TOYOTA NASCAR Sprint Cup Series (NSCS)
Carl Edwards, Denny Hamlin & Matt Kenseth – Notes & Quotes
Chase Media Day in Chicago – September 17, 2015
Toyota drivers Carl Edwards, Denny Hamlin and Matt Kenseth were made available to the media at Chase Media Day at The Murphy Chicago:
CARL EDWARDS, No. 19 STANLEY Toyota Camry, Joe Gibbs Racing
What’s your mindset entering the first Chase race?
“We’ve just got to win races. That’s the only way you guarantee anything. This format is pressure-packed because any point you can have a bad race or two bad races and there’s no guarantees you’re going to advance.”
Do you feel like you have to perform well in the first Chase race?
“I feel like the first round should be good for us. I feel pretty good about Chicago. It’s a little bit of an unknown – our mile and a half program. Our 19 team, we’ve not been stellar at the mile and a halves, but we’ve just been making strides. New Hampshire, I really believe we can go there and win. Dover is one of my favorite race tracks – that’s good. I believe the second round is really the toughest one – Charlotte, Kansas, Talladega – there’s a lot that can happen there, so kind of breaking it down it’s tough. But I really believe if we can be in the final four, we can win this championship. Our cars are good. I love Homestead (Miami Speedway). I’d be good.”
What would it mean to win Toyota’s first NSCS championship?
“When I made the move, I didn’t know what to expect from Toyota and I’ve been blown away at how much they care about competition. I mean they truly are here to race. David Wilson (TRD, U.S.A. president) is standing here. I spent some time with him out in California and he described to me from start to finish how TRD has really developed, so everything they do for our sport, as much as fun as I know they would have winning it, it would be really special to win it for them.”
Are you more clear on the restart rules now than you were a few weeks ago?
“I believe the restarts are still kind of – there’s still a lot of gray area there that I don’t think everyone in the garage understands exactly what is allowable and what’s not. There’s a lot of people that hang back pretty far and get runs. When you’re on the front row – let me put it simply as I think that the leader now he’s in a little bit worse of a position than he’s ever been probably on the restarts just because everyone is getting so good at hanging back or pushing the envelope. It’s really – it’s tough to decide what to do as the leader.”
Are restarts an opportunity to gain an advantage?
“The restarts, it’s cool. The restart is neat because it gives you an opportunity to get an advantage. It is tough and it’s a dynamic part of the race. It’s just where do you draw the line? Can I go 50 feet early or 100 feet early? If the leader doesn’t go, can I just go and beat him into turn one? I don’t know exactly what’s allowable and, yes, you don’t want to have the start happen and have no penalty thrown and have given up an advantage. Let me put it simply, if you do the restarts by the book – the way they say to go at it – you’ll get passed by about four guys every restart, so nobody really knows what to do.”
Can a pit crew be the difference in winning a championship?
“Yeah, getting off pit road first is – it’s way easier to pass guys on pit road and I’ve learned that this year more than ever. My guys are amazing and it’ll – they won us the race at Darlington (Raceway). That could win us a championship at Homestead (Miami Speedway), you’re right.”
How do you feel about Kevin Harvick saying he’s going to stomp the Toyotas into the ground?
“That’s talk. We’ll go race and we’ll see how it turns out, but I think statistics and our performance lately speaks for itself. We’re pretty fast and that’s that.”
Do you think Joe Gibbs Racing (JGR) will have multiple entries in the final round of the Chase?
“Yeah, I think we have a really good chance at putting multiple cars in the final round. The way we’ve been running – as fast as everybody is – it’s going to be a fun Chase for us.”
Will things be weird at the team shop if all four JGR Camrys are in the final race?
“No, I don’t think that would be weird. I think that was Matt Kenseth’s statement the first meeting we had in the first 30 seconds of the meeting this year. He said that should be our mission and that’s what he believes we can do and we need to work towards that. I had fun racing with those guys when we were one-two-three-four at Richmond (International Raceway) the other night. I mean, that’s as good as it gets.”
Do you want more horsepower with the lower downforce package?
