TEAM AND RACE NOTES

Michael McDowell and the No. 34 team reunite with Fr8Auctions.com to take on the now superspeedway-style Atlanta (Ga.) Motor Speedway.

The Atlanta, Georgia-based asset recovery business, Fr8Auctions.com, returns to their home track with McDowell and the No. 34 Ford Mustang. This will be the eighth consecutive race that Fr8 Auctions raced with McDowell at the track.

McDowell joined Fr8 Auctions founder, Marcus Barela on July 4 for their Fr8 Auctions Fireworks Extravaganza which was the largest on the southside of Atlanta. McDowell is staying in Atlanta for the week and participating in the Fr8Auctions.com auction on Thursday.

McDowell will then turn his focus to the car. Track activity will begin with qualifying on Saturday at 5:35 p.m. Sunday’s 260-lap race is scheduled for 7:00 p.m. ET on the USA network.

COMPETITION NOTES

After finishing seventh at the Chicago Street Race, Michael McDowell and the No. 34 team head to the Atlanta (GA.) Motor Speedway looking to continue to fight for a spot in the NASCAR Playoffs. McDowell enters the race ten points behind.

McDowell has one top-15 finish with FRM at the track and finished 21st in the first day race at Atlanta in March. Sunday’s race will finish under the lights.

CREW CHIEF TRAVIS PETERSON

“The track should have more grip at night and it should be faster. It’s tough to take the notes from March and now apply them to this race. We are moving from a 3:00 p.m. start time to 7:00 p.m. and that just changes how we need to approach it.”

DRIVER MICHAEL MCDOWELL

“We’re up to speed with what we need for Atlanta.

“I think the track probably threw us all for a little bit of a loop – of just how much it aged in a year and how the grip level changed. The first two races, you really didn’t know exactly what to expect. But now, we have a pretty good understanding of what we need to bring back and things we need to do better.

“It has that element of drafting, pushing and all that. It’s not like that’s not there. But I think handling is more of a legitimate factor that you need to take in for this race, especially for how hot it’s going to be and how the track will change as the sun goes down.

“But we’ll be ready with our Fr8Auctions.com Ford Mustang. It’s a big week for them and I’m happy to be a part of it.”

ABOUT FRONT ROW MOTORSPORTS

Front Row Motorsports (FRM) is a winning organization in the NASCAR Cup and CRAFTSMAN Truck Series. The team is the 2021 Daytona 500 and 2022 CRAFTSMAN Truck Series champions. The team was founded in 2004 and is owned by successful entrepreneur, Bob Jenkins. FRM fields the No. 34 and the No. 38 NASCAR Cup Series teams along with the No. 38 CRAFTSMAN Truck Series team from its Mooresville, N.C. headquarters. Visit teamfrm.com and follow FRM on social media: Twitter at @Team_FRM, Instagram at @team_frm and Facebook at facebook.com/FrontRowMotorsports.

Ford Performance Notes and Quotes
NASCAR Cup Series
Atlanta 2 Advance| Wednesday, July 5, 2023

Todd Gilliland, driver of the No. 38 Georgia Peanuts Ford Mustang for Front Row Motorsports this weekend at Atlanta Motor Speedway, has posted three top-10 finishes so far this season. He spoke with members of the media about last week’s street course event in Chicago and how racing at AMS this weekend will be different from in the spring.

TODD GILLILAND, No. 38 Georgia Peanuts Ford Mustang – DO YOU FEEL ATLANTA IS CONSTANTLY EVOLVING? “I think what you said is true. Atlanta is still probably a moving target for everybody in general. I think even the difference between the two races that we run at Atlanta. Going forward I feel like it’s something that we see at a place like Vegas, racing in the really cold and then it’s usually hot when we go back. It’s usually the same thing here. You would think that the setup would be a little bit different and still probably evolving in a better way from the beginning of the year until now. I think, hopefully, our cars drive good. I think that’s the biggest thing as a driver at Atlanta. It’s not as much a superspeedway as one would think and at least from my eyes I think handling still real important there.”

