“I Can Trust My Teammates” – Team Penske Relying on All Ford Cars to Push Them to Victory Lane

Going into the final regular-season race at Daytona on Saturday, Austin Cindric only has one goal, winning. The Team Penske driver is yet to win a race this season and is too far out of the playoff bubble to make it through to the last 16. The likes of Chase Elliott and Alex Bowman also find themselves in the same situation but Cindric believes that he can rely on his teammates to help him onto victory lane if he finds himself in a position to win at Daytona.

The 24-year-old’s teammates, Joey Logano and Ryan Blaney, have already made it through to the playoffs.

Team Penske Star Reliant on Teammates and Other Ford Drivers

Cindric knows that he is not the only Ford driver who is yet to qualify for the playoffs and, at the end, it will be every driver for themselves. However, the 24-year-old believes that the best chance any Ford driver will have of winning the race will come from bunching up the Fords at the front of the pack and keeping everyone else at bay. While this does sound like a steep task, teams of the same manufacturer have worked together in the past to work wonders.

Ahead of the race at Daytona, Cindric was asked by a reporter if he trusted his teammates and other Ford teams to give him the necessary push if he found himself in a winning position.

“Austin how comfortable are you that your teammates will be there or other Ford drivers will be there to help you if you are in a position to win the race and you need a push?”

The 24-year-old answered that he had complete faith in his teammates Joey Logano and Ryan Blaney if such a situation came to be. He also mentioned that Logano and Blaney were two of the best drivers for that job and that they had already been successful at Daytona, which was a huge advantage.

“Yeah well, I can certainly feel like I can trust my teammates. You know that’s probably one of the biggest advantages to having a teammate is to be able to trust, you know, whether if that’s a lane that you’re in or a move you’re gonna make,” Cindric said. 

“It’s a lot higher percentage chance of it working or not being hung out. So, from that standpoint, I’ve got two of the absolute best in this style of racing. Two guys that have obviously already won here,” he added.

Speaking about what Ford needed to do to have the best chance of having one of its drivers in the playoffs, Cindric said that they should bunch at the front of the field and then fight it out.

“I think from a Ford standpoint, I think it’s important to have fast cars in numbers obviously. The Ford’s pretty high percentage fast in qualifying which is good so from a pitting strategy standpoint there’s a lot of Fords that have to win but the best way for that is to comp them all at the front,” the Team Penske man said. 

Ford’s recent resurgence in the Cup Series this season has become a cause for concern for non-Ford drivers, especially Bubba Wallace. Wallace currently occupies the last playoff place, but it is far from safe. If any new driver wins at Daytona, the 23XI Racing man’s season will be over, and of late, Ford has been racking up the wins and Austin Cindric is one of the drivers he is worried about.

Read More – Michael Jordan’s Prodigy Warns Bubba Wallace of the Roadblocks That Could Jeopardize His Playoff Hopes

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Michael McDowell and Chris Buescher’s recent victories have proven that Ford is not down and out and while it adds to the excitement for fans, Bubba Wallace’s spotter Freddie Kraft feels a bit uneasy. Kraft feels that two Ford team drivers could prove to be Wallace’s undoing, Austin Cindric and Aric Almirola.

On a recent episode of Dirty Mo LIVE, Andrew Kurland shed light on the matter.

“Freddie was saying the two drivers he is most worried about are Aric Almirola and Austin Cindric. In particular the Fords this weekend at Daytona. I mean if there’s any time for the Fords to be getting hot it’s right now,” he said.

“They’ve kind of had some momentum on their side, I feel like, from their last month of August, capturing a bunch of wins with McDowell and Buescher. Maybe the Fords can get their act together and get one more guy in the playoffs before it’s over,” Kurland added.

No matter how anybody looks at it, the Ford teams have a mighty task going into the final race of the regular season. The great old company has proved in the past that their teams can work together and they will be hoping for more of the same on Saturday.

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