“Absolutely, if you have really low downforce and lots of horsepower, it becomes a real show of talent and driver skill and car setup and strategy and that’s what the sport is based on. It shouldn’t be based on track position and I think NASCAR knows that and hopefully they continue to go lower and lower on downforce because low downforce is not what we had at Darlington. It’s just a little lower than what we’re racing right now and if you look directional it gets better the lower we go, so it would be nice if we could keep going that way.”
How did Matt Kenseth help you in your move to JGR?
“Matt (Kenseth) really helped me a ton in the transition to Joe Gibbs Racing. My teammates are just spectacular. I never knew what it was like to work with Kyle (Busch) and Denny (Hamlin). They are way – they are better than I thought they were and I thought they were really good. They’re super race car drivers. Right now, we’re working really well as a group. We’re very competitive with one another, but there’s nothing negative that comes out of us interacting. It’s all really good and it’s bee neat.”
Is Matt Kenseth the elder statesman of the JGR drivers?
“Yeah, Matt’s definitely the oldest. If you’d write elder statesman, that’d be great – yes, that’d be good. No, that’s great – do it. He’s a real pioneer of the sport. I said that about Jeff Gordon one time – he’s never forgiven me I don’t think. I do believe that all of us are – we have enough experience to know what this opportunity is about, to realize the size of this opportunity we have. We’ve got fast cars, good drivers and it’s really neat to be involved with a group where everybody understands that working together is the best thing we can do. It’s pretty cool.”
Is it reasonable to expect JGR to sustain this?
“Absolutely. What I’ve seen out of JGR – being there in the meetings with Coach (Joe Gibbs, team owner) and TRD (Toyota Racing Development) and the drivers – we should win the championship. I mean we really should. These teams are so strong right now and the cars are fast and really we just keep doing what we’re doing, ignore the – whatever anybody says – the performance speaks for itself. It’s really cool”
How is the candor among your JGR teammates?
“The debriefs at Roush (Fenway Racing) were really similar. Everybody really worked well together there as well. The thing of it is – I don’t know. I guess it just really kind of took me off guard how descriptive and how well Denny (Hamlin) in particular can communicate what his car is doing. The contribution from Kyle (Busch) is amazing. He’s a very, very smart racer. It’s neat to listen to how he approaches a race. Matt (Kenseth) is the same Matt that he’s always been – he really understands from start to finish how to go fast and he understands the racing and he communicates it so well. I sit in those meetings and really I’m blown away. I have these three guys who not only are very good, but they’re very willing to share, they’re very good at describing what’s going on. For instance, Denny can – we’ll be sitting there and he’ll talk about a pattern the way the race track took rubber from two years ago at some race and he’s like, ‘Remember, don’t forget that this track does this here,’ and I’m just like, ‘Man, that’s really spectacular.’ And then Kyle came back and it feels like his performance kind of motivated us and everybody kind of pushes everyone in a really positive way. It just has a neat feel to it. I don’t know how to really say it’s different than RFR, but it’s just neat.”
Will the information sharing continue if all the JGR Camrys make the final race?
“I guess so far this year, I hope it continues. I guess as we go through the Chase, as long as of us are still in it, that will probably get harder and harder to do, right? It will get to where it looks like it’s going to be a battle between us, there might be a little less of that, which that’s natural, but I’m telling you still – I don’t know if Coach (Joe Gibbs, team owner) would let that happen. It’s a very open atmosphere there and it’s really cool. It’s competitive, but in a really good way.”
DENNY HAMLIN, No. 11 FedEx Ground Toyota Camry, Joe Gibbs Racing
How does your knee feel?
“It’s good. I’m walking a little bit more normal now, so everything’s good and everything should be good in the car as well.”
Do you plan to have surgery on your knee at the end of the season?
“Yeah, I mean, I think you don’t have to have it, but I think most people do especially if you want to stay active and run again you have to. So, yeah, I’ll wait until the end of the season and make sure I’ve got plenty of time after Homestead to heal and then let it have plenty of time before Daytona.”
Are you doing physical therapy now?
“Yeah, that’s the biggest thing is physical therapy which I’ve already started that as well. Trying to get as strong as I can now that way going into that way when I come out the recovery should be shorter.”
Do you feel like Joe Gibbs Racing (JGR) Camrys are the favorites going into the Chase?
