Pro Stock driver Matt Hartford has spent years building his team into a legitimate world championship contender.

So far this season, Hartford’s team hasn’t looked anything like a world championship contender.

Through six races, Hartford is 13th in the points standings and has a 2-6 elimination round record.

Hartford knows that his team needs to get on track starting with the Thunder Valley Nationals, June 17-19 in Bristol, Tenn.

“We need to,” said Hartford, when asked about the need to turn things around. “We’ve had no ups yet. Everything's been down. It's time to start going up. Honestly, we've ran decent in eliminations. We've just been on the wrong side of the win lights. I personally feel I need to drive better. I think we need to do a better job qualifying, and we need to get a little bit of luck.”

Hartford’s team is still running a power plant from KB Racing, which Hartford praised.

“I mean, look, here's the facts. Jerry Haas built an incredible race car,” Hartford said. “KB built great power. It's up to us to manage it and turn on win lights, and we simply as a team have not done that this year. We have all the confidence in the world that there's not a race that we go to that we can't win. So far this year, we've not proven it, nor do we look back and say that we're happy about this season so far.”

Hartford knows nothing will come easy in Bristol this weekend.

“You know, I haven't raced in Bristol for quite a few years, but I know they did some work on the surface, so it should be better, but it's a beautiful facility,” he said. “It's a beautiful area to come in to. It's a competitive track, but look, there's 22 cars there. We just need to go out there (Friday) night at seven o'clock and put a good number up on the board that sets us up for Saturday and Sunday. Yeah. (Pro Stock) is as hard as it's ever been. It is definitely the most difficult class and it's only getting more difficult every race.”

Hartford, who has won four career Pro Stock national events, embraces the present competition in Pro Stock.

“Oh, I do this for the challenge, and so does everybody on our team,” Hartford said. “The only way to really walk away from a race and feel that you succeeded and were able to beat the best. So, hypothetically, if you went out there and you could outrun everybody by two tenths of a second... Granted, you get the Wally, you get the prize money, but is there really the same satisfaction as knowing that you got there and had the win by thousandths of a second?”

Between being dead-on on the Christmas tree and taking care of the little details is essential to win in the class now.

“This year, if you look at the caliber of drivers we were up against, you look at the Dallas Glenns, they're on their game,” he said. “Aaron Stanfield, he's as good as it gets every time he goes to the line. It makes it a lot harder now. I've proven over the years I can definitely be at the front of the starting line, and I've proved this year that I can be not leaving first. So, like I said, as a driver, I need to do a better job driving. And as a team, we just need to do a better job qualifying and be prepared for race day.”