NASCAR CUP SERIES
DAYTONA INTERNATIONAL SPEEDWAY
COKE ZERO SUGAR 400
TEAM CHEVY PRESS CONF. TRANSCRIPT
AUGUST 27, 2022

KYLE LARSON, NO. 5 HENDRICKCARS.COM CAMARO ZL1, met with the media in advance of the NASCAR Cup Series race at Daytona International Speedway. Press Conference Transcript:

THE NASCAR RACE TO THE CHAMPIONSHIP DOCUMENTARY COMES OUT NEXT WEEK, WHAT WAS IT LIKE TO BE A PART OF THAT?

“Yeah, honestly, I haven’t had to do a whole lot with it. I think they came to my house one morning and followed us around to Millbridge (Speedway) one night. Other than that, I think they have been collecting stuff behind the scenes and like from a distance. So, it’s been nice that it hasn’t been like in our face all the time, so honestly, I don’t even know what they have captured. I am excited to see it next week and I think it will turn out really good and I hope all the fans will really enjoy it.”

HOW WAS TIME AWAY FROM THE TRACK WITH THE FAMILY?

“We always go to Disney in February and I have been gone so much and away from the family so much the last couple of months that I wanted to spend some time with them. I forgot how hot Florida is this time of year, so I think we were all dying yesterday. But I was happy that qualifying got rained out so I could stay there and spend more time with them. Had a really fun time but not sure I will go back ever again in August, but I look forward to getting back in February.”

WHAT ARE YOUR EXPECTATIONS FOR THE RACE WITH SO MUCH ON THE LINE FOR OTHER DRIVERS?

“I am not sure. The only way for those guys to make it in the playoffs that aren’t currently in the playoffs is to win. So, with that, I think the first couple of stages could be pretty tame. Just because a lot of those drivers are just trying to get to the end of the race to have a shot. But then it could be crazy and wild all race long. So, I am not really sure what to expect. No matter how it is, I hope we are in front of the craziness. I know at the end of the race, as it always does, whether it’s the cutoff race or not…..at Daytona or Talladega it always gets wild. We will see and it will be kind of interesting to follow along and see what guys are fast and if there are going to be a couple of big crashes to wipe out guys that could shake things up a lot. We will see.”

DO YOU TAKE A SPECIFIC APPROACH TO IT?

“Yeah, I think for us and in my position….we are second in the regular season points right now and I think there are maybe four of us that are really close to finishing second. Because of that, I feel like we need to go after stage points to do our part to finish second. Our plan is to race the whole time and just stay up front and get some points.”

IF YOU END UP NOT RACING TONIGHT AND YOU RACE TOMORROW AFTERNOON, HOW DOES IT CHANGE THE STYLE OF THIS RACE IF AT ALL?

“Yeah, good question, I am not sure. This place, the handling will be more of a factor for sure during the day than at night. I mean just the whole track is slicker, but I feel like turn four gets really tight. So, I don’t know and I don’t remember us being on track earlier this year with the sun out. In Talladega, handling is not a big deal there. The cars drove really good there gripped up. So, yeah, I am sure it will play a factor as it always does. As far as the race, I am not really sure.”

NOW THAT YOU HAVE HAD FOUR SUPERSPEEDWAY RACES WITH THIS CAR, WHAT KIND OF UNDERSTANDING DO YOU BRING HERE TONIGHT?

“I don’t know. I am not sure. I don’t think it feels way different than the other stuff. You have to hit your marks on stuff like green flag cycles getting on pit road and getting off pit road even more than the other car. When you are in a big pack, it is not as easy to lose the pack, but as soon as you get to shaking things up with green flag stops its kind of strung out for a lap or two and it seems really easy to lose the draft in that sense. You need to be on your game for that type of thing. Other than that, I don’t think it races way different.”

CAN YOU DESCRIBE A LAP AROUND DAYTONA AS FAR AS BEING IN THE PACK OR BEING IN OPEN AIR?

“Well, in open air, any of you could do it. In the middle of the pack it gets really hectic and your car doesn’t necessarily do its own thing, but you can feel the air more. The disturbance of the air. You can feel runs and you feel runs stall out a lot. When you get out to the lead you feel like you are going really slow, even though you are going just as fast as the guys behind you. When you are in the middle pack, you feel like you are going fast. It’s a lot quieter out front, but its just when you get out front your car obviously handles a lot better with clean air on it. You are not really looking out the windshield as much and you are looking in the rear view mirror a lot of the time. I haven’t seen the lead on a superspeedway very often but its definitely a little quieter and less going on out front and like I said, your car handles better.”

HOW DO YOU MAKE SURE YOU ARE IN THE RIGHT PLACE AS FAR AS BALANCING FOCUS AND EMOTION IN THE PLAYOFF SEASON?

“For a superspeedway race…..I don’t really get too emotional anyway, so that’s not a problem for me. Staying focused sometimes and making sure you are trying to make the right moves is tough to do a lot of times because runs are happening quick. The gaps are really small that you are trying to get into. Trying to stay focused on risk versus reward but also trying to position yourself for the end of the race is important. I mean a little bit of that goes into each race and race by race. Especially in the playoffs in putting yourself in the right spot at the right time and weighing risk versus reward. Just trying to maximize your day and trying to get as many points as you can like you would at any other speedway race.”

AT THIS POINT LAST YEAR YOU HAD ALREADY HAD FIVE WINS AND IT WAS A DOMINANT SEASON, THIS YEAR YOU HAVE TWO. DO YOU ATTRIBUTE THAT TO THE NEXT GEN CAR AND MORE PARITY?

“I think definitely a little bit of parity, but you still see a lot of the same good guys running up front. With us, its really just been a lack of execution I would say most weekends. We have really only had a few, like less than five, really clean races where nothing happened and we finished where we deserved. Whether it be just bad restarts or bad pit stops or a missed call for strategy…..something that we just haven’t executed the best. Last year we had a fast car and that makes everything execution wise a lot easier with pit calls, pits stops, and restarts and all that. Yeah, the parity probably pays a big role in it but just us as a team, until recently, haven’t done the best jobs a lot of time. And that is an area where we have tried really hard all season long. Its just hard to do sometimes. But like I said, I feel like lately we have been getting out stuff together. Last week was a great week to get a win and roll on into the playoffs with some momentum hopefully.”

