NASCAR
Stratta’s Six: Who Could Celebrate July 4th Weekend Big at Road America?
The third road course race of the NASCAR season is Sunday from Road America. July 4th weekend will be celebrated on the four-mile circuit in Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin, with their third-ever Cup Series date. Last season, Chase Elliott took his seventh road course victory here, after starting deep in the field. With the Next Gen car now though, one Chevrolet team has been stout on road courses, but not Hendrick. Through the season’s first two road course races, Trackhouse Racing is undefeated with both of their drivers. Can Trackhouse score a road course threepeat, or will someone else pull off the Road America victory?
Chase Elliott
The road course king, Chase Elliott has seven victories since 2018, including Road America last year. Despite starting 34th, Elliott methodically worked his way forward all day in Wisconsin, eventually leading the final 17 laps en route to the win by six seconds. Can Chase Elliott go back-to-back on Independence Day weekend? Through 2022’s first two road course races, Elliott does have a pair of top-10s.
“I’m excited to get back to Road America,” Elliott said. “I thought last year’s event was really good. For me, I was always partial to having the Fourth (of July) race at Daytona, but the crowd was really good and the energy was super high, and I think we need to have an energetic race on the Fourth. That’s a big weekend for our country. It’s a race inside our sport that I think is deserving of a lot of energy too, because we are a sport that’s going on this time of year and that needs to be a big event.”
“I felt like the people up there welcomed us with open arms and brought a lot of energy. Anytime you have energy at the track, it makes it fun for everybody involved. Whether you’re working inside the sport, you’re a driver, you’re another a fan there, it just makes for a better event, better environment. Last year, I felt was a great example of that. I hope that’s the case again this weekend. I hope the results are the same this weekend and everybody has a big time.”
Coming off of his second win of 2022 at Nashville, Elliott has to be seen as a favorite to go back-to-back. The 9 team overcame great struggles prerace to win at Road America a year ago, so Elliott can win here under duress. Everything is different on road courses with the Next Gen car, but the Road America winner could still be the same.
Ross Chastain
So far in 2022, Trackhouse Racing is 2-2 on road courses, which began with Ross Chastain’s COTA win. Chastain has been arguably the most consistent driver all season long in the Cup Series, with 11 top-10s. While his teammate Daniel Suarez won at Sonoma a few weeks back, Chastain’s 1 car was seventh. Coming off a P7 result at Road America last year, Chastain is excited for another trip to Wisconsin.
“I love going to Road America,” Chastain said. “I’m excited to get there and get on the track. Obviously, I’m a fan of road courses but I really enjoy Road America.”
Chastain also explained how he prepares now for a road course race. “Actual preparation of the car for the road courses is so different from what it used to be since we take oval cars and race them on the road courses and vice versa. On the driver side, its something as simple as a visual board, chasing dots, reaction times, getting our eyes to look left and up. For ovals, we kind of look out of the top of our helmet and the banking. We are so conditioned to look left since we’ve been oval track racers most of our lives. Muscle memory for the right and getting our muscles and bodies to focus to the right because it’s not as natural. It’s kind of like writing your name with your non-dominate hand, it just doesn’t come as natural.”
Trying to make up ground to points leader Chase Elliott, Ross Chastain aims for a strong run at Road America. With a 30-point deficit to the 9, Chastain fully believes that the regular season championship is still in reach. The 1 vs. the 9 may very well be the winning battle on Sunday.
Kyle Busch
In 2021, Kyle Busch had perhaps the best weekend of anyone at Road America. Driver 18 won the Xfinity race, backing up that run with a third-place result on Sunday. For this being his first visit ever to Elkhart Lake, Busch was not far off from a perfect weekend. With a return trip to the four-mile track, KB could be lights-out this time around.
“I’ve never raced there before last year, but we had a really good weekend,” Busch remembered. “We were able to win the Xfinity race with our M&M’S Ice Cream Supra, and then we had a really solid race with our Skittles America Mix Camry. We had to come from the back last year, but we had a really good racecar; just not good enough to keep up with Chase (Elliott). We struggled at Sonoma (earlier this month), so hoping we learned some things not to do from Sonoma and we can have a better run there. Looking forward to getting to Road America this weekend and learning as much as we can and have a good run with our Skittles America Mix Camry and get us a win on Fourth of July weekend. That would be pretty cool.”
