RAGAN WANTS MORE FR9

BY TEAM FORD RACING CORRESPONDENT

Talladega, Ala. — Jamie McMurray gave Team Ford Racing its third victory this season with a gut-wrenching performance that left team owner Jack Roush almost doubled-over with nervous anxiety in the final laps. McMurray held on down the stretch to win the AMP Energy 500 in the No. 26 Irwin Marathon Fusion from Roush Fenway Racing. It came 30 races and more than eight months after teammate Matt Kenseth won February races in Daytona Beach and Fontana.

It was McMurray’s third career win (two with Roush, one with Chip Ganassi), his first at the Talladega Superspeedway and the 23rd all-time for Ford at the 2.66-mile track east of Birmingham. TFR’s last win here was five years ago, when Dale Jarrett won with Robert Yates Racing. Ford’s other winners here include Donnie, Bobby and Davey Allison, Dale Earnhardt, Bill Elliott, Neil Bonnett, Cale Yarborough, Buddy Baker, Jimmy Spencer, Terry Labonte, James Hylton and Mark Martin.

McMurray led four times for a race-high 32 of the 191 laps (scheduled for 188), including the final 11. He also led in clumps of one, 14 and six laps on a day when 25 drivers swapped the lead 58 times. The race was slowed six times for 23 laps while crews cleared debris and scooped up carnage from wrecks that included (in order) two cars, one car, five cars and (on the last lap) 13 cars.

By then, McMurray was safely out of danger. He took the yellow and white flags, then came around slowly for the checkered ahead of top-five finishers Kasey Kahne, rookie Joey Logano, fellow Ford driver Greg Biffle and Jeff Burton. The second five included points leader (and soon-to-be four-time champion) Jimmie Johnson, Michael Waltrip, Brad Keselowski, Bobby Labonte and Elliott Sadler, in a Fusion for the first time with Richard Petty Motorsports.

Five additional TFR drivers were in the show. Roush Fenway teammates Carl Edwards, David Ragan and Kenseth were 14th, 17th and 24th. Yates Racing drivers Erik Darnell and Paul Menard were 37th and 42nd, the latter sidelined in an early-race, tire-related accident with Joe Nemechek.

McMurray, Roush and crew chief Donnie Wingo knew they had a winning car, but worried that the overtime laps might run them out of fuel. “It was really, really close there at the end,” Wingo said. “But we’d put ourselves in that position and that was what we needed to do. The crew did a good job getting in enough fuel [on the last stop, with 49 laps left] and Jamie did a good job hanging in there and staying up front.”

That fuel uncertainty, though, chewed on Roush’s nerves. “I thought we were gonna find another way to lose one of these races,” he said. “I thought [in the final laps] cars were going to run out of gas [as several did] and delay the restart until we were out of gas, too. That was my horror. In fact, I had to turn away and get off the pit box. I couldn’t stand it. I left. I just couldn’t stand it.”

GREAT PERFORMANCE
The race marked the competitive debut of Team Ford Racing’s new FR9 engine. Ragan and Kenseth used it, while the other five Fusion drivers used Ford’s existing engine. The new engine debuted after more than a year of planning, designing, building and static testing by Doug Yates said his staff at Roush-Yates Engines.

Ragan ran near the front much of the day, but was swept up in the last-lap melee on the frontstretch. “Our Ford was pretty fast,” he said, “but we were at the mercy of everyone around us. In general, it was just kind of a terrible race today and I’m glad we only have to do it three or four times a year. These cars are too easy to drive and everyone just gets kind of crazy. It’s a shame to tear up a lot of good race cars, but that’s restrictor-plate racing.”

He was pleased with the performance of the new engine in his No. 6 car. “The new engine performed great,” he said. “We didn’t have any issues; it ran cool all day and had good power and great fuel mileage. The guys back in North Carolina [the engine department] will look at the valve train and inside, but from where I was sitting it was pretty good.”

R0ush was happy with it, too. He knows that one race isn’t any reliable gauge of anything, but he liked what he saw and heard from the FR9. “I was very confident of the engines themselves; for all the moving parts,” he said. “There were little questions about the valve train and valve springs, but the basic engineering that’s gone into that engine has been the best I’ve ever seen. I was most nervous about the mechanically-driven fuel pump. I was scared we’d break a chain or cable, or have trouble with that fuel pump. But it all worked good.”

Doug Yates, the primary designer and builder of the RF9, hopes to run one in the season-ending Cup race at Homestead-Miami Speedway on Nov. 22. If so, it’ll be only the second competitive test of the new piece he and his staff at Roush-Yates Engines spent more than a year developing.

The first competitive test was Sunday, with Ragan and Kenseth. But that was a restrictor-plate race, one of only four each year in NASCAR. The other 32 are “unrestricted” and Yates is anxious to see how the RF9 fares in those.

“That’ll be a big moment because we’re talking about two different engines,” he said. “The makeup and the combinations [of parts and pieces] between restricted and open engines are so different. Our goal right now is to look at the open configuration at Homestead later this month. That’ll be another milestone, so we can build for the future from that.”

When told that Yates planned to take an FR9 to Homestead, Ragan quickly volunteered. “Hey, I’ll raise my hand and apply for that,” he said. “I’ll lobby for that deal.”

OVERALL TOP-10 IN THE AMP ENERGY 500 AT THE TALLADEGA SUPERSPEEDWAY
1. JAMIE MCMURRAY, FORD
2. Kasey Kahne, Dodge
3. Joey Logano, Toyota
4. GREG BIFFLE, FORD
5. Jeff Burton, Chevrolet
6. Jimmie Johnson, Chevrolet
7. Michael Waltrip, Toyota
8. Brad Keselowski, Chevrolet
9. ELLIOTT SADLE, FORD
10. Bobby Labonte, Chevrolet

TOP-12 IN POINTS AFTER 33 OF 36 SPRINT CUP RACES
1. Johnson, 6248
2. Martin, -184
3. Gordon, -192
4. Montoya, -239
5. Stewart, -279
6. Ku. Busch, -312
7. BIFFLE, -340
8. Newman, -402
9. Kahne, -414
10. EDWARDS, -437
11. Hamlin, -448
12. Vickers, -556

TEAM FORD RACING FINISHERS IN THE AMP ENERGY 500 AT THE TALLADEGA SUPERSPEEDWAY
1. Jamie McMurray, Roush Fenway Racing
4. Greg Biffle, Roush Fenway Racing
9. Elliott Sadler, Richard Petty Motorsports
14. Carl Edwards, Roush Fenway Racing
17. David Ragan, Roush Fenway Racing
24. Matt Kenseth, Roush Fenway Racing
37. Erik Darnell, Yates Racing
42. Paul Menard, Yates Racing