“I think we have a great shot. Coming into this last year we had our cars come in but we weren’t running that well. We made it to the final four but we were very consistent and we ran top-five when it really, really counted. This year I definitely feel like we have more opportunities to make it to the final four. We all said at the beginning of the year we all wanted to be the last four guys standing and give Joe (Gibbs, team owner) his first championship in a really long time and I don’t see why that can’t happen. So, pretty optimistic right now that JGR (Joe Gibbs Racing) has got a great shot at – four shots at a championship.”
Is there any sort of blueprint you can follow this year after experiencing the new Chase rules last year?
“It gives you some part of a blueprint, but it’s hard to execute like we did last year or like (Ryan) Newman did last year. You can’t rely on other people having bad weeks and a lot of people had bad weeks in the Chase. You can’t rely on that and you have to go out and perform really, really well and I think this year will be harder to move on especially in the earlier rounds than what it was last year.”
Was JGR hitting its stride just before Kyle Busch came back from his injuries or did that help the team?
“Maybe a little bit of both. It’s a good point that when Kyle (Busch) came back obviously we all started running better, but as a company we were getting better also so it was kind of a mix of both things. Obviously the driver lineup that they had set out last year I looked at it and said, well, I can’t wait to work with these three guys in one room and we didn’t get to do that until May. I think we’ve all fed off of each other. We’ve helped each other at race tracks that one person is maybe weak and that’s why you see on a weekly basis now our cars running so strong.”
What have you learned from working with Matt Kenseth?
“I was a big advocate to have Matt (Kenseth) come over to JGR (Joe Gibbs Racing) and it’s been better than I expected. It really has. It’s just been so good for our race team. He really helps us identify issues with our team that we could all get better at. He’s a guy that’s been around a long time and he’s got that experience. When he talks you listen. Even though I’ve been at JGR the longest, he’s that guy that when he speaks in the room everyone perks up and pays attention to.”
How special is Jeff Gordon’s consecutive starts streak?
“It’s a big deal, I can tell you that. It’s been quite a few seasons since I’ve ran every single race. Jeff’s (Gordon) that iconic guy and I don’t know when he’s on track to beat that, but it’s pretty special that a guy has been in the sport for 20-some years and never missed. Now, had there been medical staff back then like there is today he might have had to sit out a few races, but it’s awesome to see the guy kind of like iron man Terry Labonte for some many years.”
Do you look at JGR as the team to beat in the Chase and which other teams do you have to keep an eye on?
“Well, I’ve learned I don’t look at anyone else in the Chase. I just can’t control how they run. I know if I concentrate on mine and try to do everything I can to be faster then it will all play out. At no time do I really look at anyone except for if it’s an elimination race and I’m on the bubble one way or another and you see someone you’ve got to beat to move on. I think Dover last year was that situation for me. We were on the outside going in and we raced our way in and it got us all the way to the final four. You try not to look at your competition. I think for the newer guys, (Paul) Menard and those guys that have not been part of the Chase before, it’s going to be very easy for them to look at the scoreboard to see where they’re at at all times. Just seeing over the years it’s been easier for me to not do that.”
Will strategy and track position be the most important during the Chase?
“Yeah, it definitely will. Track position has been more important every single year in our sport and a lot of it is whether it be downforce or horsepower. Pit crews have always been very important and they’re no more important than what they are right now. I feel like I have the best group on pit road so it feels good when you go in and know you have an advantage over the field especially as hard as it is to pass.”
Would you like to see NASCAR give you back more horsepower next year?
“Possibly. I think that whatever works for the engine builders. Obviously there’s money involved in making more horsepower so I’m up for whatever costs the teams the least amount of money.”
What would the drivers like regarding restarts?
“I think drivers want longer restart zones. Ultimately now it’s so short that if you don’t go right away the second place guy does and knowing that he can beat the first place guy to the line there’s no repercussions for it. If you make that box – at a local short track it’s between three and four and nearly the flag stand the leader starts the race, and so the second place person can anticipate that much. I think it would be better to open that zone up two, three times the size of it right now and then don’t let that second place guy beat the first one to the line.”
Does the size of the restart zone depend on the size of the race track?
