Underdog role suits Stenhouse

Ricky Stenhouse has been a NASCAR Cup Series racer since 2011, chalking up 430 races in that time, claiming three wins and 24 top-five finishes. The JTG-Daugherty Racing driver – Stenhouse recently re-signed a multiyear contract with the one-car team he first joined in 2020 – is widely seen as the consummate NASCAR underdog, which is a perception he’s fine with.

“Yeah, man, the underdog thing, it’s interesting,” said Stenhouse. “We show up to win just like everybody else. If you want to succeed at this sport, that’s the mindset you have to have. I think we re-evaluate once practice is over, where we are at on the weekend as a team and what realistic expectations are for the race. I think my team and myself, we’re up for that challenge of being an underdog and not being the favorite to go out and win each and every week. To me, I think it takes really strong confidence in yourself and in your team to take on that role.

“I think it’s easy being a favorite. You know, it comes with its different challenges, for sure. Mentally, and how you have to dig deep as a race team, I think being an underdog is pretty difficult. It takes a special group and I think we’ve got a good group to do that.”

Fully committed to the JTG-Daugherty organization, Stenhouse feel that the No. 47 Cup team is a unique team with calculated goals and a determined, fighting spirit.

“Yeah, we are a brotherhood,” said Stenhouse. “And we’ve got some cool things coming down the pipeline that I feel are going to make our team even stronger. When you’re an underdog, you’re not working race-by-race necessarily, you’re working for years in advance. Signing a multiyear deal there and knowing who our people are allows us to work on those goals together. It’s not trying to flip something and light the world on fire overnight. Having those things in place is definitely beneficial for a small team like us.

“Like this past weekend at Kansas, we were working on some things trying to get our cars faster and I think we achieved that. The results don’t show it because we got a flat tire in that third stage that killed our good run. I left the weekend bummed about the finish, but excited about the future. You’ve got to make sure you look at all aspects of the weekend and take that into consideration and move forward with it. It wasn’t a lost weekend, even though the results were not where I felt like we should have finished.”

With six races remaining on the ’24 Cup schedule, Stenhouse and company have a goal in mind they feel is realistic to achieve when the checkered flag waves at Phoenix next month.

“We’ve got our sights set on top 25 in points,” said Stenhouse, who currently stands 27th. “You know, we were there after Atlanta; we had a strong run at Atlanta. Then we got caught in that first-lap wreck at Watkins Glen; we were not as strong at Bristol as we needed to be, or what we normally are. At Kansas, we were back to running how we felt like we should and we got a flat tire. We’ve got our backs against the way when it comes to that, but we’ve still got six races left to achieve that and that’s more than enough time to get the job done. I would say that’s the number one goal on our list.

“The second is to trying to come up with a better package at different racetracks. So we’ve got Homestead and Las Vegas, which are the two mile-and-a-half racetracks that we have left. I think we learned a lot at Kansas that can prepare us for those racetracks. We’re trying to get those dialed in a little bit better. Our speedway racing is good. I’m confident in that. I think our road course program is close. We’ve got one of those races left this season, as well as two short tracks left this year with Martinsville and Phoenix. I would say those are two of our toughest racetracks as far as trying to get speed and a good balance in our car. That is something that we will continue to work on. I think we’ve got enough different racetracks left that hopefully we can hit on something that we can continue to work on in the off-season.”

There’s plenty of variety coming up, with this weekend on the 2.66-mile Talladega Superspeedway, followed up by the reconfigured 2.28-mile Roval at Charlotte Motor Speedway.

“Yes, it’s a crazy mixed bag!” said Stenhouse, who was a winner at Talladega in 2017. “Obviously, I’d love to be in the playoffs, but, man, I tell you what, being in the playoffs and going to two races like that is definitely treacherous, right? When you’re not in the playoffs, you go to a place like Talladega, you don’t want to cause an issue that’s going to mess up a playoff guy. But you’ve still got to go compete for your team and your partners and all your fans.

“Yeah, I’m looking forward to Talladega. Obviously we know how to win there. I think that’s our best shot before the season is up. So we are going to put a big effort into getting that done. We’ll see what shakes out, but the Roval, it’s a unique and fun racetrack. It’s difficult. They made some changes to the layout and the configuration, so everybody is kind of going to be learning that as we go throughout that weekend. All in all, it’s going to be a fun rest of the year.”

Looking back at his 2024 body of work, though, the underdog admits it hasn’t all been fun.

“No, I’m not happy with it. I think we’re disappointed, for sure,” he admitted. “But I think we’ve learned a lot more recently. I guess you can kind of sum up that as the more we learn, we can kind of see where we have been at a deficit. Now it is trying to make that deficit up. It does make us feel a little bit better about the potential in our cars if we do all the right things.

“We’re definitely unhappy with it. I think we averaged basically a top-17 finish in 2023 and we have not achieved anywhere close to that this year. I think that’s a big bummer. It’s taking a step backwards. Obviously we know it is in us to get those good finishes. We did it last year, so that’s something that we’ll keep striving for.”

That striving will continue in the offseason.

“Us as a team, we will just continue to define our process. I think that is another thing we can get better at,” he said. “It’s just refining and getting our process dialed in. I think we have a decent process, but it can better. That’s something that is just kind of trial and error. We did things different towards the end of last year in hopes of being a little bit better this year and I think it has helped in some aspects of our season, but there are also some areas that still need some work. We’re just continuing to do that and we’ll figure those things out in the off-season.

“I want to go back and do a deep dive back into some of these racetracks and races where we struggled. Hopefully we hit on a few things. That way when we roll out of the gate next year, we have a better starting point than what we did this year. A lot of things to work on. The good news is that the cars are not changing a whole lot, but we still have to keep up with the times and the setups and everything everyone is doing. I think we got behind on that, but we are trying to claw our way back.”