News

Track:  Kentucky Speedway
Race:   Quaker State 400
Date:    July 11, 2015
 
No. 2 Miller Lite Ford Fusion – Brad Keselowski
Start:  2nd
Finish: 6th
Status: Running
Laps Completed: 267/267
Laps Led: 62
Points Position (behind leader):  6th (- 133)
 
Recap: Brad Keselowski and the No. 2 Miller Lite Ford Fusion team started from the second spot, led a bunch of laps, fought through a lot of adversity and finished a disappointing sixth at Kentucky Speedway on Saturday night. Keselowski started second after the field was set based on the first practice speeds when rain canceled qualifying Friday afternoon. The No. 2 Team Penske Ford was the class of the field for the first two-thirds of the race, as Keselowski led laps, fell back in the field due to issues on pit road and ultimately raced his way to the front on three separate occasions. It looked like the No. 2 Ford Fusion would claw its way back to the front as the race came to a close, but a light brush with the wall caused just enough damage to take away the car's strength and the Miller Lite machine would eventually come home sixth. The finish allows Keselowski to hold on to sixth in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series point standings, 133 points behind the leader Kevin Harvick.

Quote: "We probably had the best car in the field, though it's easy to play the Saturday evening quarterback, but it just didn't come together for us. There are certainly some things I could have done better and we didn't have the best day on pit road. It's something to build off of, but I thought Kyle (Busch) and I both had pretty good cars and we just didn't put it all together when it counted.  We'll keep working on it." 

No. 22 Shell-Pennzoil Ford Fusion – Joey Logano
Start:  4th
Finish: 2nd
Status: Running
Laps Completed:  267/267
Laps Led:  23
Points Position (behind first): 3rd (-68)
 
Recap:  Joey Logano had a strong Shell-Pennzoil/Autotrader Ford Fusion on Saturday night, raced up front all night long and came home with a second-place finish at Kentucky Speedway, his best finish of the year since winning the Daytona 500 earlier in the season.  Logano started the race from the fourth position and quickly showed he would have one of the cars to beat.  Despite falling back early with a loose car, Logano showed his prowess for the new aero packaged debuted by NASCAR at the 1.5-mile track.  Logano ran inside the top-three for much of the evening, only to drop back to 11th following a round of pit stops where crew chief Todd Gordon called for four tires when much of the field opted for just two.  Despite restarting 11th, Logano quickly made his way back into the top-five in just 18 laps.  From there on out, Logano and the Shell-Pennzoil Ford would be a top-five fixture.  Logano used a great restart on lap 225 to take the lead and would hold the top spot for 23 laps.  Logano and Kyle Busch put on a great back-and-forth battle for the lead with less than 20 laps to go before Busch was able to put some distance on the No, 22, relegating Logano to a second-place finish as the checkers flew.  The finish was Logano's 10th top-five finish of the season.  Logano gained one spot in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series point standings and now sits third, 68 points behind leader Kevin Harvick.
 
Quote:  "We tried tonight.  We cleared the 11 (Denny Hamlin) on the restart, which got us clean air and I thought we were in good shape.  And then as tires started wearing, the 18 (Busch) was really good on the long run and he figured out the top before me.  That's the advantage you have as the second-place guy is you can go up there and play around more.  I was just trying to keep the gap, so I didn't want to take the penalty of losing three or four laps trying to figure out the top and he would have been closer, but he figured it out before me and got around me.  We raced the heck out of each other, but I figured it out too late.  Really proud of my Shell-Pennzoil guys tonight.  That was the most competitive car we've had in a while.  A good building block for sure."