“Will Be a Dogfight”: Corey LaJoie on Playoff-Or-Bust Scenario for Spire Motorsports After Off-Season Haul

Corey LaJoie has been extremely positive about his team’s chances in the 2024 season owing to the massive acquisitions that were made over the offseason. Apart from buying the facilities of Kyle Busch Motorsports, Spire Motorsports went on to sign potential superstars Zane Smith and Carson Hocevar, amongst other moves. Following the successful run that the team had at Daytona, LaJoie’s confidence has only been bolstered.

Ahead of the Cup race in Atlanta, he expressed that Spire Motorsports was no longer the same team as before. He threw light on his new teammates and the team’s engineering partners, saying, “The new teammates, the added engineering, the more help from GM and Hendrick engines and Hendrick pit crews, like, it’s not even remotely the same team.”

Last weekend saw Spire Motorsports’ Rajah Caruth champion the team with a 3rd place finish in the Truck Series). In the Cup Series, LaJoie finished fourth in the Daytona 500, and Zane Smith came in 13th. LaJoie believes that these results and the ones that will follow along similar lines are because of a change in “intention” from the team.

Praising the vision of his team’s top brass to bring a change around, he concluded that Spire was just beginning to be a legitimate race team. He said, “The last three years have just been like, ‘How can we just go and put a race car on the racetrack?’ So the intention going on the race track’s a little bit different and the expectations are different.”

Corey LaJoie confident of Spire Motorsports’ playoff chances

Continuing the interview, LaJoie was asked whether his team’s future in 2024 will be a “playoff or busy” scenario. He responded by reiterating the transition that his team has undergone. The recent past wasn’t kind to Spire Motorsports or LaJoie by any means. Now with all the added resources and firepower, the driver believes that their goals have changed accordingly.

He said, “If we can get close to that [playoffs] I think it would make a lot of guys, myself included, really happy. I think I’ve matured as a driver behind the wheel as well as off. I think it’ll be a dogfight. It would be. It’ll be an absolute dogfight. But I think if we execute for the next 20 weeks, 24 weeks… I think we could be in that conversation.”

LaJoie had two top-5 and three top-10 finishes in 2023. Heading into the new season, he has been backed with confidence by many including Dale Earnhardt Jr. Whether the #7 driver and his team will create an impact over the rest of the year is a question waiting to be answered.