Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway Race Preview

Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway (.533-mile superspeedway, Bristol, Tenn.)

No. 22 Shell-Pennzoil Ford Fusion driven by Joey Logano

Sunday, March 16, 1:00 pm ET

• NEVER BEFORE IN HIS CAREER…: Just three races into the season, Joey Logano is already off to the strongest start of his Sprint Cup Series career. His fourth-place standing in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series (NSCS) points is the highest that Logano has ever been over the course of his five previous full-time seasons. Logano also has led laps in the Shell-Pennzoil Ford Fusion in all three events in 2014 (all four, counting the Sprint Unlimited). This marks the first time that Logano has led laps in three or four straight events.
• HELP JOEY HELP GAVIN: In 2010, a special young boy named Gavin Grubbs got the thrill of a lifetime when Logano, his favorite driver, surprised him when he visited Gavin in Arkansas as part of the Make-A-Wish Foundation. Since then, Logano and Grubbs have remained very close and often exchange text messages. Now, Logano is helping Gavin once again. Gavin, who suffers from merosin-negative muscular dystrophy, is trying to raise $10,000 for a local Muscular Dystrophy Association (MDA) walk in Arkansas. Logano is enlisting his social media followers to help Gavin raise the funds. In addition to Logano personally donating through the number of retweets, anyone that donates $5 or more to the cause will get a Racers Dream Garage calendar. Visit twitter.com/joeylogano for more information.
• BRISTOL BIOGRAPHY: Bristol Motor Speedway is known to be unpredictable and that theme ties in well with Logano’s results at the famed half-mile speedway. Logano struggled over his first couple of years at Bristol, but he turned things around in 2012 when he finished eighth. Last season, Logano was racing for the lead before contact with another competitor took him out of contention. He backed up that run with a fifth-place finish in the fall Bristol race last year. Logano has only qualified outside of the top 10 twice in his 10 career starts at the track. In 2010, he won the pole at Bristol when he set the record as the youngest Sprint Cup Series pole winner in series history.
• BRING ON ANOTHER SHOOTOUT: With Logano’s pole won at Las Vegas, the eighth of his career, he qualified for next season’s Sprint Unlimited. Logano has never missed the season-opening event in his NSCS career. Logano’s eighth-career pole puts him 69th on the all-time list, tied with Kyle Petty and Elliott Sadler.

TALK ABOUT YOUR GREAT START TO THE SEASON.

“Yeah, it’s been a really good start. We have done some of the things we wanted to going into the year other than win a race. But we have been in a position to win races at each of the first three races. Daytona is Daytona, but I think we were good enough with a few more changes to win at Phoenix and Vegas. We’ve lead laps in each race as well. And we’ve qualified on the front row in the last two races. So it’s been a good start. But we can’t focus on that. We need to focus on winning races. We want to get that first win under our belt and then let the rest take care of itself. So we don’t think about the first races too much. We focus on what’s coming next. But we will ride the momentum.”

IS MOMENTUM A BIG FACTOR IN THIS SPORT?

“Momentum really gives you confidence. And confidence means a lot, both as a driver but also for the team. You need to work well together as a team between the driver and the crew chief, the driver and the mechanics and the mechanics and the crew chief. When you have momentum, you have confidence and when you have the confidence, the chemistry is just there and it shows in the garage. I don’t think momentum itself does a lot, but it can affect other things, which then can mean a lot. That is one of the strongest parts of the No. 22 Shell-Pennzoil team is our chemistry. It’s at an all-time high right now.”