WHAT DID YOU THINK OF THE TURN 3 PIT ENTRY LAST TIME THERE AND WILL YOU BE USED TO IT THIS TIME AROUND? “Yeah, I think everything kind of went fairly smooth with that pit road. It was unexpected and something I had never even thought of being an issue without the turn three entry, but the NASCAR guys were definitely worried about it from the first time we went there. I think the only thing that’s kind of weird is that you’re coming off pit road off turn two right exactly where guys are trying to get off the racetrack, so you just have to pay a little bit of extra attention there and coordinate with guys. It’s kind of the same thing on pit road when guys are coming out of their stall versus going in, so just faster speed. That’s the biggest issue I could see having, but everything went smooth the first time and I definitely expect more of the same this time around.”

DO YOU ENVISION ANOTHER RACE WITH A 44 LAP GREEN FLAG RUN TO THE FINISH LIKE LAST TIME? “I don’t know. As a younger driver I would always venture to say that there’s gonna be a caution and wrecks and green-white-checkereds to finish the race in the Cup Series. We’ve even seen recently at the superspeedways like Daytona and Talladega where we have relatively greenish finishes to the end, I don’t know. I think Atlanta is a place where you could get pretty out of shape. There’s give and take, but at the same time it’s really easy to have an issue and turn someone around. I would say there will probably be less green flag runs to the end this year.”

WHAT IS YOUR TAKEAWAY FROM CHICAGO LAST WEEKEND? “I think overall I was just extremely impressed with the run of the show. Honestly, I think NASCAR had all of their ducks in a row and it was honestly just super impressive with their preparation on the NASCAR side. We were staying at the Chicago Athletic Association, which is one block away. We walked into the garage. Obviously, it was a similar walk to what we do sometimes at a normal racetrack from the parking lot. I was worried about our haulers being far and it was no further than a normal garage area, and then the rain is something that we can’t control. How many people stuck around for the race on Sunday blew my mind. I thought there was gonna be no one left for the race with how much rain we had and in my eyes it just means how big of an event it was going to be. With all of the concerts and blue skies I think it would have been huge, and then the on track, I think there is definitely a lot to be learned. I think setup-wise all of the drivers were constantly learning out there. I feel like my team did a good job preparing and we were ready when we hit the track, but there’s always going to be a constant evolution of setups, drivers understanding of it all, but I think the course layout was fun and I think the whole thing went relatively smooth.”

IS ATLANTA ANYTHING LIKE DAYTONA OR TALLADEGA? HOW DO YOU VIEW IT? “I’ve been trying to push to my crew chief that it’s not like Daytona and Talladega. To me, I guess you are wide-open. It’s just the hybrid. It’s something new that we’re all trying to understand every time we go back there, but there’s just so much more handling involved. Even at Daytona there are some times, I mean you can feel out of control but stay relatively wide-open and have good speed no matter what, where here if your handling is off, you’re not gonna have the speed. You’re not gonna have the comfortability to drive up front and do what you need to do at all, so, to me, it’s so much more important to have a good driving car. I think almost even in my mind at least, which I don’t know anything about what we’re doing this weekend, but even just a normal mile-and-a-half car, to me, seems like it would just be good at Atlanta – just as much throttle-on time as you can and you’ll have the ability to make moves. I think that’s the biggest thing I’m trying to push.”

HOW MUCH OF A WILDCARD WEEKEND IS THIS OR NOT? “I still think in the early stages of Atlanta that there is still probably opportunity there, but it’s about making good decisions. I think what I’m trying to say and trying to push of – we’re not gonna have a faster car just based on drag and downforce than a Hendrick car when they show up to Daytona and get the pole, something like that. So, what can we do? We can make our car drive better. Have good pit strategy that puts us up front and once you’re up front you just have to have the confidence to be able to make moves and stay up there. We’ve seen Corey LaJoie do really well here at Atlanta and I think that’s a good benchmark that we can have a surprise winner, but it’s really tough when you get in that spot to have everything in line to make it all happen on that one day.”

HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT YOUR SEASON SO FAR? “I feel like we definitely had a really good stretch there for a little bit. We got off to a bad start and then went on a good run there for a little bit, and then recently we’ve just kind of been down on speed and not our best performances. It definitely would be nice to get back to consistently being in the top 20 and then hopefully get some top 10s there like we were doing for a while, and it didn’t seem too hard at the time. I know we can get back there, it’s just about constantly developing and getting better. I think in the Cup Series that’s something I’ve learned is you can never just be happy with where you are at and I think we can definitely get back to where we were. Overall, it’s a much better season than last year and I still think that our ceiling is much higher this year.”

