Joey Logano had hit the headlines for some shady, illegal maneuvers. He was caught and fined a hefty amount for wearing modified gloves that did not comply with NASCAR rules at the Atlanta race. But in other Logano headlines, he is on a hot pole-winning streak. After securing the pole position at Daytona, he grabbed his second pole for 2024 at the Las Vegas qualifier.

Logano’s wins come in a revamped body of the new Ford car: the Mustang Dark Horse. Meaning “a candidate or competitor about whom little is known but who unexpectedly wins or succeeds”. The ‘dark horse’ may very well be pushing Ford drivers to race leads this season. But Logano is not too sure.

Joey Logano casts a shadow of doubt over his car’s capability

Logano made both Team Penske and Ford proud at the Cup season opener. He gave team owner Roger Penske his first Daytona 500 pole with an 181.947-mph lap. Also, this snapped an 11-year-long Chevrolet supremacy. Ford swept the front row for the first time since 2012, when Carl Edwards and Greg Biffle achieved the feat.

The car manufacturer has pinned high hopes on Joey Logano to make their reputation soar. But Logano himself harbors doubts about effectively riding the ‘dark horse’. He recently talked about it in a press conference ahead of the Pennzoil 400 race.

“We’re still uncertain of what the new Dark Horse Mustang will be like. It’s really challenging to unload at a track like Vegas with limited practice where you can’t change many things. We can’t go throwing springs and stuff at this car. You’re going off of really not much, like, physical notes with this car…the aero numbers are different with this car. You’re putting a lot of trust into what the wind tunnel numbers spit out.”

Logano further pointed out the need to bridge the gap between expected and real results, saying, “And how much of it’s real and how much of it is fabricated or different. There’s a lot of what ifs between Sim world, wind tunnel world to reality- is a lot of things that can be different. So really hard to make those changes to your car and getting that balance right. So it took us a couple of runs obviously to do that. We still got a lot to learn with the car, but yeah, good start for sure.”

Despite his apprehensions, it is quite clear that Logano is getting it under control. He won the pole with an 184.357 mph run at the Las Vegas qualifier on Saturday. This marked the 30th pole of his Cup career.

As is apparent from the sweeping pole wins, Ford must have put in a lot of effort and dedication in developing the new car.

No stone was left unturned in strapping up the ‘dark horse’

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When Ford unveiled its new Mustang Dark Horse, it had two objectives in sight: honing its superspeedway package and then improving its performance at the intermediate tracks. After hitting two back-to-back superspeedways, the car has now been tested at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

Richard Johns, NASCAR Development Leader for Ford Performance, elaborated on the car’s technical nitty-gritty. As per Autoweek, he said, “When we design a new car it’s strictly aero. We don’t touch any suspension. The tech transfer side of things is where we get the bigger gain for Ford, where we learn how to make our tools better in simulation. The production side helps us with rapid prototyping and added manufacturing.”

While the brand-new Ford is living up to its expectations, Joey Logano could only convert his pole win into a 9th-place finish at Vegas. However, this season has just started and there no way we should give up hope for Ford or Logano. 

Read More: Joey Logano’s Embarrassing Antics Leave Owner Roger Penske Disappointed in the Team Leader