Jeb Burton on Being O’Reilly Elder Statesman, Closing the Competition Gap & VT Football

This season marks Jeb Burton‘s sixth full-time year in the NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series and fourth with Jordan Anderson Racing.

The Virginia native had a rough start to the season, with only one top 10 and two top 15s. But since Indianapolis Motor Speedway in July, Burton has put up two top 10s and three top 15s in the past six races.

Frontstretch caught up with Burton ahead of the O’Reilly race at Bristol Motor Speedway to discuss the season’s turnaround, his plans for next year, his status as the O’Reilly elder statesman and an upcoming charity race he has planned. Plus, he talks some Virginia Tech football, given his fandom and the program’s rejuvenation.

Michael Massie, Frontstretch: First off, Jeb, how are you doing today?

Jeb Burton: I’m doing good, buddy. I feel special you’re coming to talk to me. You hadn’t talked to me in a while. We hadn’t ran very damn good. The last couple of weeks we have, so it gives you something to talk about.

Massie: Lately, you’ve had a couple of top 10s. It feels like your season’s turned around a little bit. How are you feeling about things?

Burton: Yeah, I feel like ever since [Indianapolis Motor Speedway], to be honest, our guys have found some speed. We qualified 12th at Indy, and then we went to Iowa [Speedway], qualified 12th. Really ever since then, we’ve found some stuff with our cars and made them better. I feel like at Darlington [Raceway], we were going to finish top 10 and got wrecked.

Then at [Daytona International Speedway], we ran good, top 10, and then last week we got a top 10. So I want to keep that momentum going for the rest of the year.

Massie: I heard on Door Bumper Clear, you got a fat wad of cash handed to you after the [Worldwide Technology Raceway] race from John Bommarito. What was that all about?

Burton: Yeah, so, Bommarito actually gave Jordan [Anderson] and Blaine [Perkins] the same amount of cash. They gave us all the cash to try to incentivize us to go get top 10s. I appreciate John [Bommarito], and I got mine. I earned mine. I don’t know if John asked for the other two’s back, but I earned mine and just appreciate John for doing that. It was special. For our little team, it was a big night.

Massie: You’re in your thirties now. Do you feel like you’ve become one of the elder statesmen of the O’Reilly Series with all these kids, 18 years old and whatnot, coming into there?

Burton: Yeah, I would say a little bit. I was one of those kids at one time. I remember at Kentucky [Speedway], the first race I went to, I was 21 years old. We went there, we finished eighth. I was on cloud nine.

I think nowadays, it’s definitely a lot of young guys coming in. I’ve been doing it for a while now, but I still got a lot of gas in the tank and want to do it for at least eight to 10 more years.

Massie: I feel like you’ve always been authentically you. Microphone in your face, you’re gonna tell people how you feel.

Burton: That’s a good thing and a bad thing, I guess.

Massie: But I feel like this younger group coming in, maybe I’m wrong on this, but a lot of them don’t really have that. What do you think that is, or am I just way off on that?

Burton: The correct way to answer it isn’t what I want to say, but look, I think a lot of them come from a different world, to be honest. It’s just a different situation for them. And I think when they get older and realize the situation that they’re in and what they had or have, I think that will change with some of those guys, right? And not all of them are like that. Look, when you get put in a really, really good racecar at a young age and you’re on top of the world and you’ve never driven a bad car or ill-handling car and you’re in the best equipment, it changes your perspective on things. So, I think that some of the times you see that going on.

Massie: So a big change this year for the series was getting rid of the win-and-you’re-in and going to The Chase. I feel like it hurts a smaller team like Jordan Anderson where you could pop off a win at Talladega or anywhere and, and make The Chase, get more end-of-the-year money. But on the flip side, there’s people that didn’t really like that system. Where do you kind of fall on that whole thing?

Burton: I actually like the system that we have now. I like having to be consistent. This year, we haven’t been very consistent. But when you are consistent, like we were last year, it can pay off. You still need to get stage points. The biggest thing that hurts little teams like us is the stage points.

