NASCAR CUP SERIES: COKE ZERO 400

August 26, 2023

Brad Keselowski

Press Conference

An Interview with:

THE MODERATOR: We'll continue our post-race media availabilities. We're joined by Brad Keselowski, owner of RFK Racing.

Brad, what does it mean to have Chris in the Victory Lane for the third time?

BRAD KESELOWSKI: Just a really great day for RFK. A few weeks we were sitting down, kind of going over the goal and visions, what we value. One of the things we brought up was 1-2 finishes. It's been a long time since this company has had 1-2 finishes. I can't stay say a specific date.

Of course, I wanted to be the one on the front of that. Proud nonetheless of Chris and his efforts and both teams, where they've grown and come together. Doing all the right things to grow us and to just take us to that next level.

Today was just another kind of feather in our cap. We're really proud.

THE MODERATOR: Questions, please.

Q. How hard was that? You're happy to finish 1-2, but was it a question of you knew you weren't going to get around him and that was the best finish for you guys?

BRAD KESELOWSKI: Yeah, well, second is first loser. We could have ended up in a ball of flames in three and four, too, that would have looked pretty dumb.

The cars were certainly on the edge at the end. I got a good push from Aric. I was able to carry that through to my teammate Chris Buescher. There were a lot of cars breathing down our back. It would have been really difficult to pull a move off without probably wrecking both of us.

Happy for Chris. We still achieved one of our big results. Of course, we wanted to win today, but we wanted to get fifth in the regular-season points, take all those bonus points into next week being fifth rather than 11th or 12th, whatever we could have fallen back to. That's going to bode well for us in the Playoffs.

Every year you see somebody get knocked out by one or two points. That's great defense for us against that.

We look at the races to come with Darlington and Kansas and Bristol, Darlington being one of my favorite tracks, ran really well there, coming off of two strong races at Darlington. Then Bristol being one we won at, had dominant cars last fall. There's a lot of energy for us, a lot of great racing to look forward to.

Q. You called your shot because you told T.J., I think Chris and I need to come to pit road together and we can win this race. You were that confident.

BRAD KESELOWSKI: Yeah, I know we've had great cars here at Daytona and Talladega. At the end of the race we seemed to get broke up for whatever reason, circumstances fall apart on us. That's been frustrating.

I feel like we've had a shot to win the last really three Daytona races, they've kind of slipped through our fingers with different circumstances.

I was confident that if we could keep together, Chris and I, that this one would be a little different.

Q. Joey had a front-row seat watching you guys finish 1-2. He said, Brad taught Chris everything he knows.

BRAD KESELOWSKI: I'm trying. But Chris knows a few things on his own. He's growing. He's in a spot where he can win races like this in a deserved fashion. He's got a lot to be proud of.

Q. I think he meant restrictor plate tracks.

BRAD KESELOWSKI: Yeah, well, it's still good, right?

Q. There was a year that Roush Fenway didn't make the Playoffs. Here you have both cars in. Maybe the only team that has all your cars in. You talk about satisfaction. How does this feel as a team owner for doing this? Would have been nice to get that win, though.

BRAD KESELOWSKI: Yeah, tremendous to get up front and to be able to control races, just execute at a very high level while also having the pace and just earn it. We're not winning races that we don't deserve to win.

You certainly have races that you lose that you probably deserve to win. Probably goes both ways.

I think you look at the wins that RFK has had this year, they're not fluke wins, they're earned wins. We're proud of that. But come Monday, all this kind of washes away and we're focused on the 10 weeks to come.

We got to soak it up, celebrate the wins, but keep moving forward.

Q. Exactly what happened when you were going in circles? I believe your car was on fire.

BRAD KESELOWSKI: I did not think it would take four or five questions to get to that one (smiling).

I was sitting there under red flag, it just started smoking really big out of the left front rocker panel. I knew that meant it was about to catch fire and I was going to get knocked out of the race.

The only way to stop that was to get air moving through the car. Being under red flag, I had to improvise. There was a pad at the bottom of the racetrack. I knew I couldn't drive around the racetrack without getting in serious trouble, but I figured I could get away with driving on that pad.

I just ran on that pad until the flames and the smoke disappeared and called it good.

Q. What caused it?

BRAD KESELOWSKI: It's hard to say. Most likely it came from the foam insulation overheating as the car was sitting with stagnant air. Hard to say if some of the foam broke up in the race and dropped on the exhaust or if the exhaust cracked. There's a number of things that could have caused it. It's not really fair for me to speculate.

Once it happened, I knew I had to do everything I could to fix it or the car was going to catch flames and burn down to the ground and we were going to be out of the race.

Q. March 2014 Bristol, last time the organization 1-2, Edwards and Stenhouse.

BRAD KESELOWSKI: Good.

Q. You were 12th in that race.

BRAD KESELOWSKI: Nine, ten years ago. Thanks for pulling that up, Dustin. Racing reference.

Q. The folks at Racing Insights.

BRAD KESELOWSKI: Oh, competitor, I'm sorry (smiling).

Q. To get the stage win, a Playoff point, I think you probably may have moved up in the standings.

BRAD KESELOWSKI: Yes.

Q. How do you look at that? Doesn't balance not winning, but you always seem to look at big picture type of stuff.

BRAD KESELOWSKI: Yeah, I mean, it's hard to measure all the things that a night like tonight will do for us as a company, but I'm sure they're all going to be positive.

We'll kind of work through what that means. But we're building something that's going to be special for a long time. That's a big goal of mine. I'm proud of everybody in the team, certainly Chris for his efforts.

The bigger picture is to have a sustainable race team that can win championships for years to come, be a perennial championship contender. Today was good progress for that.

1-2 finishes are huge for teams. This was certainly another case of that for us.

THE MODERATOR: Brad, congratulations. Thanks for your time.

BRAD KESELOWSKI: Thank you. Glad to hear Ryan is awake and alert. Any updates?

THE MODERATOR: He has been transported to a local hospital.

BRAD KESELOWSKI: Thank you. Hope he's all right. Appreciate it, guys.