DID YOU GET TO GO OUT AND DO ANYTHING IN CHICAGO? “We kind of stayed close to the hotel, but it’s just really fun to walk around the city and see so much life, so many cool restaurants. I always joke and say that I could definitely live in the city. That’s what I love is walking around. The weather was nice for the beginning part of the trip and just seeing how much fun everyone was having down there. We went down to a rooftop restaurant and got some Chicago pizza – all the good stuff right around there – and, honestly, all within a couple blocks of where we were staying. It’s really cool and just a little bit different than what we normally do.”

HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT THE ROAD COURSES LEFT THIS SEASON? “I’m excited about the upcoming road courses. I think that’s definitely our stronger suit when we go to the racetrack here at Front Row and I give a lot of that credit to Michael McDowell. I think he just has us in a good spot as far as setup-wise – braking, just having the fundamental things right when we go to a road course is honestly really huge, so I think he does a really good job with that as far as getting our simulator right and all the tools right. That way we can prepare as good as possible when we get to the racetrack is another thing. I think Ford does a really good job about that and I think all of the upcoming road courses can be really strong with us. It’s funny, I never really grew up road course racing, but just always really enjoyed them since I started doing them.”

WHAT DID YOU THINK ABOUT THE SINGLE-FILE RESTARTS AND SHOULD IT BE CONSIDERED FOR OTHER ROAD COURSES AS WELL? “That’s a really good question. I don’t know. I think that’s another thing that’s ongoing and evolving as we go. As the younger guy that’s never really watched a race with single-file restarts, I remember when we talked about it and threw around the idea I was like, ‘Man, that seems kind of lame to me.’ It seems like you take the excitement out of the race and, for me, an opportunity. I think if you’re the leader, a single-file restart is great, but as a guy trying to improve their spot and make an aggressive move, double-file definitely gives you a better opportunity for that, but on the flip side I really thought the single-file restarts went really smooth this weekend and got us back into the flow of a race much quicker, which was definitely unexpected. I think both things, because we moved the restart zone back to try and prevent the turn one wrecks and then single-file also, so I thought it honestly all went much smoother and you’re still bunched up but you’re back to racing instead of just wrecking each other and muscling each other out of the way. Like I said, it’s one spot at a time from there instead of just big chunks.”

CAN YOU REMIND ME IN TERMS OF HOW YOU GAINED SO MUCH GROUND AT COTA IN THE FINAL LAPS? YOU SEEM TO HAVE BENEFITED FROM THE DOUBLE-FILE RESTARTS THERE. “I think I’ve been on the beneficial side of most. Indy last year, we were able to come away with fourth. We were relatively fast then, but still definitely benefited from some chaos at the end, where at COTA this year we were running OK and then I got spun with probably only five laps to go. Then we were able to make our way back up with other guys getting spun, so my look at it is kind of like sometimes you’re gonna be the one that gets the short end of the stick, but there are gonna be more opportunities for it in the future. To me, I definitely always look at them as an opportunity and maybe that’s more so because I’ve come out of the good side more than the bad side.”

This Week in Motorsports: July 3-9, 2023

· NCS/NXS: Atlanta Motor Speedway – July 8-9

· NCTS/ARCA: Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course – July 7-8

PLANO, Texas (July 5, 2023) – After racing around the streets of downtown Chicago, NASCAR is back to superspeedway-style racing at the newly-configured Atlanta Motor Speedway, while the NASCAR Truck Series and ARCA Menards Series teams compete at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course.

NASCAR National Series – NCS | NXS | NCTS

1,000 for the Camry… This weekend marks the 1,000th event for the Toyota Camry in NASCAR. Counting this upcoming race weekend, the Toyota Camry has competed in 595 NASCAR Cup Series (NCS) and 405 NASCAR Xfinity Series (NXS) races under the Toyota Camry badging. The Camry has won 324 races – 175 in NCS and 149 in NXS.

Gibbs continues to impress in rookie season… Ty Gibbs continues to impress in his rookie season in the NASCAR Cup Series. With his fourth ninth-place finish of the season at Chicago, Gibbs moved inside the Playoff field for the first time since the second race of the season. Gibbs had a strong run at Atlanta earlier this season, bringing his Camry home in the ninth spot.

