Ahead of the Cook Out Southern 500 scheduled at Darlington Raceway this weekend, Kaulig Racing driver AJ Allmendinger was featured in a media day. During the interaction, Allmendinger shared his thoughts on joining the team's Truck Series program with the new OEM RAM.On August 23, the truck manufacturer announced its return to the Craftsman Truck Series with Kaulig Racing in the 2026 season. The announcement was also made at Daniel Dye's father's Daytona Dodge Chrysler Jeep RAM dealership, located at 1450 North Tomoka Farms Road in Daytona, Florida.The new OEM aims to debut in the Truck Series with five trucks. However, no official announcement has been made yet about the drivers. Reflecting on the same, the press questioned Cup Series driver AJ Allmendinger about whether he would join the team's Truck Series venture. The #16 Chevy driver replied (via Taylor Kitchen on X):“I’ll drive whatever Chris [Rice] and Matt [Kaulig] want me to drive.”Following the same discussion a few days earlier, Bubba Wallace's spotter, Freddie Kraft, named two potential names for the new trucks: Daniel Dye and Butterbean.Currently, the NASCAR team fields two entries in the Cup Series, with AJ Allmendinger piloting the #16 Chevy Camaro ZL1 and Ty Dillon in the #10 Chevy. Meanwhile, in the Xfinity Series, the team has two full-time rookies, featuring Daniel Dye in the #10 Chevy and Christian Eckes driving the #16 Chevy.AJ Allmendinger got candid about the struggles he faced in stock car racingNASCAR Cup Series driver AJ Allmendinger sat down with Motorsports.com for an interview ahead of the Mexico City race. During the interaction, Allmendinger opened up about the challenges he faced during the early phase of his stock car racing career.The 43-year-old began his Cup Series career with Team Red Bull Racing, driving the #84 Dodge in his rookie season and the #84 Toyota in his sophomore year. However, he had a series of DNQs with the team and struggled to adapt to the racing style after competing in an open-wheel racing format previously.Reflecting on the same, AJ Allmendinger stated (via Motorsports.com):"was almost trying to learn how to walk again. And I kind of got shoved right into it with Red Bull. I would never change it, but I didn't have any experience in stock car racing. And they went right to the Cup. We probably were trying to do it in, I wouldn't say the most competitive era, but it definitely had the most cars right there. In my first two years, we had 50 to 56 cars trying to qualify for the race every week. So that was difficult." AJ Allmendinger missed his spot in the 2025 playoffs and currently ranks 21st in the Cup Series points table with 516 points. Additionally, he has secured five top-ten finishes and one top-five finish at Charlotte Motor Speedway, where he finished in P4.