The stage points are what create the big gap in the point system. If it just went off of finishing, it would be different. I’ve kind of got to the point of I wish they would just give stage points for the top five and kind of eliminate the ticky-tack point here, point there, point here. It adds up for the guy running ninth or 10th every single week. Like us, we’re running 13th-15th, we don’t get the points. Look, shame on us. We need to be better, but I think that would tighten up the points even more in my opinion.

Massie: There is this great divide in O’Reilly right now where you got like the Cup-affiliated teams and you got the independent teams. Is there anything that could bridge that gap a little bit?

Burton: It is very difficult, and it comes to resources and funding and people and technology. The big teams have those things, and little teams like us gotta try to keep up. We do a really good job for what we have, and we’ve grown this deal a long way from where we were years ago.

Last week [at Gateway], we were top-seven car on the long run, but on the short run, didn’t quite have the grip. And the thing that allowed us to run good the last couple of weeks have been at the short tracks, and I wish we raced even more short tracks, like the North Wilkesboro [Speedway]s of the world, the Bristols. I think it closes the gap for us, because the downforce isn’t so important.

Massie: South Boston?

Burton: Yeah, man, the tough thing is with all these little tracks is you gotta put in SAFER barriers, and it’s so expensive to do for the little tracks. So, man, look, to close the gap, I’m not sure what else the series can do. I think they do a good job, but again, it comes to resources, and the big teams have the most resources.

Massie: Speaking of SoBo, you and your dad [Ward Burton] got a pretty big race coming up there. What can you tell me about that?

Burton: The Krush 250, it will be Nov. 14. I’ll be racing Kaden Honeycutt, Trevor Ward, a bunch of other really good late model stock racers. I’m trying to get Carson Hocevar to come. I got Matt Weaver working on it, trying to get him to come race with us. We’ll put him in a really good car, so he wouldn’t be in anything bad.

It’s gonna be a huge day for the Ward Burton Wildlife Foundation, raise a lot of funds. And dad created that foundation years ago, but we’ve protected over 88,000 acres with conservation easements, where different things won’t be be put on the land and it’ll be like that for wildlife. Doing a lot of great work, and that race is a lot of fun. It’s a $75,000 purse, huge late model purse. The way it’s ran, it’s been really successful. 250 laps, day race, so it’s just old school racing.

Massie: Speaking of your dad, to go to another family member. I talked to your cousin Harrison before this and asked him what I should ask you. Don’t kill the messenger here. He said ‘How does it feel to get beat by your little cousin every week?’

Burton: Well, last week [at Gateway], he was crashed on pit road. So, he didn’t beat me last week. The only reason he outran me at Darlington is because the 87 [Nick Sanchez] crashed me, and I’m only three points behind him [19 after Bristol]. So hopefully after tonight [at Bristol], he’ll be behind me in points.

Me and Harrison have a friendly rivalry and work good together on the racetrack, and I’ll be sure to mention that if I pass him in points tonight.

Massie: Are you signed for next year yet? Do you know what you’re doing? Where are you at in that process?

Burton: I haven’t signed anything. Not sure really what I’m doing yet. I feel like we’re getting close on some things but don’t have anything to talk about yet. I know I’ll be driving something, somewhere. I just don’t have anything done yet.

Massie: Let’s talk something you and I both love, some Hokies football. We are 2-0 right now, baby [4-0 now]. How are we feeling? James Franklin [new Virginia Tech head coach] is coming in and turning the whole program around.

Burton: Yeah, I’m good buddies with Bud Foster [former VT defensive coordinator], and he told me he’s so excited. Virginia Tech has got a lot of momentum. I know we’ve played two of not the strongest teams in the world, but I haven’t seen Virginia Tech football play like that against anybody in a long time, so it’s got me excited.

I don’t know where they’ll end up the rest of the season, but I just feel like everybody there has done a good job and finally got money, and that’s what has been holding us back. So I feel like we got the right donors in there now and got the program going.

Massie: Are you gonna try to get to any games after the season?

Burton: Yeah, for sure. I’m a big hunter too, so it kind of messes with my hunting schedule a little bit. And then our racing season goes so far, all the way to Nov. 7, and my race is the 14th, so we’re racing against the Hokies, unfortunately. But yeah, I want to definitely try to make a game.