By Jerry Jordan
News/Motorsports Editor
The Examiner Newspaper
After two days of no sleep, I decided after last night’s Craftsman Truck Series O’Reilly 200 race that I would just go to sleep. Sorry, I didn’t update the site but I was exhausted.
By now, most NASCAR fans know that Kyle Busch continued his dominance and on the race with ease. For a while, I thought Jimmie Johnson was going to give his former teammate a run for his money but Johnson lost it on the backstretch. In the end, it was an all-Toyota Top 4.
As I expected the racing was incredible. You couldn’t ask for better action and standing down in Turn 1, you could see the drivers banging their trucks into one another.
As for Busch, he stayed out of the fray for the most part — only getting into one driver that he could remember. But then again, it is easy to stay out of trouble when you are at the head o the field and no one can catch you.
This is what Busch had to say after the race.
“"We just had a great race tonight. It's a lot of fun with Billy Ballew (owner), Richie (Wauters, crew chief) and all these guys. This thing was pretty good when we unloaded it. We just kind of fine-tuned on it a little bit.
“We got into it a little bit with Johnny (Benson) there. Sorry about that. I
didn’t even see him come down there. I got my nose in there, and he was trying to miss a lapped truck, I guess. Overall, we just wanted to stay up front up all night and keep our nose clean. To bring this Miccosukee Resorts and NOS Energy Drink Toyota to victory lane is awesome.”
It’s not like this guy needs anymore help but Busch said he learned a little bit from the race that he hopes to use in the Sprint Cup Series Sharpie 500 on Saturday night, as well.
“Some of those guys started off pretty tight and just got tighter. I started off loose and got a little tight. I was just a little freer than those guys. I was a little bit more able to carry my speed better through the corners than they were, and that helped me. I just got some good restarts and was able to hold them off.
Coming in second behind Busch was Toyota driver Todd Bodine, who admitted that there was no way he could have caught Busch.
“No. His truck would roll in the center and that’s where he would beat me. We had that problem in practice. Unfortunately, it was still there in the race -- we didn’t get it fixed. I could run with him everywhere except through the middle. At Bristol, that’s what you have to do -- you have to roll through the middle good.
And the big surprise of the night was former Formula 1 driver Scott Speed, who climbed into the No. 22 Red Bull Toyota Tundra for in his first-ever appearance at Bristol Motor Speedway and came home with a third place finish.
Speed, who takes everything in stride, wasn’t phased by the Roman Coliseum atmosphere of Bristol. He just got in the truck and went out with 35 other driving gladiators and did his job. By the way, he started on the pole. It was cool. The racing was a lot more difficult than driving in qualifying. It was great. Honestly, definitely one of the more
fun tracks, like Michigan, where you can really run two-wide, there are two grooves here. For short track stuff, this is easily my favorite. I’ve seen it (Bristol) on TV. Being here is a lot different when you take the car on the track in person. The banking is more aggressive in person. It’s just two corners though. They give me a good truck, like they always do.”
Johnny Benson brought his Toyota Tundra across the finish line in fourth place.
Tonight is an off-night at the track but the action gets started at 8 a.m. CST on Friday and then the Nationwide Series takes to the track that night. The Cup race is on Saturday and everyone is telling me that it is going to be incredible.
That’s about it for now. In a little while, I will be uploading a few photos and a video of the final few laps of last night’s race, so check them out.
No comments:
Post a Comment