Toyota GAZOO Racing – Erik Jones
NASCAR Cup Series Quotes
CHICAGO (July 4, 2025) – LEGACY MOTOR CLUB driver Erik Jones was made available to the media on Friday prior to the NASCAR Cup Series race at the Chicago Street Course.
ERIK JONES, No. 43 AdventHealth Toyota Camry XSE, LEGACY MOTOR CLUB
Tell us a about the July 4 parade you were a part of today.
“Yeah, we drove up to Hinsdale, (Illinois), (which is) I guess west of here and AdventHealth is our primary and they’re partnered with UChicago Medicine. They did a big parade down there, and yeah it was a huge Fourth of July parade and the whole thing I think took close to a couple hours to do, but that was great. A great turnout, handful and NASCAR fans there, excited to see the car. We were towing it through there, so it was cool to do something Fourth of July-themed and have some fun with it.”
Can you get into how solidifying the competition direction at LEGACY MOTOR CLUB has impacted your team’s performance?
“Yeah I mean we hired Jacob Cantor (director of competition, LEGACY MOTOR CLUB) and Brian Campe (technical director, LEGACY MOTOR CLUB) around July of last year and there was kind of a gap of time there where it just wasn’t a lot of leadership in those roles and we didn’t have a good engineering flow from the top, down. So there was some processes that needed to be built out and people understanding what their roles were and what they needed to be doing, what they needed to focus on, what they didn’t need to focus on. It took a solid six-to-eight months probably to break that down and then beyond that, just hiring more people, right? We were pretty short-staffed in our engineering department, even after hiring those guys. It took all that time to really get everybody in their right position and figuring out what they were going to be doing. Now, I feel like everybody’s really in the flow of it and (there’s) a lot more open communication between everybody just knowing what’s going on, who’s working on what, given enough forum for guys to come up with new ideas and figure things out. It just took some organization. There was just a stretch where we didn’t have the leadership in place and now, I feel like our leadership group is really strong.”
How has the crew chief change impacted things for your team?
“We did the last four races in 2024 together, and then obviously, all of this year. Not only was a chief change, we swapped the entire team, so engineers, mechanics, everybody. That’s not easy for a lot of reasons, right? People are used to working with who they’re used to working with, so there’s some apprehension probably just in a team swap and then you get settled in, well you have to get to know everybody and figure out what kind of makes them tick, and what’s good. With the crew chief side of things, just learning the language between us, myself and Ben (Beshore, crew chief) when I’m asking for certain things, what I’m looking for, what he’s asking for, what he kind of wants from me, what he’s most curious about after practice. So, it took up until probably April to feel like Ben and I were really on the same (page) and what was going on, and the engineers as well, just knowing kind of the cadence, not only Saturday and Sunday, but Monday-to-Thursday – what we need from each other. Felt like that’s finally, and has been for the last couple months, been on a good spot.”
Do you feel that LEGACY MOTOR CLUB is as much out on an island as they have been in the past?
“Yeah, there’s no alliance still. I would say the information that we get is (pause), we get a bit more now. There’s been some compromise on some different areas, I don’t want to dive into every bit of piece of it, but yeah, I would say there’s been some compromise on what information we get. I wouldn’t say that’s the reason that we started to run better. I think it’s helped, but to say that’s made the big difference, I wouldn’t say it’s true. Yeah, there’s been a better compromise recently.”
How does the No. 43 team approach the rest of the season with the recent surge in performance?
“Yeah, I mean we’re kind of in a tough spot, right? We’re 39 points out of the Playoffs which is kind of eight really good races. Obviously, a win would be great, but I feel like there’s a couple of tracks we really have to target hard on what places we can win at. For us, I mean, it’s just doing what we’re doing. If we keep running the way we’ve ran since Charlotte, we’ll yeah we’ll probably point our way in barring another kind of obscure winner farther back in points. So, that’s the plan right now is just to keep running well and keep racking these points up. I hope it goes well again this weekend. Kind of three strange weeks: here (Chicago), Sonoma and Dover, so it’s going to kind of make-or-break us. You know, one bad race, (pause) if we have a race where something goes wrong, we don’t score any good points, I mean it’s kind of over unless a lot of other people have bad races too. We’ve been on a great roll, tons of momentum. It’s easy to look at it right now and say it’s going to keep going, but you don’t know how things ebb and flow. Pointing our way in is the number one goal, but we’re banking hard on a couple of races that we can win too.”
