By Luis Torres, Staff Writer/Photographer
SAN DIEGO – When it comes to delivering excellent results on road and street courses, AJ Allmendinger is certainly that driver.
Through excellent pit strategy and pit stops by his No. 16 Kaulig Racing team, Allmendinger netted his first top-five of the season in Sunday’s Anduril 250 at Naval Base Coronado.
A result that’ll certainly boast tremendous encouragement for him as he’s looking to build momentum after gaining 33 points on the Chase cutoff line with nine races remaining the regular season.
“We were able to run some good laps in this No. 16 Celsius Chevrolet. Trent Owens (crew chief) and this entire team did a great job with strategy and pit stops,” said Allmendinger. “We know we lack rear grip late in a run, and that’s what we were fighting there at the end. Getting points in both stages and finishing in the top-five, these are the days we have to have at racetracks that we can be pretty good at.”
The road to a top-five required an all-around team effort and favorable grip as Allmendinger explained during the Prime Post-Race Show.
“I struggled Friday and Saturday, just not having any sim and trying to learn the race track. I felt like today, it was a fun race,” said Allmendinger. “We got into a good rhythm there. The track kind of gripped up at certain sections where you can attack it and there were other sections where you have to be real easy with. It was a good day for us.”
As the 75-lap race gradually continued, Allmendinger noted the lap times became much faster with him saying he went two seconds quicker than when he qualified 15th.
However, there were certain parts of the track, namely Turns 2 and 5, where the rear tire grip fell and mistakes can happen.
“It was so easy to make a mistake because there’s so many marbles, but it was fun,” said Allmendinger. “You can start attacking the race track at the end of the race, but you still have to be easy on the rear tires.”
Of all the courses Allmendinger has run, Naval Base Coronado ranks high on the list and gave his appraisals on the race weekend atmosphere. Coming from a racer that’s competed in various street courses such as Long Beach, Toronto and Surfers Paradise in his days at Champ Car.
“To be here on (America’s) 250th birthday. Just looking outside right now, I don’t know how many people were there but it felt like 150,000. That’s what it felt like,” Allmendinger commented. “The fans who were passionate about NASCAR were here and hopefully we made a lot of new fans as well.”
After 17 races, Allmendinger sits 20th in points, 21 markers behind 16th place Ryan Preece. The next stop will be Sonoma Raceway (Sunday, June 28 at 3:30 p.m. ET on TNT), a Cup road course venue he’s never won before.
Allmendinger explained how despite lacking manufacture support from Chevrolet, the expectations were unknown going into the season. But now, with a fighting opportunity to make the top-16, anything less can create frustrations.
“I felt like if we can run top-25 in points, you’re still beating a lot of good cars, but I hate that,” said Allmendinger.
“I’m sure you guys hear me on the radio sometimes because I get so frustrated with myself because if we’re not running better, that’s on me. I’m also trying to learn how to be better at that and for our race team
“But to know we’re 21 points out, we know we can go to Sonoma, you need a few things to have a chance. We can still go there and run top-five like we did today and make another good points day out of it.”
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