Toyota Racing – Martin Truex Jr.
Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series (MENCS)
Atlanta Motor Speedway – February 22, 2018
Joe Gibbs Racing driver Martin Truex Jr. was made available to the media in Atlanta:
MARTIN TRUEX JR, No. 19 Bass Pro Shops Toyota Camry, Joe Gibbs Racing
Will qualifying be different at a track that has more grip than Atlanta does?
“Oh yeah, it’ll be different everywhere. The package is going to look a little different depending on the track we’re at and what we’re able to do with it. Here it’s so worn out and so rough and bumpy, it’s hard to – in order to get through the corners you kind have to have some air in your car. Next week, we’ll definitely be drafting, at least that’s what everyone is kind of thinking.”
Did it feel different in practice?
“Just the corner entry speed is a lot slower. It’s pretty much wide open, but it’s barely. You’re right on the edge. I think that’s why nobody has really tried drafting yet.”
Is this race like a test of the new package?
“I would say yes and no. I think it’s more just because the race track is so unique. There’s not a lot of tracks we race like this anymore. Homestead I would say would probably be the closest just based on tire wear and grip level. The newer tracks – Vegas, Charlotte-type asphalt, high grip, I think will be a lot different than what we’re going to see here.”
So nobody has any idea of what Sunday will look like?
“No, nobody has any idea about anything. I think pretty much all teams had more questions going into practice today than any time I can remember in the sport maybe back to when we first ran the Car of Tomorrow. It was just there were so many questions and so many different ways you can do this. There’s so many different options to set the car up aero-wise and different things. A lot of questions and only an hour and 20 minutes of practice, so still a lot to learn.”
Will it be that way for a few weeks to come?
“I think it will because we’re going to different race tracks again. We go to Phoenix, it’s going to be totally different again with more horsepower, so yeah, we’re going to learn a lot through the first five races with the different race tracks and then try to figure it out and go from there.”
So it’s going to take time to understand what’s going on?
“It’ll take time, but you still want to get off to a good start. You hope that your preparation is better than everybody else’s and you can kind of have some good results early and have something to build off of. I think most teams aren’t just guessing, they’re just let’s see how close our calculations really are in our sim and all those things. You’ve got to kind of get all that stuff correlated so it takes a little bit of time.”
Is this where it’s better to be part of Joe Gibbs Racing and fully integrated with the team or worse in the fact that you can’t be as nimble?
“I don’t know. You’d have to ask Cole (Pearn, crew chief) on that. I feel like it’s better just because we have a lot more people behind us – a lot more numbers of support. That’s really all I know about it.”
Does it give you some confidence knowing that Cole Pearn is quick on his feet and able to adapt to changes quickly?
“For sure. Just having him in any kind of changes or any weekend at all, I have a lot of confidence in him and his abilities – what he’s been able to do for me over the past four or five years. I think it’s again something we’ll have to figure out as we go, but if there’s somebody that I want on my side, obviously he’d be the guy. Hopefully we can figure it out. I felt good about the Camry today. Practice went pretty well. We were off a little bit and made some gains. Not really sure how we stack up on speed. I think we’ll see possibly the running order form practice times shift around a little bit because again, a lot of guys are going back to the garage or going back to haulers and saying, okay, here’s where we think we messed up and we’re going to try some new stuff. The track is going to be different as well too because of all the practice that’s been out there. I think grip will be even less than it was earlier and that’s going to change things. I think we’ll see some guys in the field shift around a little bit from what we’ve seen in practice.”
What do you enjoy about this place that’s so different from other 1.5-mile tracks?
“I just enjoy the challenge of it. It’s so so slick. The tires wear out so much in the long runs. It’s a lot of fun on the long runs that race. Being able to move around on the race track, it’s just a fun place. I enjoy that and I think handling is still going to be the key to winning here – being good on the long run. You just hope that you don’t get caught by one of those late cautions and not have the speed to go for five or 10 laps. We’ve kind of been in that position before a few times and it’s bit us. It’s just a fun track to race at and hopefully it’ll be a hell of a race.”
The strategy of running the bottom of the track, does that change with the aero package?
“Not really. Especially qualifying, you’re just trying to make the shortest distance. After you ride around the top, you’re going to be more comfortable and have more grip, but you’re going to give up speed. It’s like Daytona almost. If you can run wide open, you want to shorten the track as much as you can, so that’s why we’ll see everyone on the bottom qualifying today. Normally we would see – especially in 1 and 2, a lot of guys run high here the past couple of years just trying to find some grip. You’ve got to do what’s fastest.”
Was it weird to work with Hendrick cars during Daytona?
“I mean that’s just something that came about I guess throughout the week. Like I said, I didn’t really race much so I didn’t work with anyone. I pretty much stayed on my own, worked on my Camry all day, finally got it going pretty good and I was like, alright, here we go and then boom, crash. Just wrong place, wrong time.”
Was the race last weekend at Daytona pretty crazy for the drivers and did Jim France have anything to do with it?
