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NASCAR CAMPING WORLD TRUCK SERIES: NEXTERA ENERGY RESOURCES 250

February 19, 2016

Daytona Beach, Florida

THE MODERATOR: We're going to roll right into our post‑race media availability for the NextEra Energy Resources 250 here at Daytona International Speedway. We are joined by our third‑place finisher, the driver of the No.92 Valvoline Advance Auto Parts BTS Tire Ford, Parker Kligerman. Parker, just talk a little bit about that finish there as you squeezed through to come in third.
PARKER KLIGERMAN: Well, thank you to all the media that stayed for all the truck races. We appreciate that for sure. You know, this was kind of one of those deals that came across, especially in my situation, you've got to be‑‑ I know it's cliché, but you've got to be very grateful for an opportunity like this to hop in equipment that is on the up. Last year they had their best year in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series in terms of getting top 10s, running up front and that sort of thing. So to have this opportunity to come out here to Daytona for a bit of a hiatus and doing more TV stuff was a lot of fun.
Thanks to obviously Valvoline, Advance Auto Parts and Ricky Benton, the owner of this team. He's been an ardent supporter of this series, maybe not in a full‑time capacity but they continually show up year after year in a part‑time capacity and it's really cool to be part of that lineage and go out there and get them a good finish. This ties their best finish that Clay Rogers did in 2011, which I was in that race, too.

Q. Parker, what was your view really of the last‑lap incident? What did it look like happened, and how scary did it look?
PARKER KLIGERMAN: I was pushing the 17 really hard. My buddy Ryan Truex was leading. It was cool for him to be in the lead. He and I have been in similar situations since our rookie endeavors in Cup in 2014, kind of on the outskirts, so it was cool to see him leading. I was pushing the 17 as hard as I could. I saw Johnny coming, I should have moved up, and as we came ‑‑ the 4 was really loose even 20 laps before that. I mean, the 4 was just constantly sideways. Kudos to Chris Bell for holding onto that as long as he did, but then eventually he just lost it. I saw him turning the 17, and all I saw was the under side of his truck, and it was really reminiscent I think it was 2012 where Joey Coulter did a similar thing on the 22 truck. You just kind of see the under side and then you know something happened, you look in the mirror and you see a bunch of smoke.
So not much, if that helps you.

Q. Parker, after the lengthy delay for the other big wreck, were you expecting something like that to unfold?
PARKER KLIGERMAN: I mean, you can never expect‑‑ the big wreck I expected, so I was sitting there at the back of the pack, I had messed up in pit road and got us blocked in on our fuel only stop and we were running the top 10, so we lost track position. Everyone was trying to go three wide. Everyone was trying to make the outside line work, Daniel Suarez, Rico Abreu, and it just wouldn't work. There eventually comes a point where you can see the race kind of take a character, it's almost like a class, like a class becomes a funny class, group of kids, very serious, they want to work hard. Suddenly a race takes like a shift and suddenly is hitting each other as hard as they can, and I could just see it happening. So I sort of backed off and suddenly the 88 got turned sideways, that big wreck happened.
But really after that when you cleared out so many trucks I was focused on ‑‑ literally in my mind I was thinking, you're gonna get the third. You're in fifth basically because I knew those trucks would pit, and the 21 is going to be on the outside. If you block him when he comes, you'll win this race and I didn't. I didn't live up to my premonition, but I guess I'll be beating myself up for a while.

Q. Why do you think the outside lane didn't work?
PARKER KLIGERMAN: The third lane doesn't work. It's all aerodynamics and essentially what happens is you have the two lanes need to get away from each other because when trucks get side by side or cars, they take their cowl tire pressure. So you see a truck come up or a car‑‑ Dale Jr. does this better than anyone. He comes up to the left rear tire or right rear tire, gets up to the door and gets away. You don't want your cowl pressure to match. When the engines are stewing over each other, you're going to go nowhere, so eventually what happens when three wide like that, we're just stealing cowl pressure from each other. No one is gonna go anywhere because you can't side draft and can't get away from it.

Q. Parker, you gave Ricky Benton Racing their best finish ever. What's that mean to you?
PARKER KLIGERMAN: Well, what I said before, this ties Clay Rogers actually in 2011, so I don't want to take away from him. But just for this team, there's three guys that work full‑time in the shop, Bobby Gill, Mike Hester the crew chief and Mike our tire guy. Bobby Gill, the famous living legend of USAR Hooters Pro Cup is our car chief, and then our crew chief, and they're the three that are in the shop and they work very hard, very methodically to put great equipment on the track, and you see it today and I think you saw it last year, though. You saw this team consistently have the ability to maybe get in the top 10 and that was something that was a step ahead for them.
Running force, that was the first race I've done in a Ford and that was very cool. I've now raced all four manufacturers, including Dodge, in the NASCAR series. So that's pretty cool statistic. Roush Yates horsepower, that horsepower was great, as well.
To give this team that kind of momentum to give them the opportunity to be up front, it's great.
THE MODERATOR: We're also joined by our second place finisher, Ryan Truex, the driver of No. 81 Toyota Osaka Parts Distributor Toyota. Ryan, talk a little bit about holding held him off there for the win but not quite.
RYAN TRUEX: Yeah, God. If that wreck wouldn't have happened I think we had him. The bottom was just the place to be all day. It seemed like you could hook up and bump draft to the front. It was really hard to do and there was a lot of guys that couldn't do it properly. The 13, Hayley, really pushed me well and got me to the front and kept me there. So I've got to thank him for that.
But yeah, it just all came down to who could bump draft the best without locking up and stay out there, and the side draft on the top was huge, too. So you just had to make the right moves and be there at the end and we were, and unfortunately it just didn't end up in our favor.

