Q&A: Jon Wood

CONCORD, N.C. -- Jon Wood, driver of the No. 50 Roush Racing Ford F-150, is currently seventh in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series point standings and has finished in the top five in the last three races.

This has been your best season so far in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series with your first career pole at Memphis and your best career finish (second) at Mesa Marin. Why is this season so much better than the last year and a half?

There are two major differences in our program from last year. The first is our engine program, which Bob Rinaldi oversees in Mooresville, N.C. The second is the chassis we are running each week, which Dave Dunlap oversees in Concord, N.C. Once we moved the truck teams to North Carolina, Roush hired John Monsam as my crew chief and he was able to hire his own people to form our team.

I've done nothing different from last year. It is our trucks and our team that have improved and put us in a position to win races.

We are not quite at the halfway point of the season yet, are there any tracks coming up on the schedule that you especially like, or dislike?

I didn't like many of the tracks last year since we weren't running well. I have been surprised by the tracks I have liked this year like Memphis and Mesa Marin. I never expected to do as well as we did at Mesa Marin. It is easy to like a place when you are fast. I don't want to jinx myself, but I think we should be good everywhere we go this year.

Has running without a sponsor made you race any differently?

No, but everybody likes to say that. It doesn't matter what people think because we are where we need to be right now. I haven't changed the way I drive and it hasn't affected the way we prepare the trucks. Once we get a sponsor, we'll continue to be fast and people will have to come up with another reason why we are running so well.

How much of a difference has it made having a teammate this year?

The way I look at it, it would be like going to a gun fight with only one gun instead of two. You get the job done twice as fast. Carl and I have the same feel for the trucks because we have the same driving style. We have the same ideas and the same way of describing stuff.

That makes it easier on our crew chiefs to communicate, so we can learn twice as much every time we are on track.