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What if NASCAR drivers could chat during races?

David Ragan spoke about a fun idea during an interview in 2016: What if drivers could talk to each other during every race, and fans could hear their conversations?

“(What) if we had direct communication with other cars and I could flip over to someone else’s radio and say, ‘Hey! What the hell did you do that for? What are you thinking?'” Ragan said. “We had that option (in 2011) when we were doing the tandem drafting. We had like 15 different channels, and that was a cool feature.

“That would be something fun for the TV networks and fans to listen in, absolutely.”

Building off that idea, I asked drivers on Daytona 500 Media Day about whether they’d be in favor of the concept.

Check out what they said:

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Let’s talk about reverse skew at Daytona

If you watched the opening weekend of NASCAR practice and racing at Daytona, you likely noticed the cars look…uh…different.

The cars appear like they’re crab-walking down the straightaways, except going the opposite direction than everyone is used to seeing. Instead of being pointed into the corners, they actually seem angled toward the wall.

“They look broken,” Danica Patrick said.

“It’s definitely weird to see,” Chase Elliott said.

“Is that an interesting look for you?” Bubba Wallace asked. “You’re like, ‘What the hell…?’”

I mean, yeah. We are.

So what’s the deal? Well, let’s talk about reverse skew!

WHY ARE TEAMS DOING THIS?

There hasn’t been a ride height rule at non-plate tracks for a few years now, but there was still a rule at Daytona and Talladega until this year. But NASCAR decided to get rid of the mandated ride heights at the plate tracks, which supposedly will help the cars not go airborne as easily.

The smart people in the garage immediately figured out a way they could take advantage of the new rule: By doing the opposite of what they do at intermediate tracks.

“Basically, everything we’ll do to gain skew at Atlanta next week, we just do opposite here to get the spoiler out of the (air),” David Ragan said.

As Ryan Blaney explained, teams want the spoiler in the air at other tracks so the car will go through the corners faster. It adds more side force and downforce.

“Here, you don’t really want that,” Blaney said. “You want to get the spoiler out of the air as much as possible, so that’s why they reverse it. It knocks drag out.”

By turning the cars toward the wall, the spoiler ducks behind the car a bit more. Thus, it creates speed.

IS IT HARDER TO DRIVE?

For sure. The more skewed the cars are, the worse they handle. That’s one reason why the Clash ran single file toward the end — the drivers were just trying to hang on and had difficulty racing side-by-side.

“There are a couple cars that are really aggressive with it, but when you do that, they don’t race as well,” Blaney said. “They handle worse. So that’s been interesting to see who all is doing it that much or how low you want to get the back end.

“I about wrecked (Saturday in practice) when we lowered it a bit more. I just couldn’t drive it. It was too loose.”

It’s going to be a tradeoff between speed and stability — something teams didn’t really have to worry about as much at plate tracks in recent years, when drivers could just hold it wide open and side-draft the crap out of each other.

Would you rather have a fast car or a comfortable one? That’s what teams will try to find in the Duels and practice sessions this week.

“It’s not going to drive the greatest, but I’ve always said as long as we’re fast — (even) if it drives like a dump truck — we’re fine,” Wallace said.

IS IT LEGAL?

Yep. The teams are playing within the rules set by NASCAR. They still have to pass inspection — and the new technology for inspection is even better than before.

It’s hard to get straight answers from the teams about their methods (“I’m not going to tell you that,” Greg Ives said), but some of the skew is achieved by setup and some of it is achieved by adjusting the track bar from inside the car (controlled by the driver).

“There’s a handful of ways you can get there,” Chase Elliott said. “I’m sure guys are adjusting track bars to do it. There’s so many other things you can do to make that happen. There’s no way everybody is doing it the same way.”

SHOULD NASCAR MAKE IT ILLEGAL?

If you recall, NASCAR didn’t like the cars looking so sideways in 2011 and later implemented rules to limit skew in the rear ends. So will it do the same thing now?

Not likely. This is only something you’ll notice at plate tracks, and it’s not very noticeable when the cars are in a pack.