“They’re all tiny. They’re all so small that literally by the time you get to the first line you’re nearly to the second. It’s just the zone is just entirely too small. It literally is just two marks on the wall that tells the second place guy when the first one is going to go. That’s all it is right now.”
Should NASCAR use electronics for restarts similar to what they use on pit road?
“They’ve got a tough job. If they want to officiate from above that’s a very, very hard thing to do especially as far away from the race track as what they are. I think, yeah, you try to make it as black and white as possible, but I mean restarts are important and everyone is always going to try to get an advantage. But I’m a believer that the leader should have the advantage. He’s earned that position and it’s tough that the second place guy now has got just enough advantage as the first place.”
Does being so close to a championship last year still linger in your mind?
“Not really. We overachieved so much to get to that final four by being consistent, getting top-fives that – the Chase tracks just play out well for me. You look at the bracket and you look at the tracks and you’re like, well we can win at all three of those pretty easily. I knew if we could get to the final eight last year then we were going to go to Homestead with a chance because we knew that Martinsville is going to be a good track for us. Luckily for me, the tracks play out the way they do. It doesn’t linger on your losses especially last year knowing that we overachieved getting to that point, so anything we did from that point on was a bonus.”
Was your knee any better or worse than you thought it would be Saturday night at Richmond?
“It was about what I thought it would be. I’m a week out now and I feel like it’s probably a little bit better than it was the first time around. I think I had two or three weeks between the start of the season and my ACL tear last time. I hadn’t had to race on no ACL this quick. It hurts outside the car and it doesn’t hurt really inside.”
Will Talladega be a challenge for you with the knee injury?
“That will be the biggest challenge I think is that it’s not the heavy braking race tracks, it’s the one where you’re holding the throttle wide open the longest. So, Talladega will be the biggest challenge I think but I’ve driven many, many laps at Talladega anyway with my left foot hung over there pushing the gas down because you’re leg falls asleep there anyway holding the gas down so much.”
Is it realistic to think that all four JGR cars could be in the final four?
“It can happen. It certainly can happen. It’s so easy each round when you play out these brackets to just take, ‘Well, the bottom guys now are going to be eliminated and the next bottom are going to get eliminated.’ This thing is going to get mixed up and there will be two of your top, I think, two of your top 10 seeds miss the first round. I just think that things happen. Dover is a very tough race. New Hampshire we’ve seen attrition. This thing doesn’t always play out like you think and it’s not always the four fastest cars that make it to the end.”
MATT KENSETH, No. 20 Dollar General Toyota Camry, Joe Gibbs Racing
How important is the Chicagoland Speedway race for you?
“They’re all important. Chicago is the first race. Yeah, it’s in the Midwest – closest track where I race at that’s closest to home I guess – so I’ve always enjoyed coming down here. The track has aged really well. I think it’s a great track, so looking forward to racing there.”
Does momentum matter?
“The guys without momentum say no. They guys with momentum say yes. I usually say no because I don’t know that I’ve ever – I know for sure I’ve never won Richmond going into a Chase. I don’t know. I think it always is good to perform at a high level. I think even if you’re fortunate enough to win the first race of the Chase and the next two don’t matter for ranking, I think it’s still important to go there and qualify well and be up front, leading laps, have your pit crew in competitive situations, racing with the leaders – I always think that’s important, so yes and no. It can stop at any time, but I do think it’s good to be running good. It’s good for everybody’s confidence. Everybody knows that we can win if we do everything right, so I think that’s always good.”
Is Joe Gibbs Racing (JGR) the team favorite to win the Chase?
“Anything can happen. I think you’ve got to look at all 16 honestly the way this system works. Last year (at) Homestead (Miami Speedway), there was a guy who dominated all year and Joey (Logano) was super-fast all year and there was a couple guys that got in on consistency making it through every round, so there’s not a – I mean, the only way you know you can get there for sure is to win three races – win the first race of every round. I don’t know – anything can happen. Three races is a lot to recover from a bad finish.”
Does Kevin Harvick have an advantage by having already won in this championship format?
