For starters, deal with that second letter of his final identify — the V — as if it’s a W.
QUAW-pul.
There you go, you bought it.
In all seriousness, in case you comply with NASCAR, you actually ought to be taught to pronounce it accurately, as a result of you could get a complete lot of alternatives within the coming years.
Carson Kvapil is three races into his rookie season as a full-time Xfinity Collection driver with JR Motorsports, which is owned by a reputation with which you’re extraordinarily acquainted: Earnhardt, as in Dale Jr. and his sister Kelly Earnhardt Miller (and her husband L.W.).
Kvapil, 21, ran 9 races for the staff final 12 months, with three top-five finishes, and opened this season with a fourth (Daytona) and twenty third (Atlanta) earlier than battling for the win final weekend within the closing laps at COTA in Austin, the place a blown right-front tire ended the chase and gave him one other end of twenty third.
Kvapil is a second-generation racer who was fairly actually born into the game — he’s a local of Mooresville, N.C., the realm simply north of Charlotte that’s residence to just about all NASCAR groups. Dad Travis is a former NASCAR Truck Collection champ (2003) who ran full-time within the Cup Collection from 2005-14.
Carson’s largest break, to date, got here in 2022 when JR Motorsports employed him to drive within the CARS Late Mannequin Inventory Tour, changing Josh Berry, who’d been promoted to the staff’s Xfinity Collection staff. Late final 12 months, he was tabbed to hitch JR Motorsports’ five-car Xfinity staff full time in 2025.
Carson’s 18-year-old brother, Caden, is following his older brother’s tire tracks — he’s now working within the CARS sequence for JR Motorsports.
In Austin final week, it was one other JRM Xfinity rookie, teammate Connor Zilisch, who handed Kvapil, held him off after which cruised to victory. It’s assumed it gained’t be the final time these two determine issues amongst themselves within the closing laps.
A Q&A with NASCAR Xfinity Collection rookie Carson Kvapil
Information-Journal: Your bio says you mainly got here up within the conventional approach for a contemporary stock-car racer, proper?
Kvapil: “Began racing after I was 10, which is definitely fairly late, working Bandolero automobiles. Ran some Legends Automobiles. Did the weekly factor for just a few years, from age 11 to 18 or so, all the way in which from children courses to grownup sequence.”
N-J: How previous had been you once you began racing towards grownups?
Kvapil: “I used to be in all probability 13. I began getting severe in 2020, working full time within the CARS Collection. And in 2021, I received the eye of Dale Jr., Kelly and L.W. Miller. About then, Josh Berry was transferring as much as the Xfinity Collection they usually wanted a full-time man to come back to the store. Proper place, proper time.”
N-J: Actually go to the store?
Kvapil: “Yeah, I received the chance to work over there throughout the week and race on the weekends. I labored on the race automobiles, getting them prepped.”
N-J: So that you’re good with a wrench?
Kvapil: “I used to be all the time engaged on my dad’s stuff with him. The one approach we may race was if we received the automobile prepared.”
N-J: And that’s truly the case at Junior’s Late Mannequin store?
Kvapil: “Yeah. Within the Late Mannequin program, there are two or three guys working full time. It’s not just like the Xfinity program, the place you’ve got 100 staff within the store. The primary driver has to come back work on the race automobile. That comes together with it.”
N-J: Do you continue to get to tinker on issues?
Kvapil: “I don’t actually work on these (Xfinity) issues. I might, however all these guys have their jobs and I don’t need to get in the midst of it.”
N-J: The place’s your toolbox as of late?
Kvapil: “It’s in my dad’s store proper now. I nonetheless like going over to the Late Mannequin store the place my little brother now runs.”
Ready for residence costs to come back down
N-J: You continue to dwelling at residence with the household?
Kvapil: “I’m for now. Home costs are too excessive.”
N-J: You’re nonetheless so younger. Do you continue to have any racing posters in your bed room wall at residence?
Kvapil: “No, I by no means actually had a complete bunch of that. However I did accumulate hub caps from completely different automobiles after I was a child. I had them up on my wall, however I lastly took them down.”
N-J: What’s your dad doing as of late?
Kvapil: “He nonetheless works at his store, engaged on my brother’s race automobiles. Every time he will get an opportunity, he involves the racetrack and hangs out. Helps me out at instances. Offers me some recommendation on what I must do.”
N-J: Do you’ve got a dream automobile you propose to purchase as you start to make actual cash?
Kvapil: “I’d say a Corvette. I do have a Chevy Silverado on the way in which. It’s not right here but. I don’t prefer to splurge. At the very least proper now. But when it will get to that time, a Corvette will in all probability be my possibility.”
N-J: You turned 21 final 12 months. Did you do something we have to find out about?
Kvapil: “No, I didn’t. I’m not a drinker. I don’t social gathering. I’m truly form of a boring man, not a loopy man. I like racing. That’s what I love to do.”
Tracks on his to-do checklist, and a short-term objective
N-J: Any observe you’re trying ahead to tackling this 12 months?
Kvapil: “I’m actually trying ahead to Pocono (in June) as a result of that place seems so completely different than something I’ve ever raced. On the road-course facet, I’m trying ahead to Sonoma (July). I all the time performed the NASCAR video video games rising up, and that was one among my favourite locations to race on that sport. Hopefully, a few of that stuff transfers over once we go there this 12 months.”
N-J: Are you the form of man who units targets for the season?
Kvapil: “I do. I actually need to win a race. I don’t need to say it’s gonna be simple to do. This sequence is so tough. However on the similar time, going off the races we ran final 12 months, I felt like we should always’ve gained a minimum of one race. However we simply couldn’t give you it. This 12 months needs to be our 12 months.”
N-J: How in regards to the long-term objective of racing within the Cup Collection? Do you’ve got a private timeline?
Kvapil: “Issues can go the way in which you need them to, however more often than not they don’t. I hate setting targets or expectations on that for myself. It’s one thing that I really feel isn’t very predictable.”