“I have no idea about if Jim France had anything to do with it. I think just the way the cars were handling, the temperatures we had there, I think it made it a good race. I was impressed by the ability of everybody to not crash until at least at the end. We had a terrible strategy to chill out and ride around and take care of it most of the day. We had some handling issues we were working through and towards the end we had it going pretty good and it’s like alright, it’s time to go and just about that time is when all hell broke loose. Terrible strategy and terrible weekend overall for us last week. Looking forward to getting it turned around here.”
Would you say it was a disappointing debut for you with a new team?
“It’s Daytona. For me, it’s Daytona. For me, plate racing has not been very kind to me over the years and that was just another instance.”
Why was it a terrible strategy at Daytona?
“The guys right at the front didn’t get crashed. We just needed to be all the way at the front. It’s just – indecisive on when to go. Just the way it is with timing. It didn’t work out.”
How will these first few weeks of the season challenge the drivers with different rules at different tracks and potentially different styles of racing? How different is this from any other year?
“I would say that it’s not standard. It’s definitely more complicated than past years. Normally, you basically try to make the cars have as much grip as you can make – as much downforce as you can make and make them drive the way you want. Now you’re almost having a Daytona, Talladega approach to certain tracks. How much drag can we take off the car and still handle good enough. It’s those kinds of questions and each week it’s different. It’s a huge challenge for the teams. Crew chiefs and engineers are just pulling their hair out right now trying to get a baseline but then you go to Vegas and it’s going to be completely different. It’s a huge challenge and it’s going to change a lot that’s why I feel like you’re going to see different racing at different race tracks. It’s going to look different. You’re going to see different guys at certain tracks excel and certain guys not do as well. It’s definitely going to mix things up I feel like a lot more than normal.”
In terms of preparing, is there anything you have to do differently or just get in the car and go from there?
“I think for me so far preparation has been really the same. I try to get all of the info I can on what I should be looking for and the things I need to pay attention to or look out for and then just try to adapt your style to what they feel like is the best way to approach each race track and each session. That’s kind of what we’ve always done. That really from my standpoint doesn’t change a lot. Just a lot more information and a lot more things I think will be different throughout the season depending on where we’re racing.”
Carrying more speed into corners – how does that change your driving style?
“I will say that it seemed to me that the more downforce we took off the cars, the better I was. I’m not sure how this is going to work out to be honest. With that being said, I wasn’t with the team of guys I have now in those situations. I’m a competitor, I want to win everything and whatever the rules are, it’s our job to figure it out. I’m looking forward to it. It’s going to be a challenge, but it should be fun.”
Where do you feel in the next couple of weeks you need to be gathering data to adapt to the rules package and the different styles of racing?
“That’s hard to say honestly. I think we’ll just take it as it comes and again try to have success as we’re doing it. I feel good about our preparation and where we’re at. We did a test at California back in January. I thought that went well and some of that kind of translates to here – similar in just being an old surface and tire fall-off and things like that. Of course, it’s two mile, so it’s a little different in that regard, but I feel good about things. I know I have a great team and a lot of great people around me and I’ll just try to take advantage of that like I always do.”
How different is it being in house and working with Joe Gibbs Racing?
“Honestly, for me not a whole lot of difference right now, but again we’ve only raced one time. I think for the guys and for Cole (Pearn, crew chief) he feels the support. He feels how many people are behind him and getting things done at the shop and loading a day earlier and just things feel different and I feel like he feels really confident in the amount of support he has and what he can do with that. From my standpoint, it’s not been a lot different yet. I know there’s some cars and things along the way that maybe we didn’t get that they had and we didn’t even know about, but that’s all part of racing.”
With the package do you think it might scramble things up with more drivers winning races this year?
“Unfortunately, yeah I believe that’s correct. Again, it’s all speculation. I don’t know until we get going. You’re still going to have teams figure it out better than others. Whether we’re one of those, we’ll have to wait and see.”
What would you tell fans to watch out for during the race this weekend?
“there’s going to be a lot happening. I think you’re going to see the potential for a few guys to maybe be really fast on restarts – be really fast for five or six laps, but when the tires start falling off here especially, how are they going to do? Are we going to see a lot of guys – a lot of coming and going? A lot of guys that are fast early, but not fast late. It shuffles the field a lot. It could be a lot of that back and forth depending on how cautions fall and all those kind of things. There’s going to be a lot of action here, that’s for sure.”
What do you expect from Vegas next week based on the test a few weeks ago?
“From what I watched, I feel like it’s going to be a little bit hairy and crazy, you know? It definitely looked like the leader had a big advantage. I’m a little worried about that, but it looked like the racing throughout the pack was pretty good. Honestly, I don’t know. Hopefully we’ll be in good shape and be the leader a lot of the time because that’s where I feel like you want to be. But that takes a lot of execution – pit road, pit stops, all those things, restarts. It’s going to be interesting. That’s another thing we haven’t seen is double-file restarts with this package and what does that look like. How long does the field stay two by two? Does it go 10, 15, 20 laps or does it string out fairly quickly. All the testing we’ve done so far has been guys just go out there, they line up and they get going. It’s not competition. We really haven’t seen the full effect of what we’re going to see yet.”
