When the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series returns to action next weekend at Martinsville Speedway, there will be 36 drivers set on picking up a victory in the second race of the season. One of those will be Jeb Burton, who will be driving the No. 13 for ThorSport Racing.
Burton did well at Martinsville last year with Turner-Scott Motorsports in his rookie season, finishing third in both races. The April race he actually started on pole and ended up finishing behind ThorSport drivers Johnny Sauter and Matt Crafton.
“I’ve got the confidence going there – just going with a different organization,” Burton commented. “That’s going to be a little different for me, but ThorSport runs very well there so hopefully our truck will be handling well.”
Entering his sophomore season, Burton feels that he should be stronger this year as he knows now, versus last year, what he needs in his truck in practice to be good in the race.
The trucks at Martinsville always bring tough, tight short track racing to the forefront and sometimes it can be tough for a young driver to be patient. Burton says to make sure you get to the end, you just got to keep telling yourself that you can’t win it on the first lap.
“You need to sit there and ride and when you’re handling good, that’s when you really need to ride,” he commented. “You just need to become a more mature driver and become more patient. It doesn’t matter what happens before the last pit stop as long as you’re in the top three after the last pit stop, you have a shot to win.”
Last season, Burton had a stellar rookie season, scoring seven poles and 11 top 10s in the 22 races while scoring his first career victory at Texas Motor Speedway and finishing fifth in points.
Burton was set to head into the new season looking for another great year – possibly a championship season – when less than a month before the 2014 season began, everything fell apart. His sponsor pulled support and as a result, TSM had to let Burton go. A couple weeks before Daytona, ThorSport came to the rescue, hiring Burton to drive for them at Daytona.
“I was hoping to be able to run a race or two at Turner-Scott, but it didn’t work out and I feel like I’m a better place now with ThorSport,” Burton commented. “I feel like I’m surrounded with good people at ThorSport Racing and that’s what it takes. I had a really good race team for last year and I was going to have a really good race team for this year to go after a championship, and it was took away at the last minute.
“Mr. and Mrs. Thorson called and gave me the opportunity to race and if it wasn’t for them, I wouldn’t have a ride right now. I’m really grateful to be driving for them.”
Burton put together a solid performance at Daytona – finishing seventh – and opened the doors for the chance to head to Martinsville next weekend with the team. Beyond Martinsville, whether Burton is able to run more races this year will depend on whether ThorSport Racing can obtain sponsorship.
“I don’t have a ride for the rest of the year, but I feel if we can keep running in the top 10 like we did at Daytona, we’ll be in the top five in points and that’ll help things,” Burton said. “We just got to keep plugging away and trying to find more sponsors.”
The Camping World Truck Series will see a bit of a new picture moving forward, especially on the mile-and-a-halves as a result of the new bodies. These bodies are supposed to make the trucks look closer to what people drive on the street. While they may not effect the action this weekend at Martinsville that much, it could effect things moving forward.
“I tested one at a mile-and-a-half and they’re going to be different,” Burton commented. I think clean air is still going to be very important. I don’t think see much difference with the racing as our truck races are normally really good and exciting. I still think you’ll see a lot of that.”
Racing is something that Burton has always been around since a young age with both his dad Ward Burton and his uncle Jeff Burton racing in the Sprint Cup Series.
“My dad raced for a number of years and just being around that gave me the passion to race,” Burton said. “I started racing and I was pretty good at it. I wasn’t great at it, but I was pretty good and really competitive. I was so competitive that it drove me to keep trying to get better and better to be the best. I’m still nowhere close to the best, but I feel I can win races now and that’s what it’s all about.”
With coming from a racing background, some people would say that there’s added pressure for Burton to perform. However, Burton’s says most of the pressure comes from himself.
“I just want to do well,” he added. “So the pressure’s there but I just try to block it out and do my job.”
Certainly at the age of 21, Burton is just getting his career started in NASCAR. Though with being so young, there’s also the possibility and area where he could try different forms of racing. Burton says while he’s mainly a NASCAR guy, he wouldn’t mind doing the Rolex 24 Hours one day down the road.
“I’m a big short guy, NASCAR guy. That’s all I’ve ever known,” Burton commented. “I’d maybe do a Rolex 24 hour race. I think that’d be pretty cool. Other than that, I think that I’ll stick to what I know.”
Having gone down the road that he has gone down the past couple of months, Burton’s advice to young drivers trying to get into the sport is simple – it’s tough, but keep working at it.
“You just got to keep digging and work hard and never give up and good things will happen,” he said.
