Ford Performance Notes and Quotes
NASCAR Cup Series
Goodyear 400 Media Availability — Darlington Raceway
Saturday, April 5, 2025

Brad Keselowski, driver of the No. 6 Castrol Seven Critical Areas Ford Mustang Dark Horse for RFK Racing, has two career NASCAR Cup Series wins at Darlington Raceway. The owner/driver stopped by the infield media center before practice and qualifying to talk about this weekend’s race.

BRAD KESELOWSKI, No. 6 Castrol Seven Critical Areas Ford Mustang Dark Horse – TARIFFS ARE IN THE NEWS. FROM A TEAM OWNERS PERSPECTIVE IS THIS CONCERNING AND HOW ARE YOU LOOKING AT THIS? “I can’t say I’ve put a ton of thought into it, but a lot of our single source parts come from here in the United States. I don’t know a lot of them that don’t, but that doesn’t mean that they’re not affected, whether that be raw materials or so forth, but at this point in time I don’t see there being a drastic effect for us, but I don’t know what I don’t know.”

WHEN YOU LOOK AT THIS SCENARIO DO YOU FEEL IT COULD BE AN ISSUE FROM AN OEM OR SPONSOR PERSPECTIVE? “It’s hard to say what kind of lagging indicators are out there, but, generally speaking, in the short term everybody has contracts and commitments and all those things. Long term, I can’t really answer much. I know that we’re in a good spot with all of our sponsors and deals that we have. I feel like you’re never immune, but we’re positioned well.”

NONE OF THE RFK CARS ARE RUNNING THROWBACK SCHEMES THIS WEEKEND. HOW HAS THE CALCULUS SHIFTED TO RUN YOUR TRADITIONAL SCHEME VERSUS THE THROWBACK? “It’s just hard. It’s hard to get all the different people to line up to pull it off. For my car this weekend, we have Castrol on it. We did throwbacks the last few times here. It’s kind of like we ran out of a little bit of energy to pull off one that was good enough to make a mark, so to speak. The other thing is, at least for us, is we have global brands on our cars and they have global initiatives and things that are going on and they want to make sure they hit those, so with limited windows to do that it doesn’t always work out. I think from a body of work on the throwback stuff we’ve done a lot and I’m really proud of what we’ve done. Maybe this year wasn’t obviously our greatest for making that happen, but I suspect that will come back around in the years to come.”

IS THE WEEKEND AS A WHOLE STILL WORTH DOING? “I think so. It’s difficult to get all the parties to join in and to participate, but year over year it seems like it has its ebbs and flows, where you have partners who are super excited about it and then the next year you have partners who are kind of just kind of ‘eh’. Ultimately, we need to make them happy.”

HAS THERE BEEN A SPECIFIC STRUGGLE WITH THE 6 TEAM THAT IS HAMPERING YOU GUYS AND DOES THE SPEED OF THE OTHER TWO CARS GIVE YOU OPTIMISM YOU CAN RIGHT THE SHIP? “Yeah, I feel like we’re gonna do all the right things and get where we need to be. We just haven’t gotten the results. We haven’t qualified as well as we’d like to, but neither has particularly the 60 car. In the race, we haven’t been able to put it together – some of it in our control, a lot of it not in our control, so it’s been frustrating, but I kind of have this feeling that we’re getting a lot of the bad luck out of the way very early in the season. That’s kind of the overwhelming sentiment and that if we stay the course, it will come back to us.”

HOW HAS THE TRANSITION BEEN FOR JEREMY? “I think for Jeremy there’s a lot of transition coming to RFK, learning all the tools and trying to understand how to maximize them. I can see him understanding them to a higher level every week and that improves our communication and ability to generate results, so I’m pretty optimistic.”

