Edwards Wins Phoenix Pole As Three Fords Qualify In The Top Four Positions

 

ARIC ALMIROLA – No. 9 Budweiser Ford Fusion (Qualified 9^th) – “That was a respectable lap time because I thought that was gonna be extremely slow. I was actually surprised at how fast it went for how bad it drove, to be honest. I’m proud of Kenny and all the guys on this Budweiser team. They’ve done a good job.” DO YOU FEEL LIKE YOU’RE PART OF THIS TEAM NOW AFTER THREE OR FOUR WEEKS BEHIND THE WHEEL? “Yeah, I really do. Kenny Francis and all the guys on this team do a good job of making me feel welcome, and I’ve had a lot of fun with it. That’s the biggest thing I’ve noticed is how much fun I’m having. I don’t have a whole lot of pressure involved with it, so it’s been a good time.”

 

GREG BIFFLE – No. 16 3M Ford Fusion (Qualified 4^th) – “I just screwed up in three and four. The car was so good and it was hugging the bottom of the race track, so I just sneaked the gas pedal to it and I just got a little greedy and pushed it down a little bit more because it had grip. It just wasn’t there. I bet I could have run a .35. I know that’s what the pole is gonna be. The 43 just went to the top and I know the 99 is gonna be fast. I feel I just left a little too much out there. I’m just frustrated with myself. That was a great run for us, but I want to be perfect every time. I was probably trying to do something the car didn’t want to do, obviously. It didn’t want to go any faster and I was trying to make it, but you’ve got to make the most out of it.”

 

AJ ALLMENDINGER – No. 43 Insignia/Best Buy Ford Fusion (Qualified 2^nd) – “No matter what happens I’m just proud of everybody at Richard Petty Motorsports. There’s no secret of what we’re going through right now and it’s a tough time. All the crew guys here and all the guys at the shop listening and watching, they’re amazing people because it could easily tear this team apart. Everybody could be fighting with each other and not want to be here, but everybody is sticking together and fighting hard to go out there and perform. We’ve shown that, no matter what, it’s not gonna get us off our game. We’re just gonna keep getting better as a race team. I thank everybody at Insignia and Best Buy, Valvolina, PVA, everybody at Ford Racing and Doug Yates for building such great horsepower and everybody for building great race cars. That’s all we can do, just go out there and drive.” IS THIS MORE MOTIVATION? “It’s such a cut-throat sport. There’s no secret to that. This is a tough sport and in tough times like that, we could easily give up or we could start fighting each other and it’s not more motivation. We don’t need anymore motivation than what we have, but it’s just a tough time and these guys are fighting hard. I’m just going out there and trying to drive the wheels off this thing every weekend. These guys are stepping their game up and I’m proud of them. I’m proud to be here. We know The King and Robbie Loomis, all the guys, they’re doing what they can to resolve these problems and we’re just gonna put our heads down and do our jobs.”

ELLIOTT SADLER – No. 19 Paralyzed Veterans of America Ford Fusion (Qualified 23^rd) – “I was a little disappointed. I didn’t make a good lap. I didn’t get through three and four like I needed to. My car was a little tight and I tried to run across the apron to loosen it up and got it a little bit too loose. That’s definitely not the lap we wanted or needed, so we’ve got a lot of work to do on Sunday.   We’ll race hard and see where it takes us.”

 

MATT KENSETH – No. 17 Valvoline Ford Fusion (Qualified 15^th) – “The car was probably a little better than me, so we’ve had a pretty good day today. Actually, we were pretty good in race trim and there was one mock-up qualifying run we were real fast in, but I probably didn’t get the perfect lap. I thought I got most of it, but probably could have done a little better, so, overall, I’m happy with it because that’s faster than we usually qualify. We should end up in the top 15, which will be good.”

CARL EDWARDS – No. 99 Aflac Ford Fusion (Qualified 1^st) – “That was a really good lap. Bob did a really good job. We were fastest in practice, but it was a 27.65, I think, and that lap was a 27.30 something, so the track picked up so much. I was really nervous that the handling would be different. Bob did a really good job, so it was a great lap.” A GOOD TRACK AS WELL FOR YOU. “This was the best circumstance we could have. We’ve got a great race car, I love the race track and we couldn’t have done better with the draw. It’s just a great day.  Hopefully, it holds up for the pole. That would be great to get a track record. I don’t know if I own any track records right now, so that would be nice.” SO YOU TOOK ADVANTAGE OF AN OPPORTUNITY. “Yeah, you’ve got to take advantage of them when they come. Opportunities like that don’t come very often, so, hopefully, that holds up.”

 

AJ ALLMENDINGER PRESS CONFERENCE – “As Kurt said, he put up a great lap, especially as early as he went. Nobody could really get near him until the track cooled down a little bit. I knew it was gonna be tight there. In qualifying practice we were really good and I just felt like I wanted to go out there and put a solid lap in. I felt like I got everything I could out of the race car there, and I knew Carl was gonna be tough there at the end. I feel good about what everybody is doing on the race team, it’s such a tough time here, so I’m just happy and proud of the guys back at the shop and here at the race track. Having Insignia back on the race car is really cool, so it’s a good starting spot and now we’ve just got to put in a good race on Sunday.” 