Bell adds to Playoff tally… Christopher Bell led the most laps and earned two valuable Playoff points at the Chicago Street Course, as the Oklahoma-native now has seven Playoff points in his tally heading into Atlanta. Bell, who is just 21 points out of the championship lead, finished third at Atlanta in the spring to lead Toyota.

Nemechek looks to add to advantage… John Hunter Nemechek added to his Xfinity Series points lead for the second consecutive race with a runner-up finish in the Chicago Street Race. The North Carolina-native led 10 laps and finished eighth in the spring race at Atlanta Motor Speedway earlier this season.

Smith, Grala desire to start top-10 streaks… Sammy Smith and Kaz Grala both earned solid top-10 finishes in Chicago and are looking to add to those streaks heading into Atlanta. Smith, who finished sixth, moved back inside the top-10 in points with the strong run, while Grala (10th) has officially bounced-back from a tough start to the season with nine top-20 finishes in the last 11 races.

Heim plans to extend points lead … With three races remaining in the regular season, Corey Heim continues to hold down the points lead. After missing Gateway due to illness, Heim got right back in the seat and back in his consistent groove as the Georgia-native earned a stage win and his sixth consecutive top-10 finish. Despite competing in one less race than any other full-time driver, Heim has 10 top-10 finishes – two more than any other competitor. He is 16 points ahead of second-place Zane Smith heading into this weekend. Heim made his track debut last season at Mid-Ohio, earning the pole and leading three laps before losing a transmission with seven laps to go.

Sawalich running two… William Sawalich will get two chances for victory this weekend. The 16-year-old will compete in his normal ARCA Menards Series ride – the No. 18 Joe Gibbs Racing Camry – on Friday, before making his second Truck Series start for TRICON Garage on Saturday. The Toyota development driver was impressive in his Truck debut, finishing inside the top-10 at Martinsville in April.

NASCAR Regional Series – ARCA

Love looks to continue hot streak… Jesse Love continued his strong performance with his fourth national ARCA Menards Series win in the last five events. The Toyota development driver holds a 40-point advantage in the series standings going into Mid-Ohio this weekend. Love finished fifth in his track debut last year.

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Martin Truex Jr.
Atlanta Advance
No. 19 Auto-Owners Insurance Toyota Camry TRD for Joe Gibbs Racing

Event Overview

● Event: Quaker State 400 (Round 19 of 36)

● Time/Date: 7 p.m. EDT on Sunday, July 9

● Location: Atlanta Motor Speedway

● Layout: 1.5-mile oval

● Laps/Miles: 260 laps/400 miles

● Stage Lengths: Stage 1: 60 laps / Stage 2: 100 laps / Final Stage: 100 laps

● TV/Radio: USA Network / PRN / SiriusXM NASCAR Radio

Notes of Interest

● Atlanta Motor Speedway is a much different track than when Truex had grown accustomed to during his career. The 1.54-mile oval was reconfigured after the final race of the 2021 season. The banking was increased from 24 degrees to 28 degrees and the track was narrowed from 55 feet wide to 40 feet wide, and it was all covered with fresh asphalt. The goal of the reconstruction was to recreate the kind of pack-style racing seen at the behemoth, 2.5-mile Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway and the even bigger 2.66-mile Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway.

● Truex and the No. 19 team for Joe Gibbs Racing (JGR) set the tone for the season right out of the gate by winning the 150-lap feature in the non-points Clash at the Coliseum on Feb. 5 in Los Angeles. Truex won his heat race, then went on to lead the final 25 laps of the feature en route to a victory that gave him and the team much-needed momentum heading into the 2023 season. While the team was knocking on the door over the next 10 points-paying races, the breakthrough win finally came at Dover (Del.) Motor Speedway on May 1, and Truex added a second points-paying victory and third overall this season last month at Sonoma (Calif.) Raceway.

● 33 and Counting: Truex’s win at Sonoma was the 33rd of his Cup Series career, putting him in a tie with NASCAR Hall of Famer Fireball Roberts for 26th on the series’ all-time wins list.

● After last weekend’s Chicago Street Race, Truex continues to lead the Cup Series driver standings as the series heads to Atlanta. He has 591 points, nine ahead of William Byron. The top five in the Cup Series standings are separated by just 31 points as things start to heat up in the chase for the regular-season championship. The regular-season champion will receive 15 important playoff points when the playoffs start on Labor Day weekend in September. Eight races remain in the regular season.

