FOUR FORD TOP-TEN FINISHERS IN NATIONWIDE SERIES RACE
Greg Biffle was the top Ford driver in the NASCAR Sprint Cup race in Daytona, Fla., finishing 10th in his No. 16 Fusion. Matt Kenseth was the top Ford driver in the NASCAR Nationwide Series race in Daytona, Fla., finishing fifth in his No. 17 Fusion.
Rick Crawford was the top Ford driver in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race in Daytona, Fla., finishing fifth in his No. 14 F-150.
The 2008 NASCAR season began this weekend with the Daytona 500 in Daytona, Fla., in what was the 50th running of the Great American Race. Saturday’s NASCAR Nationwide Series race was the highlight for Ford Racing fans as four Ford drivers grabbed top-10 finishes.
The Nationwide Series race went mostly uninterrupted, as there were only four cautions throughout the entire 120-lap event. Matt Kenseth led the way for Ford drivers in the race, taking fifth place in his No. 17 Fusion. The next Ford driver to cross the finish line was Greg Biffle, taking seventh place in the No. 16 Fusion. Rounding out the top 10 were Ford drivers David Ragan in ninth and reigning Nationwide Series Champion Carl Edwards in 10th.
“It was a fun day,” said Ragan. “I got to run on the top, the middle and on the bottom some. Hopefully, it will help me a little bit for tomorrow. Our Discount Tire pit crew did an excellent job. I think we picked up a spot or two every time we came down pit road. That makes it tough when the cars are so equal out there on the race track. A good pit crew really helps a lot. It was a lot of fun. There was a lot of slippin’ and slidin’ out there and I can only imagine what July is going to be like when we come back here.”
Unfortunately, the success on Saturday only followed Greg Biffle to the Sprint Cup Series race on Sunday. Biffle led the race three different times for a total of seven laps and was running in second place with less than 10 laps to go, but a restart after a caution flag bunched all of the cars together and he eventually finished 10th. Biffle didn’t want to risk getting caught in a wreck and losing a lot of points by getting caught up in all of the traffic after the restart. He will begin the season in the top 10 in points.
“We had a really good run out there today,” said Biffle. “We were a little bit shy on speed. They got such a run on us and I couldn’t block them. They’re just going to spin us out. We’re thinking about the championship, not a Daytona 500 win. We needed it to go green for us to have a chance. With cautions like that you get ganged up and you don’t have a chance. They had a huge run and went right by us. I had a really, really good Fusion. My 3M guys did a great job to get it to drive the way it did. I’m really excited to get this season off in the top 10 in points.”
Matt Kenseth and David Ragan fielded very competitive cars as well. Both drivers were running near the top 10 when Ragan bottomed out and ran into Kenseth, pinning him to the wall. Kenseth would lose five laps to the leaders while his car underwent repairs in the garage.
Carl Edwards also ran near the top 10 before getting involved in a minor incident and falling back. Edwards would eventually rally and grab a 19th-place showing in his No. 99 Fusion.
“We were really pretty good and just got shuffled back at the end,” said Edwards. “And we had a deal where we got caught up with the 77 car and slowed us way down. We had a competitive car, and it could’ve been a top-10 pretty easy. We just did the best we could.”
In Friday night’s Craftsman Truck Series race, Rick Crawford was the top-finishing Ford driver, taking fifth place in his No. 14 F-150. All of the other F-150 drivers but one were collected in wrecks throughout the rest of the evening.
One wreck was caused when Kyle Busch came down and took out Ford drivers Brendan Gaughan, P.J. Jones and Jon Wood, as well as six other trucks. Another wreck took out pole-sitter Erik Darnell’s No. 99 F-150, which led for 45 laps of the race and was one of the fastest trucks on the track.
“That Ford Power Stroke Diesel by International Ford F-150 was always performing and fun to drive, said Crawford after the race. “We got a little bit of damage over there. I was trying to push Hornaday through the wreck over there in turns three and four. We missed the other one. It looks like a missile went through our spoiler and our nose is sort of crippled.
“I followed my old teammate [David Starr] to a top-five finish, but I sure wish there was more Fords up here because we could of got together and those guys were flying. My hat is off to Roush Yates engines. I was really strong getting through the tri-oval and into turn three. I thought we had a shot to win.”
Next weekend the NASCAR Sprint Cup, NASCAR Nationwide Series and NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series will compete at California Speedway in Fontana, Calif. The NHRA POWERade series will also resume competition in Phoenix, Ariz.
