Friday New Hampshire Notebook

Friday New Hampshire Notebook

Notebook Items:

- Joey Logano says Team Penske is “right there”

- Appendectomy can't keep Gibson away from track

- Truex gets new tire changers for New Hampshire race

Sept. 25, 2015

By Reid Spencer

NASCAR Wire Service

Joey Logano says Team Penske is “right there”

LOUDON, N.H. – Clearly, there’s strength in numbers, as Joe Gibbs Racing has proven on more than one occasion during the organization’s dominant run in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series this year.

But Joey Logano cautions those who have trouble seeing past JGR’s four-car armada not to overlook Team Penske’s two-car outfit.

Yes, the Gibbs are 1-2-3-4 in the standings after last Sunday’s opening Chase race at Chicagoland Speedway, but Logano feels his No. 22 Team Penske Ford has the speed to match the organization that has won eight of the last 10 Cup races.

“I feel like we’re right there with them,” said Logano, who took the checkered flag in the two most recent races JGR didn’t win, at Watkins Glen and Bristol. “Even last weekend in Chicago (where JGR driver Denny Hamlin won), I thought we had a very fast Shell/Pennzoil Ford that had speed in the car, ran up top-five all day and had a legit shot at winning. 

“That last restart (with five laps left), I felt like we were in position with our four tires and where we were starting, but when you’re racing against four cars that are very, very fast, and they’re all pretty equally matched with speed, that’s what kind of makes them look like they’re the next level. It’s not just one car that’s doing it.  It’s not two cars that are doing it.  It’s all of them, which is impressive.”

Nevertheless, Logano feels he and teammate Brad Keselowski can hold their own against a four-car team whose drivers have combined to win 12 of the first 27 races this season.

“They’re strong, but I don’t look at them as stronger than us,” Logano said before opening NASCAR Sprint Cup Series practice at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, site of Sunday's Sylvania 300 (2 p.m. ET on NBCSN). “They just have more numbers out there. They have more cars, and I feel like Team Penske is right where we need to be. I think we’re really close. 

“I think we’re fighting with them every weekend for wins, so I don’t think we have to take a step back and say, ‘Oh, my God, we’re doing something wrong—they’re just so much faster than us.’ They’re not faster than us.”

APPENDECTOMY CAN’T KEEP TONY GIBSON AWAY FROM RACE TRACK

Standing behind the No. 41 transporter in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series garage, Tony Gibson didn’t look like a man who had undergone an emergency appendectomy just three days earlier.

In fact, Kurt Busch’s slimmed-down crew chief, who recently has lost considerable weight with help and encouragement from Jimmie Johnson, drew a quip from the six-time champion.

“Jimmie came over during practice and asked me, he said, ‘Man, you’re losing enough as it is—they don’t have to take body parts out,’” Gibson said Friday after opening practice at New Hampshire. “It’s not what I wanted to do, but it is what it is. We all get old, and stuff breaks.”

After experiencing stomach issues on Monday, Gibson finally went to the doctor.

“I got home (from Chicagoland) Sunday night, felt great, no problem, woke up about 2 in the morning, and my stomach hurt pretty good,” Gibson recalled. “But I’ve had ulcers all my life, so I didn’t think much about it.

“Went to work Monday. Worked Monday. Went home. But it never got any better. Then about 12 o’clock in the morning, the pain started moving into my right side a little bit. My wife’s like, ‘Look, you’re not going to sleep anyway, so you might as well go (to the doctor).’”

The trip to the doctor turned out to be timely.

“They did a CAT scan pretty quick, and that’s when they saw my appendix was pretty close to rupturing,” Gibson said. “They shipped me by ambulance over to the hospital, got me in there, put me in a room, and it wasn’t two hours later they were doing surgery.”

On Friday, Busch sent his plane to fly Gibson to the track. Doctors had advised the crew chief to stay home until Saturday, but his wife gave the go-ahead for the Friday trip.

“I could have (stayed home), but I ain’t built that way,” Gibson said. “I love this stuff. I love the sport. That’s why it’s going to be so hard for me to stay home when I do decide to do that. It’s going to be tough. I miss it.

“It would have been worse for me to sit home and watch it. The guys are more than capable of doing it without me, that’s for sure, but I just feel like we’re a team, and leave no man behind. They were texting me every day and all day today, and I just feel like I’ve got to be here to support them and pull my weight.”

Even if the weight has diminished noticeably over the past few weeks.

TRUEX GETS NEW TIRE CHANGERS FOR NEW HAMPSHIRE RACE

Martin Truex Jr. will compete in the second Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup race with a pair of new tire changers.

Front tire changer Dave Collins suffered an ankle injury during pit practice on Wednesday and will sit out Sunday’s Sylvania 300. Josh Franko, a backup tire changer for Michael Waltrip Racing, will replace Collins.

Adam Hartman, who also has been a backup at MWR, will replace Kyle Turner as rear tire changer. Denver, Colo.-based Furniture Row Racing, which fields the cars for Truex, runs its pit road crew out of the MWR shop.