TOYOTA NASCAR Sprint Cup Series (NSCS)
Carl Edwards – Notes & Quotes
Las Vegas Motor Speedway – March 6, 2015
CARL EDWARDS, No. 19 Comcast Business Toyota Camry, Joe Gibbs Racing
How was your Camry in practice?
“We had a fast race car in practice. Really looking forward to qualifying. All of the JGR (Joe Gibbs Racing) Toyotas seem pretty good and this track is more fun than I remember it. It has more bumps and a little more character. The cars are sliding around a little bit and it’s just about how I like it, so this is going to be a good weekend.”
Would you take a risky gamble for a win?
“Absolutely if we can come out of here with a win. If we can win anytime – at the point at which we feel like we’re locked in to the Chase, it definitely allows you to take gambles. It’s more fun to race that way too, so this format allows guys that have wins to do that. That’s what we did last year after a win at Bristol and Darian (Grubb, crew chief) and I talked about it early, before the year even started. Whatever we can do to get wins early so that we can go out there and be aggressive, get those bonus points and really just have more fun racing, that’s what we want to do.”
Does it feel odd to race in Las Vegas without a Busch brother in the field?
“I know that the competition will be easier for all of us because those guys (Kyle and Kurt Busch) aren’t out here. Those guys are both extremely fast and all of us at JGR are thinking a lot of Kyle and his recovery. He seems to be doing really well and it looks like Kurt’s well on his way to being back here soon, so I guess we’ll look forward to their return.”
How has the adjustment been with David Ragan stepping into the No. 18 Camry?
“David Ragan has done a great job stepping in there. He was the fastest car of our group in practice. I think it’s a big opportunity for him. I know that for me to be able to have a really good, solid teammate – that was a big part of or that is a big part of anybody’s race weekend is to help them speed up – and right now David is doing a great job, but I really look forward to having Kyle back with all the speed he has and the huge part of JGR that he is. He’s a guy that I can learn a lot from.”
What is it working with a new crew chief in Darian Grubb?
“It’s going really well. We’re learning a lot. Each race is a learning experience. I’m learning how Darian does things. The personalities are different. It’s new people. Just the way that Denny (Hamlin) and Kyle and everybody at JGR communicates, that’s new to me. I’ve just been trying to do the best I can to build those relationships, but it’s been great. We’re having fun. The cars are pretty fast and we feel like there’s a lot of room to gain as well. We don’t think as a group we’re as fast as we’re going to be by the end of the year.”
Has it been difficult to find your place at Joe Gibbs Racing?
“I thought it would be harder to find my place really, but it’s really simple. Everybody is extremely open in the debriefs. It’s pretty amazing. I’ve already learned a ton about the guys’ different driving styles. Everyone is – there’s a lot of information sharing between the drivers and for me that’s good. It’s exciting. It gives me an opportunity to learn new things. The way Denny drives is different than I thought he did and it’s different than what I expected and that helped me a lot at Atlanta. Just this weekend looking at practice, being able to lean on Matt (Kenseth) and the things he was doing and Denny both – and I haven’t even had a chance to look at David’s (Ragan) stuff – just when you have fast guys to compare things to and all the cars are fast and everyone is just trying to be P1 all the time, that’s a fun way to race.”
Why do motorsports fans watch practices?
“Our fans are amazing. These events are – they’re events. It’s not a race. It’s a weekend event. There’s racing going on the entire weekend. There’s all different things for the fans to do. Here in Las Vegas, me personally I had a plane load of people coming out here. Everyone wants to come to Las Vegas – it’s a fun place. You can’t be bored around the race track. If you get bored, all you have to do is go out in the campground, talk to people, look at what’s happening. There are families here, people from all over the world and, yeah, they come to watch everything that goes on on the race track.”
Is the wind a factor and what plans do you have in Las Vegas?
“The wind – the wind is a big factor. The cars are so aero dependent, we’re moving so much air, we’re relying on the air so much, you can feel every gust of wind. Coming off of Turn 4, I almost hit the fence. We had a big tail wind and it blew the car around a little bit. That’s a big factor and I’ll be at – we’re going to be at the Fremont. 6:30 to 8:30 tonight, I’ll be over at the Fremont Casino. We’ve got a really neat thing that we’ve been doing the last couple of years. I don’t know how many people they give out tickets for – it’s probably four or 500 people. Free tickets, we do a question-and-answer session with Jeff Hammond (Fox television commentator) and every time I’m here, I go hang out over there and we have really good times. That’s probably the biggest thing I’ll be doing while I’m here.”
Do you have a timeline for working with a new crew chief?
“No, there’s no set timeline, but I’ve been very fortunate every time we’ve got a new crew chief in the past it seems like we’ve done really well together soon. I know Jimmy Fennig (former crew chief) and I, the last new crew chief I had, we won really quickly. That’s really the key. You’ve got to do well right off the bat and that’s Darian and I’s goal is just to go out here and get a win here to start and then it takes all the pressure off. But we both between us have a ton of wins and a lot of experience and I think we’ll be okay.”
Have you enjoyed learning about Toyota?
“It’s been really fun to learn about Toyota and the way they do things. For me personally, having spent so much time at Roush Fenway Racing, it is a little bit overwhelming to come to a new place and to meet everyone and to see everything. I’m really excited about the California trip – I get a chance to go out to TRD and to Toyota’s headquarters. They say they have a really amazing place out there and I get to see how they do business. I know for me, that’s been one of the neat things about being a race car driver is I get to learn a lot about all of these companies. I just had a meeting with the folks from Comcast Business. I learned how they run their business, what they offer to people, how they market things and with all these new relationships, there are opportunities to do that. Yeah, it’s been pretty fun.”
How does the new package feel?
“I spent a little bit of the morning watching some of that show, ‘A Perfect Storm,’ where they show all the races. They were showing a lot of the footage from back in the day and I believe that I’m on the same page with everyone – NASCAR, the drivers, the fans – we all want to see the best racing on the race track. The question is how exactly do we get that. The way I understand it, Gene Stefanyshyn (NASCAR senior vice president for innovation and racing development) and everyone at NASCAR is going through the process of trying to remove a little bit of downforce and to make the cars race better. I’m hoping that there’s more of that in the future because what’s happening is as you remove horsepower, there’s just less time off the throttle and eventually if you keep taking more horsepower away and the teams keep finding more and more downforce, it will be impossible to pass. So NASCAR has to stay ahead of that curve. They’re working on it. We tested a package that is even lower downforce than this and I hope and pray every day that that’s the direction we go, because I believe that’s what the fans deserve. I think that’s what’s going to provide the best racing and NASCAR has been headed that direction.”
Will we see that lower downforce package for the All-Star race?
“I believe that’s what NASCAR’s got planned. I’m not sure exactly when they’re going to bring it out, but I think that would be an opportunity. To me, it’s an opportunity to say, ‘Hey, this is what the sport was built on.’ It was built on stock cars not relying on spoilers and splitters and guys manhandling race cars around the race track and I think that’s where NASCAR wants to be, that’s where the drivers want to be and I hope we end up there.”
Have you ever had a backflip go wrong?
“Not on television – I’ve not screwed it up, so that’s been good. I know there a lot of folks in the booth and a lot of folks up there with their cameras that want to get that on tape and eventually I’m sure I will fall down. But as long as I only do the backflip when I win, then I’m a guy laying on the ground hurting, but I’ll still be a winner.”
