Kes led three laps and held strong in the Top 10 all evening at Darlington Raceway, but while trying to gain ground late in the 367-lap event, he brushed the outer wall, disrupting the handling on the No. 2 Ford, ending his shot at a desirable finish. Brad finished fifth in Stage 1, sixth in Stage 2 and 15th for the race.

“We just weren’t where we wanted to be at the end of the race,” BK said. “I was just kind of holding on and we were going to probably run 10th or 12th and I tried a little bit too hard and brushed the wall. I ended up probably hurting our Miller Genuine Draft Ford a little bit and we finished 15th.”

The throwback “Midnight” machine, originally driven to Victory Lane 13 times between 1992-1994 by Hall of Famer Rusty Wallace, was solid in qualifying to earn Brad a sixth-place start. He moved up into the Top 5 early on, where he remained until Trevor Bayne brought out the first caution at lap 18.

Kes fell back on the ensuing restart and nearly dropped out of the Top 10, but the No. 2 Miller Genuine Draft Ford recovered over the long run. As every competitor’s tires were shredded by the rough 1.336-mile egg-shaped oval, Kes pushed his way back into the Top 5, where he ended Stage 1.

Brad battled a tight-handling MGD Ford and remained in the Top 5 for much of Stage 2, ultimately picking up some more points with a sixth-place finish in the segment.

The Team Penske driver continued to stake claim to a spot inside the Top 10 until that late mishap. A brush with the outer wall forced Brad to hit pit road for minor repairs. Though considering how late the damage came, Kes was proud that his team persevered and left Darlington with a Top 15 finish.

“Paul made a good call at the end there to get us into 15th when we probably could have been worse than that, so I was proud of that effort,” BK said. “We just need to be faster.”

Just one race remains in the regular season: the Federated Auto Parts 400 at Richmond International Raceway. Kes has dominated and won this race before, and he’ll need another performance like that to gain ground in the standings. After the Denny Hamlin’s win at Darlington, Brad now trails the No. 11 driver by 49 points in the MENCS standings.

The competition is sure to be fierce in this final regular-season race as several talented drivers are still vying to punch their tickets to the Playoffs. And those who have already sewn up a spot will look to take advantage of the final opportunity to gain precious Playoff points. The race will go green at 7:43 p.m. ET on Saturday and will air on NBCSN.

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The 2017 model might be the best yet.

In 2015, Brad’s No. 2 Ford Fusion rocked the Miller High Life look. Last season, it was baby blue throwback Miller Lite colors adorning the Deuce. This year, BK is bringing back Midnight—the Miller Genuine Draft Ford famously driven to great success by Rusty Wallace —for Sunday night’s Bojangles’ Southern 500.

But Darlington’s annual Throwback Week is more than just a few fun days at the track. Brad has long been gunning for the coveted Southern 500 crown, one of the most prestigious in NASCAR.

“We love Darlington, we love the throwback week,” Brad said. “We look at our marquee races in the Sprint Cup Series and you can’t help but to think about the Daytona 500, you’ll think about Darlington’s Southern 500.”

Sporting throwback schemes the last two years, BK has come oh-so-close to checking a win at Darlington off his career bucket list. In the High Life red and white in 2015, he started first and finished second. Then last year in the Lite baby blue, he started second and finished. Between those two near misses, BK had the throwback Deuce out front for a combined 243 laps along the way.

He’ll look to finish the job in one of the 2 car’s most infamous looks. Wallace drove “Midnight” in 38 races from 1992-94, notching 30 top 5s and 13 wins behind the wheel of the black and gold Deuce.

Brad last sported the dark Miller Genuine Draft paint scheme in the August 2015 race at his home track, Michigan International Speedway. He finished ninth in that race, and he’ll hope for an even better finish in the Black Deuce this weekend.

Kes boasts four Top 10 finishes in eight career starts at the unique 1.366-mile egg-shaped oval. BK has had a handle on the tricky surface since the start. His first career start came in 2009 and ended in an impressive ninth-place finish in Rick Hendrick’s GoDaddy car. He crossed third in the Miller Lite Ford in 2011, but his most impressive run certainly came in 2015.

The Rochester Hills, Mich. native secured the Coors Light Pole Award and called it one of the biggest poles of his career.

“This is probably the biggest pole I have ever had as far as what the track means,” Brad said after winning the pole position in 2015. “I have always thought of Darlington as being one of the elite tracks in NASCAR…you look at Daytona, probably Bristol, Charlotte and Darlington as definitely in the top-five, maybe top-two or three to our sport and what it means. When I think of that, I think that any success you have on those tracks is just a ‘whoa’ moment. It is huge. So in that sense this is a great accomplishment to me personally and it means a lot.”

