Kyle Busch - At JGR, Two is Always Better than One
HUNTERSVILLE, N.C., (July 2, 2008) – In any team sport, if there is no chemistry, there is little chance of victory.
A basketball team can have the five most talented players in the country on its roster, but if they can’t play together as a team and don’t like each other, more often than not they’re beaten by five players who play together unselfishly.
Racing is a unique sport where two people can be on the same team but still compete against each other every week.
It’s what Joe Gibbs Racing (JGR) crew chiefs Jason Ratcliff and Dave Rogers do each week as they wage war in NASCAR’s Nationwide Series. They are teammates and friends. They’re also fiercely competitive.
Despite that competitive fire, Rogers and Ratcliff work unselfishly to put the team’s success above all else to ensure that their two cars have a better shot of winning than any of the other 41 cars on the track on any given weekend.
It might seem against their competitive nature that Ratcliff, crew chief of the No. 18 Farm Bureau Insurance Toyota driven by Kyle Busch, and Rogers, crew chief of the No. 20 Toyota driven by Denny Hamlin, often share things they’ve found that could potentially give their biggest competition – each other – an advantage that might help the other find his way to victory lane.
While others may doubt the JGR crew chief duo gives each other full disclosure of what the other is doing, the proof is in the pudding. JGR Toyotas have rung off an astounding 11 wins over the first 18 races during a dream season for the Nationwide Series program that is in its 11th year of existence.
But as the series returns to the 2.5-mile Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway for Friday night’s Winn-Dixie 250 Nationwide Series race, the two teams again unite as they have all season with one common goal – keeping up the JGR dominance.
The JGR duo set the tone from the season-opening race at Daytona in February, as the No. 18 Toyota driven by Kyle Busch pushed teammate Tony Stewart to the win with Busch finishing second. In all, Stewart and Busch combined to lead 93 of 100 laps. Fast-forward to the return trip to Daytona this weekend and JGR has now led an astounding 1,646 of 3,344 (49.2 percent) of the laps run in Nationwide Series competition this season.
Since February at Daytona, the No. 20 car has rung up seven more wins with victories at the Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, Calif. (Stewart), the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez road course in Mexico City (Busch), Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway (Stewart), Richmond (Va.) International Raceway (Hamlin), Darlington (S.C.) Raceway (Stewart), Kentucky Speedway in Sparta (Joey Logano), and finally this past weekend at New Hampshire Motor Speedway in Loudon (Stewart). The No. 18 team added wins at Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth (Busch), Phoenix International Raceway (Busch), and Dover (Del.) International Speedway (Hamlin) to its resume.
For Busch, he’d like nothing more than to flip-flop the result from February’s Orbitz 300 at Daytona and come out on top for the employees and agents of the Farm Bureau Insurance Companies. Through their 4,200-member agency sales force, Farm Bureau Insurance provides auto, home and life insurance to customers and fans throughout the Southeast and will be on board a JGR Toyota for the third time this season with Busch and fourth overall.
The motto of Farm Bureau Insurance is “Helping You is What We Do Best.” For Rogers and Ratcliff, the battle cry this weekend, once again, will be “Helping Each Other is What We Do Best.”
Kyle Busch – Driver, No. 18 Farm Bureau Insurance NASCAR Nationwide Series Toyota Camry at Daytona
You worked so well with your teammate Tony Stewart at Daytona in the first restrictor-plate Nationwide Series race this year. Are you planning to hook up with the No. 20 car that will be driven by Denny Hamlin Friday night in hopes of a similar result at Daytona?
“It doesn’t matter who wins as long as we are on the same team. I’d sure like to win, but if the team wins, that’s what is most important. We worked well together at Daytona. Any time you have two cars out there with guys who get along as well as Tony, Denny and I do, then we are going to be tough for other teams to run against. Anything we can do to get JGR a win will be great for everyone, whether it’s Denny or I who end up in victory lane.”
You won the Nationwide Series race at Daytona last July. Where do you want to be in the draft during the final couple of laps so that you’re in the best position to win?
“The best place to be is out front most of the time, but not always. If you’re on a restart, you know it’s not the best place to be. But if it’s a long, green-flag run to the finish, then you try to get to the front and stay there. It all depends on the situation. When you have a car as strong as I had there last July, then it’s pretty easy to get out front and stay there. We ran well at Daytona in February, but if we want to win, we are going to have to beat Denny and the 20 car.”
Jason Ratcliff – Crew Chief, No. 18 Farm Bureau Insurance NASCAR Nationwide Series Toyota Camry at Daytona
Both you and Dave Rogers share a lot of information. How difficult is that, knowing that you are basically giving stuff you learned that might help your stiffest competition beat you?
