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MONSTER ENERGY NASCAR CUP SERIES: CAN-AM DUEL 1

February 15, 2018

Dayton Beach, Florida

THE MODERATOR: We are joined by winning crew chief Jeremy Bullins.
Coming out of the gate with the first triumph of the season, 10 points on the board for you, talk about that No.12 Ford tonight, how you got it to Victory Lane.
JEREMY BULLINS: It's been a good week so far. Everybody at Team Penske put a lot of effort into the new rules package, trying to understand what we needed to be fast here. You've seen all week the three of us can kind of work to the front. The other two guys, Ryan has learned a lot from them about how to manage the line.
It's been a fun week so far. Obviously we'll keep working to try to make things better, be back here on Sunday.
THE MODERATOR: We'll open the floor to questions.

Q. You talk about Ryan learning from Joey and Brad. Have you learned anything working closer with Penske?
JEREMY BULLINS: I've learned a lot since I started here from those guys. Brad to me is one of the best of this era drafting. You've seen how many races he's gone to the front of the pack, managed both lines, can stay out front. Those are things we pay attention to, talk about, myself and Ryan. You've seen Ryan be in position to win two of these things at the end. We're one for two, that's not bad.
Like I said, there's one more on Sunday. Hopefully we can put ourselves in position again.

Q. The new inspection tent, what your impression is of that?
JEREMY BULLINS: I think if you look at the past several years, NASCAR has done a great job of trying to make inspection a little more clear‑cut. A lot of these tools, the technology that's out there allows us to measure things. It's either good or it's not. That's the beauty of it.
I think that's very exciting for the future. I think it's going to speed that process up. There's no interpretation. It's either green or it's not, right? That's a big step forward for the sport.
I think so far what we've seen is it seems to be very repeatable. That's what you always hope for when there's a big change in technology like that. As long as it continues to do what we've seen so far, I think it's going to be a big step.

Q. Sunday you have three good cars, if the three Penske cars are up front with 10 to go, decisions to be made. Do you leave all that up to Joey or can you get involved in helping him make some choices? I'm sorry, I mean Ryan.
JEREMY BULLINS: I wanted the top on the restart. Those guys kind of do what they want to do when it gets to that point.
I said, What are you thinking?
I'm going to take the bottom.
You sure?
He knew what he was doing. He had a plan. Those guys are smart, they know what they're doing. I might coax him one way or the other if I feel strongly about something.
The key is that race is a lot longer. We've got to work really hard together to get to the point where the three of us have to make that decision. That's a really good problem to have with 10 to go in the 500.
The thing that we've talked about is trying to race smart, as long as we can, to the point where it's one of us that wins it. That's the thing we've got to try to do. It's a long day on Sunday. Can't have any mistakes. Try to keep ourselves up front to have that problem.

Q. Did the race go like you might think it would in terms of the accidents occurred, the way the cars were racing?
JEREMY BULLINS: I think the 48 blowing a tire, that kind of stuff is unfortunate because you wind up taking out two or three cars. Every time there's a wreck, there's less and less cars. It dictates what you do at the end because there's not as many people behind you helping. That's probably the worst part, they had that unfortunate issue, took out a couple cars early.
I don't want to say the race would have been better, it was a pretty good race, but it's always fun when you have more cars in a line, move around a little bit more. To me, either the first one goes perfectly calm and nothing happens, then the second one is a disaster, or the first one there's a bunch of stuff, these guys will ride around and be smart, not get their backup car out. I bet the second one is pretty calm.

Q. Did you see the replays of the two Stenhouse wrecks? Were you surprised how the other cars reacted?
JEREMY BULLINS: No. It's something that we talked about all week, leading into qualifying. There were a lot of guys who tried to sit on the pole. I think you saw the 88 being smart with their car. What it took to be fast for a lap is probably not what you need to drive well in the race. I think a lot of people figured that out.
It's even going to be worse on Sunday if it's 82 again or whatever it's going to be. Guys learned a lot. I think being in the Clash this year for us was big, understanding what it's like to race in the daytime with these rules. I feel like we took a lot away from Sunday, look forward to working on the next couple days to be ready for Sunday.
THE MODERATOR: Thank you, Jeremy.
We are joined by Ryan Blaney, driver of the No. 12 Menards Peak/Ford for Penske. Seemed like had you some friends on the track when it mattered the most. You made the most of those friends. Walk us through the closing laps from your perspective.
RYAN BLANEY: I thought our car was super fast all night. I thought all three of our cars were really fast, myself, Brad and Joey. It's a shame the 2 got tore up.
I thought we were able to really control the whole race pretty much. We saw that in the Clash, the 2 was able to control it, Joey was able to control it. I was kind of the middle. We had a set plan to try to work with each other the best we can. I think we do that great as a whole organization.
Nice to know we have some really fast racecars, and can also be aggressive at the same time, race people. We don't have a fast car in a straight line, we can make aggressive moves. Our balance between the two is pretty good right now.
It will change. I would like my car to do a little bit different stuff for Sunday. Tonight I could get a little bit free, Sunday you're just going to be having your hands full a little bit more.
Really happy with the performance of our car. Nice to have a friend at the last restart. That's why I chose the bottom, because he was in third. I figured he'd help me out a good bit.
He did a good job all night, but really happy for our whole team. Can't thank everybody enough from the whole organization for giving us a fast car.
THE MODERATOR: We'll open it up for questions.