Kes led 196 laps that day at Darlington, but he was edged off pit road by Carl Edwards on the final stop, and the now-retired driver went on to secure the win with the preferred position on the final restart.

The Team Penske driver will look to move up one spot, finish first and add some playoff points in the process. Brad is sixth in the drive point standings and is tied for fifth with 14 playoff points. And with just two races remaining until the Playoffs, time is running out to build that postseason cushion. But even setting aside points and standings, this Southern 500 is a big one—one of the biggest in BK’s eyes.

“We were so close in 2015,” BK said. “It was very frustrating, but we’ve had the speed, but to finish it off that’s kind of been our Darlington history. A lot of great runs there and I feel like we can go get it.”

The Bojangles’ Southern 500 at Darlington Raceway will go green shortly after 6 p.m. ET Sunday night and will air on NBC Sports Network.

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The company, which offers a complete suite of solutions including in-flight Internet, entertainment, text messaging and a host of other communications related services to the commercial and business aviation markets, is widely credited with many of the industry’s most influential achievements.

“Gogo has made a positive difference in what I do both as a driver and team owner,” Brad said. “For me, the airplane is a business tool – it’s a time machine – and the ability to take my entire digital lifestyle with me when I fly is simply invaluable. Gogo allows me to be productive in my business by eliminating the downtime of not having access to the internet when I’m in the air, and I can get my work done quickly and efficiently. Whether it’s staying in close contact with my family and business team, interacting with fans immediately after a race, seeing our flight’s progress, or just watching a movie – it all couldn’t be easier. I’ll never fly ‘unconnected’ again.”

(NKP, Matthew T. Thacker)

Gogo’s partnership is a perfect fit with Brad, one of NASCAR’s most tech-savvy and high-profile drivers. The 2012 Sprint Cup Series champion and 2010 XFINITY Series champion is also the owner of Brad Keselowski Racing, an organization that fields two full-time entries in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series.

Those responsibilities – plus interacting with his Twitter followers (560,000 and counting), whom Brad considers his “fan club” – add up to a critical need for communications services whether on the ground or in the air.

“Since equipping the aircraft with Gogo earlier this year, one surprise has been the difference Gogo has made from an operational standpoint,” said Joey Meier, Director of Aviation and Chief Pilot for Brad Keselowski Racing. “It’s been a huge help to us in the cockpit – we use it for cockpit weather and operational applications, communicating with personnel on the ground, and much more. It definitely helps us deliver a better experience for passengers.”

For travel to races, sponsor engagements, and numerous other business-related activities, Keselowski currently owns and operates a Learjet 45 business aircraft with a full suite of Gogo capabilities, which include:

• Gogo Biz. In-flight Internet and voice service.
• Gogo Vision. In-flight entertainment and information. Serves up approximately 200 on-demand movies and TV shows – along with moving maps, news, flight progress information and destination weather.
• Gogo Text & Talk. In-flight calling and texting with passengers’ own smartphones – and their own mobile numbers.
• UCS 5000. Gogo’s next-generation, all-in-one cabin router and media server.

“We’re excited to announce our partnership with Brad Keselowski,” said John Wade, Gogo Business Aviation’s Executive Vice President and General Manager. “Brad is a very knowledgeable and insightful consumer and he’ll be a tremendous asset to the Gogo brand. As a user of our products and services, he’ll be an expert resource for other business aircraft operators about in-flight connectivity and entertainment, and can give us valuable feedback on our services.”

ABOUT GOGO

Gogo is a leading global aero-communications service provider that offers in-flight Internet, entertainment, text messaging, voice, connected aircraft services and a host of other communications-related services to the commercial and business aviation markets. Gogo has partnerships with 11 major commercial airlines and is now installed on nearly 2,400 commercial aircraft. More than 6,800 business aircraft are also flying with its solutions, including the world’s largest fractional ownership fleets. Gogo also is a factory option at every major business aircraft manufacturer.

Gogo has more than 900 employees and is headquartered in Chicago, IL, with additional facilities in Broomfield, CO, and various locations overseas. Connect with us at www.gogoair.com and business.gogoair.com.

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The No. 2 MGD Ford Fusion ran in the Top 10 for most of the afternoon and was best on long green-flag runs, but a late restart shuffled the Deuce back outside the Top 12 with 10 laps to go. However, BK battled back and passed three cars in the final five laps to finish ninth.

Afterward, he reflected on the decent day on his home track.

“We just needed to be faster, for sure, especially down the straightaways,” Brad said after the race. “It was an okay day. Nothing spectacular. We made the most of our day in every way we could though.”

