The 2024 NASCAR Truck Series was not what Matt Crafton wanted it to be and it came off a general three year downturn of the ThorSport Racing No. 88 program in general.
In fact, the three-time champion even called it ‘terrible’ when speaking to Larry McReynolds and Danielle Trotta on SiriuxXM NASCAR Radio, even while making time to recognize all their shared accomplishments as a team over the past quarter century.
“Duke and Rhonda (Thorson) have been incredible owners and I could not ask for anyone better to be honest,” Crafton said. “And when Duke shook my hand and told me he was a man of his word and we’re going to win races and championships, build it as a business, that’s what we went and did — we built it as a business each every year and made it better.
“I mean, at the beginning, we definitely were not a a winning team right off. We slowly built it and then the wins came, and then the championships came. That’s the hard part to swallow, the last two to three years has been a struggle to our expectations because they were so high for a little while and we got off a little bit but we’re definitely planning on working and getting going in the right direction.”
Comparisons to champion teammate Ty Majeski, 98 team
“My biggest thing right now is just trying to look at what Ty’s doing. I mean, Ty’s been in a league of his own. I mean, he is been incredible. What they’ve done all year, they’ve had speed (and) at the end of the year, they really put the consistency down.
“And honestly, the other four teams, we’ve been off. I mean we’ve all been off as a whole. If you look at it, and I went on a streak, I think it was seven races (where) I had no better than a 20-something place finish. It was not always my fault there. I take a couple of them, but then there was just some mechanical issues and getting caught up in people’s crashes and just terrible luck.
“But at the end of the day, when you’re running around some of the stuff that you shouldn’t be running around, you get caught up in stuff that you shouldn’t be running around. So that’s part of it. And just like I said, I’m ready to put the year behind us and move forward and make the Menard’s Ford F-150 fast again.”
Crafton has won championships before and after playoffs; thoughts?
“Needs to be changed a lot in my opinion but I’m not an asker. I don’t make the rules. We’re going by too much stick and ball sports and we are not a stick and ball sport. We’re looking at all that and we’re not that. We should do it on the whole season — start at Daytona and put the whole season together, consistency.
“In 2019 (when he won the playoff without winning a race all year) we kind of got where we were pretty good at the end of the year and we just put it all together and I knew I was racing each and every week and I knew what stage points we had to have. I knew that and that’s all you’re gonna race at that point of the season. And I don’t, in my opinion, I don’t think that’s right. NASCAR was based on a full season and that’s what I think it should be and yeah, they probably aren’t gonna go back to that and I get it but there’s definitely some tweaks they could do to it.”
10 race Chase format?
“Yeah, I’d do that if we weren’t going to do a full season. I’d go for something like that for sure.”
Where is the incentive to win in the Chase format?
“There really isn’t. If they’re gonna do playoffs, that’s the way it’s got to be. And you can point. … I mean, if you lock yourself into the next round, if you win the final race, you lock yourself in. I’ll never forget 2019, was leading the (final) race with eight or nine laps to go. Austin Hill (is not in the final four and) we’re racing side by side by side and I’m like, ‘I might be better than him right here. He might be better than me but you know what, I don’t need a yellow and I’m not gonna keep racing like a fool like we were doing for a couple laps.’ I said I’m gonna go win the war. I’m not just going to win this battle. And I finished second that race, but I very well could have won the race and they wouldn’t have had quite as much to gripe about. But that was just part of it. I thought about big picture at that point.”
Schedule
In the conversation, Crafton also endorsed 25 races for the Truck Series schedule. He says when NASCAR cut the races beack to 20-23, that range, teams laid people off because the schedule became more seasonal, even though the cost to run the season didn’t change.
“It hurt the teams that actually pay people to go to the race track by the sponsors,” Crafton said. “If the sponsor is then paying you less to be at the track less, you’re losing money to have people and the equipment. There’s definitely two ways of looking at it but I’m definitely team 25 or more. If the teams can get the funding, it’s definitely going to help them.”
Crafton also endorsed the schedule diversity in NASCAR these days saying the race in Chicago was a success but take it to new cities now. He says today’s schedules are better than going to Texas and Charlotte twice. He said it is cool to go back to Rockingham. He says he remembers packed out races at Mansfield in Ohio.
“I feel we need to have more of that,” he said.
