New Ford horsepower has Richard Petty Motorsports’ Kasey Kahne smiling after Budweiser Shootout
Kasey Kahne (9) battles Tony Stewart for position in the Budweiser Shootout. Kahne finished second. // LaDon George, NASCAR Illustrated
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – It’s not often that Kasey Kahne is happy finishing second, but after the Budweiser Shootout Saturday night, Kahne had a huge smile on his face.
In fact, Kahne was grinning from ear to ear, like the proverbial cat that ate the canary. Kahne looked like he was hiding a big secret.
What he was most happy about was his new Ford race car, especially the Roush Yates engine under the hood.
“I thought it was a great race. I really enjoyed it,” the grinning Kahne said. “From the time it went green, we started 19th, and just kind of marched our way right up to the top three or four cars and raced there for the majority of the race.
“It was a lot of fun to have a Budweiser Ford that fast and the Roush Yates engine, the way it comes up through the gears, the way it races, the way you can get pushes and push other cars was something that was new to me and I enjoyed it. I thought it was pretty awesome.”
Kahne won two races and made the Chase For The Sprint Cup last season, but his Richard Petty Motorsports team merged with Yates Racing during the off-season, switching from Dodge to Ford.
The move came with a technical alliance with Ford’s Roush Fenway Racing and Roush Yates engines.
Kahne said the engine made a big difference in how his car ran. Though he never led the race, he ran in the top five all night and challenged leaders Carl Edwards, Tony Stewart and Kevin Harvick often.
He pushed Harvick into the lead on the final restart and held on to finish second.
“The way the car handled was fairly similar to what we’ve done in the past,” Kahne said. “I still have the same team, so we’re still doing a lot of the same things, which is really nice. I understand how our cars feel and the way they’re set up.
“The biggest difference was just the engine, and from the time it goes green, up through the gears, second, third, fourth, it just pulls hard. I can bump a little bit and get bumped a lot, so that, to me, was really good. I was pleased. I was really happy with it.”
Kahne was not surprised. He has been excited about the changes at RPM and was optimistic headed to Daytona.
“You come down here and you always see how well the Roush Yates engines run in the past,” he said. “They’ve won a lot of races at this track over the years, so I feel like it was something to look forward to and I was real happy with it and look forward to next week. I think it’s gonna be a great week for us.”
The strong run gives Kahne and his RPM team momentum going into Thursday’s Gatorade Duel qualifying races and makes him one of the early favorites for the Daytona 500.
“I think [that momentum] goes away, but this is a great night for us,” he said. “We were up there all night, and we have some things that we learned tonight.
“There are some things we’re gonna be able to make our Daytona 500 car even better than it was tonight, hopefully, and have just as fast of a car throughout the whole week.”
