Story By: BILL JANITZ / JOE GIBBS RACING – HUNTERSVILLE, NC
Ty Gibbs
Texas Motor Speedway Advance
No. 54 Interstate Batteries Toyota Camry XSE for Joe Gibbs Racing
Event Overview
● Event: Autotrader EchoPark Automotive 400 (Round 9 of 36)
● Time/Date: 3:30 p.m. EDT on Sunday, April 14
● Location: Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth
● Layout: 1.5-mile oval
● Laps/Miles: 267 laps/400.5 miles
● Stage Lengths: Stage 1: 80 laps / Stage 2: 85 laps / Final Stage: 102 laps
● TV/Radio: FS1 / MRN / SiriusXM NASCAR Radio
Notes of Interest
● Outrageously Dependable for 33 Years and Counting: Interstate Batteries has 11 primary sponsorships on the NASCAR Cup Series schedule in 2024, a similar number of schemes to last year’s expanded presence among all four JGR Toyota Camry XSEs. After another appearance in the Daytona 500 to start the season with Christopher Bell finishing in third, Interstate returned at Las Vegas Motor Speedway with Christopher Bell to bring home a 33rd-place finish, and Denny Hamlin brought the green colors to the Circuit of Americas in Austin, Texas, last month and brought home a 14th-place finish. This weekend’s race at Texas is the first of four primary sponsorships on Gibbs’ No. 54 Camry. Next up, Interstate’s colors will have co-primary sponsorships at the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte (N.C.) Motor Speedway in May with Gibbs. Bell and Gibbs will run the majority of the Interstate Batteries’ races with eight primaries total between the two drivers. Hamlin returns for the second of two races sporting Interstate colors at Iowa Speedway in Newton in June, and Martin Truex Jr., will carry a primary Interstate Batteries sponsorship for one race on the No. 19 Interstate Batteries Toyota Camry at Pocono (Pa.) Raceway in July.
● Just a Little Bit Closer. Ty Gibbs makes his 60th career start in the NASCAR Cup Series this weekend at Texas. Gibbs has had a strong start to his sophomore season in NASCAR’s top series, recording three top-five finishes and five top-10s, and leading 309 laps in the eight races contested so far this season. Sitting at the top of his to-do list is scoring his first career Cup Series win, and he’d like nothing more than to bring home that first victory in the backyard of JGR’s founding sponsor Interstate Batteries.
● Texas History. Last September’s race at Texas was Gibbs’ second Cup Series start at the 1.5-mile Texas Motor Speedway oval, but his first for JGR ended early because of an accident. Gibbs competed in the 2022 edition of the Autotrader EchoPark Automotive 400 for 23XI Racing, qualifying 16th, completing every race lap and finishing 20th. In addition to his two Cup Series starts on the Texas oval, Gibbs participated in a pair of Xfinity Series races – both during his 2022 Xfinity Series championship season. The 20-year old’s best Texas effort was a third-place finish he earned during the November 2022 Xfinity Series race.
● Gibbs heads to Texas seventh in the driver standings with 254 points, just 55 behind series leader Kyle Larson. All four JGR entries are currently inside the top-11 in points heading to the ninth race of the season. Martin Truex Jr. sits second in the standings with Denny Hamlin in third, Gibbs seventh, and Christopher Bell 11th, propelling a strong start to the season for Team Interstate.
● At the age of 19 years, 9 months and 20 days, Gibbs made his first career NASCAR Cup Series start last July 24 at Pocono (Pa.) Raceway for 23XI Racing. He became the 37th driver younger than 20 years of age to make a Cup Series start. He started at the rear of the field but completed all 160 laps on his way to an impressive 16th-place finish.
● Dazzling Debut: Gibbs was victorious in his NASCAR Xfinity Series debut in the February 2021 race on the Daytona road course. He led 14 of the 56 laps and became the youngest driver to win an Xfinity Series road-course race at 18 years, 4 months and 16 days. The native of Charlotte, North Carolina, also became the second-youngest winner in Xfinity Series history behind Joey Logano, who won in June 2008 at Kentucky Speedway in Sparta at the age of 18 years, 21 days.
Ty Gibbs, Driver of the No. 54 Interstate Batteries Toyota Camry XSE
What are your thoughts about this weekend’s 400-mile race at Texas?
“I enjoy racing at Texas and it’s cool that Interstate Batteries is back on our car for the first time this year. It’s a big weekend for them whenever we get to race at Texas with their office right up the road. I know they’ll have a lot of people there rooting us on, which is really cool. They are an important part of Joe Gibbs Racing and the founding sponsor, so hopefully we can give them a great weekend.”
With Interstate Batteries being the founding partner at JGR, how special is it to be racing the Interstate Batteries colors at its home track this weekend?
“Norm Miller (Chairman Emeritus) has been great to JGR all the way back to 1991, when my grandfather started this whole thing. He’s just a great guy, and Lain Hancock (President and CEO) is doing a great job, and it’s more than a sponsorship – they’re part of the family. I hope we can put them in victory lane.”
What is your relationship like with crew chief Chris Gayle and the No. 54 team, with whom you’re off to a strong start to the season?
“It’s really great. I work really well with them. Chris Gayle – he has been my crew chief since 2021. He’s been working with me for a minute. I feel like we have a good connection, Also, my engineer Kyle Abrahims – he’s been with me and Chris Gayle since 2021. We’ve all been working really good together and we are going to keep hammering down. Hoping we can keep running up front and have a chance for the win this weekend with Interstate Batteries.”
Joe Gibbs Racing has been very strong over the last few seasons. How do you describe the dynamic at the team right now?
“First of all, we need to give all of the thanks to the Joe Gibbs Racing aero department, along with Toyota. The new Toyota Camry XSE body – they’ve just done a great job with it. They’ve worked really hard on it, so it is great for all of them. Our team is great, and I have great teammates – they all have different characteristics, which is really cool, and I think that is really helpful with a team. We all come from pretty different backgrounds, so it’s a good atmosphere there and, in our meetings on Mondays, I can tell we all want it. All of the great feedback is just going to help us get better and better.”