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NASCAR GANDER OUTDOORS TRUCK SERIES: FORD ECOBOOST 200November 15, 2019Austin HillScott ZipadelliHomestead, Florida THE MODERATOR: We're joined by Shige Hattori, Scott Zipadelli, and driver Austin Hill. Gentlemen, congratulations on an outstanding night. Obviously it wasn't for the championship, but this was pretty sweet and a great way to kick off the off‑season and going into 2020. Maybe if you want to speak to that, Austin, about your season and ending with a highlight win here. AUSTIN HILL: Yeah, man, right when I got out of the truck and did my interview, I told everybody how much of this race, it was awesome to win but it stung at the same time. Just because we were really close to making it to the round of four and having a shot at the championship, and the round of six just wasn't very kind to us, and we just didn't have enough points there at the end to make it. Yeah, it's awesome to get my fourth win of the season and end the season on a high note going into 2020. I'm really excited to work with these guys again. I can't thank Shige enough for everything he does for this team, Mike Greci and Scott. You know, just like any other driver and crew chief, you have your ups and downs and you talk it through, and sometimes you get mad at each other and you just talk it out and move on. That's the kind of year we've had, and we know of areas that we need to get better at for next year, and that's what we're going to work on in the off‑season. We're going to grind it out, and we're going to be ready. Come 2020 it's going to be on. Q. Austin, did you have expect to have this much success winning four times in your first year with this team? AUSTIN HILL: Well, I've always said growing up that I wanted to get a chance to be in good equipment just to see what I could do and see if I could compete at the highest level and win races and race against all these guys. I've always had a good amount of confidence in myself. I know there's areas that as a driver you can improve on and get better at every day. There's racetracks that I struggle at that I've told Scott straight up that I've got to work on. I did feel like I could win races, and I kind of had a little checklist at the start of the season, and one of those checklists was just to win a race. It wasn't to go light the world on fire and win 10 races, it was just to win a race. We checked that off early, and then the next boxes that I wanted to check off was obviously make it to the round of six and just make it to the round of four and give ourselves a chance. And that was the only box I didn't get to check off throughout this season. So coming into this weekend I was very frustrated, and I felt like I had a lot to prove. I felt like this team had a lot to prove to show that we were a championship‑caliber team. Even though I'm the driver. I felt like we showed that tonight, and we showed that all season long. Like I said, there's areas we could have gotten better at throughout the year that we struggled, tracks that we struggled at. But we'll build over the off‑season and just get better. But can't thank these guys enough. They worked their tails off. Every one of these guys in the shop. There's days that they're out until 10:00 at night and they just keep grinding. There he is. Congrats. Q. Scott, you guys clearly have something figured out here. I'm not asking for any speed secrets, but what makes you guys so good here? SCOTT ZIPADELLI: I've loved this place since the first time I came here. I don't know, we work really hard on certain racetracks. I felt like this is obviously‑‑ being the last race of a championship season, this is a very important track. But it just kind of falls into our wheelhouse. Just look at things differently, I think, than some. I think our mile‑and‑a‑half program is really strong. We've got to put a little more effort and focus on our short track stuff for 2020, and if we can bring that up to speed where we can win some stages and gain some points on the short tracks and combine that with where we're at right now, I think‑‑ I hope we'll be sitting here next year. Q. Scott, as you go into next season, normally you've got your notebook and you know where you're going, but it's totally different next year. You're not going to be here for the championship race next year. You've got the confidence of having the same driver, same group, but as the crew chief now, you've got to spend the off‑season planning because you're going to go to different tracks and all that. What kind of‑‑ SCOTT ZIPADELLI: Yeah, I'll be honest with you, it's disappointing not to come back to Miami Homestead. It's kind of been our pinnacle end of the year, but as we all know, things change, and you've got to change with it. You know, I want to come back here and win in the spring, but you know, what you said is true, but our notebook is close to where we were last year, but a lot of things have changed since last year. We didn't come with the same truck. We didn't come with the