WHAT IS IT GOING TO TAKE TO HAVE A BETTER PERFORMANCE AT DARLINGTON THIS TIME AROUND?

“Yeah, we had a really fast car last time before we blew up. So the first round has a lot of really good tracks for us. I think it is Darlington, Kansas and Bristol maybe. So those are honestly three of my best racetracks. I really like that round and hopefully we can do well in it and get some wins and get some bonus points would be nice. I have always run really well at Darlington, but have not gotten a win there yet. I finished second three times in a row before we blew up this year, so would love to be one spot better there and finally get that Darlington win that I have been close to getting.”

TALLADEGA IN THE SPRING WAS A REALLY CLEAN RACE FOR YOU. DOES ANYTHING STAND OUT FROM THE RACE IN THE SPRING THAT YOU CAN USE HERE?

“Not really anything happened. We had great track position the whole race and I never once left the bottom lane. I think that if there is anything that I learned is that you can’t go into any superspeedway race with the mindset and say you are going to be patient, but with us being up front the whole time at Talladega, I stayed patient the whole time. And I literally did not move off the bottom the whole time until I did and that is what lost me the race. So yes, I guess I have that same mindset in going into tonight’s race, but like I said it could be way different. This track is narrower, the importance of this race for a lot of other drivers is way different compared to Talladega earlier this year. You can’t show up to every race with the same mindset and have the same results throughout the whole race. But I will say, since it worked last time, that is my mindset right now. But it could change early on.”

Team Chevy high-resolution racing photos are available for editorial use.

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.

Toyota Racing – Kyle Busch
NASCAR Cup Series Quotes

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. (August 26, 2022) – Joe Gibbs Racing driver Kyle Busch was made available to media prior to the Daytona International Speedway race this Saturday:

KYLE BUSCH, No. 18 Interstate Batteries Toyota Camry TRD, Joe Gibbs Racing

“Hold on, first I have an announcement to make. Everybody ready? Ok, there is no announcement. Good? We all good, we clear? Moving on.”

How was your experience to be part of this new NASCAR documentary and what do you hope is the result of the piece coming out?

“Yeah, I mean, to me, I feel like it’s just another level of humanizing us. Athletes, drivers, families, things like that of what we do outside the sport. Obviously, there’s a lot to be filmed and a lot of things that go on behind the scenes and the things that aren’t on broadcast television each and every week. And so, to kind of showcase a little bit of that, obviously, there’s a storyline, a huge development of lives and situations that are outside of just the broadcast. And so I feel like they’re trying to do the best they can and showcase some of that and get some of those storylines out there. You know, one with us is just our family life and racing and Brexton racing and that sort of stuff, where how hectic it kind of is and what we do, outside of just being here every Saturday and Sunday.”

At any point in contract negotiations, did Joe Gibbs Racing offer you a contract that you turned down?

“What did I just say? I said there was no update. This is not the place to start airing any dirty laundry. Just trust me, in time things will work out. And what happens, happens. Again, answering that question could either be positive for me or detrimental for me. So it’s fair to say I cannot answer those sorts of questions in your apologize. Or I don’t, not sure which.”

Is there any one thing you hope people take away about Kyle Busch from the documentary?

“Yeah, I mean, to me, I guess the humanizing the villian, let’s say, okay, so I’d like to be known by a heck of a lot more than just what is on broadcast television each weekend or not on broadcast television, but to me, you know, I’m a husband, I’m a father, I’m a racer. And that’s all I’ve really known. I’ve grown up doing that. I’ve come from a blue collar family from Las Vegas where my dad was a Mac Tool, man and didn’t come up from a lot but obviously trying to instill those same traits into my kids and how we go about what we do each and every week to go to the race track. So, for me, I would like to think that just, you know, again, showing the human side, humanizing myself and what is important to me, not just at the race track, but away from the race track.”

What do you expect from tonight’s race?

“So yes, if somebody wins to knock themselves in, right, so that to me is where the storyline is so you’re going to have legit, you know, the rest of the guys that want to go race for a win as well too. All of us we want to go race for a win and with the unknown predictability of Daytona and what all of that is here just lends itself into the perfect storm of opportunity of guys to win and knock themselves in. So you know, I think there’s going to be a big race up front. And, you know, I’d love to be in that. I need bonus points just as the other guys do. I need regular points. You know, we’ve fallen far enough it’d be nice to I think we have a legit shot for getting one or two spots back where we’re at right now. So that’s two more Playoff points that we have a shot for. So it’d be nice to not lose those. But you also I do know, at the end of the day, you got to be in it to win it. And so if you’re not there at the end of this race, then you don’t have a shot to win. So you know that that obviously plays a role as well.”

How do you approach this race for yourself?

“Knowing all of that, I don’t know I’m still on the fence about it. I want to go out there and race because you know, when you go out there and race you’re around people at the front of the pack for much of the day, and they get a chance to be around you see how you run see how fast your car is if they can work well with you. But on the flip side of that is if you’re around them and then you’re wiped out or they’re wiped out and you weren’t there in the beginning of the race. There’s new contenders at the end of the race, so yeah, I don’t know. If I could guarantee myself a lead lap spot, stay on the lead lap by being a half a lap down the whole race, I would probably take that. And then what restart do you go on? Do you go on the restart ten to go do you go on the recent the third overtime restart, which one do you go on? I don’t know. And the other thing too is like once you get two wide, it’s going to be hard to make moves and go up the middle and get up towards the front so you kind of need to put yourself in a spot or get yourself worked into a good spot before that final pit stop. So if that answered any questions, I have no idea good luck. That’s how I feel like people are telling me tonight. I don’t know, good luck.”