The drivers can see it from inside the cockpits, though. And it’s quite a view.

“I’m sitting there behind cars and I’m like, ‘Damn, we’re on the earth. We’re digging right here,’” Wallace said. “We’re just trying to get as much speed as we can. Whatever you’ve got to do inside the parameters in what the rulebook says, you do it — no matter how it looks.”

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12 Questions with Kyle Busch (2018)

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The 12 Questions series of interviews takes the green flag for its ninth season with Kyle Busch of Joe Gibbs Racing. These interviews are recorded as a podcast and are also transcribed. You can find previous interviews with Busch at the bottom of this post.

1. How often do you have dreams about racing?

Not that often, really. I’m actually not a dreamer, I guess. When I was a kid, I dreamt a lot. I remembered a lot of dreams. But since I’ve gotten older, I really don’t dream a whole lot that much anymore. I don’t sleep all that well. Like I don’t get into deep, deep sleeps very often. I don’t know what that is.

Funny story. Last year when I was at Bristol Motor Speedway, after the Truck race, it wasn’t until like 2 in the morning that I went to bed. (Wife) Samantha and (son) Brexton, they weren’t there, so finally when I crashed out and I went to bed, I was out-out. That was the deepest sleep I remember since Brexton’s been born, and I woke up in the morning and I was like, “Oh my God, where the hell am I?” You ever have any of those, like in a hotel room? Like, “What city or what state am I in?” I was like, “Where am I?” And it took me a second. Man, that was the best I’ve slept in a long time. I don’t get those very often.

You’re like, “Oh yeah, I won Bristol?”

I did. I woke up and I was like, “Oh yeah, I think I won last night.”

2. If you get into someone during a race — intentional or not — does it matter if you apologize?

I think if you get into them intentionally, I don’t think it matters if you apologize. I think if you get into them accidentally or unintentionally, then I think it should mean a little bit when you apologize, you know?

How do they know?

Well, you go up and tell them, “Man, look: I’m sorry, I did not mean to do that. That was totally my bad, I did not mean to do that.” But obviously, if you kind of get into somebody and then you don’t ever go talk to them afterwards, they’re kind of like, “Oh, OK. Well, I guess he kind of meant to.”

3. What is the biggest compliment someone could give you?

Well that’s like tooting your own horn, so I don’t know. I’ve had a lot of compliments over the years and I’ve a lot of non-compliments over the years. I guess, people all the time want to compare you to other drivers and I always kind of say that you can’t always compare somebody to somebody else who’s not in the same era. People want to say, “You’re like Dale Earnhardt” or “You’re like Richard Petty” or whatever and his 200 win thing. It’s not the same. It’s what I’m doing in my time right now, and it’s not the same as what they were doing in their time back then.

4. NASCAR comes to you and says, “Hey, we are bringing a celebrity to the race and we’re wondering if you have time to say hi.” Who is a celebrity you’d be really excited to host?

Two years ago, they brought Peyton Manning to the Bristol Motor Speedway. Actually, Nationwide brought him, but NASCAR let some of us know and they knew I was a big Peyton fan. So I was like, “That’s cool, I’d certainly like to have my time to talk to him or meet him, shake his hand, that sort of stuff.” I also maybe took like three or four of my favorite items of Broncos gear to the side and gave them to those guys and even spelled out on a piece of paper and wrote, “Sign here in silver” and “Here’s the silver (pen) that actually works,” and stuff like that. Yeah, I was that guy. I did that with Peyton Manning.

So who else would I be that kind of guy with? I’ve never met (Tom) Brady yet, so Brady would probably be one of those guys. But that’s kind of where I’m at. I’m more into the sports world than anywhere else. No politics. Movie stars? Not really.

5. In an effort to show they are health-conscious, NASCAR offers the No. 1 pit stall selection for an upcoming race to the first driver willing to go vegan for a month. Would you do it?

If it was for more than one week.

Just for one race.

No. No, no. I haven’t won enough poles in my career that I think that’s mattered — where I’ve ever won a race because I had the No. 1 pit box. So, no, I wouldn’t swap.