DO YOU KNOW WHAT TO FIX AND DO YOU FEEL YOU CAN GET CLOSE TO WINNING, OR DO YOU FEEL YOU CAN STILL POINT YOUR WAY IN? “We can definitely still point our way in, but we just don’t want to. We want to win our way in. I look at the next four or five weeks and they’re all tracks that we feel like we can win at, so it’s hard to just turn it around in one week, but I wouldn’t be shocked if we did. We know that we need to qualify better and we know that we need to – even our race execution hasn’t been bad, but if we’d have started further up front, we wouldn’t get caught up in other people’s problems or get caught up in yellow flags during pit cycles and things of that nature. I feel like, yes, we know what we need to be better.”

WHAT MIGHT BE THE IMPACT OF THE RICK WARE LEGAL SITUATION AT THIS POINT ON YOU GUYS? “It’s too early to tell. If you read the court documents, the majority of it was redacted, so not knowing what is said in there I still think it’s too early to tell.”

STEVE PHELPS TALKED ABOUT THE OWNER’S ADVISORY GROUP WITH YOU, HEATHER AND JUSTIN. WHAT DO YOU SEE AS THINGS YOU COULD POTENTIALLY ACCOMPLISH AND HOW MUCH HAVE YOU BEEN AROUND THOSE TWO? “I’ve got a lot of respect for both Heather and Justin, so I’ll answer that part first. Justin is really an outside the box thinker and kind of runs in a different pack, which I appreciate. He brings viewpoints that maybe I wouldn’t have thought of. I can say that. I think that’s good, and Heather, she’s got her family name in this sport. She’s clearly very invested and has a son running in the sport and has a passion for it that I respect and appreciate as well. Altogether, it’s hard to pick one initiative that’s important. There are a lot of important initiatives. If there are two that stand out to me it’s the end of the season and how we continue to make it the best we can for our fans, whether it be the racetracks we go to or the schedule as a whole with respect to when the season ends and when it starts. I think that’s something that I’m really keen to try to bend a few ears on and the group as a whole, and, beyond that, I think what stands out a lot is just the garage personnel and relationships and culture that we have in trying to solidify it as a place to work, whether it be for team members or officials or what not and trying to make it the best place we can. Those two have probably taken the priority for me.”

THERE’S TALK OF THE NFL EXPANDING TO 18 GAMES THE SUPER BOWL MOVING. THAT COULD MAYBE CHANGE SOME THINGS FOR NASCAR AND WHEN THE SEASON STARTS. “Without getting in front of our skis here and everything that is somewhat a proprietary issue to discuss, but I think you’re on the right path. The world is changing around us and we have to continue to adapt to that, whether it be the Super Bowl moving or different opportunities that exist with our broadcast partners that didn’t exist before and just trying to maximize those opportunities and adapt to the world.”

WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS ON THE CURRENT PACKAGE FOR BRISTOL? “The big guessing game is the tires. We went there last spring and the tires didn’t hold up very well. The dynamics of the race shifted fairly drastically and then we came back in the fall and the tires didn’t wear at all. That was another shift in the dynamics of the race, so trying to understand which one of those is going to be the case is probably the biggest question mark.”

WHAT DO YOU HAVE PLANNED FOR THE OFF WEEK? “A nice Easter celebration with my kids. We haven’t figured out exactly where, but we’re gonna have a good time.”

WHAT DOES THE ADDITION OF PREECE MEAN FOR RFK AND WHAT HAVE YOU SEEN OUT OF HIM? “I think Ryan is doing all the things he needs to do, whether that be on the track with results that are clear to see, or off the track with a lot of things that you don’t see and whether that’s different settings of meetings or his work ethic as a whole has been very high and we’re just trying to make sure that he’s surrounded with the right things to go with his work ethic that they can become potential advantages for him on the racetrack. He’s certainly putting in the effort. He’s highly focused and highly motivated and it’s nice to see him get the results out of that.”