“With those big straightaways, the corners are important,” Busch explained. “Like missing turn three, I think it’s called, and then going down along back there. That’s important. That’s a big deal. Obviously, the last corner, I think it’s 13 or 14, coming up along from straightaway. So those can be detrimental to lap time, for sure, because you’re just losing time by the distance in which it takes to get up to speed, so you really want to be strong on those turns.”
Joe Gibbs Racing, Kyle Busch, and Toyota all want to bounce back from poor results at both Sonoma and Nashville a week ago. With Busch almost going 2-2 in his first Wisconsin races last year, he is seen as a heavy threat for Sunday’s victory.
Daniel Suarez
After being arguably the best car at COTA and winning Sonoma, Daniel Suarez will chase another checkered flag at Road America. As said above, Trackhouse cars are unbeaten so far this year on road courses; both the 1 and 99 will likely be tough to beat on Sunday. The winning gorilla is finally off of Suarez’s chest. Just how does he feel entering a weekend where he’s a favorite?
“I would be lying to you if I told you I’m not extremely excited about every single road course because I believe that we can win in every single one of them,” said Suarez. “We have good cars. I have a very good team behind me. I feel like I’ve done a good job with the tools that have been given to me and it’s been fun. So, I’m really looking forward to it. I know it’s going to be a lot of fun for me; and hopefully we can have another strong shot.”
Winning his way into the Playoffs at Sonoma, Daniel Suarez now aims to assert his place as a championship threat. The Trackhouse 99 debatably should have a few wins by now, so they could go for broke in trying to reach another victory.
Kyle Larson
Road America 2021 was a very rare whiff weekend for eventual champion Kyle Larson. With that in mind, Larson is entered in this weekend’s Xfinity race for added track time. Saturday will see Larson drive the No. 17 Chevrolet for Hendrick Motorsports, as one of five drivers pulling double duty. With the additional laps, Larson will have a wealth of experience heading into Sunday’s race. However, Xfinity cars contrast greatly with Next Gen cars, so how can Larson manage the changes across both vehicles?
“There are some big differences between the Cup and Xfinity cars,” Larson said. “Like braking points and sequential shifting in the Cup car versus an H-pattern in the Xfinity car. But getting more track time is worth it while getting an additional race with Kevin (Meendering) calling the shots will help our communication.”
Larson had three dominant road course wins a year ago, but Road America was not one of them. It will certainly be a big story all weekend long to see how the California driver fares in both races, as he chases a weekend sweep on the four-mile track.
Martin Truex Jr
Road racing ace Martin Truex Jr could earn his first victory of 2022 this weekend. Coming off arguably his best run of the year at Nashville, the 19 is primed to possibly break through into the winner’s circle. Earlier this season MTJ was seventh in COTA, so his road racing prowess could pay off Sunday.
“It’s a great track,” Truex said. “It’s obviously a very long track, so you get a lot of different types of corners and some elevation changes. We’re definitely looking at this weekend as being very important. We weren’t where we need to be at Sonoma and our guys have been working really hard since then to figure out why and hopefully come to Road America this weekend with a better shot at running up front like we know we’re capable of.”
No longer racing in doubt of his future, MTJ could throw caution to the win and fully focus on chasing victories now. Finishing ninth here a year ago, Truex enters as among the favorites for those still searching for a first win of 2022. Nashville’s breakout run could have been just a teaser of things to come for the 19.
Coverage of the Kwik Trip 250 Presented by Jockey begins Sunday at 3:00 p.m. ET on USA Network, MRN, and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio Channel 90. Between Chase Elliott, Trackhouse, and Toyota, several hungry drivers enter this weekend favored for another win. Still a relatively new track for all drivers, can Road America provide an upset winner?
Written by Peter Stratta
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Photo Credit to Logan Riely/Getty Images for NASCAR
