HOMESTEAD, Florida – Brad Keselowski again expressed strong dismay about manufacturer parity in NASCAR’s premier series after Sunday’s season finale, saying Ford could “take a drubbing next year.”

Keselowski stirred controversy before the playoff opener at Chicagoland Speedway by tweeting that Toyota had the largest edge among NASCAR manufacturers in 40 years, and the Team Penske driver doubled down on these comments and said the field was covered from the Daytona 500.

“When that car rolled out at Daytona, and I think we all got to see it for the first time, I think there (were) two reactions: One, we couldn’t believe NASCAR approved it; and two, we were impressed by the design team over there,” he said. “I don’t think anyone ever had a shot this year the second that thing got put on the racetrack and approved. It kind of felt like Formula 1, where you had one car that made it through the gates heads and tails above everyone, and your hands are tied because you’re not allowed to do anything to the cars in those categories that NASCAR approves to really catch up.

“As to what will happen for 2018, you know, I don’t know. I would assume that Chevrolet will be allowed to design a car the same way that Toyota was for this one, but Ford doesn’t have any current plans for that. If that’s the case, we’re going to take a drubbing next year, so we’ll have to see.”

Chevrolet will unveil a new Camaro next season that drivers are expecting will have more downforce, similar to the 2018 Camry (which was put on the racetrack ahead of its appearance in the showroom).

There has been speculation that Ford will move to the Mustang next season (mirroring Chevy’s move of running the same model in Cup and Xfinity).

When asked about the potential of switching to a new car, Dave Pericak, who oversees Ford’s NASCAR program, said Saturday “we always look at what’s going on in the showroom, where we’re going with our product development cycle plan. We introduced the new Fusion a couple years ago. We will be looking at introducing a new car in the future. We have not submitted anything as of yet but stay tuned.”

The Toyotas of Martin Truex Jr. and Kyle Busch finished 1-2 and led 121 of 267 laps in the Ford EcoBoost 400, continuing a season-long trend in which Camrys won 16 of 36 races.

The championship-eligible Fords of Kevin Harvick (fourth) and Keselowski (seventh) combined to lead one lap.

“There wasn’t really any point in the race where we were capable of running with (Busch) or (Truex),” Keselowski said. That was just kind of the way it was. We tried everything we could throw at them with strategies and whatnot, and it seemed to work out a little bit, force everybody’s hands a couple times and put them in some uncomfortable spots, but in the end we just didn’t have enough speed to really contend with those guys. Really nobody did if you look at it.”