A LOT OF THE PROBLEM WITH THROWBACK SCHEMES IS THAT THEY’RE TRADEMARKED. HOW DIFFICULT IS IT TO GET SOME OF THESE PAINT SCHEMES? “It’s a big lift, without a doubt, for the marketing and partnership teams that are inside all of these organizations to make it happen. There are a lot of conversations and it takes months of planning, maybe even years of planning in some cases to execute. I was having this conversation with Kevin Harvick a few weeks ago when we were talking about when he ran the 29 during the All-Star Race. I know that’s not this, but it’s calls with partners, it’s calls with trademarks and you kind of get to the point where you’re like, ‘I just want to go race.’ But when you do get the project done and you see it on the track or you hear from the fans, whether it be social media or wherever else it might be, when you’ve hit a good one, it’s definitely worth it.”

HAVE YOU EMBRACED AI AT ALL? “I think NASCAR has been pretty heavy in AI for a long time, it just maybe isn’t branded that way. If you took it to the AI world, they would clearly say it is. I think that for no small part of the last decade plus the use of AI and how the race cars are put together and how they’re set up has been gradually becoming more and more of a dominant force in the results that you see on any given weekend – to the point now where, particularly with the Next Gen car, where the race is more and more driven by how you bolt it together rather than component development. Using any type of artificial intelligence, I mean it moves the needle for us and we’re gonna continue to double down on that. We’re seeing more and more interest from AI partners in the sport and I suspect that it’s gonna be a big storyline for our sport for decades to come. It’s kind of like if you go back through the late 80s or early 90s when aerodynamics really came into NASCAR in a really heavy way. You don’t unlearn those things and now I look at artificial intelligence and what NASCAR is doing with it and the teams don’t really talk about it, particularly not publicly. They talk about it a lot within in the OEM circles. They talk about it a lot in the hiring practices in those types of settings, but particularly not within the media does NASCAR really talk about at the team level the importance of AI, but I can tell you every team on the track today is using some level of AI just to purely compete and the ones with the better tools are going to run better.”

YOU VISITED A LOCAL HOSPITAL EARLIER THIS WEEK. HOW DO YOU LIKE GETTING OUT IN THE COMMUNITIES AROUND THE TRACKS, AND WHEN YOU SEE KIDS OR ADULTS FIGHTING FOR YOUR HEALTH DOES IT GIVE YOU AN EXTRA FIRE TO PERFORM WELL? “It’s certainly a reminder of how fortunate we are when you have those opportunities to go to hospitals and see people who aren’t as well off. We get so caught up in our good weekends and our bad weekends and sometimes lose sight of the broader picture of just how fortunate we are just to be here. We probably wouldn’t be very good competitors if we just felt fortunate to be here though, so it’s probably pretty natural. To your point, it’s nice to get out in the community to see our fans, to tell our story. Big credit to NASCAR and their vision for the DAP program. I think it’s really moving the needle and inspiring a lot of people to do things that they wouldn’t have done otherwise. Being more involved in the community, I don’t want to take all the credit. Look at what the other drivers are doing. They’re doing as much or more, and I think you’re seeing that because of NASCAR’s commitment back to the drivers. It’s a great time in the sport. We spend a lot of time talking about what the sport doesn’t get right and very little time talking about what the sport does get right, and I think the drivers being involved in the community and engaging back with our fans is one of the things NASCAR does very well.”

NASCAR CUP SERIES
DARLINGTON RACEWAY
TEAM CHEVY DRIVER QUOTES
APRIL 5, 2025

 Chase Elliott, driver of the No. 9 UniFirst Chevrolet and the No. 17 HENDRICKCARS.COM Chevrolet for Hendrick Motorsports, met with the media in advance of running double duty in the NASCAR Cup and Xfinity Series at Darlington Raceway.

Media Availability Quotes:

We’ve heard different drivers kind of speak throughout the week on the Xfinity Series race last week. I’m just curious your perspective on what you saw.

“Yeah, it was terrible. It was really bad. I don’t know what all has been said already, so I don’t want to add to the negativity of the week. But yeah, it wasn’t impressive at all, for sure. It was kind of embarrassing, you know, I think more than anything. We’re better than that and those guys are better than that. You just want to try to set a better example, I guess, on Sunday’s and hope that that gets taken to heart somewhere in there — that not doing things like that is a better route.