6. It’s time for the Random Race Challenge. I have picked a random race from your career and you have to guess where you finished.

Fantastic. This ought to be good. So you give me clues?

No, I’m just going to ask you. I have some information about the race, but I don’t remember it, either. Where did you finish in the 2016 July New Hampshire Cup race?

Spring New Hampshire of 2016… uh, let’s see. Last year was 2017, so the year before that, July… spring… I’m gonna go with fourth.

It was actually eighth.

Was that the one where I had two speeding penalties? I didn’t remember if it was that race or if it was last year’s spring race that I had two speeding penalties.

I’m not sure. You led 133 laps. You started second. And something must have happened. Matt Kenseth won. That’s all I know. I just went and looked at Racing Reference.

Well leading 133 laps of 300, that means I was up front a lot of the day and I probably threw it away at the end. So yeah, it sounds like the one where I sped twice on pit road. (Editor’s note: After looking it up, that was last year’s July New Hampshire race.)

7. Who is the best rapper alive?

Oh man. This is like asking who the best President ever was. You get in a lot of trouble with fans these days and whose opinion matters most, which none of them do.

My favorite of all time, which I’ve always listened to, has been Eminem. I enjoy listening to Eminem and kind of hearing what his take is. Obviously, he’s kind of graphic sometimes and a little bit dirty or whatever. But I know a little about Tupac. He’s obviously really good.

You know who the guy to ask this question would be? Mark Martin. Mark Martin would absolutely know for sure who the best rapper is. So if you can get in front of Mark, he’ll be able to tell you that.

8. Who has the most punchable face in NASCAR?

Every single one of them.

9. NASCAR enlists three famous Americans to be involved with your team for one race as part of a publicity push: Taylor Swift, LeBron James and Tom Hanks. Choose one to be your crew chief, one to be your spotter and one to be your motorhome driver.

Tom Hanks is used to being alone (in Castaway), so he can be the motorhome driver. He’d probably find his own Wilson somehow.

LeBron seems to be pretty good at playmaking, play-calling, things like that, so I’d say he’d be the best at being the crew chief.

And I guess it wouldn’t be so bad to listen to Taylor on the radio all day long being your spotter, but I can always turn that one down — or off.

Do you ever turn your spotter down?

I don’t remember where it was or what year it was, maybe it was (former spotter Jeff) Dickerson, and he was just talking so much. I don’t really remember what was wrong, maybe I was going backward and we just sucked and we were just fading and he was always just telling me, “Car inside, inside,” or whatever and I was like, “I’ve got it! Just shut up! I don’t need your help anymore.” So I have told my spotters to shut up before. That’s when I’m in a bad mood going backward. Those things tend to happen.

10. What is the key to finding the best pre-race bathroom?

Two things: You have a good PR guy, and he kind of scopes it out a little bit, and you have a really good bus driver, and he’ll scope it out for you, too. And if you have a really, really, really good bus driver — which I do, mine’s the best out there — he’ll actually go by the john and kind of stand there and when you’re on your way up, watch where I’m coming and he won’t let anybody else in. Then I’ll have the one I can get into and not have to stand outside of it and wait.

We do need help at some of these racetracks if anybody’s listening, to get the port-o-johns on pit road. Like Indy, it’s kind of tight there, but man, there is nowhere to go to the bathroom. You have to go back in the pagoda, and you have to go to the second floor to go to the bathroom. That’s the only spot to go to the bathroom before the race at Indy!

Is there a line?

Yeah! Typically you’re waiting like three, four guys, and the NASCAR officials, they’re right there too because that’s race control, so they want to go to the bathroom. And there’s only two stalls, you know? So racetracks, we need some help with restrooms on pit lane, please.

11. NASCAR misses the highlight reel value brought by Carl Edwards’ backflips and decides a replacement is needed. How much money would they have to pay you to backflip off your car after your next win?

No, I’m not gonna answer that one. You can’t do that one. I would say who would be the best to do the Carl Edwards now, right?

Who would be?

Noah (Gragson), I think would be.