same setup, but a lot of the same thought processes kind of went along with the setup. We're racing on a different tire than we raced on last year, some rules have changed, aero packages have changed. You know, we just work as hard as we can. We know we've got to focus on winning races early in the year. We've got to focus on winning stages. It's kind of where we were weak this year. So we're going to focus on that, on short run speed and short track stuff, and you know, just win as many as we can. Q. Austin, as you were racing with the championship contenders tonight, was that on your mind? Were you a little more cautious maybe, or did you think about that, or was it just I'm going to do what I need to do to win this race? AUSTIN HILL: The way I saw it, they had a lot more to lose than I did, so if they wanted to race rough, then that was on them. I raced them as clean as I could and never touched anybody. I side drafted really hard tonight and did whatever it took to get by them. But the truck was just so good, buried on the bottom that I just kept working them over, kept working them over, and as the run went, you got 10 laps into a run, their falloff was a little more than ours. I just had to be patient all night and just keep wrapping that bottom. And, I mean, yeah, obviously you don't want to take out any of the championship contenders, but we were going for a win tonight and show everybody that it wasn't no fluke all year, that we still can get the job done. Even though we didn't make to the round of 4, we can still do this. It was awesome to come in here and get the win and kind of shake up the championship weekend. Q. Scott, you were giving me crap earlier, so now I'm going to come to you and follow up on what Davey said. I'm curious, again, no speed secrets here, but how much of what you guys used to dominate last year's finale with Moffitt were you able to bring for Austin and implement this weekend? Because I felt like déjà‑vu during that race, watching that truck do so many of the same things that Brett did to win the championship last year. SCOTT ZIPADELLI: Well, if there was‑‑ from 0 to 100 percent, I would say probably 50 percent of what we ran last year we ran this year. The thought process and the strategy setup strategy was very similar. You know, we studied this racetrack a lot, and Austin and I talked a lot. I watched a lot of videos, he watched a lot of videos, and we were well prepared to come here. I think we just look at this racetrack a little bit differently and did whatever we had to do to duplicate what we did last year. In practice we changed some setup things so we were able to do what we did last year, and Austin came with his A game, and everybody on the team, we worked very late all week last week, this week, preparing to come here. We wanted to come here and make a statement, and everything was executed perfectly from the time we left to sitting here right now. That's kind of where we're at. Q. That was kind of what I was going to ask you, is how confident you felt coming in here knowing what the team had last year, and also that extra motivation that I'd imagine that you're speaking of in terms of just missing out on getting to the Final Four. How confident were you about winning tonight? AUSTIN HILL: Yeah, I feel like any racetrack that I go to with these guys we have a shot at winning if we get it dialed in and we get it driving right. I felt very confident all season with the mile‑and‑a‑half program, and I didn't think about it until we were just sitting here, but that truck is the truck that they built to go to Michigan, and now it's three for three. It hasn't lost a race. So we raced it at Michigan, we raced it at Las Vegas, and we raced it here, and it's three for three now. They have built a rocket ship up under me, and I'm glad that we built that thing because it's just‑‑ we were right there with everybody, and this truck, for whatever reason, has just put us over the edge. It's just made us that much better. It was just good all night. But, yeah, I mean, I had a ton of confidence. Obviously after Phoenix, all of us, we were down in the dumps, we were frustrated, stressed out. I didn't sleep much this week. Even last night, before coming here this morning, I couldn't fall asleep last night, just anxious and ready to get to the track and get in the truck and start practicing. And that kind of all went away, like, as we practiced, but then when the rain came and when we didn't start the race until late, I was pretty anxious to get going. But as soon as the green flag dropped, I knew how good it was just because I could see that all the guys in front of me, they had to move up the racetrack so early in a run, and we could just keep running the bottom. Even though I told them all night it was still on the tight side, and we could still wrap the bottom better than anybody. Like I said, we just executed all night, and we did our jobs. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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