It wasn’t just like the last lap thing. It was just the whole race. The whole race was just chaos. They were running over each other with 75 laps to go, it seemed like. But anyways, I’m good on it. I think enough has probably been said.”

At what point in the year, or maybe now, is it when you start assessing who’s strong and who’s kind of legit championship contenders and teams, that kind of thing? Is it this now or is it later in the year?

“I think it’s all year, for sure. It’s still very early. It definitely is early in the season. It’s going to be the same crowd. It’s the same crowd every year.. we don’t have to beat around the bush. It’s going to be the same people that are going to be good in the last 15 weeks of the year. The people that are good right now are just going to get better. That’s just how it is. It will be the same crowd, as always, when we get down to it.”

You’ve been solid here in Cup but not necessarily spectacular compared to some other tracks. Is there something about Darlington perhaps that you’ve struggled to crack the code with here?

“Yeah, for sure. I love Darlington. I just haven’t gotten it to love me back. Maybe this week.. maybe I can talk it into liking me this week.”

What is it about this racetrack that we see even veterans struggle to master that high lane here more than anywhere else? We see the skill of Homestead and other places, but what is it about this track specifically that makes running against the wall so challenging?

“It’s very similar to Homestead in a lot of ways. I think what makes it different here is that Homestead has a very gradual entry. If you enter on the wall, it has this nice radius to the corner. And this place, the wall is kind of choppy and makes it hard to get against it just right at the perfect time. You’ve got the safer barrier that juts out there in (turn) three. All those things kind of play a role.

Obviously, the tire wear throughout a run here is extreme, just like it is at Homestead, too. It’s always a challenge, but I think probably just the radius of the corners makes it a little different.”

Looking back last weekend at Martinsville, I was just curious — some people said it was still kind of hard to pass, even with the tires that were wearing more. What’s your thoughts on the state of short track racing after quite a few now?

“I thought it was better. It seemed like it’s better. You definitely have to be really mindful of how you either take care of your tire or don’t at the beginning of the run. But I think we’re in a better place than we were in the past. When I look at it, I think the tire is a big piece of that. I think I told you all that last week — it seems like it matters quite a lot. It makes sense that that’s what touches the ground, and that’s a big deal. The car plays a role, for sure, and I think it has had improvements. But yeah, I don’t know that it’s where it exactly needs to be, but I’m just not exactly sure how much better we’re going to get it. We can only piece together so much. But look, motorsports is an aerodynamic game, and I think we just all need to understand that that’s just part of it now. We’re not going to run those tails at these places all the time. I don’t care if you’re going 70 mph in the center of the corner or 170 –- like it matters a lot, and clean air is going to be king. You just hope that there’s enough difference and enough challenge behind the wheel that you can do something different early in a run to make a difference in your car late, and I think as long as we achieve that, then we’re doing all we can do. I thought we did more of that in Martinsville. I think we could still have a step more of that. I personally thought the tire felt really good. I thought the tire was in a pretty good place.

We’d just love some more power. I think if you give some more power, you give guys an opportunity to make more mistakes and be harder on the tire. We have a bunch of gears to choose from, so you can downshift or not downshift, and I just think that gives you an opportunity to really screw up bigger, which I think would be good. If you can add to that and just make it to where guys who really are mindful of every aspect of the run would excel or fail.”

Obviously, a few years into this new car, there will be discussions about what’s next for the series. I was curious, now that we are in this spec car box, do you envision that probably being just the standard moving forward into the future generations?

“It seems that way. I don’t have a crystal ball by any means, but I think that we’re pretty deep down the road of the spec parts and the policing of things that way. Yeah, I think that’s the way NASCAR wants to go with it. I think they’ve made that very loud and clear, that this is the direction. I think everybody’s understanding of that.

What’s next? I don’t know. I think it’s in an OK place right now, but whatever changes come down the road, I don’t think it’s going to be much different than what we have now. So with that being said, everyone is just going to continuously get closer and closer and closer every year.

