Toyota Racing – Dakoda Armstrong
NASCAR XFINTIY Series (NXS)
Indianapolis Motor Speedway – July 21, 2017
JGL Racing driver Dakoda Armstrong was made available to the media at Indianapolis Motor Speedway:
DAKODA ARMSTRONG, No. 28 WinField United Toyota Camry, JGL Racing
What’s it like to be back racing in your home state of Indiana?
“Yeah, you know, it’s always cool. I’m probably a little biased when we come here, but I think the atmosphere is just a little different, you know? Everyone knows this is a big venue and a big track that everyone wants to run well, so get to meet a lot of family here again, so always that added pressure to do well here, so hopefully we’ll – we can go out there and perform this week.”
What’s your mindset approaching this race with a different package?
“I’d say the same thing – a lot of people just don’t really know. You can kind of speculate, but until we actually get out there and run we don’t really know what it’s going to be like in bigger packs or really even in smaller ones or by yourself, so we’ll see. I think it’s exciting. So I think there’s going to be a lot of hype behind it and that it’s a good – I think it’s a good idea to attack it and try to bring a different race kind of to this track, so we’ll see what happens.”
How has your season to date been?
“For us, it’s week to week. We’re in a spot – I think we’re 10th right now – where we have to make sure were capitalizing on everything we do. We’re not locked in yet, so we have to – every point matters. Everything we do is important. We had a little bit of a bad week last week losing brakes, so we’ve done a good job of just finishing every race. We haven’t had any DNFs, but we still have to kind of tidy up and continue to do what we were doing to kind of gain us all those points in those last couple weeks. We’ve just got to keep going out there doing our jobs and then be good in the stretch to the playoff starts.”
Do you anticipate nose-to-tail pushing in this race?
“Yeah, I doubt you can lock up all the way around or anything like that just – I don’t know these cars can handle that wear and tear. You know, we’re not really plate racing. We’re not really set up for that, but even with the handling in the corners, I think Ryan (Reed) would have a better idea of it as he saying the dirty air is important, so I mean I anticipate people pushing down the straightaway for sure. That happens every week. Sometimes people get a run and when you get side by side they’ll pick whichever lane they want to go faster and they’ll push that guy, so that will happen a lot. But really we don’t really know. I think if it’s as slow as everyone says, there’s definitely speed in just putting two cars out there and then just being right behind each other and trying to go faster down the straightaway for sure.”
