‘I’ve gotten the short end of the stick more times than I feel like I deserve’ - Zilisch

Connor Zilisch knew what he was getting into with a ride in the NASCAR Cup Series, but the first few weeks have still been tough on the Trackhouse Racing rookie.

“I never expected to come here and be as successful as I have everywhere else,” Zilisch said ahead of Sunday’s race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. “I knew I was the rookie. I knew I was going to have a learning curve. Has it caught me off guard? No, not really. I feel like I expected it to be tough, and I knew it wasn’t going to be as easy as everything else that I’ve done, so it hasn’t really been a surprise to me.

“I definitely feel like I’ve gotten the short end of the stick more times than I feel like I deserve, but that’s racing and it’s going to happen. I have to keep doing my thing and know it’s going to turn around on the other side.”

Zilisch and the No. 88 team have one top-20 finish through the first four races, and an overall average finish of 26.5. He failed to finish in two of those events due to a crash at EchoPark Speedway and a suspension issue at Phoenix Raceway.

The small victories would be clean races in which Zilisch sees the finish and is on the lead lap. Circuit of The Americas is the only race that Zilisch has been on the lead lap. And as for keeping it clean, Zilisch feels he’s done a reasonable job trying to make that happen, but it’s been tough sledding.

“I’ve definitely had a rough stretch of weeks with incidents and things out of my control,” Zilisch said. “As a race car driver, I have a hard time saying it’s bad luck when it’s four weeks in a row, so I definitely just need to do a better job putting myself in positions where I’m not going to get wrecked all the time.

“It’s kind of just been one of those years; you’re knocked down and keep trying to get up, but keep getting knocked down. We’ll keep our heads down and focus on Vegas this weekend and look forward to hopefully getting things turned around.”

And, of course, the on-the-job learning comes with ever-changing variables. There were back-to-back superspeedway races to start the season, then a road course, and while Phoenix was an oval, it was the first points race with the higher horsepower package.

“It’s been a lot of learning and a lot of stuff that I’ve been through before, but I’m enjoying the process of it,” said Zilisch. “Obviously, this is the highest level that I’ve ever had to learn something on the fly, which makes it a little tougher for me and definitely, there’s a learning curve that is going to take time to figure things out. But it’s been good to go to so many different styles of racetracks.

“This past weekend in Phoenix was kind of the first standard oval of the season. So, it was good to get a feel for that. We didn’t have a great weekend, but the laps are what’s important right now.”

Sunday will be Zilisch’s eighth start at the Cup Series level and his first at Las Vegas. In eight starts, Zilisch has a career-best finish of 11th at EchoPark Speedway last season.