You’ll certainly still have your standouts, don’t get me wrong. There will always be a way to have a small advantage, but that advantage will become even more minute than it is today. We’re going to see more of that as time goes because there are no secrets in that garage. I don’t know if you all know this, but you have guys that leave one team and go to another team the next year.. like there are no secrets in there. Everyone knows everything about everybody all the time — what you’ve got going on with your car, who ran what setup last fall at all these places.. that’s just what it is. That’s just the world we live in. Charlotte is a small area, and the garage is even a smaller group of people. That’s just part of it. It just makes it more difficult to find little advantages here and there. You have to make sure that you’re perfect. You’ve got to be perfect. You’ve got to be really good on Saturday; have a good pit box on Sunday, not lose any spots on pit road. You’re just going to see more and more of that, in my opinion.”

I don’t remember the exact number, but I think it’s around 19 cars this weekend that are not running a throwback paint scheme. I’m sure you’ve seen the talk on social media on that the throwback weekend has lost its luster. I’m curious on where you stand on that. Do you feel like this weekend has lost luster over time?

“I thought I lost it about four or five years ago, so I was way too early to that conversation, I think.

Not to be a downer — I joked about this years ago, but if we kept going down the road, we’re going to be throwing it back to me in 2018. At some point, I think we’ve got to chill on it a little bit. I think we’ve rode the horse to death, and we tend to do that a little bit too much.”

Chase, growing up with your dad around the sport, seeing how drivers race back then, where did the sport go wrong with that? Is it the points format today? Is it the cars being too safe? The guys being so far removed these days from anything happening? Where do you think the sport went wrong with what we’re seeing out there?

“In what way?”

Just what we saw last Saturday in the Xfinity Series, especially with the younger drivers..

“I don’t know how to answer that in a professional manner, so I’m just probably not going to. There’s a lot of reasons and parts and pieces to that, and why I think it has come to that. You’ve got to sit back and kind of look at it from a 1,000 feet view and understand why things are the way they are.. the points, who’s driving and the paths. It’s a little bit of everything, so I don’t think we have time to go into all of it. For me, at the end of the day, we can sit here and talk about how embarrassing it was last week, or we can sit here and try to encourage guys to do better. So let’s just encourage people to do better and try to set a better example on Sunday’s. I really feel like throughout the entirety of this year, the Sunday races have been really good from that perspective. I thought that race at COTA – man, you couldn’t have a better example of how to race. And not just 20-year veterans, but those guys that were racing for the win, you had William (Byron) and Christopher (Bell), guys who were on the younger side of life in the series, that set an incredible example, I thought, for everyone else. I think we just need to watch that stuff and appreciate that more. We don’t have to have side-by-side crashes to the line to have a good race. We can have a good race and it go green to the end, or whatever. I think we need to celebrate some of those other things a little more than we celebrate the chaos, and I think that’s part of the reason why we went wrong.”

60 percent of your finishes at Bristol have been in the top-10. What do you attribute to that consistency?

“ Well I like Bristol.. I think that’s number one. I enjoy going up there. I think Alan (Gustafson) had a really good grasp on that track, really before I got there to work with him. And I think just over time, we have developed a solid base of the feel that I want, and the feel that he knows that I need and want in the car. So I would say a combination of all those things together. I thought we had a really solid race there last fall. I thought we were right in the hunt with Kyle (Larson) and had a shot at it there. I thought that was fun. I hope we can do more of that. I look forward to getting up there and trying to piece together a good day.”

Do you have anything exciting planned for the off-week?

“No, nothing exciting. No races or anything scheduled. I’m going to try to enjoy it. It’s a long road after that all the way to the end this year. I really try to reset; get the batteries recharged and ready to go to the final stretch.”

Chase, do you use the cool shirt? If you do, is there a race in particular that comes to mind where you’re really thankful to have it?

“I’m kind of one of the guys that goes back and forth. Some weeks I use it, some weeks I don’t.

