His late-season surge, Eckes noted, came as part of a team meeting after a midseason race at Chicagoland Speedway at the end of June.
“Between Chicago and Iowa was really when we sat down and we realized that we need to do better, and that we weren’t doing everything to the best of our capabilities,” Eckes explained. “And from there on, you know, we were just about lights out. I actually did this (math) last night, but from the start of the year without Salem up to Iowa, our average finish was 6.57 … or something like that. The last seven, our average finish was 1.57, so we definitely picked it up a little bit.
“That’s something that we can be really proud of, at least in my mind, anyway.”
Eckes helped to deliver Venturini Motorsports’ first ARCA championship since 1991, which was a memorable moment in its own right, but he added that his entire season was a sequence of standout highlights — both good and bad — that all melded together to give him the experience of a lifetime.
“I think for my entire life, I’m going to be really proud of what we were able to turn around and what we made this season into,” Eckes noted. “The fact that that we missed a race and we crashed a bunch of times, that we had a lot of bad races and still fought back for a championship run was just unbelievable in my mind.
“I don’t care what else I do in my career; this will definitely be one that stays with me for a while.”
With a title in hand, Eckes believes he’s proven himself capable of stepping into the NASCAR ranks at the national level — he’s made six Gander Outdoors Truck Series starts this year and contended at the front of the field in several of them — but he’s trying not to stress about what may be next just yet.
“I felt like I proved a lot this year, and not just with how we won it, but how we took it back from Michael,” Eckes said. “So that was a strength in my corner, I think. I’ve got a few things in the works that I’m feeling pretty good about, but it’s got to be pen to paper before I’m truly going to say, ‘this is mine.’
“I’m definitely looking forward to it and hoping that it goes through, but I want to savor right now too.”
For a kid who started racing Legend cars in southern New York State and, for a long time, never viewed a national stage as a realistic goal for his racing aspirations, Eckes’ ascent to ARCA’s pinnacle has been a life-changing experience for him.
It’s also one that he wouldn’t trade, even if the ups and downs to get there were many.
“It’s honestly kind of crazy when I look back and realize how much my mindset towards racing has changed,” he admitted. “When I first started out, all I really wanted to do was run locally. I was completely content with regional legend car on the weekends for my entire life and being OK with that. But as it has gone and as it’s progressed, it has turned into something a lot bigger than that.
“I can’t be any more grateful for the opportunities that I’ve had to get to this point. Obviously, I’m still really hungry and ready to go after more, and I’m not sure I could have said that completely before … just because I wasn’t sure it was possible. I feel like in about the 2017 or 2018 seasons — really not even after I won the (Snowball) Derby — it took that long before I really thought that I had a shot at it and I started figuring out what it all took to get to the top.
“It’s been awesome to be a part of though, and I’m looking forward to the future, whatever it holds.”