Yahoo Autos McDowell and FRM are fast, so now it’s about finding consistency
Michael McDowell and Front Row Motorsports have had a fast Ford Mustang Dark Horse early in the NASCAR Cup Series season, but they’re still working to put together consistent performances and results.
“I think the speed has been great; I think our execution just hasn’t been very good,” McDowell said at Phoenix Raceway. “And that’s on me. Last week we didn’t execute well, [but] less on me last week. The good news is we have speed, and speed makes up for a lot of things. We’ve just got to keep that speed up throughout the year and then clean up some of the things that we’ve had troubles with and I think we’ll be in a good spot to contend for wins.”
No team wants to be searching for speed. It’s far easier to be fighting for finishes.
McDowell has started no worse than 12th in the first three races. After earning a front-row starting spot in the Daytona 500, McDowell earned his first career pole at Atlanta Motor Speedway. An eighth-place finish at Atlanta is his best finish of the season; his average finish is 23rd going into Sunday’s race in his home state.
“I think that’s the good thing — we’re pretty close with everything,” McDowell said. “We just have a few little areas to clean up and I think we’ll be able to put ourselves in a better position, especially as we get into the summer months.”
The 39-year-old McDowell is amid a career breakout. Since NASCAR introduced its Next Gen car in 2022, McDowell has enjoyed career numbers by quickly adapting to its feel and driving characteristics. He’s earned 21 top-10 finishes driving the Next Gen car, which is more than he had in his previous 14 seasons as a Cup Series driver (17).
Front Row Motorsports is primed for even more success going forward with a new alliance with Team Penske. The technical partnership gives the small organization access to more information, like engineering support, but McDowell stressed it will take time for that to truly show results.
“Being able to lean on them more on that technical side for sure will help us to make better game day decisions and changes,” he said. “But all that, like I’ve been talking about, is going to take a process of being able to go through the information, understand it and then apply it, obviously. It’s still early, but I feel like…this week we made really big gains at home, at the shop, on how well we were able to utilize the information. We’re making gains, and I think it’ll get better and better every week.”
The next step for McDowell is turning their existing speed into top-five speed. It’s there where wins will come.
“Somewhere you’re going to get it right, you’re going to execute, get it all right, and you’re going to win a race,” McDowell said. “And winning a race, there’s such an emphasis on that in our series because it gets you in the playoffs and all the things it does. So, for me, it’s more about having those days of top-five speed than it is having top-15 speed throughout the entire year, if that makes sense.
“I think they go together, for sure, but I think just having more of that top-five speed is what’s going to allow us to contend for more wins.