Certainly, as we get to these summer months, you’re going to want it, for sure. I’m trying to think of a good example. This race, honestly. I mean, I feel like this race is always the first hot one of the year, it seems like. Certainly, the 500 mile race in the fall here.. it’s still pretty hot when we get back here. There are a bunch of races that you’re thankful to have that. Some weeks, not necessarily at all. You can kind of get through it. And other weeks, I do think it certainly helps your fatigue level when you get to the end of these things.”

The second thing I wanted to ask was — going back to what you said about trying to get Darlington to love you back, how much of it is circumstance of trying to get a finish the team deserves, or is there something you’re chasing here, balance or feel, that you just haven’t hit on?

“I was just joking, it’s totally me. It’s not the track. It’s me, not you, right? (laugh). It is definitely totally on me. I think just the feel that I need in the car. It’s been a hunt to try and find that and find what I want. I thought we had a nice week of prep this week; have a good game plan, I hope, and just kind of start practice on a high note.

This Xfinity race – it’s been a year since I’ve driven one of those things. Jumping back and forth, I always find it to be a little bit of a challenge. Looking forward to getting going over there. Hopefully those laps will help me just get kind of comfortable with the racetrack; visualize things how I think they need to be. And then when we get out there and in Cup practice, try to get going and get going quick.”

It’s certainly not uncharted waters for you guys at Hendrick to be atop the standings early in the season. All four of you guys are solidly top-10 in points. What do you attribute most to your ability consistently to get off to strong starts this season?

“The company as a whole has done a great job over the winter to build really, really fast race cars. I think there’s some areas that we can be better. I really don’t think we’re at our best, really any of us, honestly. So it’s encouraging to see that. We can pretty confidently say that – hey, these are flaws. These are areas that can certainly have improvement. That’s an exciting place to be, in my opinion, because there’s so much more racing left this year and opportunities to get where we want to be, and I think we can do that. The company’s in a good spot. Everybody’s pulling in the same direction, and we’ve got to keep that up.”

You mentioned how there’s a lot of movement in the garage these days, but your driver lineup, you guys have stayed intact now for half a decade. As the veteran driver in that stable, how would you say building that chemistry year-to-year with your teammates has benefited you guys to get to this point? “I just think we have a really good working relationship. None of us are best friends off the racetrack. You know, we don’t hang out.. not because we don’t like each other, we just kind of run in different circles. But we have a really good working relationship when we show up and we have our meetings. I think everybody’s open and honest and willing to help one another. We show each other a lot of respect on the racetrack, just kind of how it should be. Those guys give me respect. I’m going to give it back at least that much and probably then some.. that’s just how I am. I enjoy being around guys like that who are hungry and want to get the job done for their team, but also kind of have the bigger picture.. the big picture of just the company in mind and are willing to help us all get better together and be stronger as a four-car stable.”

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NASCAR CUP SERIES
DARLINGTON RACEWAY
TEAM CHEVY DRIVER QUOTES
APRIL 5, 2025

 Austin Hill, driver of the No. 33 United Rentals Chevrolet and the No. 21 Bennett Transportation Chevrolet for Richard Childress Racing, met with the media in advance of running double duty in the NASCAR Cup and Xfinity Series at Darlington Raceway.

How would you describe the tone of the meeting with NASCAR?

“I would say the tone of the meeting was firm, but they got their point across and they did it in a really good way. So I think that was good for everyone in the series to hear, you know, the different sides of it with all three that were in there.

A lot of great things were said about what we could do better going forward. I stand strongly on the side of — for whatever reason, when the Xfinity Series go to Martinsville, we just lose our minds. But everywhere else, we’re the best racing in NASCAR and I strongly stand behind that.. that we are the best series in NASCAR. Just when you go to Martinsville, we look like we don’t know what we’re doing.

So we’re going to get through it. We have, whatever it is, seven or eight months before we go back to Martinsville. I’m hoping a lot of things, you know, change between now and then.

