No. 20 Dollar General Toyota News & Notes:
- DOLLAR GENERAL TWO’FER: For the first time this season, the No. 20 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota Camry will carry the colors of new sponsor Dollar General this weekend in Phoenix. In fact, this weekend will mark the first of several events where Dollar General will have two Joe Gibbs Racing Toyotas in the field, as Dollar General is also a full-season sponsor on the No. 11 of driver Brian Scott in the Nationwide Series. Dollar General will also sponsor JGR’s No. 18 in several NASCAR Nationwide Series events this season, as well as Joey Logano’s No. 20 Sprint Cup Series ride in 12 races.
- MOMENTS FROM VICTORY IN DAYTONA: Logano and the rest of the NASCAR Nationwide Series made their season-debut last weekend at Daytona International Speedway and Logano found himself just yards from victory before getting involved in a last-lap multi-car accident. On the final lap, Logano found himself working with Trevor Bayne as the tandem was moving to the front on a final green-white-checkered run to the finish. Heading down the backstretch, Bayne had pushed Logano into the top-spot. In turn four, Logano and Bayne were forced to move up the track as the car underneath them moved up to block. As a result, Logano was spun from behind and slammed into the outside wall with the rest of the leaders. Logano was able to re-fire his Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota and drive across the finish line, coming home 16th.
- PHOENIX VICTORY LANE STILL AWAITS LOGANO: While victory has eluded Logano at Phoenix International Raceway over the years in the NASCAR Nationwide Series, it’s been a good track for the 21-year-old. In six-career starts at the track, Logano has never finished outside of the top-10, including a near-race win in the spring race of 2010 when Logano found himself leading late, but contact with another car damaged the right front of his Toyota and forced him to slide through the field on a final race to the checkers. Logano’s last three finishes at Phoenix have been third, sixth and fourth. Logano also has two top-10 finishes in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series at Phoenix.
- IF YOU HAVEN’T YET, MEET ADAM STEVENS: For the second-straight year, 33-year-old Adam Stevens will serve as the crew chief for the No. 20 Toyota and driver Joey Logano. Before taking over the reins of the No. 20 last season, Stevens spent the previous six seasons as the race engineer for JGR’s NASCAR Sprint Cup Series No. 20 Home Depot Toyota team. A native of Portsmouth, OH and graduate of Notre Dame High School, Stevens grew up racing dirt late models with his father in Ohio. Stevens worked on cars until he turned 16 and then got behind the wheel until he moved to North Carolina following his college graduation from Ohio University with a degree in Mechanical Engineering. Adam is married to his wife Aubrey and has one son, Carter, and another boy, Ryan, due in May.
- NEW FACES, SAME OLD CREW: While a majority of the No. 20 Dollar General team is remaining the same, led by crew chief Adam Stevens, there are a couple of new faces on the crew heading into the new season. Heath Landis will serve as the team’s new car chief, coming over from Roush-Fenway Racing’s No. 60 Nationwide Series team. There are two new members on the over-the-wall pit crew as well. Joe Crossen will serve as the team’s new rear-tire changer and comes over from the No. 17 Roush-Fenway team, while Chris Taylor will be the new front-tire carrier and joins JGR from the No. 1 Earnhardt-Ganassi team. Rocky Ryan will serve as Joey’s spotter for the 2012 season. Ryan spent the last few years spotting for David Ragan.
- THE RACE: The Bashas’ Supermarkets 200 at Phoenix Int’l Raceway (Avondale, AZ; 1-mile oval) is set for Saturday afternoon, March 3, 2012. The race will be broadcast on ESPN2 at 4 p.m. ET, with radio coverage on MRN
Logano’s 2012 NASCAR Nationwide Series Season Stats:
|
Starts
|
Wins
|
Top 5
|
Top 10
|
Poles
|
Laps Led
|
Earnings
|
Avg. Start
|
Avg. Finish
|
|
1
|
0
|
0
|
0
|
0
|
0
|
$44,845
|
22.0
|
16.0
|
Logano’s Career NASCAR Nationwide Series Stats:
|
Starts
|
Wins
|
Top 5
|
Top 10
|
Poles
|
Laps Led
|
Earnings
|
Avg. Start
|
Avg. Finish
|
|
89
|
9
|
41
|
69
|
16
|
1453
|
$3,104,179
|
7.3
|
7.6
|
Logano’s Career NASCAR Nationwide Series Stats at Phoenix International Raceway:
|
Starts
|
Wins
|
Top 5
|
Top 10
|
Poles
|
Laps Led
|
Earnings
|
Avg. Start
|
Avg. Finish
|
|
6
|
0
|
3
|
6
|
1
|
44
|
$166,943
|
6.0
|
6.2
|
From the Cockpit:
Joey Logano Quotes: “I feel really confident going into Phoenix. The last few times we’ve been there, we’ve learned a lot about the track. We know some things we can do and things we can’t do with the car. Plus, Joe Gibbs Racing as an entire organization has made a ton of changes during the off-season and really worked hard to improve on the cars, especially on the mile and mile-and-a-half tracks. It will be nice to get back to a place like Phoenix where it is more about the car and handling than Daytona is. We all enjoy racing at Daytona, but when you get to Phoenix, you really feel like you are starting out the year and feel like you will get a good idea as to what you will have on the track.
“I’m pretty excited to have Dollar General on board for this weekend. This will be my first of many races with them this year on both the Nationwide Series and Cup Series sides. It’s big to have a company like Dollar General come on board with Joe Gibbs Racing and not with just one team, but on all three of our Nationwide Series cars during the year and with me in the Sprint Cup Series for a bunch of races. That tells a lot for our team, our drivers and our racing program. Hopefully we can get Dollar General a few wins this year, starting this weekend.”
From the Pit Box:
Adam Stevens Quotes: “Phoenix is still very new with the repave and that goes into your planning and preparation. Last time there in November we saw large balance changes through practice. This will likely be the trend again this time around. Track position beat tires late in the race because it’s really difficult to pass here. The racing groove didn’t open up much last time. This will get a little better every time we come back, but track position will be huge. The focus will be on getting a good starting spot and beating people off pit road this week.”
The Joe Gibbs Racing Machines:
- PRIMARY CAR INFO: The Dollar General team will take chassis #132 to Phoenix. It raced last season at Loudon and Chicago.
- BACK-UP CAR: Chassis #124 will serve as the team’s backup car.
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