June 27, 2022 | By Lee Spencer

Erik Jones hopes to extend his run with Petty GMS

LEBANON, Tenn.—Erik Jones believes he’s close to securing a new deal with Petty GMS Motorsports.

The six-year Cup veteran is enjoying his second season behind the wheel of the iconic No. 43 Chevrolet—and his first round with the recently formed Petty GMS group.

“We're getting close,” Jones said. “Obviously, I've been in talks with Petty GMS now for about a month, I guess, at this point. So just kind of finishing things up. You know, back and forth on all the little stuff, right, that makes a difference. And so we're going through that, but I feel like we're getting close.”

While there had been rumors of Jones weighing his options—including the No. 10 Stewart-Haas Racing ride soon to be vacated by Aric Almirola—he insists it’s his intent to stay the course with the No. 43 team.

“We’ll see,” Jones said. “I have to button up a few things here, but I've been happy with the group and happy with where we've been going. We’ve been racing well, so I want to stay over there, for sure.

“I can't really talk to other teams at this point. But I've been happy with being in the 43 car—especially this season with what we've done as far as a group and the way we're going, the direction we're going. We have stuff we can continue to get better on and keep getting better at but I've been happy with my team, with Dave (Elenz, crew chief) with everybody there.”

The 26-year-old from Byron, Michigan, has improved vastly over 2021—when he finished 24th in the standings and fell short of posting a top-five finish. In 2022, Jones finished a season-high third at Auto Club Speedway and collected five top-10 finishes in the first 17 events.

Jones worked his way up into the top 15 by Lap 200 before coming into the pits. His car caught on fire during service and Jones had to return to pit road. Jones made a valiant recovery over the final 90 laps to finish 11th on Sunday.

“We definitely had our ups and downs today, but nice to rebound and get an 11th-place finish,” Jones said. “We fought the handling of our FOCUSfactor Chevy early in the race and I felt like we were making the right adjustments to have a good day before the rain delay.

“Once we restarted, after 10-15 laps, the handling would go away and it was just hard to drive. We’ll keep learning and working to get better. Overall, a good finish that we’ll take with us into next week at Road America.”

Jones finished 19th on the 4.048-mile road course last season. But with a new car and an updated team, the driver remains optimistic entering Elkhart Lake this weekend. With starts in both the NASCAR Xfinity and Cup tours at the bucolic Wisconsin circuit, Jones has learned to respect the track including Turn 11 better known as the “Kink.”

“It’s high speed and you’re trying to carry so much speed through there and not lose any time,” Jones said. “So, you’re doing a lot of different things in the race car. But it is tough, that whole track is tough, but that’s the most high-speed, on-edge part of the track that we go through. You can lose and gain a lot of time there and that makes it tougher than most.”

If Jones didn’t feel enough pressure entering the weekend, his boss, Richard Petty will celebrate his 85th birthday on Sunday.

“It’s been fun to know him the last few years now,” Jones said. “I’m obviously a lot closer to him now than I was before I started driving for him. I’ve enjoyed it. He’s a really cool guy. He’s got a great sense of humor and he’s just fun to be around.

“He’s been coming to a ton of races lately. Just to see how much time he still spends at the race track is cool as well. He still makes an effort to come to the race track and support us and be around us. Just being able to be around him and listen to his stories is cool. I hope I can get him to Victory Lane soon.”