Darlington Raceway was the latest site for a Goodyear tire test on Tuesday. A total of five teams were on-hand to test tires at the legendary South Carolina track.
Clint Bowyer, Marcos Ambrose and Elliott Sadler all tested their respective Sprint Cup Series rides with the new spolier, while Aric Almirola and Timothy Peters tested their Camping World Truck Series vehicles in preparation for the series’ return to Darlington on August 14, 2010.
After a couple of early morning spins, the drivers stopped in the media center to discuss the test session. One thing that remained constant across all of the drivers is how difficult of a track Darlington is to drive.
“This place is like no other, it is as intimidating and challenging as it gets,” said Marcos Ambrose. “You’re winging it around the top with no room for error with a lot of speed and a lot of grip on the track. It will punish you if you don’t drive it the right way, it’s an amazing place. I think anyone who wants to run in NASCAR needs to come here to prove themselves because this is as tough as it gets.”
Richard Childress Racing driver, Clint Bowyer, talked about how being close to the coast creates a slick surface for drivers to contend with.
“This track sits and sand and grit gets down in it and makes it really slick and it takes a while to burn that off,” said Bowyer. “You would think that the jet dryers would blow that off but being this close to the beach it settles overtime. Now we’ve got it burned off and the speeds are doing good.”
Almirola and Peters were both excited to see the track for the first time in a Camping World Truck Series ride and both were predicting an exciting race for race fans on August 14 when the trucks return for the Too Tough To Tame 200.
“This is one of the coolest tracks we go to with a ton of history. Just getting here you drive down a two lane road, most of the racetracks we go to you get off the interstate, go down a six-lane road and pull into the racetrack,” said Almirola. “This place still reminds me of Martinsville and the old school racetracks where it’s out in the middle of nowhere and you’re surrounded by a bunch of diehard NASCAR fans that come to watch the race. I think it’s awesome that the Camping World Truck Series is coming here and it’s going to put on one hell of a race, it’s going to be exciting.”
“I was glad that we were able to come for Goodyear. It helps me out a lot; this is the first time I have been on the racetrack. I have been here to watch several races but I had to work my courage up to make myself get up close to the wall and get up to speed,” said Peters. “I’m looking forward to getting to come here to race. It’s going to be an exciting race for the fans, but it’s going to be a challenge for us. We always run close together week-in and week-out, it’s going to be action packed for sure."
