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[/media-credit]Back in June, it was Joey Logano finding victory lane at Pocono Raceway. Now as the series returns to the tricky triangle for its second visit of the season, Logano is in need of another win as he currently sits 17th in points with only the one victory on the season. Currently, he sits fourth in the wild-card standings.
With six races leading up to the Chase for the Sprint Cup, a win would certainly put Logano in prime position to make the playoffs.
With the situation that Logano is in, he is now placed in a “nothing to lose” scenario where wins are all that matter.
“We ere definitely at that point that we have to win another race to get in the race,” he says. “So that’s definitely – you know, we don’t have as much to lose at this point, so just go for it.”
In theory, that’d say that the No. 20 Home Depot team would be trying harder to win a race, however Logano says they don’t do anything different as they go out trying to win every weekend.
“We can’t do any more or less for any other race,” he says. “We just do what we do every week and try to win. We go into Pocono with a lot of confidence after winning there earlier this year with a strong car that’s fast in practice, qualified on the pole and won the race. When you have a car like that, if we are bringing back the same one, I guess we’ll be going in with a lot of confidence to the weekend.”
Beyond looking for the win, Logano will be looking for his third straight Pocono pole in qualifying. Logano says he has had some fast cars there and qualifying is important at Pocono, though it’s about having the right mind-set to be able to do it.
“You’ve got to have the right mind-set when you go into practice and when you’re going to put your fast lap and when you’re going to go into qualifying,” he says. “Obviously when you go out there and qualify, it’s a little bit trickier place to qualify, because you have one more turn to either get it right or screw up real fast.
He says it’s tricky to lay down that quick lap and understands why the track is called the tricky triangle.
Before on the old Pocono surface, it was Logano’s teammate Denny Hamlin that was dominant as he had four wins, eight top fives and nine top 10s in 13 starts. Though on the new surface, it was Logano taking the field by storm with the win, marking his first ever top 10 at Pocono.
Having a teammate that was good on the old surface was good as Logano said that Hamlin has helped both him and their teammate Kyle Busch.
“He’s got us around there a few times, and teaching us quite a few things, and I think JGR as a company has been really strong over the years at Pocono, too. I think the drivers know what they are looking for and the teams are able to give us what we need.”
Whether Logano performs or not could decide a lot of factors going forward as this is contract year and the young driver has yet to announce that he has resigned or anything.
“You need to do what you do best, and all of that other stuff is going to come along with it eventually,” Logano says. “I’ll focus on the racing part and during the week, see where the best opportunity is going to be for me and go with that.”
ESPN has posted that their sources have said that Matt Kenseth is set to replace Logano in 2013 after announcing that he has left Roush-Fenway Racing. The same article states that JGR president J.D. Gibbs says that they’d like to have four teams for 2013, though it depends if sponsorship can be found for Logano.
“We’ve talked a number of different potentials, but obviously we’d like him to be in Cup full-time,” Gibbs told ESPN.
If it can’t be found, they are also looking at other schedule options to see if they would work.
For now though, the focus is on this weekend and getting in the chase and Logano is going to do everything he can possibly do as a driver to help his team.
“I think this year, I have a lot more confidence in myself and my abilities in what we are doing out there,” he adds.
