Chevrolet has a 12-win streak going at Indianapolis
SPEEDWAY, Ind. — Chevrolet NASCAR Sprint Cup Series teams have owned Indianapolis Motor Speedway, lock, stock and four-barrel.
They may no longer run carburetors in the series, but the switch to electronic fuel ignition has thus far failed to stymie the strength of the bowtie gang. Not when it comes to competing on the legendary 2.5-mile track. The past 12 trips here (this year it’s known as the Jeff Kyle 400 at the Brickyard, 3:30 p.m. ET Sunday on NBCSN, IMS, SiriusXM) have ended with a Chevrolet driver in the winner’s circle.
That may be about to change.
Toyota teams are rumbling. For just the second time here, a Toyota driver and team will start on the pole. Three others are sprinkled throughout the top 10. And Kyle Busch won Saturday’s XFINITY race from the pole in a Toyota.
“We started so slow yesterday (in practice) and we struggled,” Joe Gibbs Racing driver Carl Edwards explained after winning the pole with a speed of 183.464 mph.
It was bad enough, he said, that at one point during the day he and crew chief Darian Grubb could only look at each other and shrug their shoulders.
“We were looking at each other going, ‘What are we going to do here?'” Edwards, 35, said. “I’m so proud of my guys. … This is big.”
Of course, it’s only the pole. Four hundred miles sit between Edwards and a potential trip to Victory Lane. The No. 1 qualifying spot comes with no guarantees.
Surprising David Ragan (Michael Waltrip Racing) will start third in a Toyota; teammate Clint Bowyer will go off seventh and Kyle Busch (JGR), winner of three of the past four Sprint Cup races, will start ninth.
Joey Logano, one of two Team Penske Fords in the field, will start alongside Edwards. Logano has his own incentives – the Daytona 500 winner has a shot to become just the second driver to sweep both the 500 and the Brickyard in the same season.
Toyota teams have won at 22 of the 23 tracks currently hosting Sprint Cup events. Indy has yet to be conquered. The manufacturer has won here before in open-wheel competition, but it is 0-for-NASCAR where Sprint Cup is concerned.
“I think (for) most drivers, manufacturers and teams there are two races that you would circle … as the biggest,” David Wilson, President and General Manager, Toyota Racing Development, USA, said Saturday.
“It starts with the Daytona 500 and then I would have to say the Brickyard is next, if not on the same level.”
From an engineering standpoint, Wilson said he puts more stock in the Brickyard.
“I’d say a win here is a greater achievement because of the nature of (restrictor) plate racing, you marginalize so much of the technology that goes into that race,” he said. “Not to suggest I wouldn’t love to have a Daytona 500 win and hopefully one day we will, but to win here at the Brickyard it would be difficult to express how big that would be for Toyota.”
Wilson has heard the numbers. He knows Chevrolet’s sterling record at Indy.
“Whether we win or not … what’s clear is that we are bringing cars that can win. Last year we finished second, third and fourth. There was one car that was better than us. But it was a lot better to us.
“I feel like, heading into tomorrow we can race with anybody out there on the race track and I don’t know that we’ve come here before with that level of confidence.”
Edwards knows all about confidence. Posting only one top-10 through this season’s first 11 races wasn’t how he envisioned his start with JGR.
“This sounds kind of silly in hindsight, but I planned on going out and winning the Daytona 500, then going and winning Atlanta — I was on a mission and I think I got a little bit ahead of myself.
“Darian and I, to be completely honest, we just didn’t settle for running seventh where we probably should have ran that week; I was out there driving like a maniac and then we had a little bit of bad luck there with flat tires and all of a sudden here we are with no good finishes.
“Disappointed is a fine word; I don’t know if that’s a strong enough word for how I felt maybe 10 or 12 weeks into the season.”
The No. 19 team enjoyed a breakthrough at Charlotte Motor Speedway, winning the Coca-Cola 600 and putting Edwards in line for one of this year’s 16 Chase for the Sprint Cup spots. Although his next five starts were 12th or worse, for the past two he’s finished inside the top 10.
“It allowed us all to relax,” he said of the win, “and from that point … I think that has really helped us and given us a little more confidence and calm and it’s been good. …
“It has been a trial; I think in a way it’s been really good for me because I’ve had to dig deep and lean on my teammates and get back to the basics to get what needs to get done.”
No other manufacturer enjoys such a stellar track record as Chevrolet at Indy. Edwards would be more than happy to see the streak come to an end.
“To be able to win here would be huge,” he said. “Toyota hasn’t won one (here) yet. The JGR stable, which includes Denny Hamlin and Matt Kenseth as well as Edwards and Busch, “is fast,” according to Edwards.
And obviously “our car is really fast,” he said.
“It definitely could happen.”