Zane Smith, driver of the No. 38 Ford F-150 for Front Row Motorsports, is the only one in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series with two victories after coming away with a win two weeks ago at Circuit of the Americas. Smith also won the last time the series headed to this week’s stop – Martinsville Speedway. He was a guest today on a Ford-hosted media call and spoke with reporters about his season.
ZANE SMITH, No. 38 Front Row Motorsports F-150 – WHAT IS IT ABOUT MARTINSVILLE THAT SUITS YOUR STYLE? “I feel like Martinsville is probably, if not the biggest rhythm track that we go to, and I feel like ever since I was a little kid on short tracks and that’s really at the end of the day what it is, they’ve just suited me. I really enjoy going to those places. The racing is always hectic, but it’s always a thrill of a finish and fortunately, I’ve been on the good side of those recently. Hopefully, we can continue that wave.”
HOW CONFIDENT ARE YOU ABOUT YOUR CHAMPIONSHIP CHANCES WITH FORD? “It’s so early to talk about championship stuff just because of the format that we go through. You’ve seen guys that dominate the regular season and then when the playoffs come around they struggle to have things go their way, so I’m trying not to get caught up in the too high of highs and enjoy the amount of fun that we’re having each and every weekend so far. Going back to Ford and being underneath that banner now has been awesome. The simulation tools and everyone I’ve been able to meet over the past few weeks or a couple months now have been awesome to lean on and work with, so the simulator time is still extremely valuable even in the normal world and now we’re kind of coming out of the COVID world, but I think typically we’re only getting 30 minutes or an hour of practice, so if you don’t have that you really lean on your simulation tools and they give us that, so a huge thank you to them and we’ll continue getting those Blue Ovals in victory lane.”
HOW DO YOU MANAGE THE CHAOS AT MARTINSVILLE? “I don’t know how it will be this year. Martinsville is always crazy, but I feel like we’ve seen the past few years it’s been the transfer race to get to the final four, so I feel like that really made the aggression level really high there at times. Going back and watching film of the night race in 2020 it was ugly how aggressive it got, and that was my first time ever at Martinsville so I was a little gun shy, but I was in a must-win situation last year and we pulled it off. I just feel like that place has been good to me and it fits me and I always look forward to Martinsville week.”
WHAT DOES HAVING TWO WINS AT THIS POINT DO FOR YOU AND YOUR TEAM AS FAR AS YOUR APPROACH TO RACES AND STRATEGY? “I wish we had a few more stage wins and more stage points in general and then I feel like we’d be able to really approach these races a lot differently, but being locked in, and I think I have more wins than anyone this year, has been awesome. It not only boost my confidence, but really my whole team. It’s a lot of fun we’re having each and every week, so we’re just trying to enjoy that. I feel like I stole a clock from this team last year, so hopefully I can get them one this year.”
HOW HAVE YOU BEEN ABLE TO ADJUST TO A NEW TEAM SO QUICKLY AND HIT THE GROUND RUNNING LIKE YOU HAVE? “I feel like if you finish Daytona rolling, it’s gonna be a good year, so we finished Daytona winning. Once that happened, it was kind of a different ballgame of we got to focus forward on all the next steps, already locked in the playoffs and just getting to go have fun and chase trophies. I know that word keeps coming up of having fun, but that’s just simplifying it of what we’re doing and it’s been working.”
THIS WILL BE THE FIRST SPRING RACE AT MARTINSVILLE IN THREE YEARS AND THERE’S NO FALL RACE TO FOLLOW IT FOR THE FIRST TIME. HOW MUCH DOES THAT CHANGE THE DYNAMIC OF THIS RACE? “I see what NASCAR is trying to do putting it still right after a road course where we all get into each other so we all go into it pissed off. I feel like the past couple years you spend all year and the guys that haven’t won are extremely aggressive. The guys that are in a must-win are extremely aggressive and then there are just the normal guys that are always aggressive. I feel like you could possibly see a three-truck breakaway maybe in this one and those guys duke it out. I don’t see it being such a caution fest as its been in the past couple years, but, like I said, now that I say that I’ll probably get proved wrong, but you would think they wouldn’t be as aggressive. I don’t know. I’ll race however it is.”
FRM PR
