Jack Wood: Driver, No. 51 Eberlestock Chevrolet
NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series Overview:
Event: NextEra Energy 250, Race 1 of 23, 100 Laps – 20/20/60; 250 Miles
Location: Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway (2.5-mile tri-oval)
Date/Broadcast: Feb. 17, 2023, at 7:30 p.m. ET on FS1, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR 90
Get to Know Jack:
Jack Wood will make his Kyle Busch Motorsports (KBM) debut behind the wheel of the No. 51 Eberlestock Chevrolet in Friday night’s NextEra Energy 250 at Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway. The Daytona race will be part of a 13-race schedule for Wood this year sharing the No. 51 with KBM owner-driver Kyle Busch and other drivers yet to be announced. The 22-year-old driver finished ninth in his ARCA Menards Series debut at Daytona in 2021 and recorded one top-five and four top-10 finishes across eight starts that season. He was elevated to the Truck Series in May of 2021, where he posted one top-10 and three top-15 finishes while competing in 12 of the last 13 races on the schedule. He returned to full-time Truck Series action in 2022 and finished tied for third in the Sunoco Rookie of the Year standings.
Friday night will be Wood’s second career start in the Craftsman Truck Series at Daytona. He started 11th but was relegated to a 33rd-place finish after getting caught up in a lap-63 crash in last year’s event. He finished ninth in the 2021 ARCA Menards Series race at the “World Center of Racing.” Wood will be performing double duty this weekend and he makes his first of seven scheduled starts in the ARCA Menards Series event on Saturday driving the No. 6 Chevrolet for Rev Racing.
Eberlestock, an outdoor apparel and tactical gear company, will be the primary sponsor on Wood’s No. 51 Chevrolet Friday night and again in May at Charlotte (N.C.) Motor Speedway. From their original roots in the radical design of Olympic class biathlon racing rifles to current projects, Eberlestock has shown the world how much performance should be expected of outdoor gear. They have always been a pioneer and a leader, not a follower. For the hunter, the tactical operator, the shooting sports, or the hardcore adventure outdoorsman, they invite you to explore our current designs. You’ll find something that you can really use — use it hard, and use it well. And they’ll be excited to show you what’s around the next corner. Check them out at www.eberlestock.com.
The California native is part of a new-look KBM that will hit the track for the first time Friday night as a Chevrolet team with two full-time entries of its own and a technical alliance on REV Racing’s first-ever entry in the Truck Series. The manufacturer switch aligned with owner-driver Kyle Busch’s signing with Richard Childress Racing for 2023, one of the premier Chevrolet teams in the Cup Series. Across its 13 seasons with Toyota, KBM collected and amazing seven owner’s championships (2010, 2013 – 2017 and 2019), two driver championships (Erik Jones 2015 and Christopher Bell 2017) and a Truck Series-record 98 wins. At Daytona, Pattie has one Cup Series win, which came in the summer race with Stenhouse Jr. in 2017.
Veteran crew chief Brian Pattie will call the shots for the No. 51 team this year in his first season at KBM after spending the last 14 seasons atop the pit box in the NASCAR Cup Series. In the Cup Series, his drivers produced six wins, nine poles, 57 top-five and 131 top-10 finishes across 528 starts. In 2012, he guided Clint Bowyer to three victories and a runner-up finish in the Cup Series championship standings. In 2017, he guided Ricky Stenhouse Jr. to two wins and a berth in the playoffs. The Florida native has also recorded 11 wins in the NASCAR Xfinity Series and has one win across six starts as a crew chief in the NASCAR Craftsman World Truck Series. Pattie’s drivers have two wins at Daytona, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. in the July Cup Series race in 2017 and Joe Nemechek in the July NASCAR Xfinity Series event in 2002. Stenhouse Jr. also captured the pole with his Pattie-produced Chevrolet for the 2020 Daytona 500.
KBM owner-driver Kyle Busch will make his first of five starts behind the wheel of the No. 51 Zariz Transport Silverado March 3 in the second race of the season at Las Vegas (Nev.) Motor Speedway.
Jack Wood, Driver Q&A:
Jack Wood | Daytona International Speedway Preview
How has the transition to KBM been?
“The transition has been good. Having a veteran crew chief like Brian (Pattie), and then having a great mentor like Kyle has been incredible. There is such a wealth of knowledge in this building and I think that is really going to help me in my career and growing as a driver in this sport. Really excited to work with these guys, seems like a great group and we have a lot to prove.”
What is your outlook heading into Friday night?
“I’m still pretty new to speedway racing, so my goal for that race is to survive as long as I can and if we can get ourselves in a good spot with five or 10 laps to go then me and Brian can start working on a strategy to get closer to the front. The first thing for me is to learn and get comfortable with the guys around me, build trust with other drivers and teammates or whatever it may be and then kind of make that push to the checkered flag at the end.”
Do you enjoy speedway racing?
“I do, I don’t – I think there is definitely a skill to it. I think a lot of people says it’s a luck thing but I think there is definitely a skill involved in speedway racing. It’s pretty much a big chess match on the race track at 200 mph. I do enjoy and think the more that I start to do it, I’ll like it more, but right now its just like everything else, it’s all new to me and just learning every time I get to the track.”
Jack Wood Career Highlights:
- Has produced one top-10 finish across 35 career starts in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series. Posted a series-best 10th-place finish in August of 2021 at World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway.
- Has compiled five laps led, one top-five and four top-10 finishes across nine career ARCA Menards Series events.
- Has totaled one top-five and four top-10 finishes across nine ARCA Menards East Series races.
- Has totaled two top-five and seven top-10 finishes across 10 career starts in the ARCA Menards West Series.
- Compiled one top-five and three top-10 finishes across 24 starts in the SRL Spears Southwest Tour from 2017 to 2021.
- Jack Wood’s No. 51 Chevrolet Silverado RST:
KBM-27: The No. 51 Eberlestock team will unload KBM-27 for Friday’s season-opening race at Daytona. This chassis has made just one prior start, a 35th-place finish with Drew Dollar at Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway in October of 2021. After finishing seventh in the opening stage and 11th in Stage Two, Dollar got caught up in a 12-truck incident that ended his day prematurely.
KBM Notes of Interest:
- KBM drivers have collected one win, three poles, 188 laps led, four top-five and 11 top-10 finishes resulting in an average finish of 17.1 across 34 starts at Daytona. Owner-driver Kyle Busch picked up the team’s lone victory at the 2.5-mile tri-oval in dramatic fashion in the 2014 season opener, finishing .016 seconds ahead of Timothy Peters.
- KBM holds the Craftsman Truck Series records for most career wins (98) and most wins in a single season (14 in 2014). With his victory at Atlanta (Ga.) Motor Speedway last year, Corey Heim became the 18th different driver to win a Truck Series event for KBM. In addition to collecting a series-record seven Owner’s Championships, the organization has produced two championship-winning drivers: Erik Jones (2015) and Christopher Bell (2017).
- With 40 victories, the No. 51 is the winningest number in KBM’s Truck Series fleet.
