If the past year has been an education for Jake Garcia, next year is time to start applying the lessons learned in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series.
Garcia finished 13th in his debut full-time season with McAnally-Hilgemann Racing, albeit with a caveat, in that he missed the season opener at Daytona because he had yet to turn 18 years old. So, Garcia is still very young and spent past calendar year learning the Truck Series game.
He also won his first Super Late Model race, the North South Challenge at Nashville Fairgrounds Speedway. There were Truck Series highlights too — strong runs at Texas, Bristol Dirt and Richmond. The Truck Series finale at Phoenix was a messy affair for most everyone involve but Garcia survived to finish post a career-best runner-up that night as well.
Most impressive is that Garcia was running at the end of all but one of his starts.
“The aero stuff was big,” Garcia told Sportsnaut earlier in the month. “I had never been on a really big track until this year. That was the biggest thing to learn, for me, was how to race people properly in these trucks, timing your runs, things like that.
“I had to put a lot of thought into things that come naturally once you have experience.”
Garcia has spent the past decade driving straight-rail Pro and Super Late Models with veteran racer Ricky Turner. He basically followed the same path that a young Chase Elliott did the decade before.
He shared their Super Late Model with Elliott this year. Elliott even drove the race at Daytona that Garcia wasn’t yet eligible to run.
These trucks, Garcia learned, are a completely different machine, even on short tracks.
“These styles of (trucks) are a lot different than these Super Late Models I’ve come up driving,” Garcia said. “How the brakes work are different and the racing is just different, too.
“So, getting used to the (trucks) was something I felt was big for me because I didn’t run much ARCA or any Late Model Stocks at all.”
Both of those cars are more spiritually similar to NASCAR platforms than straight-rail Late Models.
“It’s good to be used to the vehicle and the aerodynamics going into this year,” he added. “I’m thankful for the opportunity with Thorsport, Quanta Services and Ford Performance.”
That’s the biggest difference, of course, that Garcia has made the move to Thorsport, one of the most successful organizations in division history.
He will drive the No. 13 next season and says there is definitely heightened expectations to win.
“Yeah, of course, that’s the expectation around there talking to people,” Garcia said. “At the same time, you can only do as much as you can do. I’m going to give it my best and hope everything else falls into place.
“At the same time, I have confidence in Thorsport because they’ve proven time after time that they bring good stuff to the race track. I’m going to do what I can to get myself to that level and hopefully we win races.”
Crew chief assignments within the organization haven’t been announced yet but Garcia said he really enjoyed his time at the team shop all the way up in Sandusky, Ohio.
“I’ve only met Duke at this point,” Garcia said of the Thorson family. “But their atmosphere is different than what you see in North Carolina.
“You hear about it but don’t realize it until you go up there. I really enjoyed it, spent a couple of days up there, and hopefully I can spend some more time up there before we get started. I’m really excited to be there.”
Matt Weaver is a Motorsports Insider for Sportsnaut. Follow him on Twitter.