After last season, Stenhouse Jr. and JTG knew they had to recalibrate. The result: a lot more consistency — and a playoff berth.
When Mike Kelley left Daytona International Speedway with the Daytona 500 trophy in hand last February, he was extremely proud of what he, driver Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and all of JTG Daugherty Racing had accomplished. But the crew chief made it known that while winning NASCAR’s biggest race was significant, virtually ensuring a spot in the playoffs, he didn’t want this to be the team’s lone highlight.
“At the end of last year, I had no confidence at all, honestly,” Stenhouse said. “I didn’t have confidence in what we were doing with the race cars. I wasn’t so sure I had confidence in what I was doing behind the wheel and the feedback I was giving. Everything was just kind of a disaster; the last 10 races just didn’t go well. We just struggled for speed. And it’s not like we had speed with no handling or handling with no speed. We didn’t have either.
Few within the industry know Stenhouse like Kelley. And similar to Daugherty, Kelley began to restore Stenhouse’s confidence while also initiating efforts to build JTG into a team capable of winning races and vying for a playoff berth, something the single-car team had only done once previously. On this front, Kelley and competition director Ernie Cope restructured several aspects of the organization. Changes were made in how pre- and post-race meetings were conducted, and Cope’s vision became the guiding principle for the overall organization while Kelley led the No. 47 team how he saw fit.
Fast cars will go a long way to upping a team’s performance, yet it still requires a capable driver. And if JTG was going to truly find its form, it needed Stenhouse to not just regain his confidence but also to embrace a “less is more” philosophy.On days when Stenhouse had a 10th-place car, for instance, the team wanted him to actually finish 10th instead of wrecking it while pushing to finish ninth.
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