 

HOW HARD IS IT FOR THIS TEAM RIGHT NOW? “There’s no secret right now with what our race team is going through right now. I think it shows my crew guys here and back at the shop and everybody at RPM that there’s really two scenarios that can happen in a situation like this – you can try to band together and be stronger and come to the race track more focused, or you can let things start tearing you apart. It’s wearing on everybody. It wears on me, but with that said, everybody inside the race team doesn’t let it effect each other. Everybody is working well together. With everything they’re still having to go through, to build great race cars, Doug Yates and everybody at Ford is still giving us great horsepower. It’s a tough thing, but once we get to the race track our cars are here and it’s pretty simple, we focus on the job at hand. That’s all you can do. You just put your head down and keep working hard and that makes it a lot easier to go out there and run up front and try to sell the race team than struggling and trying to sell the race team. That’s all we can do.” 

 

WHAT IS IT ABOUT THIS TRACK YOU SEEM TO LIKE? “It’s more Mike Shiplett and the guys. He’s got a good setup here. This is a track initially when I came here in ’07 that I hated, I struggled here. It’s the same thing, it’s kind of like Loudon where once you get a good setup there, it makes it easier. For us to go out there in qualifying trim especially we had a really good setup. It’s something that we need to work on in race trim. We struggled a little bit in the race here in the spring. In race trim today we were OK, we weren’t great, so we definitely have to keep working on it, but once you have a good setup you can start building off of it, instead of just trying to start from scratch and showing up each weekend with a different setup.” 

 

IS THERE ANYTHING YOU’VE HEARD ABOUT NEXT YEAR? “No, honestly we’re taking it day-to-day. It’s not something I can really focus on and help do anything with. My job is to get in the race car and run strong. We know Richard and everybody there is doing the best they can to go out there and figure out this situation and that’s all we ask, so we just focus on day-to-day – just getting to the race track. These next two weeks are really important. We’ve got Insignia back on the car for the last two races and they’ve been a huge supporter of this race team throughout the year, and next week we have a huge Ford promotion with 43 Ford Fiestas and have a chance to go out there and win 43 fans a Ford Fiesta, so those are the things I’m focused on. Next year is something that as we go into the off-season we have to learn more about what’s happening with the race team, but, honestly, no matter what, I can’t do anything about it. I’ve just got to go out there and do my job and try to make Best Buy and everybody happy and just focus on that.”

 

CARL EDWARDS PRESS CONFERENCE – “It was a good run. The car was very easy to drive. Bob Osborne did a really good job with it. When I saw Kurt’s lap, I thought, ‘Man, that’s fast. There’s no way anybody is gonna beat that.’ I didn’t even ask what AJ’s lap was. I didn’t want to know, and I still don’t know what it is, but our lap was really good. Bob did a good job adjusting for that pickup in speed. We were first in practice, but it was almost three-tenths slower, so for the car to go that much faster and still handle the way it did, my hat’s off to Bob. I owe this pole to him.” 

 

DO YOU HAVE THE CAR TO END THIS LOSING STREAK? “I hope so. Everything kind of lined up for us with this pole run. We had a great draw. The car was perfect and we focused on qualifying the whole time. I have run a race trim run yet, so I still don’t know what we have for Sunday, but we’ve been working very hard at our shop to be better and to have cars and performances that earn us trophies. Hopefully, we can end that here. There would be no better place. I love racing here and these last two races of the season, we’d like to go into the winter with a win, that’s for sure.” 

 

HOW IMPORTANT WAS IT TO MAKE SURE YOU START UP FRONT HERE? “It’s very important to start up front. That’s one of the things we’ve been focusing on is qualifying. We’ve had three poles, I think, in the second half of the season and I think I’ve only got seven poles in my career. We’ve focused on it and it’s been working, and it’s really important here. I think this track, like almost all the tracks we race on now, track position is just really important and it’s because everyone is so competitive and the field is separated by such a small amount, so that first pit stall will help us and that clean air at the beginning of the race will help us, and, hopefully, I can race mistake-free and capitalize on all that.” 

 

WITH 8 CARS BEING UNDER THE ROUSH WATCH, IT SEEMS LIKE A BIG BOAT TO TURN AROUND WHEN CHANGES NEED TO BE MADE. IS THAT A PROBLEM? “I don’t know. It appears that way. I don’t know exactly. As things change you can’t just say, ‘Hey, we are this way and we’d be better this other way,’ but we’ll find out here. If we are producing cars and sheet metal and engines for fewer cars next year, it may be simpler for us to change direction and to maybe adapt to good things that we find. It’s one of the things, I’ve only heard Jack say it one time and he did talk about how much production we do there, and sometimes we all know how it is. If somebody says you have to produce three articles a day, that’s a lot different than if you have a couple days to do something really nice. So, for all of our guys, if it gives them a little more time, if it does take a little work load away, maybe we’ll have better product and that would be nice.” 

 

THE THREE TITLE CONTENDERS ARE FAIRLY FAR BACK. DO YOU EXPECT TO SEE THEM UP FRONT? “The only thing about this place is it is a relatively short race. It is very difficult to pass here. I think you’ll see some pit strategy. I think that the pit strategy will come into play for those guys and their respective finishes. I think their finishes will be determined more on pit strategy here than maybe at other places. Yeah, I expect to see those guys up front. They run well every week. That’s why they’re in the position they’re in, but there are a lot of cars that are fast here. I saw some cars that were fast in race trim, and you might have a surprise winner here. It seems like there are a lot of guys that are fast.”