The result marked Brad’s sixth consecutive Top 10 finish, his longest Top 10 streak of the season, and it was also his fifth straight time finishing better than he qualified.

BK started 14th at Michigan, and he was off to a strong start in the 400-mile trek around Brooklyn’s two-mile D-shaped oval. Thanks to a great start, he was able to push the Midnight Black Miller machine all the way up to eighth position on the first lap. But he didn’t get much opportunity to ride that wave of momentum. In an event that featured eight cautions for 31 yellow-flag laps, the first incident occurred on that very first lap, when David Ragan went for a spin.

Another caution flag came at lap 11, but rather than trying to jump the field on those restarts Brad chose to play it conservative in the early going, in an effort to keep his machine clean, and as a result he was shuffled back to 13th on the second restart. However, as they often do, BK and the No. 2 Ford showed their strength under green, which allowed Brad to pass the No. 14 of Tony Stewart and No. 27 of Paul Menard back to position No. 11 before a NASCAR mandated competition caution at lap 22.

This caution marked the first pit stop of the day for the No. 2 crew, but crew chief Paul Wolfe called for a fuel-only stop, which gave Kes some much needed track position. He was third off pit road and restarted fourth because Austin Dillon in the No. 3 car elected to forgo pit road. But that track position didn’t last long, because on the ensuing run, Midnight wasn’t running well for Brad. He tried to combat its tight condition with in-car track bar adjustments but fell back in the pack to seventh position.

Kes was finally able to come down pit road for a wedge adjustment and four fresh tires at lap 59 and the 2 Crew had him out of his pit box in just 12.3 seconds, again gaining some valuable track position. But the adjustments never quite took hold. Another caution flag flew at lap 72 and on the following run, BK reported that he was still unhappy with the car, which lacked straightaway speed and the power to make passes.

He remained right around the fringe of the Top 10 for much of that run before pitting under green at lap 114. This stop was set up to give the team the strategy they needed to regain track position, but a miscue on pit road erased that opportunity. BK turned up in 10th place after the stop, but a loose left-rear wheel forced him down pit road for an unscheduled stop during a lap 121 caution.

New tires remedied the issue and also allowed BK to gain ground on a restart for the first time since the start of the race. He jumped from 15th to 13th on the restart, then moved up to P11 after another quick caution and finally passed Kyle Busch to get back into the Top 10 before the race’s seventh caution came at lap 136.

While the leaders stayed out, Brad pitted once again and the 2 Crew strapped four fresh tires on the MGD Ford Fusion. Kes used that rubber to notch his best restart of the day, carving his way from 16th to 11th on the lap 141 restart. During the green-flag run that followed, BK cycled to second place, his highest running position of the afternoon, before pitting at lap 172.

On that pit road trip, Wolfe called for a two-tire stop to give Brad another track position boost, and he cycled out to seventh place, where he was running some of the best lap times on the track. That move put him within striking distance of the leaf for the final reset at lap 187.

However, a disturbing trend from the last several weeks reared its ugly head once more as a poor final restart sunk the MGD Deuce’s ship. Brad fell to 13th on the restart and instead of competing for the win, he spent the final 10 laps passing the No. 1 of Jamie McMurray, Busch’s No. 18, Dale Earnhardt Jr. in the No. 88 and Menard’s No. 27 car just to get back to a ninth place finish.

His sixth straight Top 10 kept him in fifth place in the Sprint Cup Series points standings. Oddly enough, his ninth-place finish at MIS nearly mirrored his 10th-place result at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, where NASCAR debuted the high-drag aerodynamics package also used this past weekend at Michigan.

Brad left both weekends disappointed in the new package, and he shared with the media his opinion on what it brought to the sport.

“It doesn’t matter what my thoughts and observations are, it is what NASCAR wants,” Kes said after the race. “Whatever they want to do. It wasn’t fun. It wasn’t the worst I have ever seen but this package increasingly rewards the car over the driver and I am not a fan of that.”

NEXT UP

The No. 2 car will be racing under the lights next week at Bristol Motor Speedway in the Irwin Tools Night Race.

This race comes at just the right time for the No. 2 Crew, which is still starved for their second win of the year. The 0.533-mile short track is one of just four tracks where BK boasts multiple wins. He won back-to-back races there in 2011 and 2012 and in 11 starts as Bristol, Brad has four Top 5s, including a second-place finish in this race last year.

Back in April at Bristol, BK was set to start second in the Food City 500, but rain throughout the weekend created a slick track and that contributed to a wreck just 20 laps in, which swallowed up the Deuce and led to a 35th place finish. They No. 2 crew will look to avoid a similar fate this weekend.

The Irwin Tools Night Race will be run on Saturday evening at 7:30 p.m ET on NBC Sports Network.

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