“Absolutely, he’s the only one who has won the Chase in this format. The only way he was going to make it to Homestead (Miami Speedway) was to win Phoenix (International Raceway) and obviously that’s a great track for him and he was able to win Phoenix and then the only way to assure himself a championship is to win Homestead and did that too. Nobody has ever had quite that pressure to win a championship – (Tony) Stewart and Carl (Edwards) kind of did, they ran one-two and whoever won was going to win it, so that was kind of the same thing – but to able to do that in this format, to be behind and step up to the plate, absolutely, I think that gives him an advantage.”
Has it been easier to pass this year?
“Well, I think the racing has been pretty good this year. You can’t compare the Chase yet because we haven’t ran the Chase yet. I don’t know. There’s things we did that probably made it a little bit harder to pass. There’s things we did that probably made it a little easier to pass. It sure wasn’t easy to pass last year, so I don’t know. Whatever they make for rules we’ll figure out how to try to make it work for us.”
Is it realistic for Joe Gibbs Racing to stay on this high through the Chase?
“I hope so. I honestly feel like from a performance standpoint, I feel like our four cars should be very competitive throughout the whole Chase, but that doesn’t mean you can’t break a part, crash your car, have a flat tire. I mean, who knows what’s going to happen. It doesn’t guarantee anything for finishes, but I really feel like we’re going to be pretty fast and we’re going to be – I think we’ll all be, we should be top-five, top-eight cars every week unless we do something really wrong the way our cars are running right now, but it’s up to us to do it. We’ve still got to get to the track and get the right setup in it and have good pit stops and restarts and not make mistakes – all those things we’ve still got to do obviously, but I feel like we should be pretty competitive.”
Is your chemistry with crew chief Jason Ratcliff strong as it’s ever been?
“Yeah, I’d say probably stronger. I think – it’s funny because everybody is a good winner. When you’re winning and things are going good, that’s easy, right? Last year, obviously as an organization we didn’t win very much and things were much tougher and our group was a fair amount different last year too, but anyways you learn more about each other when things aren’t going good than when they are going good. So yeah, I’d say our relationship is probably stronger now than probably it’s ever been. It’s almost three years old now and we’ve learned a lot about each other and obviously we work well together, so it’s good.”
Did JGR hit its stride as Kyle Busch came back or did Busch coming back spur more success?
“Both. I think it kind of happened at the same time, but I think there was a lot of things that went to that, but certainly having the teammates that I have makes this all better. All of them are capable of winning races on any given week and getting Kyle (Busch) back in that car and getting him with Adam (Stevens, Busch’s crew chief) – obviously they’ve got great chemistry together – and they were able to win right out of the gate. That certainly helped us all.”
Should there be more penalties on restarts?
“Yeah, I think that they need to probably make some calls and then we’ll get everybody more honest. I think if you’ve got to – when the second-place guy jumps the first-place car and it’s obvious, I think they need to make that call and then it won’t happen anymore. It’s just, I think you’ve got to make that call. I think when the third-place guy lays back too far and gets a run and passes the whole front row before they get to turn one, I think they need to make that call. I think you make that call one time, two times, three times – whatever it may be – and it will stop. If the second-place guy and third-place guy is not jumping the leader and they’re doing everything legal, there’s no reason for the leader to jump the start either. He’s going to go in the zone, but it’s just there just hasn’t been any penalties in – there’s probably been some that maybe could have been or should have been maybe. It’s not for me to say, but everybody is trying to get whatever advantage they can and I feel like the leaders should have an vantage because he’s the leader and worked for it all day and being the leader you never want to get taken advantage of and be behind when you get to turn two.”
How big would it be to win the first NSCS championship for Toyota?
“Everybody wants to win it and there’s always cool things that come along with that.”
Is there any reason to think the Chase will have less pushing and shoving this year?
“I hope it happens – I just hope I’m not involved in it. That stuff is great to watch. It makes great TV. It’s great storylines. That stuff is really fun if you’re not in it, so I hope so. I just hope I’m not in it.”
Do you have a better understanding of this Chase format in its second year?
“I think it depends. I think to start off, you go out and you just – you go out and go hard every week, but there’s obviously things that can change when you get to all the cutoff races. One year is not a very big sample size of a championship format, so I think there’s going to be a lot of things that will still happen through the years as long as they keep this format that might surprise you or it might change your thinking.”