Have you spoken to Kurt Busch and how is he doing after the news from this week?

“I’m not speaking for Kurt Busch. Same as though I’m not speaking for Kyle Busch either. So, a few of you got that, good work, all right. So yeah, he’s, I mean, he’s down right, like he wants to be here. He wants to go out there. He wants to race he wants to put a helmet on again and he wants to get back in that race car, as I would expect. I’ve been around him for all of my 37 years. And so, you know, he’s a talented and driven individual who wants to go out there and do what he loves to do. So, I respect his decision and his news that he gave earlier this week for relinquishing a Playoff spot. I think that’s mighty strong of him to do and obviously I feel like it’s also — he’s not he’s not sacrificing himself for a spot or taking a spot from the rest of the field. Right. Like he’s relinquishing that spot for others to be able to go out there and race with his unknown status at this time. So I think that was very strong with him. And yeah, I think that’s going to bode well.”

From the family side, are you worried about Kurt’s recovery?

“You’re always worried about your family, right? You know, certainly want the best for him and whatever that is, but obviously his health needs to be first and he’s going through the exercises and the things that he’s told to do in order to make sure that he can please the doctors to get back in that race car. So you know, this Kurt Busch not being in the race car is not Kurt Busch’s decision. It’s someone else’s. So that’s what stinks to but also that’s what keeps us from ourselves and going out there and racing hurt is those around the sport and the doctors in which he has to deal with. Yeah, it’s tough for sure. It’s not easy, but he’s fine. He’s I don’t know how to say this politely. But he’s not knocked himself stupid. He’s, he’s very well aware of the decisions and the repercussions of those that he’s making. So I give him full vote, or full credit for making those.”

How do you try to help your Toyota teammates tonight with the 19 holding a Playoff spot and the 23 trying to get into the Playoffs?

“If I’m coming off a turn four the 23 (Bubba Wallace) and the 19 (Martin Truex Jr.) are side by side in front of me and I’m the next one, I’m lifting. So if I know I can’t win, I am out. Just give me the points. So yeah, that’s kind of how I look at it. Obviously, you don’t necessarily, again, the 13 other car numbers you’ve got to figure out that are in the picture that you don’t want to push to a win if Martin’s the last one on points. You know, same thing like you, you obviously, you know, if there’s the 9 (Chase Elliott) car is on the bottom, and there’s, name one, the 43 (Erik Jones) on the outside, and I’m following the 43 like, the 100% rule comes into effect, right? What do you do? You obviously don’t want to knock a teammate out.”

Do you need give-and-take to win a championship?

“Absolutely. Yes you do, you need give and take to win a championship.”

Will Ross Chastain get benefit of the doubt when it come to the Playoffs with other drivers?

“Absolutely not, no way, no chance. I don’t think people are paying him back yet, they’re waiting for the right time. Denny (Hamlin) got really tight off turn one in Pocono. I know how tight these cars can get.”

Have you had your Toyota meeting yet and have you talked about different scenarios?

“Yes. Just what I said before, if the 19 (Martin Truex Jr.) and the 23 (Bubba Wallace) or side by side I’m out. That’s what I said. You know, like I said, obviously, it’s the 13 other car numbers that you don’t need to be behind pushing to the checkered flag to score a win. If you know the 19 is on the edge. So yeah, I mean all that’s been laid out.”

How will aggression with this new race car in the Playoffs impact the racing when everyone gets to Darlington?

“Yeah, I think the biggest thing with this car is people are seeing it take little hits a bit more racing hits, you know, knocking each other out of the way pushing on each other a little bit leaning on the bodies. The bodies are way, for sure, more durable in that aspect, but the chassis components still have a tick of weakness to them, you know, you can bump on the fence or somebody else and bend a front or rear tow rod. And so those are the things that that you’re cautious of or more cautious of is those wheel hits. But the body stuff, yeah, everybody’s taking full advantage of that and leaning on everybody a little bit more, which I think we all kind of saw was going to be an opportunity with this car with the composite body we see an opportunity a little bit. And you know, as you said the parity plays a piece in that too because these cars are more similar to the same speed. I mean, you look at Martinsville tests, they ran 300 and some laps and the whole field was within three tenths you know, so yeah, like passing at a road course. You know, you have to bomb it off in there and you know, you’re not going to make the corner you know, you’re going to lean on the guy and push him out of the groove in order to make a pass like that’s how it’s done now, just because there is, I don’t have any better breaks than the next guy because they’re all bought from the same place.”

Does it change how the 19 is viewed in the Playoffs if he can only compete for the driver’s championship and not the owner’s championship within the Joe Gibbs Racing organization?

“No, I don’t think it changes anything. I think Joe (Gibbs) looks at it as if it’s in. I don’t think there’s any difference, any separation in that. You want to talk about contracts, let’s talk about contracts. I don’t know what’s in his contract with Toyota and TRD or his sponsors if the car isn’t what the driver is, or if it’s even in there and spelled out, I don’t know. Mine would say that if I’m in, I get what I’m supposed to get, you know what I mean? So I don’t know how that works otherwise, but I probably gave you guys a whole other topic to go down the rabbit hole on. I’m sorry, Joe. So anyway, they won’t look any different than 19 car will still be a normal player for us as the Playoffs progress.”

About Toyota

Toyota (NYSE:TM) has been a part of the cultural fabric in North America for more than 60 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 more than 48,000 people in North America who have contributed to the design, engineering, and assembly of nearly 43 million cars and trucks at our 13 manufacturing plants. By 2025, Toyota’s 14th plant in North Carolina will begin to manufacture automotive batteries for electrified vehicles. With the more electrified vehicles on the road than any other automaker, more than a quarter of the company’s 2021 North American sales were electrified.

Through the Start Your Impossible campaign, Toyota highlights the way it partners with community, civic, academic and governmental organizations to address our society’s most pressing mobility challenges. We believe that when people are free to move, anything is possible. For more information about Toyota, visit www.ToyotaNewsroom.com.