● When he took over the lead in the driver standings following his win at Sonoma, it was first time for Truex since 2018, when he led heading to Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, California, five races into that season. That was a 191-race stretch. While this is his first points lead in more than five years, Truex had won 17 races and led 5,069 laps in those 191 outings.

● Ahead at this Stage: Truex leads the NASCAR Cup Series with 57 stage wins since the beginning of the stage racing era in 2017. He is the only driver with 10 or more stage sweeps, as well. Truex added to his haul of stage wins by taking the opening stage last month at Darlington (S.C.) Raceway.

Martin Truex Jr., Driver of the No. 19 Auto-Owners Insurance Toyota Camry TRD

With the repaving and reconfiguration of the Atlanta oval before last season, would you qualify it as a speedway race, and what are the new challenges there because of those changes?

“It’s definitely a speedway race, no question about it. Last spring, we led some laps and we were leading there and had a late caution and restarted on the front row. We got a good shove down into (turn) one and (turn) two, and (Corey) Lajoie was leading the inside lane and got up inside of me, and Chase Elliott was stuck up in the middle of us and got us three wide and got into me and shoved me up the hill and got me out of line, and that was it. Sort of what happens at those types of places – you can be in the best spot possible, but you have to count on other guys to help you and sometimes it just doesn’t work out. We saw that this spring, too, got some damage and we just weren’t able to be up there at the end of the race. All I can do is hope we are in the same position this weekend with our Auto-Owners Insurance Camry TRD and maybe things will work out a little bit better in our favor and we can bring home the win.”

How much has superspeedway-style racing changed with the NextGen cars?

“Certainly, I count Atlanta among the speedways now, but I would say that the superspeedways haven’t changed as much as the other tracks with this car. Just the way you can bump draft with this car and the way it drafts is completely different than the previous-generation car. I think right now there are a lot more options as far as how lanes work. Used to be that you would never want anyone on your outside, and now you can pass guys on the bottom a bit easier. So it creates opportunities on the speedways, but you also have to be really aggressive.”

Is there one thing you can point to that shows why you are more successful this season?

“I think just better cars, in general. Better cars, better understanding of what we need on the racetracks. Last year was a big learning curve. We were trying to figure out what direction we needed to go at races with this car and, having 15-minute practices where you opt in on what you show up with, there is no real time to recover if you show up with some bad ideas or things that didn’t work. You have to wait till you go back to that track again. Just all of that learning process and figuring things out has been a big factor for us. I think our cars are better this year, as well. Toyota did some work in the offseason and everybody at JGR (Joe Gibbs Racing) worked hard to try to put the pieces together, so I think, overall, we just have a better platform to work with and a better understanding of what we need.”

No. 19 Auto-Owners Insurance Team Roster

Primary Team Members

Driver: Martin Truex Jr.

Hometown: Mayetta, New Jersey

Crew Chief: James Small

Hometown: Melbourne, Australia

Car Chief: Chris Jones

Hometown: Smith Mountain Lake, Virginia

Engineer: Nick Burton

Hometown: Arvada, California

Engineer: Jeff Curtis

Hometown: Fairfax Station, Virginia

Spotter: Drew Herring

Hometown: Benson, North Carolina

Road Crew Members

Underneath Mechanic: Ryan Martin

Hometown: Mechanicsburg, Virgina

Mechanic: Todd Carmichael

Hometown: Redding, California

Interior/Tire Specialist: Tommy DiBlasi

Hometown: Annapolis, Maryland

Engine Tuner: Gregg Huls

Hometown: Beatrice, Nebraska

Transporter Driver: Kyle Bazzell

Hometown: Fairbury, Illinois

Transporter Driver: Eddie DeGroot

Hometown: Baldwinsville, New York

Over-The-Wall Crew Members

Gas Man: Matt Tyrrell

Hometown: Fort Lauderdale, Florida

Jackman: Kellen Mills

Hometown: Mesa, Arizona

Tire Carrier: CJ Bailey

Hometown: Outer Banks, North Carolina

Front Tire Changer: Lee Cunningham

Hometown: Leaf River, Illinois

Rear Tire Changer: Danny Olszowy

Hometown: Lexington, Kentucky