Landon Cassill will return to the Cup Series for Front Row Motorsports in 2017.
The 27-year-old has competed full-time in the Cup Series for the past six seasons, finishing a career-high 29th in the championship standings in 2016. At Bristol in the spring, the No. 38 car was out front for 20 laps, the most laps he has ever led in a single race.
Front Row Motorsports picked up a victory and made the Chase in 2016 with Chris Buescher, who was victorious in a fog-shortened race at Pocono Raceway.
Cassill is seeking to secure sponsorship for next year, much like he did in 2016, in hopes of moving forward after a career year.
“We’re continuing to work forward on everything with Front Row Motorsports,” Cassill said. “I don’t see any changes being made, but everything will be getting buttoned up in the next few weeks I’m sure.”
Cassill had a career-high seven top-20 finishes in 2016, led by veteran crew chief Donnie Wingo. With a best finish of 11th at Talladega, the Iowa native is tired of being underrated, instead wishing he was “overrated.” Cassill wants to climb the ladder with FRM, moving them up the ranks to be a more competitive team in 2017.
“Obviously, the finishes are important and I think we’ve proven that we can get good finishes by out racing people with strategy,” Cassill said. “It’s the raw speed that we want to get. We want to start making the final round of qualifying and show that we have a car that is capable of running in the top 15.
“We’ve had a good, solid season. We haven’t had a lot of failures or tore up a lot of equipment. We’ve had some good runs, so I feel like we can take that going into the offseason and hopefully make every one of our cars better and get some good pieces built for next year.”
Jerry Freeze, General Manager at Front Row Motorsports, confirmed to Frontstretch that Cassill will return in 2017, admitting that the organization’s plans are not completely laid out for 2017.
“I think so, too,” Freeze said of Cassill remaining with the team. “We still have to get everything worked out with all the partners, but we are really close.”
Freeze and team owner Bob Jenkins are high on Cassill’s potential in a racecar, and feel that he has elevated the organization since coming over last off-season.
“Landon has a real super intention to detail,” Freeze said. “I’ve never seen a driver after every race give you about five pages of everything that he did through that whole weekend. He does a really good job in testing and doing simulation work and that goes back to his days with Hendrick when that was pretty much his job. He really learned how to use it as a tool and he really has the same mindset when he got with us.”
The team will remain a two-car operation, but is still working on who will be in the second machine. Buescher has been speculated to go elsewhere, possibly opening up the seat in the No. 34 car.
TIL NEXT TIME, I AM STILL WORKING ON MY REDNECK!