Toyota Racing – Martin Truex Jr.
NASCAR Cup Series Quotes

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. (August 26, 2022) – Joe Gibbs Racing driver Martin Truex Jr. was made available to media prior to the Daytona International Speedway race this Saturday:

MARTIN TRUEX JR., No. 19 Bass Pro Shops Toyota Camry TRD, Joe Gibbs Racing

What are your thoughts on having a chance to race into the Playoffs tomorrow night?

“Well, yeah, first off, I mean, obviously, we’re all thinking about Kurt (Busch) and wishing him the best and hopefully, he gets better and he can come back and do what he loves to do. He’s been a good teammate this year. First time I’ve worked with him and you know, Toyota that’s been fun. So wish him the best and yeah, for us, we’re not in until it’s over tomorrow night. I don’t really have any feelings either way. We’re here to race and excited and two scenarios, one we get in on points, or we win the race. That will be optimum because of the points situations. But yeah, we’ll see. You know, we just kind of how it all plays out and we can make our own way in there.”

Did you talk to anyone about the possibility of having a chance now to race into the Playoffs?

“I hadn’t talked to anybody about anything. I heard the news just like everybody else. So yeah, I don’t know. I don’t really know what went into the process and for Kurt not being in the Playoffs. He probably didn’t feel right taking the spot. I don’t know that would be different if it was anybody else in that 16th position. I really don’t know. We didn’t have those conversations. So yeah. That’s all I know. But yeah, it’s a good opportunity for us and you know, obviously it’s not been the season we’ve wanted. It would have been nice to be locked in. You never want to come here to Daytona and not be locked in and having to make something happen. So that’s why, you know, we’ll just go race tomorrow night, see what happens and really not thinking about it either way, to be honest with you.”

How do you approach the race tomorrow night with the points gap to Ryan Blaney?

“I think we need to go race and try to stay at the front and try to get stage points. You know, like I said, best case scenario for us would be to go out and win because you know, the owner’s championship points side of things. You know, what, you have to fall back on that last spot. We won’t be in on owner’s points. So it’s not really what you hope to accomplish, right. So we’ll just say like I said, I mean, I think we had a really strong car here in February. Led a ton of laps won two stages. Then we got kind of banged up and then finished kind of tore up so you didn’t have the speed at the end of the race. But I had a really strong day going and Talladega went good as well. So I feel like our car is really fast here. And hopefully we can take advantage of that. Would be a fun way to win one here with everything on the line.”

Does Drew Herring approach spotting with this car at this track differently?

“We haven’t talked specifically about tomorrow night yet. I’m sure we will. Probably tomorrow but or tonight but I think for us it’s kind of just been an evolution process of working together at these types of race tracks and trying to just get better at and working together and you know, kind of just feeling things come quicker and be more aggressive and you know, me not checking my mirror when he says to move. That’s takes a little while, you know, the first couple times you’re like, ‘Yeah, but I’ll check. I know, it’s close, you know?’ And then you get to where you just get more comfortable and you trust that guy. So I feel like we’ve made some really good gaines on the on the speedway’s and this year has been pretty good for us. So hopefully we can continue to, to work on that and get better as the night goes on tomorrow night and be in position to take advantage of it at the end.”

If you do advance into the Playoffs, do you feel confident heading into Darlington?

“I do yeah, we had a strong run there back earlier in the year. We got in some trouble late. Like we ran top five around the top five most of the day. We need to be a little better there than we were the last time. I feel good about it. And I feel like we’ll have a good shot at going there and running well.”

Is it possible for this race to become even more of a wild card?

“You never know what to expect here but you know it’s going to be wild and crazy and there will be a lot of crashes. Rain in the area. Who knows when it could end. Does it even go the full distance? Weather tomorrow looks about like today. So you know, they brought the last regular season race here for a reason. Right? Drama and craziness and that’s what we’re going to see. So that’s why you know, for me, I’m just like, we’re just going to go out there and race and try to put our best race out there and hope that we can get it done, but I don’t have feelings either way, right now, whether we’re going to make it or we’re not. We’re going to go a race and see how it all unfolds. And there’s a lot of things that can happen and we’ll just see what happens and take it from there.”

Could you envision a scenario where you help Ryan Blaney win to ensure you get in on points?

“If he (Ryan Blaney) ended up in front of me at the end, and I wouldn’t have a problem pushing him. I’m not going to push a guy that hasn’t won yet. So I mean, yeah, obviously, I’m going to do what I feel like is the best opportunity for me to win or be in position to win so that would probably be the best scenario. Push Blaney into the lead and pass him coming to the checkers.”

Do you still have a love, hate relationship with Daytona or are you feeling more optimistic?

“I’d say I’m pretty optimistic. You know what we did in February, we can continue that and but yeah, I mean, just you have to stay out of the accidents, right? Because I mean, that’s the hardest thing to do here is you never know where they’re going to happen. You can be running second or third. You can be running 30th and trying to stay out of the mess so in February we led a bunch, like I mentioned, had a little trouble on pit road went back mid pack and coming back through and there’s a crash so you just never know when or where it’s going to happen. But yeah, I mean, as far as our speed goes and the things we’ve been working on between Drew (Herring, spotter) and I and James (Small, crew chief) just feel more confident. This year, I think with this car in general has run well for us and we’re feeling pretty good.”

About Toyota

Toyota (NYSE:TM) has been a part of the cultural fabric in North America for more than 60 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 more than 48,000 people in North America who have contributed to the design, engineering, and assembly of nearly 43 million cars and trucks at our 13 manufacturing plants. By 2025, Toyota’s 14th plant in North Carolina will begin to manufacture automotive batteries for electrified vehicles. With the more electrified vehicles on the road than any other automaker, more than a quarter of the company’s 2021 North American sales were electrified.

Through the Start Your Impossible campaign, Toyota highlights the way it partners with community, civic, academic and governmental organizations to address our society’s most pressing mobility challenges. We believe that when people are free to move, anything is possible. For more information about Toyota, visit www.ToyotaNewsroom.com.

