Catchfence

BRAD KESELOWSKI (No. 2 Miller Lite Dodge Charger R/T) Finished 2nd “I feel really good about this one. We struggled a little bit this weekend, but we executed and that’s what these races are about. We’ve got some work to do on these short-track races, but we got some mile-and-a-half’s coming up where we’ve been really, really good. I’m proud just to get through what looked to be a rough weekend with an awsome finish. I”m proud of my Miller Lite Dodge team. Getting the right adjustments in the car all race and doing all those things that it takes. It’s been a good roll.”

YOU ARE THIRD IN POINTS. “That’s pretty good. I think I left here in the spring like 25th or something. That’s a lot of points to gain in 10 races.”

THIS WAS ANOTHER ROCK SOLID PERFORMANCE FOR YOU AND THIS TEAM. “We did the things we needed to do. We weren’t as fast as we wanted to be but we worked on our car, adjusted on it and got it where we could race with it there at the end and just had good strategy and pulled out a second. We probably weren’t a second-place car but we worked hard and made something happen.”

YOU GAINED A BUNCH OF GROUND IN THE CHAMPIONSHIP CHASE. “Absolutley, that’s exactly what we need to do. I’m proud of my team.”

YOU ARE GOING TO DOVER NEXT WEEK WITH A BUNCH OF MOMENTUM ON THIS TEAM’S SIDE. DO YOU LIKE THAT PLACE? “Absolutely, you know, I think Dover, you can’t help but compare it to Bristol and after winning Bristol I feel really good going there.”

YOU RAN OUTSIDE THE TOP 2O AT THE BEGINNING OF THE RACE AND THEN YOU MADE SOME NIFTY PIT STRATEGY AND IT TURNED YOUR WHOLE DAY AROUND. “Yeah, you know, we were able to pass cars the run before last and we drove up from maybe 25th to 16th or so and caught the yellow and moved up to about seventh, maybe we were eighth. We drove up from eighth to maybe fourth so we did pass some cars, did a lot of good things. Just all in all great execution at the end.”

YOU HAD A GREAT POINTS DAY. “Absolutely and very happy with what we were able to do here today with the Miller Lite Dodge.”

HOW BIG IS THIS RACE AS FAR AS GETTING YOU SOME MOMENTUM GOING TO DOVER AND KANSAS? “Well you know I think we’ve ran really well at the mile-and-a-halfs. We needed to get through the races where we didn’t feel like we were very good at. And these first two tracks were those and we did it. It just gets us in position and we’re just executing very well and just another good sign, and good momentum. Good mojo.”

YOU JUMPED UP THREE POSITIONS IN POINTS TO THIRD, HIGHEST EVER. YOUR CREW CHIEF WAS STRESSED OUT THIS MORNING ABOUT YOUR CAR. DID IT GET THAT MUCH BETTER OR WAS IT ALL STRATEGY? “We made some good adjustments with about 120, 130 to go, and it drove up into fourth, which I was really proud of our team for that. Still played a little strategy, used the fuel stuff to get up to second but we were a legitimate top-10 car, not quite a second-place car. But proud of the effort, proud of how we took a track we were weak at and got a finish at it and that’s what this Chase is all about. My Miller Lite Dodge team, they’re getting it done.”

PAUL WOLFE (Crew Chief, No. 22 Miller Lite Dodge Charger R/T) IN THE MIDDLE OF THE RACE YOU RAN OUTSIDE THE TOP 20. HOW DID YOU GET FROM THERE TO A SECOND-PLACE FINISH? “What we’ve done well this year is stay focused, try to stay calm. I know it’s tough for Brad when he’s back there running. Kept making adjustments to our race car each stop and got to point there when everybody was spread out there I could see that our lap speeds were good enough to run in the top-10 so as soon as the opportunity was there to stay out and get the track position that’s what we did. It’s hard to stay out when you’re car is not close and at the very beginning we weren’t where we needed to be. We kept working on it and as we got our car where I felt like we were competitive then we took the opportunity to do the strategy call there to get up front. And once we got up front and worked on our car each stop we were solidly a top-five car there. Everybody at the engine shop has done great with giving us great fuel mileage. We played our windows there at the end and had plenty of fuel left.”

