On Sunday, Michael McDowell’s engine roared the loudest at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Very rarely has the NASCAR community seen such a dominant performance at the iconic racetrack, and even more so from the Front Row Motorsports driver. Michael McDowell stood proud in the victory lane after securing the win that sent him into the playoffs at just the right time.

After his determined display, NBC Sports analyst and former driver Jeff Burton became a big fan of the 38-year-old. Expressing his admiration for the work the driver has done so far to put himself in the spot he currently is in, Burton believes that McDowell’s team, Front Row Motorsports, has played a crucial role in bringing out this performance of his.

Jeff Burton compares McDowell to Martin Truex Jr.

In every sport, late bloomers take their sweet time but arrive at the big scene in an extraordinary fashion. McDowell’s storyline in the Cup Series has followed a similar trajectory. Sunday’s win was the only second of his Cup Series career and came after a season-opening win at Daytona in 2021. It looks like McDowell has a thing for some of the biggest races on the NASCAR schedule.

In his time in the top flight of NASCAR, McDowell has evolved steadily and has stayed on the upward curve despite his increasing age. Burton is quite impressed by the #34 driver going from strength to strength over the years and uses Martin Truex Jr. as an example in his words. As he explains,

“Look, so Martin Truex is better today than he was 10 years ago. Michael McDowell is winning races when, as you know, a lot of people didn’t think he could because the equipment he was in wasn’t great. You start looking at how people’s careers go up and down and we take these snapshot views of well this guy is good or this guy is great or this guy is average and it’s these little snapshots.”

Praising the North Carolina-based team for their awareness to stick with McDowell despite him not producing the best results in a result-oriented industry, Burton then adds,

“We don’t really get to judge until the career is over and that’s where you know that’s where I give Front Row a lot of credit. They looked at Michael McDowell and they said I like that guy. Like that guy can get it done and they’ve stuck with him while they built this program and they could see.”

McDowell joined the Bob Jenkins-owned team in 2018. After half a decade on the team, he surely stands as one of their pillars of strength who has withstood adversity throughout his tenure and now finds himself in the playoff spots one week after losing his top-16 spot to Ty Gibbs.

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Burton explains how Front Row Motorsports’ faith in Michael McDowell has helped them in the long run

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McDowell led 54 laps at the Brickyard 400. Prior to the race, experts, and bookmakers placed their bets and hopes on many drivers. From Chase Elliott to AJ Allmendinger, there were various names that popped up, but none of them mentioned McDowell as a potential winner. As he has done most of his career, McDowell fought the odds in quite the style to get the #34 to the victory lane. Burton feels that Front Row sticking with Michael and his talents in the tough times has paid off for them.

“Anybody can watch a basketball game and say LeBron James is really good. If I could have him on my team, I would be better. Anyone can do that.” says Burton.

McDowell has never entered into a race as a clear favorite and has operated from the shadows for most of his career. His win at Daytona two seasons ago brought him to the fore but he couldn’t maintain the same form up until now and got lost into the grid again. Although Front Row Motorsports have not been the kind of team to compete for championships and give teams like Hendrick Motorsports or Joe Gibbs Racing a run for their money, it was important for them to retain the services of a veteran like McDowell. Burton is an admirer of the same school of thought, as he says,

“The very best at judging talent are able to look at people when they aren’t at their best and see the capability of a person. And that’s what great general managers do, that’s what great owners do in sports. They superstars or superstars, but they don’t do it by themselves and so you have to have the people that fit in a program and people that can identify and say hey, yeah I know he’s not the biggest name out there and we don’t have this long history of him winning MVPs but he’s really good and he’s good at these things so he fits in our system because of this or he doesn’t fit in our system because of this. Those are the bets and it’s just that simple.”

As for McDowell, now that has virtually secured a playoff spot, he needs to make sure that he continues the same form into the playoffs starting at Darlington. The win will be pivotal to his plans in the near future and those of Front Row Motorsports as well. On another note, the 54 laps led in the #34 is the highest a driver has led since the inception of the sport. A truly iconic performance from the aging stalwart.

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