Joey Logano, driver of the No. 22 Shell/Pennzoil Ford Mustang, signed a multi-year extension with Team Penske earlier this week. He spoke about that, along with other issues, in the infield media center this afternoon.

JOEY LOGANO, No. 22 Shell/Pennzoil Ford Mustang – YOU HAVE BEEN INVOLVED IN THE NEW NASCAR DOCU-SERIES. WHAT WAS THAT LIKE? “I think everyone has seen the success that Drive to Survive had with reaching out to the non-fan or maybe casual fan of F1, and seeing how much that turned around even with me how much my point of view. I watched it casually, but I’d say I watch it a little more intently now as you learn a little bit more about how their sport works and really peeling back the curtains of not necessarily their personal lives that I really care about, but it’s how the race team is run and how they do things differently than what we do here in NASCAR. Those things were intriguing to me, so I think it’s pretty obvious it was successful and I think it’s smart for us to look for ways to do the same thing, which we did. I’ve been able to watch the first episode so far as the approval and it’s very entertaining, like highly entertaining and it’s a good mix of preparing for racing, personal lives, and the race itself, which may actually be the smallest part of it because everyone gets to see the race on Sunday anyway. You don’t have to tell that story again because everyone knows how it goes, but at least the preparation side of it and how my competitors do it and those type of things I’m interested in. I like watching that stuff as well. It kind of reminds me of that show a long time ago when they followed Kenny Wallace and Fedewa and all those guys. It was pretty entertaining, so it’s a step in that direction, for sure, and I think it’s gonna be great. I really don’t see it where it’s bad for the sport. It has some drama in it. It’s life. It shows life and it follows different drivers on different weeks, so I think it’s gonna be great for our sport, for sure. I think it was a hole in our sport that needed to be filled.”

HOW TRUE WAS IT BECAUSE YOU’VE EXPERIENCE THEM BEING THERE WITH THEM? “I can only speak on my behalf on my stuff, and it’s pretty true there. There are some editing ways and kind of how they create a character, in a way, but I wouldn’t say they’re far off on a lot of it. I thought it was good. They came to my house and they shot what I said was OK to shoot and they didn’t what I said I didn’t want them to see. The only thing I don’t want them to see is I don’t want people to know where I live. That’s a security piece. I don’t want that and they were respectful about that. I said, ‘Here are the things that I’m willing to show,’ and we lived our life and they filmed it. I can’t say we did anything differently than what we typically would do. It was good. We did that. They put some go-pros in the pickup truck on our way up to Bristol and had a truck full of kids screaming. It was life and they filmed it. It’s gonna be fun to watch that and how everybody does things differently and how lives are different away from the racetrack. Everyone has different amount of kids or married or not or whatever. Everyone has a different life. It’s kind of fun to see.”

CAN YOU CONFIRM THE TERM OF YOUR CONTRACT EXTENSION AND IS SPONSORSHIP LINED UP FOR THE DURATION OF THAT? “I can’t speak on the terms. I’m sure everyone can probably put a few things together and figure most of it out, but it’s definitely a long-term deal that’s gonna be great for all of us. Shell and Pennzoil and Team Penske, and honestly I think about it and it’s such a no-brainer for me. I was in a great situation. I feel very loyal to my partners and Roger and in Shell and Pennzoil that picked me up when no one else was going to, and gave me an amazing opportunity to win a bunch of races and a championship and have the opportunity to continue that relationship is, to me, like I said, a no-brainer. I’m in a great spot. We’ve got a winning race car, a secure place to work. When you think of what Penske can offer there, so, to me, it was a pretty easy decision on what to do there, and the continued growing on the team that we have. It’s tough to keep jumping ship, to go from one team to another. It’s not easy to do. You have to re-learn how things work, learn new relationships, who does what and you’re kind of starting from the beginning, where having the continuity of what we see at Team Penske for years to come whether it’s on the 12 with Blaney re-signing, myself, you see we’re gonna be able to work together for a long time and keep building off what we’re doing, and I think that puts us in a place of strength.”

THE PLAYOFFS START AT DARLINGTON, WHERE YOU WON. HOW MUCH CONFIDENCE DO YOU HAVE GOING THERE? “I feel good about it. Really, for the last month I feel really good about our performance, especially how we’ve been executing races. We’ve been really good at that the last month. We’ve maximized what we had. Our cars need to be faster, for sure, and it depends on the type of racetrack, but, to answer your question, Darlington is probably more so in our wheelhouse than any other racetrack. Old wore out surfaces is good for me as a driver and Paul as a crew chief, and the length and type of track that it is as well kind of falls into our wheelhouse. I’m excited about going back to Darlington. Obviously, we have a good place to work off of after we just ran there and had some success, so we can kind of tweak that setup some and hopefully be a little stronger than we were the last time.”

YOU, BLANEY AND SUAREZ HAVE ALL RE-SIGNED IN THE LAST FEW DAYS. WHAT MUST IT BE LIKE FOR KYLE BUSCH TO DEAL WITH THE DISTRACTION OF HIS SITUATION? “It’s a fair question and I can’t answer it for him. I can answer it for myself and just going through the quick negotiations that there was. Roger flew in. We met for three hours and we shook hands and we left. That’s how that worked and that’s how it worked the time before and it works smooth like that because we both understand each other’s side and we come to a neutral ground that makes sense for everybody and we both walked out of the room feeling like we got a good deal. That’s what a good deal is – when both sides win. That’s a good deal. We’ve been able to accomplish that for the last 10 years already, so I can say when it happens that quickly and you just move on the distraction is minimal because it just happens. Boom, it’s over. But knowing the negotiation is coming you have to prepare for it and that is a distraction and that’s just with one team. What if you were out there talking to four or five different teams all at the same time and trying to drive the race car and trying to live your life and be a dad and be a husband. Holy moley. I don’t know if I can do it and be 100 percent at any of it. It’s just a balance. I don’t know if it’s possible for me. I can’t speak for anybody else. I’m just speaking for myself. That’s one of the main reasons why I feel so at home where I’m at.”

