Tuesday, March 25, 2014

Matt Kenseth looking forward to Martinsville return; led 202 laps last fall

Matt Kenseth is 18/1 to win on Sunday at Martinsville
Matt Kenseth/No. 20 Dollar General Toyota Preview
STP 500 at Martinsville Speedway
No. 20 Dollar General Toyota News and Notes:

JOE GIBBS RACING AT MARTINSVILLE: Joe Gibbs Racing has 92 Sprint Cup Series starts at Martinsville Speedway earning a total of seven wins, 31 top-five, 48 top-ten finishes, and seven poles. The organization also has led for a total of 3,267 laps and has an average finish of 13.5 at the 0.526-mile short track.

KENSETH BY THE NUMBERS: In 28 Sprint Cup Series starts at Martinsville, Kenseth has completed 13,901 of 14,034 laps (99.1 percent). Kenseth has led for a total of 371 laps and has earned four top-five and nine top-ten finishes at the half-mile track. A runner-up finish is Kenseth’s career best finish at Martinsville, which he earned in April 2002 and his last race at the track in October of 2013.

DOLLAR GENERAL PARTNER SUPPORT: Dollar General would like to thank vendor partners Angel Soft, Betty Crocker, Brawny, Bugles, Clorox Wipes, Colgate, Energizer, Gain, Gatorade, Hamburger Helper, Hanes, Hefty Reynolds Wrap, Honey Nut Cheerios, Lays, Old Spice, Snuggle, Sparkle, Stacker2, Sun and Windex for their support of the DG Racing program.

RACE INFO: The STP 500 at Martinsville Speedway (0.526-mile) begins at 1:00 p.m. ET on Sunday, March 30th. The race will be broadcast live on FOX, Sirius XM Channel 90 and MRN Radio.
From the Cockpit:
Matt Kenseth: “I think the biggest challenge for Martinsville, probably more than all the tracks we go, is the new qualifying procedure. The challenge is not getting in someone else’s way and not having someone else in your way, so I think that qualifying session is going to be a big deal. I’m not sure that qualifying will be all that different from what we had before there, but there’s definitely the potential of either being in the way, or having someone else in the way, because there’s only one groove there. I think it will make qualifying much tenser just in the aspect of making sure you get a clean lap. You might want to run three laps, or you might want to run four, and you just have to make sure that you don’t have cars in the way. I thought that we had two really great runs last year at Martinsville, which hasn’t always been the case for me, so I’m looking forward to getting back there this weekend with our DG team.”

From the Pit Box:
Jason Ratcliff:
“Thankfully we have a good baseline to go off of from our races at Martinsville last year, so it will be a similar plan of attack heading into this weekend, even with the new rules package. We had two really good races at Martinsville last year for our No. 20 team and my goal is to keep that rolling. I really thought we even improved from the first race to the second race at Martinsville last year even. I definitely thought we were a top-five car there last spring, and felt we had a top-two car with a shot to win it last fall, so it’s a race weekend that’s high on our list of places we want to pull out all the stops at.”

Find the Dollar General store nearest you or learn more about the company at www.dollargeneral.com or on Dollar General’s Facebook or Twitter pages.

- Joe Gibbs Racing

No comments: