MONSTER ENERGY NASCAR CUP SERIES
POCONO RACEWAY
GANDER RV 400
TEAM CHEVY PRESS CONF. TRANSCRIPT
JULY 27, 2019
BUBBA WALLACE, NO. 43 VICTORY JUNCTION CAMARO ZL1 Media Breakout Session Highlights:
WHAT ADJUSTMENTS DO YOU FEEL LIKE YOU NEED TO MAKE THIS SEASON TO BE A LITTLE MORE SUCCESSFUL?
“We just need to finish the race where we are running. In Kentucky, we were 18th with six or seven laps to go and we ended up 23rd one lap down. We’ve been having great runs ever since the All-Star weekend. It seems like the stars have lined up for us at the end of the race. Once that happens, we will start clicking off some spots in the points. But we were just behind the eight-ball for so long at the beginning of the season and we just need to climb our way out of it. We will continue to fight.”
THIS IS A TRACK THAT YOU HAVEN’T HAD THE BEST LUCK TO BEGIN WITH. HOW DO YOU PUT THAT BEHIND YOU TO HAVE THE BEST WEEKEND POSSIBLE?
“Exactly that, go there and be fine. The digital stuff, that was the first race in the Cup car and had a lot of motions through there. The brakes, you don’t know until you touch them. If they aren’t there, hang on. We have so many other things to worry about than that. We just have to go out, make the right adjustments, make the right calls and get our Victory Junction Chevrolet speed where it needs to put together a run I was just talking about to finish out strong.”
IN PRACTICE, NOT A LOT OF GUYS WERE RUNNING IN THE PJ-1. DO YOU THINK THEY WILL START WORKING THAT IN DURING THE NEXT PRACTICE?
“No, to me, it just pointless here. It’s way out of the groove. Maybe in the Tunnel Turn on restarts, you will have a little bit of saving grace so it won’t be as sketchy. But Turn 1, I haven’t even seen it yet. I don’t think it will be a factor in the race though, but my opinion doesn’t matter.”
WERE YOU SUPRISIED ON THE INTEREST IN THE TATTOO?
“I knew that we wouldn’t reach 43,000 retweets in one day, which I was right. It was 38,000 I believe. But I didn’t put a timeline on it. I did up here and I said it didn’t happen, but then everyone said I was backing out. I’m not getting it on my arm like it was, I’m not that stupid (laughs). It’s a beautiful signature in all, but I’m not that heavily invested in having it take up my whole forearm. We’ll get it somewhere small; I don’t know where I’m going to get it.”
HOW HAS THIS EXPERIENCE BEEN FOR YOU, CONSIDERING YOU CAME OVER FROM THE NASCAR XFINITY SERIES?
“It’s been fun, it’s been a battle ever since day one. I knew that it would be, being able to progress and move up in the ranks and get our cars better has been the task at hand every since I joined the 43 team. I knew we were behind a little bit and they called me up to help them better their program. I think we have done that at times and sometimes we have gone backwards and created a mess to get out of. It’s just what this sport produces. We will just continue to push on through the season and see what we can do for next year.”
WHAT HAVE YOU SEEN IMPROVE OVER THE LAST COUPLE OF MONTHS?
“I think communication has gotten a little better. We are unloading with a fairly decent balance on our race cars and that helps out a lot. We are not way off; our speed might not show it, but that might just be the speed we have for that weekend and the feel of it. We’ve been unloading with some speed and we’ve put races together, we just haven’t been able to finish those races. Whether it’s a tire goes down or choose a bad line on a restart. We’ve continued to show speed. Take away Loudon last weekend, the speed we had off the truck was the same speed we had when the checkered flag fell. It was just kind of a miserable weekend for us. I’m excited about the next couple of races coming up. Once we get through Watkins Glen, we will go back to the tracks we’ve been to already and get something built up to see if we can improve our results. We are having a lot of fun. Even when we are struggling, we are able to dig deep with each other and move on.”
ON WATKINS GLEN, IT DOESN’T SEEM LIKE YOU’RE EXCITED TO GO THERE.
“I’m pumped. I didn’t care to go there last year because I tried so hard. I loved going to Sonoma this year. I don’t know where I ran, but I had a blast. I didn’t care, I didn’t care what happened. I was kind of embarrassed when I spun out like two seconds into practice (laughs), but after that, we continued to gain speed. Every time last year when I got on track at a road course, I seemed to slow down and that’s where I was frustrated. For me right now, it’s to learn as much as I can.”
TALK ABOUT YOUR PRACTICE SESSION.
“Our Victory Junction Chevrolet was a little tight. We just needed some front turn and it kept making it tighter. I felt like the track went through a couple of changes there. Those practice crashes took a lot of time out of our practice, so we only got three runs in. We will continue to work on it and get our car where we need it to be. It’s the same car we ran at the last race here and we were a top-twenty car, so I have the confidence coming into here. A top-twenty is a good day for us. The last ten laps are usually what takes us out, so we have to make sure all the stars align, put all of our eggs in the same basket and see what we can do.”
DO YOU THINK THEY WILL BE GOING HIGHER ON THE PJ-1?
“No, I haven’t even seen it in Turn 1 yet. It’s too far out of the groove. I think the layout of it is not what we want. Denny (Hamlin) has been leading that message; he sends us the group chat in what to expect. We’re trying to figure out where it was laid. Like I said earlier, it might give us some wiggle room on restarts, especially through the Tunnel Turn. But I think it’s just not laid in the proper lane for us to use.”
Team Chevy high-resolution racing photos are available for editorial use.
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