Ryan Preece’s day ended early at Dover Motor Speedway, finishing in a disappointing P37 place. His #41 Morton Building Ford had to bow out after just 66 laps due to a fire. The finish marked his seventh last-place finish in the Cup Series and the fourth fire-related dropout across NASCAR’s top tiers for this car. Overall, it was the 60th time the #41 has failed to finish a race, 4th from fire, and the 1,034th for a Ford in NASCAR.
The incident actually brought back some old memories and concerns, echoing the early days of the Next Gen cars when several Fords encountered safety foam fires. Kevin Harvick initially pointed fingers at faulty car parts for these fires. However, now, Tony Stewart’s insider has offered a different perspective that challenges Harvick’s explanation.
Back in September 2022, Kevin Harvick had to ditch his burning ride mid-race, a scary scene that ended with his car engulfed in flames, which he blamed on “crappy-ass” parts during a fiery interview. Fast forward, and Ryan Preece’s car faced a similar fiery fate, not once but twice, prompting Harvick to repeat his earlier criticism about the quality of parts.
He said, “I’m sure it’s just crappy parts on the race car like we’ve seen so many times. They haven’t fixed anything. It’s kind of like the safety stuff. We just let it keep going and keep going.” But Drew Blickensderfer, the current crew chief for the #10 team, recently stepped in to set the record straight. Contradicting Harvick’s harsh words, Blickensderfer explained that the fires weren’t caused by faulty parts at all. “That was self-inflicted,” he stated, pointing towards other factors at play rather than a part failure.
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