DO FUEL MILEAGE RACES PLAY TO YOUR ADVANTAGE BECAUSE OF THE FUEL ECONOMY OF YOUR DODGE CHARGERS? “It doesn’t hurt that’s for sure and we see from short tracks to mile-and-a-halfs, it doesn’t matter where we are, it all comes down to fuel mileage. These Dodge engines seem to be good in that area and not giving up a lot of speed to do it. That’s the key thing – having good fuel mileage and being able to have the speed to go with it and I feel like we had that today.”

IS NEW HAMPSHIRE ONE OF THE TOUGHEST RACES FOR A CREW CHIEF TO CALL? “Honestly, it seems like every week they are the same on making calls. I didn’t feel like this was a lot harder. What makes races harder to call is when you don’t have a great racecar to start the race. It seems like when you have good racecars it makes it easier to call the race. Like I said we got ours there finally about halfway through the race and it was just doing what we had to do.”

HOW IMPORTANT IS THIS FINISH TODAY FOR YOU AND THE TEAM MOVING FORWARD? “It’s huge, especially as bad as we were in practice all weekend. We didn’t qualify as well as we thought we should have. It seems like the last two weeks we haven’t started the race so well but everybody stayed focused, stayed calm and he was able to be there when it counts and obviously that’s what it’s going to take. To have top fives in the first two races is big. It gives us momentum and we feel like going back to Dover we had a top-10 car there the first race. I think we finished 12th but had a top-10 car and we feel that we can improve on that and be a better race for us hopefully next week and hopefully have a shot to win.”

KURT BUSCH (No. 22 Shell/Pennzoil Dodge Charger R/T) Finished 22nd “It was a frustrating day. Our Shell Pennzoil Dodge was certainly a handful. The front tires felt like they were on skids and the car was plowing through the corners. We were late going through inspection and that set the tone for our day. We were able to stay out and lead some laps under green and Steve Addington and the guys kept making changes and got our Dodge better by the end of the race. I just wish we could have started the race with the car that good.”

TRAVIS GEISLER (Director of Competition, Penske Racing) “NASCAR wasn’t 100 percent happy with what they saw on one of their gauges that kind of checks where the rear end is in the car, so we had to do a little work on it. … It’s a ‘go’ or ‘no-go’ type of gauge and it didn’t go. We needed to make sure that it went. It wasn’t like there was any gray area that NASCAR was saying maybe we were or weren’t legal. We weren’t right yet. [We had] to kind of do it on their schedule to make it work the way they wanted. Everybody knew what needed to be done to be fixed. It wasn’t a mystery of what was wrong or a panic of whether or not we were going to be able to get the car fixed. It was just a matter of getting it fixed and getting it done in the timeline that NASCAR wanted to see, and they worked with us and got the car through. … I don’t think they were happy with us having to go around. We were pushing a little bit time-wise for their schedule, so we just had to deal with that and fortunately we got everything fixed and we’re going to make a good day out of it.”

KESELOWSKI PRESS CONFERENCE TALK ABOUT HOW THIS RACE TEAM CONTINUES TO PROGRESS. “Yeah, well, you know it’s funny because 10 races ago we left Loudon here 23rd in points. Who would have ever thought we’d be third in 10 weeks? I’d like to see some kind of stat for that, that’s for sure. It’s been a good road here to travel down the last few weeks and today was no exception. We weren’t the fastest car. I’d be lying if I tried to tell you we were but we made good adjustments to our car. Got it to where it was a solid top-10 car and drove up to fourth or fifth there with about 100 to go, 80 to go, whatever that was right there, right in that range. But that’s what you need to do. You need to make good adjustments on your car and we’re clicking on that, Paul and I, and working really hard on this. Still got a long ways to go on a lot of different things but proud of the finish we were able to get today and proud of the effort for sure and we did get a little bit of help from the fuel mileage but hell we were going to have fourth or fifth-place day. Instead we had a second-place day so all in all I felt like we were in the majority of our good fortune. A decent day and exactly what we need to do in this Chase, keep plugging away with finishes like this.”

