MOORESVILLE, N.C. (July 30, 2021) – Conner Jones is just 15 years old and early in his rise up the stock car ranks.
That doesn’t mean the Fredericksburg, Va. native has forgotten who helped him get to this point.
Jones’ entry for this weekend’s Throwback 276 CARS Tour Late Model Stock Car event at Hickory (N.C.) Motor Speedway will feature a paint scheme and number (01) driven by Jeff Jordan in 2001 on a Late Model Super Truck. Jordan competed in the Synergy Late Model Super Truck Series at Hickory, Caraway Speedway, Florence (S.C.) Motor Speedway and the now-defunct Myrtle Beach (S.C.) Speedway. Jones was one of the aces of the series.
The two met in 2019, when Jones was running U.S. Legend Cars in the Summer Shootout at Charlotte Motor Speedway. The young driver was struggling with a car that didn’t handle well and was not getting around the quarter-mile bullring on the front straightaway as he would have liked. After a couple of events during the series, Jordan stepped in to help with setups and acted as a spotter and coach for the young driver, which led to consistent top-10 results and a victory over the remaining races.
“He helped us since I started in Legend Cars and helped me get my first win at Charlotte,” Jones said. “He’s done a lot for us, and I wanted to repay him.”
Jones, his father Robert and Jordan remain friends, and Jordan and his wife Kellie attend races when they can and follow young Conner’s career.
Heading into the Throwback 276, Jones is 14th in the LMSC points, 64 points behind leader Bobby McCarty. In seven starts, Jones has one top-10 finish, at Langley (Va.) Speedway in his first start for JR Motorsports.
The competition in the CARS Tour has been a good step up for the 15-year-old.
“The competition is a lot stiffer in the CARS Tour, really close,” Jones said. “You have veterans in there, like Josh (Berry) and Bobby McCarty, and it’s going to be hard to beat them. Especially Josh, because he’s got that place down.”
Indeed he does, as Berry has logged 43 of his 88 career Late Model victories on the .363-mile oval. Berry will join Jones for the event, fresh off a victory in the Hampton Heat at Langley last weekend during the two-week NASCAR shutdown for the Tokyo Olympics.
The 138-lap event will be all about tires, Jones said. “It’s just about saving tires. You have to keep them on the car. If we do that, we’ll be fast.”
The extra distance is a factor, but it boils down to consistency, Jones said.
“I just really approach it like a normal weekly event,” Jones said. “You have to focus on hitting your marks every lap and if you do that, you’ll be fine.”
Jones will be in the team’s No. 88 Chevrolet for the remainder of the CARS Tour season, as well as the annual ValleyStar Credit Union 300 at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway and the Florence 400 at Florence (S.C.) Motor Speedway. His hopes for the remaining races are simple.
“I just want to get a win, or more than one,” he said. “I’d be pretty happy.”
Building a rapport with the experienced and successful JRM team has been easy, Jones remarked. “We’re building a better relationship every single day. There’s a ton of experience in the JRM shop.”