them and hopefully I can contend for one soon.”
DO YOU FEEL THE VOID OF NOT HAVING A 500 WITH BOTH OF YOUR TEAMMATES WINNING IT? “I don’t actively feel it. I would sure liked to have won one, so it would be nice if I could join the club, so we’ll see.”
ARE YOU GOOD AT COMPARTMENTALIZING WHAT HAPPENED AT PHOENIX OR DOES IT STAY WITH YOU? “I’ve got to be honest, I don’t really think about it until you all bring it up. I watched everything I needed to watch within that week after the race and I probably could have done a couple things different. It’s so easy Monday quarterbacking the thing. ‘It’s so simple. Just do this.’ But it’s hard to do in the moment, so, no, I don’t sit around and stew over it. I’m proud of every single person that got us there, for sure. I told my guys after, ‘Don’t hold your heads about this just because we didn’t win it. We did a great job all year, a really great job all weekend.’ And it just didn’t happen for us and that’s just the way it is, but we had a shot and that’s all we wanted. I get over things pretty quick.”
DID THE WEDDING HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH IT? “No. I get over things quick anyway, but the wedding being a month out after Phoenix definitely probably helped. Like, ‘All right, I have something bigger to focus on here.’”
WHAT DOES THE DAYTONA 500 MEAN TO YOU? “Every single guy in here is gonna tell you it means a lot and means the world to them. I guess from my personal view I came up here a lot watching dad run here as a kid. It was something really neat I was able to experience and experience race day morning and stuff like that, the Fan Zone, the stage with dad. That was always pretty neat and then it was kind of surreal when I turned around and I did my first one in 2015. I think it would just mean a lot to me personally to have my family here because dad spent so many years trying to win it and stuff like that, and I’ve spent so many years so having all of that come full circle would be pretty neat.”
COTA HAS CHANGED THE CIRCUIT. HOW DO YOU ANTICIPATE HAVING A SMALLER TRACK? “I ran it on the sim last week and it’s pretty interesting where that cut through is, like right after the esses. It’s pretty tight, but I think you’re gonna see passes into that new corner. I think you’re still gonna see people outbraking each other into what was 12, so I don’t know. I don’t think it will change the racing up that much. I don’t think you’ll see fewer passes. I think the main reason why they changed it was for the fans to see more cars go by on the frontstretch. An old lap there was like 2 minutes, 10 seconds, so every two minutes you’ve got cars going by you and now it’s like 1:20 or 1:30, so it’ll be a little bit more action for the fans to see, but there was always action going on all around that place, but I don’t think the racing will be much different. It will still be a good show and I’m happy we’re still going there. That’s a cool area and I really enjoy the fans out there, and they appreciate us coming for sure. It’ll be something different, which is nice.”
CHANDLER SMITH, No. 66 Quick Tie Ford Mustang Dark Horse – HOW GRATEFUL ARE YOU TO GET THIS OPPORTUNITY SO LATE? “Definitely last minute and I’m very grateful that I’m still on the list of drivers that somebody runs into an issue, I’m one of the guys people call and say, ‘Hey, we ran into an issue and need a driver.’ It’s definitely last minute, but really, really excited to be down here with Garage 66 and attempting to make the Daytona 500. It’s my second-ever attempt and hopefully we can make it in this time. My first time didn’t go too well for me.”
TREVOR BAYNE WAS IN A SIMILAR SITUATION IN 2011 AND BUILT SOME GOOD PARTNERSHIPS IN THE DRAFT TO PULL OFF AN UPSET. ARE YOU TAKING A SIMILAR APPROACH? “I have a good relationship with a good bit of the drivers in this garage and I feel like a lot of people would help me, but, at the end of the day, this is a very selfish sport and you’ve got to go out, yes, you need help and you need drafting partners, but at the end of the day there’s only one winner and everybody is out to better themselves for their team, so with that being said, another portion that goes into that is making sure you’re working with a fast car, so as long as our number 66 Quick Tie Products Ford Mustang is quick, I’m definitely confident that we’ll have some people helping us out.”
THIS TEAM IS AN UNDERDOG AND HAS BEEN OVER THE YEARS. DO YOU FEEL THAT AT ALL? “Yeah. I mean, Garage 66 is definitely not that established of a race team compared to a Front Row Motorsports or an RFK or a Penske or anything like that, so they’re definitely way, way behind the eight-ball in the sense of those powerhouse organizations, but we’re hungry and we’re ready to go out here and attempt the Daytona 500. We’ve put all our eggs in this basket and hopefully we can make it in.”
WHAT DO YOU FEEL IS IN YOUR CONTROL TRYING TO MAKE THIS RACE? “Not speeding on pit road is in my control. That’s about the only thing to be honest with you. There’s not a lot that’s in your control, so it’s crazy. Hopefully, we can go out there and lock ourselves in on speed tonight and not have to worry about racing our way in during the Duels tomorrow. If not, then we’ll look forward to racing my guts out and trying to make it into the race.”
WHAT DID YOU TAKE OUT OF LOGGING LAPS THIS MORNING? “We definitely weren’t anything impressive on single car speeds by any means. I know we ended up being fourth in practice or something like that, but that was because I ended up picking up the draft and just getting a feel for if our car could draft and suck up to other cars and I felt like it did, so I’m confident in that. But our single car speed, we definitely have a lot of work to do if we want to qualify in on time.”
SO YOU FEEL YOU WILL PROBABLY BE LOOKING TOWARD RACING IN DURING THE DUEL? “Everybody going into this weekend said they would be disappointed if we didn’t make it in on time, including myself. Just knowing what’s gone into this car, how many hours went into this car fluffing and buffing and how much resources went into this car. We’ve got a great engine with Roush Yates. Everything looks great. We were definitely looking to make it in on speed and, honestly top 15, top 10 is what we expected, so to be that slow in practice was a gut punch. I hope we can make some changes so we can get back to that expectation that we set for everybody going into this deal.”