HOW DO YOU APPROACH THIS RACE? WILL IT BE THE SAME AS BEFORE? “Yeah, it’s last chance. It’s your last shot to get in and everyone has the opportunity to win this thing – everybody has – and, yeah, I think this race plays differently than some of the other superspeedways. Some of it is because points don’t matter for a lot of people. They matter for us. We can get up there in points still and turn those into playoff points, but there are some teams that may not race for stage points because what does it matter? They’ve just got to survive and have something to race with at the end, so why would you take yourself out before that? You’re gonna have that, but I do think at the end of the race desperate people do desperate things and if this is your chance to get into the playoffs and know what that means for your team, and you have to make a risky move, the risky move is gonna happen even if it’s a two percent chance of it succeeding. It’s gonna happen. To me, there’s a 100 percent chance that they’re gonna crash at the end of this thing at some point. I don’t see how you don’t. I don’t see how it doesn’t happen. I’ll be surprised if it doesn’t happen in the last five laps, but it’s just a situation that we are put in coming here to Daytona, a superspeedway, with what’s on the line. It’s kind of asking yourself, ‘What would you do to win the Daytona 500?’ Well, what would you do to get in the playoffs? A lot of them are gonna say, “I’d wreck my mother to do it.’ That’s what a lot of them would say and, most likely, you’re gonna see something like that tomorrow night. Hopefully, the bright red and yellow Shell/Pennzoil Mustang is in front of all that and get a trophy at the end of the day.”

DO YOU HAVE A PLAN TO GO FOR THE WIN OR TRY TO HELP RYAN GET IN THE PLAYOFF HUNT WITH WHERE HE IS IN POINTS? “Ryan is in a pretty good spot after Kurt’s news earlier this week, unfortunately for him but I guess for Ryan it puts him in a better spot. It puts him in a better spot to make the playoffs to make the playoffs throughout this race. There are still situations that can happen that knocks him out, obviously, and I’ll be as good of a teammate as I always am and as good as I can be and work together as best as possible, but, the bottom line is I get paid to win the race too and I need to go out there and try to win the race as well. You can’t do it on your own. You’ve got to have people to work together with, but we eventually have to go race each other too at some point.”

HOW WILL THE TRACK BE WITH THE RAIN IN COMPARISON TO THE SPRING? “The rain is not gonna affect it much after the first run and the track takes some rubber – the Xfinity race tonight should rubber it in some, so I guess it won’t be that bad. It’s all about track temp. That’s really the biggest difference from the spring race to the fall race is the track temp. If it’s hot, it’s slick and you’re sliding around and the pack gets a little looser. If there’s a ton of grip, the pack seems to be a little tighter and that’s kind of what changes it up the most. Handling will come more into play, but as the sun goes down your track temp really doesn’t get much different than what it is in February in the 500.”

THERE ARE A LOT OF DIFFERENT SCENARIOS FOR RYAN AND MARTIN. IS THERE A SITUATION WHERE HE MAY HAVE TO PUSH TRUEX TO A WIN AS OPPOSED TO YOU OR ANOTHER FORD? “I don’t see where Blaney pushing Martin would be better than pushing his teammate. It would be the same result for Blaney. His teammate would have a win, which would be good for Team Penske. I guess I don’t see how that situation would play out. The worst thing that could happen for them is if there is if someone outside the playoffs now wins their way in and then Martin gains 25 points on Blaney. That would be the way he’s out, which I don’t know how likely that is. It’s very possible here at Daytona. If there is one place, it’s here so it can happen, but I can’t tell you exactly how Blaney is gonna call the race and what he’s gonna do. I think a lot of it depends and it’s a little bit off feel too on how the race is going and what’s going on the first couple stages before you make your decisions at the end of the race.”

Ford Performance Notes and Quotes
NASCAR Cup Series
Coke Zero Sugar 400 Advance | Friday, August 26, 2022

Aric Almirola, driver of the No. 10 Smithfield Ford Mustang, recorded his first NASCAR Cup Series victory in this event in 2014. He stopped by the infield media center to announce that he will be back next season with sponsor Smithfield.

ARIC ALMIROLA, No. 10 Smithfield Ford Mustang – “I’m here to announce that I’ll be back. I know that doesn’t come as a surprise to many of you, but I put a lot of thought and a lot of discussing it with Janice and the kids and, ultimately, the subject continued to get broached from the race team and Smithfield and through all of that dialogue, mainly with the race team and Smithfield, it was very evident that not only did they want me back, but that Smithfield wanted to increase their marketing campaign around NASCAR and around me. So, they’ve decided to come back for a multi-year agreement, which is incredible. The amount of support that they have given to me and my family throughout my career is humbling, so when Shane Smith called me, the CEO of Smithfield and said, ‘Hey, we really want you to reconsider retiring. We want you to come back and drive our race car.’ It’s really hard to say no. I did tell him, ‘Let me talk to Janice and let me think about it, let me pray about it, and we did and there was a lot of back and forth discussion. Ultimately, it just feels right. I told you guys down here at the beginning of the year that I was retiring and it was for a family decision and this is still very much a family decision. Janice and the kids and I talked a lot about it and I think the person that probably has the most sacrifice involved is Janice, but the kids were ecstatic that they still get to come and be with their friends and there is a community that is involved and associated with what we do. This year, I took the opportunity to really soak it all up and embrace this year, and I have found a renewed sense of what a work/life balance looks like this year. I think by the time the year is over Janice and the kids will have come to about 28 races. I think many of you might not come to 28 races, so it’s been really good for us to find that balance. Everything has worked out to make it make sense for me to be able to continue to race with the kids’ activities. We’ve moved some things around to where they’re doing most of their activities during the week and the school that they’re involved in now, Friday is a satellite day to where they have to work. They work and they turn in their work on a computer, so they’re literally sitting in the bus right now as I’m sitting here talking to you trying to finish up their school work. Our family dynamic has changed. Things have changed and it just feels right. It feels like a blessing and a wonderful opportunity to continue to do what I love to do, and I think I made that very clear when I announced that I was gonna retire that I wasn’t retiring because I didn’t enjoy racing anymore, I was retiring because I was willing to make a sacrifice for my family because, ultimately, my family is the most important thing to me. Winning races and making money and all of those things, I was willing to make that sacrifice to make sure I was being the husband I needed to be and the father I needed to be, and through this year Janice and I just found a wonderful balance to where I still can be the husband that I want to be and the father that I want to be and we did some really cool stuff this year. I forgot just what a wonderful opportunity it is to be a race car driver. Not only do I get to do what I love to do, but we get to travel around the country and go to all sorts of different cities, so we took that opportunity this year. We went to the Arch in St. Louis. We went to the stadium where the Cardinals play. We’ve been to baseball games in Philly when we went to Pocono. We went to a Tigers game when they were playing the Tampa Bay races when we were in Detroit for the Michigan race. We’ve taken family road trips between Phoenix and Vegas. We went to Zion and hiked and we’ve just really taken this year to kind of embrace it and soak it all up and I think as a family we’re not ready for it to end yet.”

