Joey Logano: The Greatest Thing Since Sliced Bread

When Joey Logano turned 18 on May 24th of this year the NASCAR garage celebrated the arrival of one of the most talented drivers into the stock car national scene. At Lowe's Motor Speedway the media centre was packed with journalists as Joe Gibbs Racing announced that their young hopeful was set to make his Nationwide Series debut at Dover a week later.

Obviously the announcement had to do a lot to do with a sponsor, but there was a special buzz about the event with this kid from Middletown, Connecticut, who sat in the middle of his bosses Joe Gibbs and JD Gibbs answering to questions from the media that covers the series all year long. After all, he was being handed a winning car for his debut.

There was even a birthday cake for the occasion in the shape of his Nationwide Series car with the number 20. And there was the actual car just outside the media center too, just in case someone missed a glimpse of the cake before it fell under attack from the hungry journos.

In just the four races that he has contested in the Nationwide Series, Logano has lived up to the hype that has followed him in an amazing career through the lower ranks. One win, two pole positions, a second place finish and three out of four races led, shows more than just a promising driver. He's already a star.

Logano not only looks like a kid, he is one. But as young as he may look, he arrived in the Nationwide Series with twelve years of racing experience under his belt.

At age six he started racing quarter midgets, winning his first championship a year later in the Junior Eastern Division. From then on he won a title almost every season while he honed his oval-racing skills.

He caught the eye of many during his early years in racing, and three years ago NASCAR veteran Mark Martin spotted him and brought his name up, tipping him for stardom. He didn't let the old man down. At sixteen, he entered NASCAR's Eastern Grand National Division and won the title as a rookie.

Joey Logano © LAT

He even had the pleasure of beating Cup star Kevin Harvick at Iowa Speedway, the day after the RCR driver had won a million dollars in the Nextel All-Star Challenge. Not many realised that Harvick's car was running on seven-cylinders, but still Logano held off a driver with 11 Cup wins and who was clearly in attack mode.

NASCAR has paved the way for Logano to blossom. The year before he entered the Grand National, the minimum age to enter a race was 18, just as it is in the Nationwide, Sprint Cup and Craftsman Truck series. However last year the rule was changed to allow drivers who were 16 - Logano's age at the time - or older to compete.

Recently NASCAR was evaluating whether to increase the age requirements for its top series, but in the end there was no change. It left the door open for Logano to make his Nationwide Series debut this year, and eventually he would be able to race in Cup as soon as this season if his bosses decided that it was time for him to step up.

"Three starts, two poles, one win. He's OK"

Finally, when the D-day came at Dover, all eyes were on Logano. Not very often you expect a driver to run at the front on his NASCAR debut at national level, but that and more was expected from him. After all, the car he was racing had won already six races while driven by Cup notables Kyle Busch, Tony Stewart and Denny Hamlin.

"This is nothing for him, just another day at the race track," said Martin on that day when asked about the pressure on Logano. "It could be a quarter-midget, legend car race, whatever. It is OK. The kid can take it. He can do the job. It is not like he is trying to do more.

"The hype is only there because he has done it, he can do it. It will not break him."

Martin knows the kid well, certainly. Logano himself sees the pressure as part of the business. Entering almost every series as the youngest guy in the field, he is used to racing with all eyes on him.

"It's something that I've kind of gotten used to for a while now," Logano says. "Since I was 14 driving ASA I've always been under a microscope, you know? 'You can't do this, you can't do that'. So, I'm kind of used to that. I'm used to that pressure and that part is not really new to me. I'd feel weird if it wasn't like that, actually"

Joey Logano leads the start of the Nationwide race in Nashville © LAT

Logano was close to get a top five in his first race but showed it would only take him a couple of weekends before he would be in contention for victory. He started the race ninth and finished a very good sixth, beaten only by drivers with more than a year of Cup experience.

However that was not good enough for him, so a week later at Nashville he put the No.20 car on pole.

