Perhaps no one in NASCAR has a more fitting sponsor than Martin Truex Jr., driver of the No. 1 Bass Pro Shops/Tracker Boats Chevrolet for Earnhardt Ganassi Racing.

That's because Truex is the self-professed best fisherman in the Sprint Cup garage. He talked 1-on-1 recently about all things fishing.

Q: Obviously you have a great passion for fishing. Why do you love it so much?

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It's not like -- as I think you've said -- getting a bucket of beer and just sitting there. It's about finding the fish, catching 'em and staying on top of it.

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MARTIN TRUEX JR.

Truex: Well, I grew up fishing [in and around his hometown of Mayetta, N.J.]. I did a lot of salt-water and fresh-water fishing. I did all of the salt-water stuff with my dad and my uncles, because they always had a boat and we would go out in the bay or in the ocean fishing. I would always go with them when I could.

But I got into fresh-water fishing because I didn't have a boat, wasn't old enough to drive. So I would grab my bait-and-tackle box, hop on my bike, and ride to the nearest lake. Where I grew up, that was Ocean Acres Lake at a golf club.

Q: Was it a lake or a pond?

Truex: It was a lake. Not real big, but pretty big. I fished a lot there. It's just something I always enjoyed, from when I was little. I can remember my grandfather taking me when I couldn't have been more than 5 years old.

Q: How often do you go fishing now?

Truex: I actually go more during the season than in the offseason. The offseason, it's wintertime and cold out there -- and I'm not too into that cold stuff.

Q: Well, you could go somewhere, you know. Like maybe Florida?

Truex: Well, yeah. But I usually do hunting trips in the wintertime. In the spring and the summer, I fish all the time. I live on Lake Norman [just outside Charlotte] and I have a bass boat that I got from Bass Pro, obviously.

I really enjoy it. I've fished in a lot of tournaments, and I've won a couple of them. I won [Ryan] Newman's tournament that he had this winter [on Lake Norman]. I like the challenge of it. It's a lot tougher than people think. It's not like -- as I think you've said -- getting a bucket of beer and just sitting there. It's about finding the fish, catching 'em and staying on top of it.

Q: What do you fish for mostly on Lake Norman, bass?

Truex: Yeah, bass. I catch some striped bass once in a while, too, but I don't target that species too much.

Q: Do you clean 'em and eat 'em?

Truex: I eat the stripers. I don't eat the bass.

Q: Do you clean 'em yourself?

Truex: Yep, I clean 'em and cook 'em. I'm a do-it-yourself kind of guy.

Q: Do you know what 'noodling' is? [It's where 'fishermen' stand about waist-high in water and try to pull giant catfish out from under rocks and in the sides of creekbeds.]

Truex: Yes. And that's crazy.

Q: Have you ever done it?

Truex: I don't like to touch catfish, let alone put my hand in their mouth and try to pull them out of a hole. So no, I've never done it nor will I.

I caught a catfish off my dock the other day, and I was like, 'Ah, s---!' Reel it up, grab the pliers, shake it off and, 'Get outta here.' That's how that went.

Q: It seems like catfish is the only kind of fish I ever catch in my very limited experience ...

Truex: Well, see, that's the kind of fish you catch when you're just there with a bucket of beer, sitting on top of a cooler.

Q: If you had a top couple of fishing memories, what would they be?

Truex: When I was a young kid, we used to all go out -- me and my dad and my mom, a couple of uncles and a couple of my cousins. ... There were probably eight or nine of us on one boat, and we would go blue fishing. We would catch one fish after another. They were pretty big, too. We did a lot of it in the bay. If you're a kid, you want to catch something -- so for us, it was perfect. We would catch the livin' daylights out of those fish. It was a lot of fun.

Q: Who in this garage is a good fisherman, and who might think they're a good fisherman but they're really not?

Truex: Oh, I haven't really fished with many of them. I've fished with Newman, and he's pretty good. I'm not sure who else. I think Tony Stewart fishes some, but I don't think he's that good.

Q: I've heard Stewart talk a good game about fishing ...

Truex: Well, see, he and Newman fish in ponds a lot, and that's like shooting fish in a barrel. It's a lot easier to catch 'em in a pond. ... It's a lot tougher to fish in a big place like Lake Norman, where they have tournament trails come through and guys fish a lot, and there is a lot of pressure on the fish. You've got to do certain things to make them bite -- and that's after you figure out where they're at. There are so many places for them to go. They move throughout the season. Different times of the year at different water temperatures, they're at different depths and on different kinds of structures.

As far as that kind of stuff goes, I don't think I've got any competition. But other than that, Newman's a pretty good fisherman.

Joe Menzer is the author of "The Great American Gamble: How the 1979 Daytona 500 Gave Birth to a NASCAR Nation." Click here to purchase.