Michael McDowell holding his own against NASCAR’s bigger-budget teams

HAMPTON — With the introduction of the NextGen car this year in the NASCAR Cup Series, it’s leveled the playing field for many drivers who are on lower budget teams.

One driver who has benefited is Michael McDowell, who is in his 15th season overall and fourth with Front Row Motorsports.

So far this season, he has been running more up front as he has one top-five (not including a second-place finish at one of the Duels at Daytona) and seven top-10s. He also has four straight top-15s, including 15th Sunday at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

“(The NextGen car has) played a big factor,” McDowell said of how much more competitive he is this season. “Knowing we have the same parts and pieces and we just have to put them in the right place has closed the gap from the beginning. The best teams will always be the best teams because they have the budget. They’re always going to excel. I feel like we have a shot; I think this NextGen car has provided that opportunity. In the past, our shots were limited…maybe at the superspeedways and the road courses were a stretch.”

One of the frustrating things about racing for a lower budget team is you are constantly trying to play catch-up with the bigger budget teams such as Hendrick Motorsports and Team Penske.

“We hoped this NextGen car would level the playing field…we really did,” McDowell said. “We’ve got good people are Front Row; we’ve had for years. It wasn’t a matter of having the people to do it. We had the people to do it. But we just had a hard time catching up with the big teams because they’re ahead of you and they’re developing at a faster rate than you are and you’re never able to catch up.”

Last season, in his 358th start, McDowell won his first career Cup race by taking the checkered flag at the Daytona 500. After beginning the season with that victory, he only had one more top-five and five top-10 the reason of the year.

“(We’re) definitely better than last year, much better than we were last year,” he said. “Last year, we were really strong but it kind of tapered off as the season went. We’ve been strong this year. This is the most speed we’ve had in our race car so things are going in the right direction.”

This season, he said everything is coming together, they are understanding the car better and there’s more communication within the team.

“The big teams have more eyeballs and more engineers and they’re probably able to figure things out quicker and we might be slowly catching up,” he said. “We’ve done a good job executing so I think we’re building on it.”

In Sunday’s Quaker State 400 at AMS, McDowell started 12th and was 13th after the first stage.

At lap 91, McDowell was in seventh place but was caught up in a major wreck with Martin Truex Jr., Ross Chastain, Joey Logano, Austin Dillon, Kyle Larson and Christian Bell.

He went three laps down and at the of the second stage, was in 32nd. In the final stage, He fought his way back and snagged a 15th-place finish.

“Wild day for us here in Atlanta,” McDowell said Sunday after the race. “We fought hard, got three laps back and got a top 15. I don’t know how we got that. I’m proud of everybody. They worked really hard on pit road to make the car drivable.”

McDowell also had a solid run last week at Road America, taking eighth.

“Last week was good,” he said. “I was a little disappointed because we were so strong at Sonoma (and finished third) and thought we would get better going to Road America. We just weren’t. We weren’t bad. We were fifth to eighth all day long, made it to second round, and qualified OK. But the expectation was higher; I think it’s good to be disappointed with eighth. We needed a little more to compete with the top two or three guys.”

Last month at the World Wide Technology Raceway just outside St. Louis, McDowell led for 34 laps, the most laps he has led in his career.

What grades would he give himself and his team so far this season?

He said he would give the team an A.

“I would give myself a B, maybe a B-plus,” he said. “There’s been a couple of opportunities where I should have gotten more or have done things a little differently. I think everyone feels that way, but I think the team has done a great job.”