"We're here to get the pole, lead every lap, win every race," he said following qualifying, not surprised at all to sit on pole for his second Nationwide race. "I think that's what everyone is here for. So, I personally expected it."

He then led the race for the first 60 laps but then lost track position in the pits and ended up hitting the wall after contact with Greg Biffle. That was it for the weekend, and he couldn't hide his disappointment.

But then came Kentucky, a faster track and one where NASCAR's man of the year Kyle Busch was racing on Gibbs machinery as well. Eventually he was Logano's main rival for victory all night after the youngster claimed his second pole in three races.

In the closing stages, while following a driver with just two Nationwide races under his belt, Busch lost control of his car and hit the wall hard enough to finish his race on the spot. He was in one of those triple duty weekends that he is not doing anymore, but Logano's pace after passing him was enough to unsettle him.

"Three starts, two poles, one win. He's okay," said his crew chief Dave Rogers following their maiden victory together.

For Logano it was just part of the plan, even if he made history by becoming the youngest ever winner in the series.

"I expected to win Dover," he said. "It was cool to get our first win in only our third start. Obviously I was getting in one of the best cars out there that had won already six races before so I had to win races, it's not even an option."

A week later came Milwaukee. He started seventh, led 35 laps and finished second, filling the mirrors of Carl Edwards' winning Ford. At the famous mile he showed some of his rough edges though. He made an aggressive dive on the inside of series regular Brad Keselowski, got loose and literally knocked him off the lead.

In the give and take of racing in NASCAR, there was no giving from him on that race. It was only take, take, take, though he later apologised.

"The contact was definitely my fault," he said after the race. "We were racing hard for the lead and I felt my car was good enough to get up there. I was a little bit loose on the front side of a run. We were both driving it really hard. I just overdrove it into the corner, got loose and had to chase it up the track."

Joe Gibbs, Joey Logano, and JD Gibbs © NASCAR

Cup is next

Logano has been out of the car for two events and is only expected to come back for the race at Gateway. Obviously he is not running for the championship, although his results in the rest of the season may well dictate whether he gives his team the owner's title or not.

But despite the early success, Logano doesn't want to set any goals. "I'm not the person to set goals for myself," he says. "I don't think you can look at my season and say that you want specific finishes, especially coming into something cold turkey like I am - not knowing where I'm going to stack up. It's kind of tough to set goals on that."

He has already proved his worth and his speed. Given a good car, he can get the job done even 'cold turkey' like he says, and racing against some of the best in the business. He is scheduled to do at least 14 more races in the Nationwide Series, but the obvious question is when he will step up to Cup.

"We haven't ruled out any Cup stuff this year but we'll just wait and see, and kind of feel it out," says JD Gibbs, one of Logano's bosses and president of the winningest team in NASCAR this season. "If he keeps doing well and gives us something to look at and it fits in, we might. But if not, we're in no hurry."

Gibbs have repeatedly stated that they don't want to rush Logano into the Sprint Cup scene, but you can hardly bet against that happening soon. Just three years ago Denny Hamlin made his Cup debut when he was just in his first full season in the Busch series - now Nationwide - driving for JGR.

The announcement of Tony Stewart's departure from JGR at the end of the year leaves the door open for Logano to move into a winning Cup car next season. Needless to say, he is the leading candidate to take over the drive for 2009 and if he is set to make the move, he will get his feet wet with a few Cup races this year.

Gibbs know how to take care of their talents and there probably isn't a better team for Logano to be with right now. They have succeeded at 'coaching' Kyle Busch to turn a talented and amazingly quick driver into a championship contender in only their first year together. And they also have Hamlin, a proven race-winner built to Gibbs' standard.

It's probably too early to say whether Logano will live up to the hype and expectation that will surround him as he gets to Cup. But he certainly seems the 'real deal', like Martin once said before anyone even started to talk about 'sliced bread'.

He seems to be moving up the ranks in a Lewis Hamilton kind of way. It's like GP2 times for him still, so the big time may just be a bunch of races ahead.