Q. Why did you make your move to the inside when you did?
RYAN BLANEY: So that's the same spot I made the move in the Clash and it didn't work. Almost didn't work tonight.
I was coming with such a head of steam, I had to. Brad laid back so much from whoever was behind him, I kind of laid back to Brad off of four because I didn't want them to get a huge run. It just propelled me so fast to Joey, I had to turn left or I would have ran him over.
I didn't really want to make my move right there because it didn't work. It really shouldn't have worked. I was trying to plot where to do the move better. I was thinking about that all week after it didn't work in the Clash. That was not the spot I wanted to do it. I was coming with such a head of steam, I had to turn left or run the 22 over.

Q. Bubba was in here, very psyched. It must have been comforting, if it wasn't a teammate, one of your best friends there at the end with you.
RYAN BLANEY: Yeah, he did a good job all night. I was watching the whole time. He did a good job of picking which lane to go with when. Not having much experience in these cars, the speedways, it's hard to choose which lane to go with when. I thought he did a really good job.
That's why I picked the bottom on the last restart. He was down there. I felt like he could give me a good push. I figured if I was clear, both lanes getting into one, I could control it and go on to win the race.
Hopefully he can continue to show what he can do. I know a loft people have given him not a lot of credit in the off‑season. I think he proved himself tonight, that he should be here and deserves to be here. I hope he can continue to do that.

Q. You're the Cup Series points leader right now. What do you think about that?
RYAN BLANEY: There ain't no points in this racing, not tonight. Sunday is the one I'm worried about. It's nice to win this one, to be honest with you. It's really, really cool to be in Victory Lane in anything at Daytona, whether it's the Clash or a Duel race.
Sunday, that's when you go to the pay window. You get a cool trophy with this, but you don't get a ring and your face on a trophy.
It is nice to get in Victory Lane. It starts your weekend up good, pumps everybody up, just shows the strength in our car, so...

Q. I asked Joey the same question. Is there any reason to believe a Penske car won't win on Sunday?
RYAN BLANEY: There's plenty of reason. There's 37 other cars. Yeah, we're super strong right now. It's really cool to be probably the best team right now I'd say this whole week. But you never know what can happen. We can get broken up. Things can happen. We can get in a wreck. You never know.
I wouldn't disagree that we might be the favorite team right now just because of the speed we've shown, but you never know what can happen. We can finish 38th, 39th and 40th. It's very nice to be confident like this with fast cars.

Q. Where did you get your confidence in plate racing? Talladega three years ago you were the only one that would try to go with Tony Stewart, create a second line. Where did this come from?
RYAN BLANEY: I don't know. When I first started racing the Cup Series in '15, I think we did all the speedways. You're just kind of learning, kind of going with the lanes. You're like, Okay, I'll go with Joey or Brad, they know what they're doing. You just learn. I learned a lot from watching Brad. I think Joey and Brad are two of the best at this stuff. I learned a lot watching them, being teammates with them.
I think you just kind of absorb all that knowledge over the years. You go from somebody who is just following and going with lanes to creating lanes, creating moves, wanting to be the lead car.
I used to not be that way. It's experience and reps when it comes to superspeedway races. Fast cars help, too. When you have fast cars like that, people tend to go with you. But I think it's just experience and time.

Q. Do you think the wrecks we've seen tonight have been partly caused by the fact that some guys are set up for speed and some for handling?
RYAN BLANEY: I don't know. I haven't seen a replay of any of them. I don't really know. I know the 48 blew a tire or something. I don't know what happened to William, if the 17 got him loose or whatnot. On the backstretch, I think the 1 jumped outside of Brad. I'm not sure.
There are some cars I could see. Watching a little bit of this race, there are some cars that don't drive very well. They set them up for speed. You watched the 88 drop back. He's got the pole, but they don't want to tear the car up. There are some cars that are out of control more than others, trying to get too much single car speed. Our cars are great, because way have a good bit of both, balance and speed. That part is nice. There are some that are pretty wild right now. That will be a handful on Sunday.
THE MODERATOR: Ryan, congratulations on the win tonight. Good luck on Sunday in the Daytona 500.

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