NASCAR Cup Series

The NASCAR Sprint Cup Series, XFINITY Series and Camping World Truck Series head to Daytona International Speedway as Speedweeks continues culminating with the 58th edition of the Daytona 500 Sunday.

"I definitely plan on racing on Thursday. You can talk about being locked in or protecting your car, things like that, but I always look at Thursday as an opportunity to show people that I’m here to race and show the other drivers that when it comes time to race with me on Sunday that I’m someone they can be around.”

I think there was a few areas we felt like we needed to be better in – a few areas where we felt like we could be stronger and a lot of that stuff is on the technical side and the car side and certainly being a Toyota team and our relationship with JGR (Joe Gibbs Racing), we feel like – Cole (Pearn, crew chief) feels like we’re stronger in every area than we were last year and that’s something in the off-season that we were looking forward to.

“It was not quite the way we would have wanted to start a season here last time around 365 days ago, but things obviously turned the corner well. Was able to get through rehab and get back in the race car and then go through the season, win some races – three in a row at one point – my first Brickyard 400 and now to be Sprint Cup Series champion at the end of the season was pretty spectacular as well.

“Well drivers are all naturally very self-motivated and sometimes what is in the best interest of a driver is not what is in the best interest of the sport and that becomes a very delicate line to walk. Having the formats that are now available thanks to NASCAR have I think shed some of that.

Trevor Bayne returns to the sight of his first career NASCAR victory and one of the biggest wins in sports history; Daytona International Speedway (DIS). Bayne scored one of the biggest upsets in professional sports history in the 2011 running of the Daytona 500. Running up front for virtually the entire race, the young driver held off the field in a feverish green-white-checkered finish to earn his place in the annals of NASCAR history. Bayne capped off a dominant Speedweeks effort by becoming the youngest winner in the history of the “Great American Race” at 20 years and one day old.

BRIAN VICKERS, NO. 14 BASS PRO SHOPS/MOBIL 1 CHEVROLET SS met with media during Media Day at Daytona International Speedway.

“I feel like I want to run well and we need to run well. It all goes to preparation and I’m working with the team and the team is preparing, and things like that. So I don’t feel any pressure, but I have to run well if I want to stay in the 5 car for a long time.

I just think when you look at how many cars were taken out of the race, we would have a much better race if the grass wasn't there. I didn't hit anything. All I did was go through the grass, got the nose ripped off. I know there were many other cars that went through the same thing.

Q. How many times have you watched the replay of that last lap in 2007 when you won this race? What's it like to relive that?