“Ever since Dave (Rogers) came over and started working on this 20 car, it’s been a very good relationship between him and I. I’ve worked on other two-car teams, and the exact purpose of having a two-car team is exactly what we are doing here at Joe Gibbs Racing – that’s feeding information back and forth in hopes of keeping the learning curve short. You learn twice as fast since you are making twice as many laps as the other guys each week. It’s the way a two-car team is supposed to work. Nine times out of 10, it doesn’t work that way because you get a personality conflict. This sport is very competitive and human nature is to not share with the guy who’s under your same roof. But since Dave came over, we have worked extremely well together. It’s been tough, at times, because we both know that, any given week, we can go to the race track and win the race – especially this year. The 18’s toughest competition has been the 20. When the 18 shows up, I think it’s the same way for them. I think some of their easier wins this year were races that the 18 wasn’t there, or at least I’d like to think so. I think something that a lot of people don’t realize is that, as the race unfolds, when you make adjustments and plan strategy, we communicate those things from pit box to pit box. We communicate on what the driver’s say about the car and what changes we are going to make and how that affected the car after the pit stop. There’s absolutely nothing that the other team doesn’t know about your race car. It’s almost like going to war and letting the other side know what your next move is. It’s not human nature to do that. But our philosophy is to let it come down to the drivers or one strategy or another.”
At both Kentucky and New Hampshire, both cars were pretty equal. In those situations, how hard is it to tell Dave Rogers exactly what you are doing?
“The last two are the ones that stand out the most, but it’s been that way all year. Both of us have had that taste of victory lane this year, but the thing that drives you the most is going to victory lane. When the opportunity presents itself to win, it makes it even more difficult to stick to the guidelines and the precedents we’ve set as a two-car race team. It makes it tough to stick to that. You know that if I just found something to make me go faster and I share it with them, it’s going to make them go faster. If you ask 100 people, 99 of them are going to tell you that you are stupid for doing that. But that is ultimately why I think it’s gotten us to where we are now. I think if we can continue to do those things, this ride that we are on is going to last a little bit longer than maybe it would if we didn’t share information. How long is it going to last? I don’t know. You are going to have race teams that might have the same parts and pieces, but they don’t communicate the way we do. We really have a two-car team that pretty much runs as one.”
Dave Rogers – Crew Chief, No. 20 NASCAR Nationwide Series Toyota Camry at Daytona
Not that you haven’t been working together in the past, but what is it about this year and how you and Jason Ratcliff have worked together to be able to bring home 11 wins so far this season?
“Jason (Ratcliff) and I, over the past couple of years, have become extremely good friends on and off the race track. That’s been the biggest key in terms of communication. I think we both realize that we can help each other be far more successful if we work together. We’ve become good enough friends now that we put our egos aside. When the 18 car is better, it’s very easy for me to go over and see what they are doing and take their stuff and put it on our car. Jason is willing to give it to us because he knows that a few weeks down the road the shoe might be on the other foot. It’s the same story everyone is going to give you that teamwork always wins. But our organization is so strong that it just helps us take it to the next level.”
It’s seems that you’ve had equal cars so many times this year. Is that a product of how well both teams share information?
“We share everything. Very fortunately, there have been several times that your stiffest competition is your teammate. Our goal is to win as many races for Joe Gibbs Racing as we possibly can, whether it comes from the 18 or the 20. We just know that if we share that information, it’s going to be twice as difficult to beat us. Our competitors not only have to beat the 18, but they have to beat the 20. A great example of that was at Kentucky. I’m sure neither Jason nor I wanted to tell each other what our strategy was because we were both trying to win the race. But we both know it’s the right thing to do. Then, if we get into a situation like we did, where Kyle ends up wrecking out, Jason went home knowing he helped JGR get to victory lane with Joey (Logano). We’re competitive and we want to win, but I think Jason’s extremely satisfied when the 20 car wins and I know I’m really satisfied when the 18 wins. That’s why you share that information. We know that the competition right now is working extremely hard to catch us. We know there are a lot of teams shooting to beat Joe Gibbs Racing, and if we stand still, they are going to beat us. We just keep pushing each other to get better. If we share something we learned with the 18, then that helps them learn something new and they share it with us. It helps us both to not become stagnant.”
While the 18 car doesn’t participate in all the races, what has it meant to you that Jason Ratcliff comes to the race track to help as much as he can with the 20 car?
“I think it says a lot about Jason as a person. He’s dedicated to Joe Gibbs Racing, and he’s dedicated to his race team, but he’s also dedicated to his career. He could easily use that time off to spend with his family or goof off out on the lake, but he’s so dedicated to making this program better and himself better. He comes to the race track and keeps good notes for himself and also contributes to the fight. He has a lot of experience in this Nationwide Series and he has seen a lot of things that I haven’t seen, yet. He gives some really good pointers. By doing that, he’s making both teams better. This sport changes on a daily basis and it’s very easy to get left behind. By him going to the race track and sharing that time with us, he’s making sure he isn’t left behind. When the 18 car goes to the race track, they aren’t behind. I think he’s shown that if the 18 car shows up and you want to win the race, you better plan on beating them because they are going to be right there with you at the front. I know I’m expecting that at Daytona, Chicago and on down the line.”