Q. Parker mentioned that two years ago you guys were running for Rookie of the Year in the Cup Series and things didn't work out for both of you‑‑
PARKER KLIGERMAN: Thanks for reminding us.

Q. It's been a while. I mean, what have you guys learned in the last year and a half, and did you guys have moments where you felt like you wouldn't have a shot to be up at this podium for sure?
RYAN TRUEX: Yeah, for sure. A month ago I felt that way. I didn't have a ride a few weeks ago, and Hattori Racing called me and wanted me to come drive for them. At first it just looked like Daytona but the more we got to talking, the more we were going to try to run a full season. Obviously we have a few races to fill out, but tonight helps out a lot. You think about it a lot and you wonder what you're going to do. My option is go work on a clam boat for my dad and I refuse to do that, so that's why you see meat the race track every weekend.
PARKER KLIGERMAN: I told him to go.
RYAN TRUEX: He thinks I should do it during the week and race on the weekend.
PARKER KLIGERMAN: I've got two jobs.
RYAN TRUEX: I can't do it. You're good at it.
PARKER KLIGERMAN: I'd say the biggest thing is I saw Brian Vickers say it and he kind of made peace with never driving again, and I think you start to look back a lot differently, and then you're like, I could've done this or that differently. You know what, that's the exact opposite of what you should do. You've got to look forward. But I mean, just like Ryan here, a month, a couple weeks ago, I didn't have a ride. There was no chance. I was totally committed to saying the TV stuff is what I've got this year to stay within the sport. We'll keep working to trying to make things happen but you kind of come to peace with like, okay, what happens from here on out I'm just going to put my best foot forward and do it.
RYAN TRUEX: Yeah, it's easy to get down on yourself, too. With the truck rule changing to 16, after we were 18, it's like me and him just came at the absolute wrong time. It's like we should have been born five years earlier or five years later.
PARKER KLIGERMAN: The recession hit in the midst of us getting into NASCAR. We laugh about that a lot. We are recession kids, recession racers. We are just riding the coattails of the end recession here now.
RYAN TRUEX: But you just can't give up. It's easy to get down on yourself. It's easy to give up. It's easy to quit. You just keep going. I know I see him at the track every weekend, I'm at the track every weekend talking to whoever will talk to you, and you don't say no to an opportunity. That's what we did this weekend, and it worked out for us.

Q. I'm wondering what is your first impression of the caution clock, and how much of a role did it play in that first crash when everyone was trying to pile onto pit road?
RYAN TRUEX: We talked about that before the race. I said, what are you going to do when it's 19 minutes and everyone hits pit road? He said, I don't know. They might all wreck and I stay out and be fine. I did that and it ended up working well.
PARKER KLIGERMAN: We didn't do that. We pitted ‑‑ so we pitted on the second go around because we saw the first group go, and I was like, ooh, gosh, no one used‑‑ the funny thing is before this race, there were so many kids who had never done ARCA, which was unusual. Normally you never go to a Superspeedway race without a kid coming into the Truck Series as a rookie but you were like, hey, so you did ARCA. That's how it was for us. That's what you always did. Suddenly all these kids are here without doing ARCA, so I was like oh, gosh. Sure enough they're all coming up to me, and I'm like, "You've never done a Superspeedway?" "No, I've never seen one in my life." "Oh, all right. Cool, we'll figure this out." So when the green flag stops come out, no one used hand signals and like if you're in Cup or XFINITY and you don't use hand signals, get ready to get run over.
RYAN TRUEX: Yeah, I didn't even know anyone was pitting.
PARKER KLIGERMAN: No one pitted. I was using hand signals, you back up, you set your braking point. I mean, there has to be like a lesson out there, use your hand signals because you've got two hands, you can make it work.
They all just piled into each other and then we got caught for getting on pit road under caution. I didn't trust it.
RYAN TRUEX: I think it's different. It spices it up a little bit. I'm glad that we got rid of it at the end there and got to run 15 laps straight or whatever it was, 10 laps straight.
PARKER KLIGERMAN: I've got no problem with it. I'd say the only thing we'd say is, why not set that two minutes to go you can't pit or something because you're going to have this happen at all these racetracks for sure.
RYAN TRUEX: Tracks bigger than mile‑and‑a‑half you can get away with pitting and beating the leader out.
PARKER KLIGERMAN: If you don't go a lap down, it's going to happen every time.

Q. Ryan, Shigeaki has been through a lot in this sport, whether it's been in the Truck Series or the XFINITY Series, he's given a lot of young racers an opportunity, but how big a deal is this for him tonight?
RYAN TRUEX: It's huge. He came on the radio after the race and thanked me. I had something wrong with my ear plugs. I couldn't really hear him. He was pumped up for sure. It feels good. I know he's put a lot into the sport and he's invested a lot. For him to see a return like that is really cool.
I hope that was enough for us to go full‑time, and like I said, we've got a little bit we've still got to get sorted out for some races, but we'll be in Atlanta and we'll be at Martinsville, and we're second in points right now, I think, so if we can continue that streak, we'll be good to go.
THE MODERATOR: Ryan and Parker, thank you for joining us, and congratulations on your run.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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