Chase surprise Chris Buescher: "We don't want to be the first ones out"

When Mother Nature forced NASCAR’s hand at Pocono Raceway, Buescher was the man out front, courtesy of veteran crew chief Bob Osborne calling for him to push the fuel mileage.

The win catapulted him into the Chase and although it’s more than anyone expected of the rookie, he’s not content with just making it and finishing 16th. He wants to be a part of it and upset the apple cart as much as he can.

"Now what?"

"We wanted to be in the Chase, we wanted to win a race -- that was our goal from the beginning," he told Motorsport.com during Chase Media Day in Chicago.

"And so, at this point, we’ve been able to check those two things off, so now what? We haven’t thought too far ahead of that. That was supposed to be an unattainable goal and we found ourselves in a great spot. We kind of have to reevaluate and like you said, we don’t want to be the first ones out. We really want to take it into that second round. I think that needs to be our big focus right now -- to move forward and drive ourselves past Dover. We want to make sure we’re not the first guys to go out of this thing.

Consistency is key

This knockout style Chase format brings a new level of unpredictability to the championship battle. Mulligans are not allowed and just one unforeseen issue could end the title hopes of any serious contender. With that in mind, Buescher plans to take the tortoise and the hare approach.

"There’s definitely the opportunity to turn consistency into a huge advantage. These next three are going to be tough ones to come out of without any on-track incidents. They’re just tough race tracks, (but) he Chase rewards two things and that’s winning and that’s being consistent."

With Roush-Fenway Racing failing to get any of their three cars into the postseason, it's to be expected that they would put more resources into the rookie driver of the No. 34, but Chris asserts that the support has been great since the get-go.

"I think our support from Roush has been great all season. Front Row and their relationship with Roush has been really helpful for us. We have an open line of communication.

"They’ve made it clear if we need something, be sure to speak up."

Looking forward

The relationship between the two organizations goes well beyond a team aspect. Buescher delivered Roush the driver's championship in 2015 on the Xfinity side. And in 2016, he became the first ROTY contender (and to this point the only) to secure that maiden win, doing so before Jeff Gordon's successor Chase Elliott and the Wood Brothers' Ryan Blaney. 

So with all that in mind, surely he's pondered where he wants to be in 2017, but he says that's not the case.

"I haven’t thought past Chicagoland at this point, Buescher laughed. "So no, we really haven’t. We focus so hard on the Chase, I have no clue what 2017 will bring at the moment."