HOW MUCH OF A MINDSET CHANGE IS THIS NOW? “Honestly, not much of a mindset change because I’ve been so focused on competition. I think my commitment and my effort to performing at the highest level has never changed, and so I think the biggest thing for me is just looking ahead into the off-season, where I was like, ‘All right, once we get to the off-season I’ll be able to catch my breath and we’ll figure out whatever is next.’ I don’t for right now have to figure out whatever is next. I know what’s next. I’m gonna continue to drive a race car. I’m looking forward to it and I’m excited about it, but you have to remember I’ve been doing this for a long time. I’m going into my 12th season next year. It’s pretty routine, so from a mindset standpoint nothing really changes.”

SMITHFIELD HAS SIGNED FOR MULTIPLE YEARS. WHAT ABOUT YOU? DOES YOUR DEAL COINCIDE WITH THEIRS? “You’ll have to continue to ask me about it later on next year. I don’t know. For right now, that’s the plan. For right now, they’ve agreed to come back for a multi-year agreement. They’ve increased their investment in this sport and in the race team, back to the levels they were at in 2018-2019. That was one thing that really hit home for me was when I talked to Shane. He came down here to the Daytona 500 this year and that was his first race in many, many, many years. He grew up in North Carolina and was a fan of this sport way back when, and he’s been running the European operations for Smithfield for the last 10 years or so. He has now been promoted to CEO and he came to the Daytona 500 and was blown away when he walked around and just seeing the level of excitement, the enthusiasm for this sport, the sold-out grandstands, the viewership, just everything that he’s seen with this sport and just walking around and seeing the people that are here – all of the campers that are here throughout the infield, everybody tailgating and cooking out. Shane just said, ‘These are our people. These are our customers. We’ve been marketing to them and telling them a story and trying to get support for our brand from this core group of people for 11 years. We’re heavily invested in this market and we want to continue to be.’ He saw it first hand when he was here that the NASCAR fans are so brand loyal to the corporate sponsors that are involved in the sport. He knows and he feels very confident that their participation in this sport and sponsoring a race car and being involved gives them the opportunity to talk directly to their customer, and so when these fans that camp out, sit in the stands, tune in to watch on TV, when they go to the grocery store and they have a choice to make in the meat aisle, we all hope that they will go and pick up the Smithfield brand of meat to take it home to cook it or to bring it to the racetrack to grill out and cook out and we have a lot of data that kind of backs that up and supports it as well.”

HOW LONG DID YOU TAKE ON THE DECISION TO COME BACK? “It was a few weeks, to be honest, and there was a lot of talking back and forth like, ‘What does the sponsorship look like? Are they going to scale back? Are the going to stay flat or are they going to increase their level of investment and what does that look like and what does that look like for me? Are they gonna sponsor half of the year and do we have to find a sponsor for the other half of the year?’ All of those things played a key role in trying to iron out all the details. The first question was, ‘Would you reconsider?’ So I said, ‘Let me think about it. Let me talk to Janice. Let me pray about it.’ And then after about a week of having those discussions it was like, ‘Yes, I will reconsider, but x, y and z. What’s the answer to this? What’s the answer to this?’ And we worked through that for probably the next month to six weeks. I know it got put out last week that it was happening, but as of last week it still wasn’t done. There was still some things that needed to be ironed out in the details and so, to be fully transparent with all of you guys, it was done this week. We actually all came to agreement on all of the terms as of this week and that’s why we’ve announced it today.”

HOW DID THE KIDS REACT? “Both of the kids were elated. Abby said, ‘Does that mean we have to wait to get a horse?’ And I said, ‘Yes.’ But Alex and Abby were both very excited to still continue to be here. I think that’s one of the things you have to realize. Alex came to his first race when he was one month old. He was born on September 4th and he came to his first race at Talladega in October. He was one month old. Abby was born on Thanksgiving Day in 2013. Her first race was the Daytona 500 and she was three months old, so our kids don’t know any different. They don’t know really what life looks like away from the racetrack and so they had a little bit of uncertainty as well. It was like, ‘What does that mean when dad is retired.’ Other than I’m gonna be home a lot more, what does that mean? What does that look like? Does that me we won’t get to see any of our friends anymore at the racetrack because we come to a large majority of the races and we have a community center. We have the MRO community center and our kids spend a lot of time at that community center with a lot of the other driver’s kids as well, so that’s their friendship group. They have their friends at school and then they come to the racetrack on the weekends and they have their friends at the racetrack, so they were nervous about what it looked like once we were done racing. Would we never get to see our friends again that were at the racetrack, so they were happy to find out they were gonna get to keep coming.”