I don’t think that just one meeting is going to change the outcome of the playoff race in Martinsville. So, you know, it might be one of those cases where we need to have multiple meetings throughout the year just to reiterate some of the stuff. Even if things aren’t happening on the racetrack, even if it’s just a — say we’re all racing clean and we’re all doing the right things, but I think we got to keep it in everyone’s head that, you know, race the way you want to be raced and race with respect, and I thought that that’s kind of where we ended the conversation today and I thought it was all great.”

As a veteran in the series, what do you see your role in doing this and taking sort of a stance for people that might be in their first year in the series?

“Yeah, so Justin Allgaier and I had a really great conversation outside of the tent. Once he got done talking to you guys and all, we were walking back and I stopped him and we had a really good conversation. I think that him and I can both bring some really great things to the table. You know, Justin’s very respected on the racetrack and but he’s also super aggressive but he does it in a sneaky way. It’s kind of crazy to watch how he does it sometimes. He’s super aggressive but he does it in a good way.. in a sneaky way.

I’m on the other end, where I’m super aggressive and, you know, you push on me, I push on you, that type of thing and it just is what it is. I try to handle my business on the racetrack and after the race is over. I’ve done so many things wrong in my career up until this point and I felt like from, you know, last year into this year, I’ve kind of changed my mind set a little bit on just getting out of the car and talking to the media and just saying random things. Like there’s so many things that I would love to go back and take back that I’ve said throughout my career, but you can’t go back and change it, right? You can just move forward and so that’s what I’m doing.

I’m kind of taking a different role on things that I say outside of the race car versus things that I do inside the race car. In saying all that, I think that Justin and I can bring a lot to the table on trying to lead the Xfinity Series. I think that him and I, both being veterans of the sport, he has different ways of looking at it than what I do but I think that we both can kind of bring our own perspective in a way and kind of reach both, you know, eras of drivers, as far as the super aggressive ones and maybe the ones that race extremely clean, whatever. I think that him and I can give a lot of feedback to the drivers.”

Some people were somewhat critical of the way you drove in that race. Last week you said the one thing you felt bad about was wrecking, the wreck that got Jesse (Love). After looking. did you see anything else that you feel like you need to feel bad about?

“No — so I said this in the meeting, actually. In our meeting that we just had; they opened it to the floor. Justin (Allgaier) spoke first and I spoke second on some of the areas that we need to do a better job of or where we stand or where we feel like we stand. I basically said kind of the same thing I was just saying a second ago — race the way you want to be raced. I said look — if you go in there and you are lifting somebody’s rear tires off the ground four or five different times and you’re not wrecking them but you’re using them as a brake pedal and you’re knocking them out of the way, out of the groove, to get by them and you’re doing it on entry.. if you’re doing it across the middle of the corner, you’re faster than that guy. No one should get mad if that guy kind of gives you a little shot across the middle of the corner. That’s ‘rubbin’ is racing’ at its finest. That’s Martinsville. That’s the ‘bump and run’ type thing. But if you’re just going in there and you’re using that guy as a brake pedal and it’s eight tires are better than four and you’re lifting the rear tires off the ground, and that happens four or five, six times with the same guy, eventually that guy’s going to break and he’s not going to put up with it anymore. I will say this, too, I completely misjudged getting into the back of the No. 16 (Christian Eckes). You can go back and listen to my interview after Martinsville. Right when I got into the No. 16, I got free with the rear tires and I was starting to like wheel hop. So then I got off the brake pedal for a second, I got back to it, and I didn’t realize that the No. 16 was already really tight to the No. 2 (Jesse Love) and the No. 2 was really tight to the No. 1 (Carson Kvapil) and it just caused a chain reaction. So yeah, I felt really bad about the situation and how it went down. Looking back at it, I probably would have waited an extra corner and done things a little differently, but I would have at least gave the No. 16 a little bit of a nudge and shot him up the racetrack into the second or third lane to show like — hey man, you’ve lifted my rear tires off the ground four or five different times now, I’m not going to put up with it. Somebody else on the racetrack might put up with it, but I’m not.

