EXCLUSIVE: David Starr Excited for Hometown Race at Texas Motor Speedway

Currently sitting in the top-10 in points in the NASCAR XFINITY Series, the season has been solid so far for David Starr and TriStar Motorsports.

“The good thing about it is our TriStar Motorsports team is building newer cars and making adjustments to our Toyota Camry bodies, all of our racecars, and we feel like we’re going to get better and better as the year go along,” Starr told OnPitRoad.com earlier this week. “We’ve been using older cars from last year with the updated nose. We feel with the things that we learned with Toyota in the wind tunnel, we’re going to make them better and stronger, and that’s exciting.”

Coming off a solid 15th place finish at Auto Club Speedway, Starr hopes to carry the positive momentum into his home race this weekend at Texas Motor Speedway.

“Texas is always fun,” he commented. “The race track is challenging from a handling standpoint, but I love racing every week – but Texas is special because it’s right here in my backyard. My family owns the stock car racing school there, and we’ve been there since the track opened. It’s a special place for us.”

Starr added that it means a lot to him personally to be able to race in front of the people who helped him get to where he is now in his career, and it’s always fun to give them a ticket or a behind-the-scenes look at the industry.

“Every time we race there is really meaningful because I’m just blessed and proud to be part of a great sport,” he commented. “It’s a great feeling for me because it’s special due to all the people that got me here. Without the people that help by allowing you to drive their cars or help financially by being a partner, I wouldn’t be where I am today. It’s special to race in front of them and thank them for what they did.”

There’s also the added bonus for Starr this weekend with his sponsor Zachry Group, as they are based in San Antonio, Texas, and will have a bunch of employees and customers on hand.

Looking ahead to the event on Friday night, Starr notices that there are going to be some challenges that drivers and teams will face with the mile and a half oval located in Fort Worth, Texas. Those challenges are namely centered around turns one and two with the tunnel.

“It’s a pretty bumpy over the tunnel that you go through to enter and exit the race track,” he commented. “The radius of the corner coming off turn two, you got to get your car to exit the corner well. A lot of times you are tight, which means they’re turning the wheel to exit the corner, but the front of the car is skating outwards towards the wall, and it’s a place that you can take advantage of someone. It’s really challenging as you carry so much speed through the corner and hit those bumps, and then you got to exit the corner. It’s just a very challenging the corner compared to most of the tracks on the country.”

He added that turn three also has its own unique characteristics, with the banking really not starting till you’re mid-way through the corner. As a result, the car has a tendency to be loose.

“Each race track has it’s characteristics, but it’s a fun track,” he continued. “You can race on the bottom, in the middle or up near the wall. I think every race track gets better with age. Also, because of what the speedway does for the drivers and the fans, everybody likes coming to Texas due to the restaurants, hotels and events going throughout the area. It’s always been a fun attractive place to come race.”

Starr has had a lot success at Texas Motor Speedway over the years, scoring top-five finishes in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series, and a 15th place finish in last year’s XFINITY event. Though thinking of the memorable moments over the years, it goes back to his first race at Texas in the truck series.

“Since I was a little boy, I wanted to do what I do now and being at Texas Motor Speedway for the first time, that was really memorable and special for me, personally,” he commented. “It was a long hard road and it wasn’t easy. When you’re able to finally do it, you can’t even describe it – the emotions are incredible. Being able to race there for the first time in the truck series, it was a great experience for me.”