WAS SMITHFIELD THE TIPPING POINT IN THIS DECISION? “Absolutely, and I think that’s one thing, for me, that has been just a huge blessing personally and professionally. Smithfield has been the primary sponsor on my race car my entire Cup career and so to continue to have their support and their backing is just an awesome feeling to be their guy and to be wanted. I truly feel like I am part of the Smithfield family and you have to remember that I’ve been part of Smithfield for 11 years. In that 11 years they’ve been through four CEOs. We’ve been through multiple different marketing executives and executives throughout the entire executive level office, so I feel very engrained there and I feel like I’ve done my part as an ambassador for their brand to build relationships, not only with the key people, but the entire organization because as things move and shuffle and change inside their organization, it’s still never wavered in their support of this sport and of me.”

CAN YOU TAKE THE LESSON OF THIS FORWARD TO MAKE NEXT YEAR EVEN BETTER? “I think those are lessons that I’ll keep with me for the rest of my life. I’m a very, very highly competitive person and when I came into this sport it was just me. I just had myself to worry about and then I met Janice and Janice and I dated for a while and then once we got married it was like, ‘Oh, boy. I’m now responsible for you as well,’ and then we had kids and it was like, ‘Oh no, now I’m responsible for two more mouths to feed.’ I always tried to separate home and work, and I felt like to be the best that I needed to be, I needed to be all in on racing. It takes that level of commitment to be really successful at the highest level of any profession, you have to be all in and committed. I found myself for many years putting my family second or actually third often and everything else revolved around racing, the sponsors, all the commitments that came with racing, and I tried to fit in family time when I could. I feel like over the last few years I’ve done a lot better job at that, but as I approached retirement it was like, ‘Man, I want to make sure that we do this together, that we go out holding hands as a family.’ We really soak it all up. We embrace it. We cherish this opportunity because when my kids were younger it was easy. They weren’t gonna remember, but now Alex almost being 10, Abby almost being 9, that changes things. They’re gonna remember this time in their life forever, so I wanted to make sure that it was done and we did it right on the way out. Yeah, I think for the rest of my life I’ll take those lessons learned and make sure that I don’t sacrifice being a great husband and being a great dad at the expense of being a professional and vice versa. I don’t want to sacrifice being a great professional at the expense of being a poor dad or poor husband or absent one.”

WAS SMITHFIELD AN IMPORTANT PART IN YOUR ORIGINAL DECISION? THERE WAS TALK THEY MAY NOT EVEN BE COMING BACK, SO DID YOU NOT WANT TO POTENTIALLY START OVER WITH A NEW SPONSOR AND FIGURE YOU AND SMITHFIELD WOULD GO OUT TOGETHER? “Absolutely. That’s a fair question. I think that was very much a factor that was weighed in was, where are they at? They were going through a transition period as well from the current CEO to a new CEO. They weren’t really sure. Shane was just coming in and was trying to get his bearings and from my standpoint I had reached a point to where Alex was still trying to go-kart race on the weekends occasionally. We were playing flag football on Saturdays. I was watching go-kart races on Facetime videos. I was watching flag football games on Facetime videos. I was watching Abby horseback ride on Facetime videos and I was sitting at the track in my motorhome, so you take those things, you weigh them out and I was like, ‘Man, what am I doing? Do I really want to continue the grind? Do I want to continue being gone from my family 40 weeks a year and hustling to find sponsorship money and trying to put all of this effort and focus into studying SMT data and constantly going here, going there for sponsors and doing media requests? All these things you have to do and I’m not complaining about it because I have the coolest job in the world, and I’ve signed up for it and I’ve loved every minute of it, but it is a grind. I’m telling you, it is long, it is a long year, it is a lot of work, so I just found myself at times going like, ‘What am I doing?’ And things changed for us. We got our kids into a school where Fridays are satellite days so they could travel with me. Alex, on his own, decided that he wanted to play baseball so we signed up for a baseball league where his games are on Tuesdays and Thursday nights. I haven’t missed a single baseball game. Our circumstances in our life changed to where it just made more sense to be able to stay out here on the road and continue to do what I love to do and my family still be a part of it.”

DOES ALEX HAVE ANY INTEREST IN RACING? “If he was sitting here right next to me he would say yes, and I think he does, but we’ve kind of pumped the brakes on that for right now. He’s really, really into baseball and it’s been so fun for me. I played baseball up to high school and growing up in Florida, a little Hispanic community, every Hispanic kid in Florida plays baseball year round and so did I. I predominantly played baseball and raced as well when I could, and as I got older racing became more important than baseball, but, for me, as his father, I have so much fun going out in the yard and throwing the baseball with him and going to baseball practice. I’m actually the assistant coach on the baseball team and it’s just been so much fun to be out there on the field with the kids. Mom and dad are still pushing baseball pretty heavy, plus it’s way, way cheaper. We can play baseball for a whole year for what it costs for a set of tires.”

WILL DREW STAY THE COURSE WITH YOU? “Yeah, I think Drew will stay the course with me. I don’t want to speak for the race team and speak for Zippy, but as far as I know Drew will stay with me. Drew has been a wonderful addition to the race team. He is such a great team leader and the guys on the team love him. I really enjoy working with him. It’s been a lot of fun working with Drew this year, so I think, as far as I know, that’s the plan. It would be news to me if it wasn’t.”

WHAT ROLE DID THE ACCIDENT AT KANSAS IN 2017 PLAY IN YOUR DECISION TO ORIGINALLY RETIRE? “Every time we strap into a race car there’s always a risk involved, but I’ve known that since I was a kid. There’s a risk when you get in a go-kart. There’s a risk involved when I modified raced through late model racing, so I’ve always known that and that’s the risk that I’ve always been willing to take because I love to race so much. The adrenaline rush for me and the thrill of competition has always outweighed the risk factor and that still remains the same for me. Obviously, when you do get older you have more people depending on you. Now I have a wife that depends on me. I have two kids that depend on me, so circumstances certainly change over the years, but, for me, I still accept those risks as a race car driver and want to go out and perform and compete. That thrill always just outweighs the risk.”