Kasey Kahne Doesn't Back Down From Vegas Comments

Kasey Kahne was fairly outspoken about his cars prior to the Las Vegas race, which is saying a lot for the laid-back, generally quiet guy.

Kahne said in Vegas that while the Ford motors were improved over the ones he had with Dodge, “I wouldn’t say my car is any different than it was last year.”

That was surprising, given Richard Petty Motorsports’ alliance with Roush Fenway Racing was expected to pay bigger dividends in information-sharing.

But Kahne said Roush’s setups weren’t any better than the ones he had at RPM last year.

“I expected the cars to be better, I mean just a little bit,” he said in Vegas. "You’d think gaining with that many people in that group and pulling our knowledge and their knowledge together you would think, ‘Man, we’ve got to have a better balance on race cars doing that.’

“That’s not the case, but I think as the season goes, hopefully, it will be the case, but not as of right now.”

But Friday in Atlanta, Kahne was asked whether anyone with Roush had gotten upset with his comments. Kahne bristled a bit.

“I said we had a better engine than we did a year ago, so that would mean we were better off than we were a year ago,” he said. "I said as far as the cars go, they’re not any better. The handling isn’t any better than what we had the year before, but the engine is better so we’re in a better situation and we’re in a better spot.

“Nobody said a word to me. I think they understand what I was saying.”