Catchfence

CARL EDWARDS, No. 99 Aflac Ford Fusion (Qualified 2nd) “Going out early is not good. We put a lot of effort into qualifying this week because, and I don’t know if it’s true or not, but they told me if we get the pole this week we tie Jamie McMurray for the pole award. This pole would be very important for s. The clouds are rolling over though so I don’t know if it will hold up. I didn’t even practice the Nationwide car because we wanted to concentrate on this.”

ARE YOU A GUY WHO BELIEVES IN MOMENTUM? “I hate to admit it but I do now. I used to never believe in it but I do now. If the sun would stay out I think we could hold on for the pole but I’m not certain it will hold up.”

PAUL MENARD, No. 98 Menards Ford Fusion (Qualified 16th) - “It felt pretty good. We have been fighting a little bit loose off of four. It had the same issues. It was a little late getting back to wide open but the car drove pretty decent so we should b okay.”

DAVID RAGAN – No. 6 UPS Ford Fusion (Qualified 9th) -“That was a solid lap. We went out early and the car felt really good. You always think there is a little more on the table. I’m proud of Drew and everyone turning this car around from Texas. It just shows how quick the process works. I know they had to do some body work and change the engine out. That should wind up in the top-10 which should be good.”

DAVID GILLILAND – No. 37 Taco Bell Ford Fusion (Qualified 40th) – “We hit the splurged really hard. We only made one qualifying run in practice and never hit the splitter all day. We hit it really hard and pushed up the track. It is disappointing. We thought we had a better race car than that. In race trim it was really good and
I’m excited about racing this car on Sunday.”

AJ ALLMENDINGER, No. 43 Best Buy/Insignia Ford Fusion (Qualified 5th) – “It was alright. This isn’t my best place to qualify at. It’s a tough race track trying to figure out what line you want to go an contemplate if you want to do something different. I’m happy with it. There could have been a little more there but us race car drivers always think there could have been. That should get us in the top 10 and I think we should have a pretty good car for Sunday. Maybe we can win 43 people a Ford Fiesta.”

TRAVIS KAVPIL, No. 34 Long John Silver’s Ford Fusion (Qualified 41st) – “We really struggled with our car in practice this morning. It wasn’t looking real good. Our teammate David Gilliland was running pretty decent so we switched the whole thing over to what he had and now we are right there lap-time wise with what he was. I am proud of my guys. We were searching for it for a little bit there and changed everything on the race car going into qualifying and it drove pretty good. I am looking forward to tomorrow and working on it and trying to keep improving it for Sunday.”

MATT KENSETH, No. 17 Crown Royal Ford Fusion (Qualified 13th)  - “We just missed the balance by a mile. I am glad our speed was still good because the car drove not very good. It was so-so earlier in race trim. I thought we had a really good day overall, we just missed it in our qualifying lap.”

ARIC ALMIROLA, No. 9 Budweiser Ford Fusion (Qualified 24th) – “I didn’t do a very good job there. The car was a lot better than that and I did a bad job. I am disappointed in myself because we have a much better car that that. I just missed it. We have a really good car in race trim and I think we will be in good shape come Sunday.”

GREG BIFFLE, No. 16 3M Ford Fusion (Qualified 27th) – “Going to the back-up car hurt us. We went from probably going in the front to going in the back. That lap didn’t feel very good. It was too tight and kind of slow. I would have thought the car would be better than that. This is a car we haven’t run for awhile. We just have to get it on the race track tomorrow and see how good we can make it.”

BILL ELLIOTT – No. 21 Motorcraft Ford Fusion (Qualified  4th)– “The track cooled off and the car was good.  Donnie and the guys do a good job.  We made some changes the very last run we did and actually slowed down a little bit.  It seemed like that last 10-15 minutes of practice a lot of people picked up, but I was really surprised to pick up that much. We’ve been fighting a little bit tight rolling through the center. The car was still just a little bit tight rolling through the center, but when I was able to pick the throttle up I could get everything I had.  They do a great job.  My hat’s off to Len and Eddie, the Motorcraft guys, Ford – everybody – they’ve just done a super job on this Fusion.”

WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT YOUR POSITION TO START THIS RACE? “I’m just glad to be in the race (laughing).   You’ve got to put this in perspective.  When you unload and you’re out of that top 35 in points, everything is just so critical as far as what you do. Len and Eddie have worked so hard to try and turn this deal around and it seems like we’ve made some really good improvement the last few races.  I know Trevor had a really good race at Texas and that was very encouraging for the whole crew.  I felt like our Charlotte was gonna be pretty good, but we had those issues during the first part of the race.  Doug and the guys have come with a great motor and this thing runs awfully well.  With the combination they’ve put together, it’s made my job easy.”

DAVE BLANEY, No. 38 A&W All American Food Ford (Qualified 36th) - “Qualifying went pretty well.  The car was a ton better than in practice, and I probably under drove it a bit and cost us some time.  But we made huge gains from practice.  David Gilliland made a nice mock qualifying run in practice, so we learned some things from him and that helped us.  Greg Conner and the guys were able to make some good changes and it turned out OK.”

Carl Edwards, driver of the No. 99 Aflac Ford Fusion, qualified second for Sunday’s Ford 400. Following are his post-qualifying press conference comments.

CARL EDWARDS PRESS CONFERENCE –

HOW WAS YOUR QUALIFYING LAP? “Jamie and I, like he was saying, we were all in a battle here and my mission was to do two things – number one, to beat Jamie. We did that and I thought, ‘Man, we’ve got it. We’ve got the pole,’ and then Kasey came along and got the pole, so there couldn’t be two better guys to race for this. I’m happy for Kasey to get the pole and I’m happy for Jamie that he’s gonna get the award this year. You’ve had an amazing year. For us, we came into this race focused on this qualifying effort and it is disappointing to not get the pole, but we’ll have a great starting spot. Hopefully, we’ll have a fast race car, but the way I look at it, though, is if there’s any way to get an award that has anything to do with fast qualifying, I don’t think I’ll ever be that guy. It looks like I’ve maintained that streak, but we have had a lot of fun this year and qualifying has been a lot better, so it was a good lap for us.”

WHY ARE YOU WINNING POLES THIS YEAR? “Being from Missouri seems to help (laughter). I don’t know how to answer that question, but I can say the same thing I said at the beginning of the season. If you get married or you change something in your life, and you go out and run really well, that’s why you ran really well. And if something changes and you run really poorly, that’s why you ran really poorly. It just seems like you run as well as you’re gonna run and people attribute it to whatever is going on in your life, so that’s just the way it goes. I don’t think about my daughter or my wife when I’m in the race car. Why am I winning poles? Because our car is faster in qualifying trim. And truly for us, we have put more effort on it in the last half of the year. We’ve spent more time in qualifying trim and I think that’s been a big help to us. We have to spend that much time. He doesn’t have to spend as much time as us, but we’ve got to spend that much time to go that fast, but we’ve put the effort in.”

- PCGCampbell for Ford Racing, Press Release