And then other thing — I mean I didn’t really get into, there was no other real contact that really happened between me or anyone else, other than the No. 1 cut across my nose down the front stretch and I went as far left as I wanted to and I finally just straightened up the wheel and I’m like, I’m not turning left no more, and he kind of drove across my nose. I could have lifted in that instance but he had already blocked me three or four different times. So again, if you block me three or four different times, at some point I’m not just going to keep turning left and let you keep that spot. So I stand strongly on how the race went, as far as my part in it. I completely misjudged the No. 16 mishap and I wish I wouldn’t have taken the No. 2 and the No. 1 out. But that was, I mean honestly, that was just a racing error on my part.”

You say that Martinsville is its own kind of animal, but this is your only trip to Darlington this year as opposed to two, so do you think there will be any more urgency here today?

“I don’t think so. Just because of it being a bigger racetrack, you know, it’s a mile and whatever — I think that us having the meeting, the drivers talking amongst themselves.. I mean I’ve had great conversations with everyone at Kaulig Racing. We had a conversation with RCR and Kaulig. We all got together down at Welcome, and we really feel strongly about the ‘One Welcome’ thing. Like it’s a real thing and so we all hashed it out. We talked about it. We had everyone in there talking about the situation, and I thought it was a great conversation to be had. I think it’s going to help us propel forward into being more of that ‘One Welcome’ scenario. And I think that all the other drivers that have talked.. I’ve talked to Justin after the meeting. He said he had a great conversation with all of his JR Motorsports drivers, Sammy Smith and all those guys, and so I think it’s going to calm down a lot more than you think today. We’ll have to wait and see but I think today is going to be a very — we’re all going to be still aggressive and trying to win the race but it’s going to be a very respectful race.”

If last week was over the line, then how is it going to be judged when we go to Martinsville in October, knowing likely that one spot will likely get you into the Championship Four?

“Well, NASCAR made it very, very clear that they don’t want to be in the ‘ball and strike’ business. They don’t want to be making all these calls. So they said for us to help them with that. They also said that if they had to step in and start making calls, black flagging people, parking people and doing all those things, that they’ll do it. So I agree with what NASCAR’s stance is at but I also think that we as the Xfinity Series have to do a better job going forward when we go back to Martinsville and not put it in NASCAR’s hands.

We don’t want NASCAR to get involved and to have to make these ‘ball and strike’ calls. We don’t want that as drivers. We want to be able to race and beat and bang and do all these things but do it in a respectful way. So there’s a lot of things that we all got to look in the mirror, even myself included. We all as drivers have to look in the mirror and figure out what we can do to move forward and not have NASCAR get involved.”

Are you excited about your first start here in Darlington in the Cup Series? I looked at your five race schedule. Chicago Street Course is on there. Why did you pick that particular one?

“A lot of it was sponsor driven. I did make a comment that I wanted to run a road course. I want to run Watkins Glen, honestly, but at the end of the day, United Rentals (Chicago) is just a great venue for them and all that. So Chicago just ended up being the place. I had some really good success at Chicago last year, so being able to go back there for a second time is going to be great. I was able to run the Cup race there, and it was raining, then it stopped raining and it got dry. We were running like 12th or something towards the very end of the race and ended up getting taken out and getting into turn one. I think it’s going to be one of those races that we can do well at. Darlington has been one of these racetracks that I’ve been so close to many times on the Xfinity Series and the Truck Series at winning here and I’ve missed it by one spot multiple times. I really was strongly about wanting to come to Darlington and it ended up just working out.

And then obviously, United Rentals and RCR wanted me to do some superspeedway stuff. The Cup Series is so much different when you’re superspeedway racing versus the Xfinity side, just the way the cars drive and the way the drag is and all those sorts of things. I’ve been wanting to do some type of short track, and so Bristol was one of those places that they picked that they just thought was a good place for us.

So yeah, I think I have a really good schedule for the five races. I’m going to learn a lot. A lot of different racetracks that we go to, so different techniques and everything that have to be shown. I’m excited to get in the Cup car today and see what we can do with our No. 33 United Rentals Chevrolet.”

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