NASCAR CUP SERIES
FIREKEEPERS CASINO 400
MICHIGAN INTERNATIONAL SPEEDWAY
TEAM CHEVY PRESS CONF. TRANSCRIPT
AUGUST 19, 2021
ROSS CHASTAIN, NO. 42 MOOSE FRATERNITY CAMARO ZL1 1LE, Teleconference Transcript Highlights:
LOOKING AHEAD TO DAYTONA, HOW DO YOU MANAGE THE DESPERATION OF WANTING TO MAKE IT INTO THE PLAYOFFS VERSUS NOT WANTING TO CAUSE SOMETHING CRAZY THERE?
“That’s the biggest thing. I don’t want to cause a big wreck. I’ve done that. I’m trying to learn from it. I used to get really freaked out and worried and stressed about superspeedway races, but I’ve just realized over my ten years in the sport; and really, I learned it from Johnny Sauter, he said one day something that resonated with me like we’re all going to crash. We’re all going to get backwards in the grass at 200 mph at some point. You make it. Go home. So, yeah. No desperation. I just want to win and compete in this series. So whatever happens there, happens.”
DO YOU TAKE ANYTHING FROM THE WAY THE XFINITY RACE ENDED WITH YOUR TEAMMATES AS FAR AS THE LEARNING PROCESS AND WHAT TO DO AT THE END OF THOSE RACES?
“Yeah, for sure. I still hate that I made that move on the last lap and I just could have done so much better there and just been a better person about it. And I wasn’t. And I didn’t do that. So yeah, I learned from that, I think.”
SUPERSPEEDWAY RACES ARE CRAZY ANYWAY. BUT WHEN YOU’VE GOT THIS WITH A DOZEN OR SO GUYS AND THE ONLY WAY THEY CAN GET IN IS TO WIN. AND THE LOCKED-IN GUYS ARE LIKELY GOING TO BE LOOKING TO BUILD UP SOME PLAYOFF POINTS. IT PUTS A LOT OF DIFFERENT AGENDAS ON THE TABLE AT ONCE. WITH ALL THAT, HOW CRAZY DO YOU EXPECT IT TO BE?
“I have not been a part of a boring Superspeedway race in my career. Whether it’s February or Spring Talladega or Fall Talladega, I don’t see there being a difference. It’s going to come down to a handful of cars that still have all their fenders and body panels intact. And from there, you race it out. Just making it to that is probably the biggest thing. The same guys cycle up there. And the same guys restart the green-white-checkered in the front three rows four out of five times. And so, that’s where I’m just trying to watch and learn from those guys. I haven’t been a part of a boring one yet and I don’t expect this Daytona to be any different.”
WHEN YOU ARE WATCHING THOSE GUYS AND LOOKING BACK, IS THERE ANY COMMON THREAD THAT JUMPS OUT AT YOU BESIDES LUCK? IS THERE SOMETHING THEY DO TO GET UP THERE ALL THE TIME?
“It’s not luck. I used to think it was, but it’s not. They put themselves in the best position and the right position to be up there. If it is luck, they make their own luck. And they make the luck so they can be up there at the end.”
THERE IS A LOT OF MEDIA ATTENTION AROUND YOUR TRACKHOUSE ANNOUNCEMENT, WHICH WILL BE WITH TEAM CHEVY. JUST ABOUT ALL OF YOUR MAJOR SUCCESS HAS BEEN WITH CHEVROLET. TALK ABOUT THE SPEED CHEVY HAS HAD THIS SEASON AND MAYBE HOW THAT WILL BENEFIT YOU LEADING INTO THE PLAYOFFS.