DO YOU THINK THIS WAS A FUEL MILEAGE RACE THAT SHOULDN’T HAVE TURNED OUT THAT WAY IN THAT JEFF GORDON HAD EVERBODY SO COVERED? DID THAT CAR LOOK LIKE IT WAS THE DOMINANTE CAR BEFORE THEY HAD THEIR FOULUP ON THEIR LAST GREEN FLAG STOP? “I’ll let Greg [Biffle] answer it ‘cause I never saw the 24 all day [smiles].”

EVERYONE WAS WORKING ON FUEL MILEAGE STUFF IN THE FINAL PRACTICE YESTERDAY. HAS THIS FUEL MILEAGE AND TRACK POSITION EVOLVED INTO SOMETHING TOO IMPORTANT ALL OF A SUDDEN? IT SEEMS LIKE EVERY RACE IS COMING DOWN TO THIS. “I just think that every race has its own personality and with this particular car and the way it’s designed it’s going to lean toward this personality a little bit more. I don’t know, it doesn’t bother me. I don’t think it’s bad racing, personally. I know there’s people that do. I think for the most part the fastest car still ends up winning the race. Not always but for the most part, I think if you looked at the odds on how many fuel mileage races there’s been I would say over 50 percent the fastest car still wins the race. Both Tony [Stewart] and Jeff [Gordon] were fast. Tony ended up winning it. You could have probably made a case for either one of those two being the best car but that’s just not the way it played out. I don’t know, I try not to read too much in. I know there’s been a lot of people talking about fuel mileage racing dominating the sport or being bad for it but I think there’s still been a lot of races that haven’t been decided on fuel mileage. I guess it doesn’t seem like that big of deal to me.”

YOU BOTH HAVE WON FUEL MILEAGE RACES. DO YOU TREAT ANY OF THOSE WINS ANY LESS THAN WINS WHEN YOU’RE ABLE TO BLOW PEOPLE AWAY? “No [laughs]. I’ve only got one and I’m not giving it back.”

CAN YOU ASSES WHAT THE REST OF THE SEASON WOULD LOOK LIKE BASED ON WHETHER YOU THINK A LOT OF IT IS STRATEGY OR FASTEST CAR WINS, EITHER CASE? “Well coming into this race, I guess this morning, I would have said I was really, really nervous about this one, and knowing that we’ve struggled at the Richmonds and so forth, the other short tracks of this nature. You know you could say we won Bristol but I would say it’s a lot different short track than a Loudon or a Richmond or whatever. And it’s this style track that we’ve really, really struggled on so I was very nervous about this race but I feel like our best races in the Chase are going to be our last five or six races, to be quite honest, with maybe the exception of Texas. We’ll have to wait and see how that one goes. So to me, if we get through this first four or five, you know I think we’ve got a really good shot at it. To get through Chicago with a fifth and here a second today, it’s a huge booster of morale for my team and momentum for Penske Racing and just hope that we can continue to capitalize and I think that’s why where we’re at. We’ve been able to capitalize with good execution on pit road and good adjustments on our car and not getting caught up in somebody else’s mess. But you know that stuff can go the other way just as easily as it’s gone the right way for us over the last few weeks. I’m still very proud of what we’ve done but we still have a long ways to go, a really long way. There’s eight big races left so then of course you can throw in Talladega and I don’t think anybody can tell you what’s going to happen there.”

CAN YOU TOUCH ON THE IRONY OF WHERE YOU WERE THE LAST TIME YOU WERE AT THIS TRACK AND KIND OF WHERE YOU ARE NOW? WHAT KIND OF THINGS DO YOU GUYS TWEAK TO RUN BETTER HERE TODAY? “Well like you said it has been a great turnaround. We’re 20 positions better in points than we were 10 weeks ago when we were here, or at least when we left. So that’s pretty cool, I think. But it’s been a turnaround because of hard work and focus on I’m very appreciative of my team for that and this particular weekend compared to the last time we were here is no different. We focused on what I needed to do better and I thought that I could do a lot better job and hit on some things and I felt like the car could be a lot better. We might have got a little bit better and we certainly made some adjustments in the race that made us a lot better so it takes all those things to get better and to get a result like we go today and as a team that’s what it means to be performing at a high level is to hit those things and my team is doing that.”

- Darnell Communications for Dodge Motorsports, Press Release