How TrackHouse Racing’s ‘stars aligned’ in NASCAR Cup Series, and more playoff notes
Ross Chastain admitted that the stars aligned to get him here — seated on one of those high-raising folding chairs and answering questions ahead of the 2022 NASCAR Cup Series playoffs.
Well, he said everything aligned, really.
“The stars, the galaxies, the everything, all parts,” the driver of the No. 1 car said with a smile. “Life’s not fair, and it’ll probably never happen again for anyone else the way it’s happened for me.”
TrackHouse Racing, in some ways, has been the surprise of the 2022 NASCAR Cup Series regular season. Most surprising has been the emergence of the second-year team’s two Cup drivers: There’s Chastain, who notched two Cup wins this year and has made waves (and enemies) for his rambunctious and physical racing style throughout the season. And then there’s Daniel Suarez, who became the first Mexican-born driver to win a Cup Series race when he took home the checkered flag at Sonoma in June.
The drivers reflected on the past two years — the growth of TrackHouse Racing as well as their own personal journeys — on Thursday at NASCAR’s playoff media day in Charlotte.
“It’s just exactly where I’ve wanted to be,” Chastain said.
Chastain signed a long-term deal with THR in August 2021 after a brief and unheralded career.
In 101 races, Chastain had previously driven for Premium Motorsports, Spire Motorsports and Roush Fenway Racing before signing with Ganassi — which sold the team to TrackHouse in June 2021 — and had only notched two top-five finishes and seven top-10s at the Cup level.
And yet TrackHouse Racing owner Justin Marks saw enough to sign him to a multi-year contract — something Chastain never had before — and saw enough to let him keep his team around him.
“Those were the building blocks of what you saw this year,” Chastain said. “Then, the new car that NASCAR and the France family rolled out was the catalyst for TrackHouse, and it’s the main reason that we’ve been able to take the group of people we have and go and compete the way we have. It’s just been exactly where I’ve wanted to be.”
Suarez was candid, too, about his two-year run with TrackHouse.
The driver of the No. 99 Chevrolet became the team’s first driver when he signed with them in October 2020. It was the 2016 Xfinity Series champion’s fourth team in four years.
.JPG "NASCARDaytona500AutoRacing (2).JPG")
He — like Chastain — was given the freedom to maintain his team and was injected with belief, he said.
“Believe it or not, heading into 2021, I had an opportunity to go with a team that was winning races,” Suarez told reporters. “And I didn’t do that because it was a team that a really important person, a person with a lot of experience, told me (was) not in a very good situation. That’s why I chose TrackHouse.
“My father told me I was crazy. A few friends from Mexico asked me, ‘Are you sure you’re making the right call?’ Eight months later, they told me, ‘Yeah, glad you made that call.’ ”
Chastain and Suarez, among the fastest in the field at many racetracks in 2022, are threats to make deep playoff runs — something that not many people expected before the 2022 regular season.
“Sometimes you have to trust your gut a little bit,” Suarez said. “And Justin looked me right in the eye and said, ‘Man, you have to trust me on this. We’re gonna build something great. And I want to be able to give you the opportunity to build a team around you,’ which is something that nobody else allowed me to do in the Cup Series.
“It makes a huge difference when you have a team for you, as opposed to a team that was already there. So I’m just very happy to be in this position.”
.JPG "NASCARDaytona500AutoRacing (9).JPG")
Other notes from media day
▪ Denny Hamlin pulled out of the Xfinity Series race at Darlington due to soreness in his neck, back and hips from the field-collecting wreck in Daytona last weekend. When asked about it, he said that “body-wise, it took a much harder hit than what I’ve had in the past.”
The comment sparked a discourse on whether NASCAR is doing enough to keep drivers safe, particularly in light of Kurt Busch still being out with a brain injury he sustained during qualifying in Pocono in July. Kevin Harvick added to the conversation, too: “I think everybody is wound up now because it keeps happening. Now you got one guy hurt, one guy kind of hurt from Denny’s standpoint, and I think everybody wants to know, ‘What is the progression here? How are we going to make this better? What’s the plan? If it’s not going to be this year, what’s the plan for next year?’”
▪ Chase Elliott, the regular-season champion, echoed many other drivers’ sentiments when he said that there is a lot of parity in this year’s field and thus there really aren’t any favorites. He also said that while playoff experience is likely helpful, that this year proved that anything can happen. Elliott led the field with four Cup wins in 2022.
▪ Ryan Blaney is the only driver competing for a Cup championship without a win in the regular season. He opened up to reporters on Thursday about his stressful final few weeks of fending off Martin Truex Jr., and he hopes that the playoffs will bring him a “fresh start.”
▪ Kyle Busch gave an update on his contract negotiations. He indicated that news might be coming soon and that multiple different contract offers have been extended to him.