“Yeah, it’s a good time to strap on a Bowtie and I’m proud and happy, just genuinely, that my success has come with them like you said. And it wasn’t on purpose, I’ll be honest. It was just the way that the different teams I’ve driven for worked out. But once that success started happening, then Chevrolet, GM, Pratt & Miller, that’s when the resources started coming my way to help me be the best race car driver I can be. I was not in a pipeline. I was not in a development program or anything. And so, to get there and then get their attention for them to help me, that’s kind of made our relationship special I think, where it wasn’t pre-planned. And now, they knew me before and I knew them before and now we work together. Yeah, it’s a good time to drive a Chevy in the Cup series. We’ve had incredible power this year and I’m not saying every week we have the most, but there are not many that beat us, and you see it across the board. All that stuff goes in cycles though, so I know it’s going to come back around and we’re going to be in a Chevy for the foreseeable future and I’ve built a lot of friendships and relationships now and just how can I help? How can I help the Bowtie? How can I help Chevrolet get more out of this than just race cars, right? What can we do during the week and what can we do off the track? I want to be the best race car driver I can be, but there’s just so many opportunities. I’m still trying to figure out kind of my role in all that.”
IT WAS NOT THE FINISH YOU WANTED AT INDIANAPOLIS, BUT IT WAS ENTERTAINING. IN THE END, THE CURB CHAOS HAPPENED. WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS AND THE GENERAL MOOD FROM THE GARAGE AFTER THE RACE AND THOSE FINAL FEW LAPS?
“I think aside from the curb breaking and coming apart, everything was fine. The road course, you’ve got strategy, you’ve got guys cycling up, you’ve got guys pitting for flat tires because they run into each other. It’s normal. It’s the same curb we’ve ran there for four or five years. Like nobody knew that thing was going to break. We hit it in the Xfinity cars all weekend last year and it was fine. We hit it at practice and Xfinity ran on it. It just broke. Something broke. You don’t know it’s going to break until it breaks. I think there are opportunities to run other parts of the track right there, or just let us run. The curbing didn’t slow us down. I heard them say they couldn’t pull out the other curb behind the one they removed because they didn’t want us just going flat-out through there when we already are. They know that. They see our data. And so, just take that out and let us have more opportunity for double file down into (Turn) 7. Hindsight is perfect vision. But it’s a fine track. It’s got all the right qualities. And so yeah, I do think they adapted pretty well. It’s got to be a pretty tough decision to say we’re going to remove this whole piece of curbing and track that we’ve had here for five years because we can’t get it to stay together. Like everybody had to learn on the fly. Little did I know I had already destroyed my car at that point. I thought I could keep going, but ultimately couldn’t.”
FOR MICHIGAN, HOW DO YOU THINK THE RESIN WILL WORK ON THE 2-MILE ASPHALT TRACK? DO YOU EXPECT A WIDER GROOVE TO WORK WITH?
“I hope so. But I don’t know. I’ve never raced on resin on asphalt. And definitely not resin on PJ1 on asphalt, which I guess PJ1 is the former the way I understand it. I don’t truly grasp what the concoctions are. But it sounds like everywhere the PJ1 was last year, which I did not get to run. We’ll just figure it out, right? We’ll just go up there and kind of poke at it and feel it, whatever we have to in dirty air, and if it’s got grip, you’ll see a lot of us up there. If it doesn’t have grip, you’ll see us all below it. We’ll only take what we can take out of it. It does seem to be more forgiving than PJ1 where that other substance has to be like activated and warmed to run it. They want the best race. They want to give us options. And I think we’ve got a shot. I don’t think the rain up there this week is helping their track prep stuff, but they’re going to do what they can. They don’t want to make it too slick or too gripped-up. They’re just trying to find a happy medium. And if they get it in the box where we can race in it, then we’ll have a lot more options for racing.”
About Chevrolet
Founded in 1911 in Detroit, Chevrolet is now one of the world’s largest car brands, available in 79 countries with more than 3.2 million cars and trucks sold in 2020. Chevrolet models include electric and fuel-efficient vehicles that feature engaging performance, design that makes the heart beat, passive and active safety features and easy-to-use technology, all at a value. More information on Chevrolet models can be found at www.chevrolet.com.