What is that last little bit you feel like you guys are missing to kind of take that next big step?
“Yeah, we’re one good (pause), we’re in the magic zone, right? So, in racing, I think if you’re running 30th, like we were last year, it’s not easy to get better to run in the top-15 or top-10, but it’s a lot easier to get to that point than it is to go from top-10 to top-five, to winning. So, this is kind of where that magic starts to happen and it takes some really good people to find some really minute things in race cars, and then it comes down to the drivers as well, right? And execution, making it happen in the seat, so yeah, I wish I could just tell you what that is. I think we’re right there, a step away of being up there with the Penskes (Team Penske), JGR (Joe Gibbs Racing) Hendrick (Motorsports). We’re real close to that mark, but it definitely takes some magic. And it’s like that in all levels of racing. It always has been for me at least, you can easily pick up (pause) if you’re a half-second off that first three-and-a-half, four tenths, is easy. That last tenth is pretty hard to find. So that’s kind of where we’re sitting right now, but it’s going to take both sides from the race car and from the garage.”
How do you assess where your team is at on the road courses?
“Yeah, I mean (they’re) not our strength from any sense of that, but I think it’s better. Mexico (City) went a lot better for us. It felt like we had a good car, strategy kind of derailed us, but the No. 42 (John Hunter Nemechek) had a great finish. We still earned a bunch of points running up front a lot of the day. But I think we took a big step forward there. COTA (Circuit of the Americas) earlier this year, we were legitimately a last-place car almost, so to take that step forward, I think was impressive. But it’s one sample size. Think we’ll know a lot better after Sunday and Sonoma where we really stand. As far as where I’m at on the road course, I don’t know, I felt pretty good about it in the Gen 6 car. The Next Gen car hasn’t gone great for me (at road courses). (Had) a couple of good days but you know, I feel like we’ve never hit on it with the race cars either until recently, we’ve started to make that climb. So, just keep working on both ends, but yeah, I’m way more confident right now than I was after COTA.”
What are your thoughts advancing to the second round of the In-Season Challenge and your outlook on your matchup this weekend?
“Yeah, making it out of Atlanta was a challenge for anybody. Yeah, it’s pretty cool. Just to still be in it, right? I mean, half the guys are knocked out, so feel good about going up against Ricky (Stenhouse Jr.). I feel like that’s a doable one for us this weekend. Next week (is) Sonoma, (and that’ll) either be No. 42 (John Hunter Nemechek) or the No. 9 (Chase Elliott), and if it’s the No. 9, that’ll be a tough one for us. He’s probably going to run really well. So, either way, it’s fun to still be in it, have a shot. We’ll see where it goes. Like I’ve said, we’re in a long stretch of races right now and to have something other than the Playoff line to focus on I think is pretty cool for the sport. Fun to follow along and even when we fall out, if we fall out, it’ll be fun to follow until the end.”
About Toyota
Toyota (NYSE:TM) has been a part of the cultural fabric in North America for nearly 70 years, and is committed to advancing sustainable, next-generation mobility through our Toyota and Lexus brands, plus our more than 1,800 dealerships.
Toyota directly employs nearly 64,000 people in North America who have contributed to the design, engineering, and assembly of nearly 49 million cars and trucks at our 14 manufacturing plants. In spring 2025, Toyota’s plant in North Carolina will begin to manufacture automotive batteries for electrified vehicles. With more electrified vehicles on the road than any other automaker, Toyota currently offers 31 electrified options.
For more information about Toyota, visit www.ToyotaNewsroom.com.