He can climb a fence.

Well, I think we can all climb a fence. He can also throw up, too. I think Noah would be the one that can probably get it figured out, I just don’t know how athletic he is. He seems to kind of be on that wild side, wild enough that he kind of wants to have something like that. So I would say Noah should be voted in for doing the backflip. 

But as far as them writing a check, I don’t know. It would take a certain amount of money and I could probably figure out how to learn to do a backflip, but I’m not gonna say how much.

12. Each week, I ask a question given to me from the last interview. Last year, I ended the season interviewing Landon Cassill. He wanted me to ask: What is your driving style? Do you use a lot of brake? Do you get to the gas earlier than most?

Well, anybody can look at my style nowadays with the new data. Information’s gonna be available to everybody. They can pick and choose. I wish I had that when I was a rookie. I certainly wouldn’t have waited 13 years to win a championship. So that’s a whole other topic.

What’s my style like? Places you go, you’ve gotta be different. Some places you go, you’ve gotta drive into the corner hard and let it roll and let it get back out of the corner. Some places you go, you’ve gotta be rolling out nice and slow and easy and letting the thing kind of set and get into the corner nice and smooth, and then hammer the gas on exit. Other places you’ve gotta roll into the throttle on exit. It all depends on where you go.

Typically, for however many years, the saying has been, “Easy in, hard off.” So you kind of let it float in, get in there easy, get the tires all set, and then you mash the gas and try to drive out of the corner really, really hard and strong and get a good run down the straightaways. The straightaways are your friend, especially when you have good horsepower under the hood. That’s the time in which you cannot lose or gain as much ground to the rest of your competitors.

Interesting. I might use that for video games or something.

Yeah, video games for sure. Easy in, hard off on video games. No question. You cannot drive it too far into the corner in a video game; it just doesn’t work.

Do you have a question I can ask the next person?

With life on the road so much, how do you balance your travel and your motorhome and where you eat and whether you go out to eat or whether you cook in? How do you balance what you feel like you want to do on a given weekend? Is it because you go to a cool town like Las Vegas that you’re gonna eat out every night, or is it BFE nowhere, somewhere like Pocono or Loudon, whatever, and you’re gonna stay in and just cook out? How do you balance all that?

——

Kyle Busch 12 Questions interviews through the years:

May 25, 2011

April 18, 2012

April 10, 2013

March 12, 2014

August 11, 2015

October 13, 2016

February 22, 2017

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The Top Five: Breaking down the 2018 Clash at Daytona

Five thoughts after Sunday’s season-opening exhibition race at Daytona International Speedway…

1. Calm Clash

Well, that was weird. An exhibition race with no points on the line, and most of the field ran single-file as Brad Keselowski led the last half of the race. OK then.

“Who would have thought they’d just run single-file for 30 laps?” said Kevin Harvick, who lost the draft while trying to make a move. “It didn’t all make sense to me.”

As the laps wound down, a few cars tried to take shots at building a low lane to challenge the frontrunners, but it was mostly a failure. They’d just drop to the back if anyone tried anything.

So what happened? According to several drivers, the cars weren’t handling well with the new restrictor-plate rules package, which made it difficult to run side-by-side or three-wide. They actually had to drive the cars — at least more than usual at Daytona — instead of running wide open while playing the typical chess game.

“I know it looks like we were just riding around the top, but we were actually lifting and trying not to run over each other when you get those big runs,” Austin Dillon said.

The new package helped cars suck up much quicker, but they’d hit the invisible air bubble just as hard. Meanwhile, the stability offered by the previous rules package — which made for lap after lap of pack racing as drivers tried to side draft and pick off positions — became a thing of the past.

“They were too much of a handful to race side-by-side and three-wide,” Erik Jones said. “Earlier in the race when we were doing that, I was out of control and just uncomfortable. I had to back out and give everybody some space.”

When a driver would pull out of line, he not only dropped to the back — but actually risked losing the draft altogether. Harvick said he was trying to slow the car in front of him in order to get a run, but he slowed both down that the draft just left them behind.

If a car stays in line, it never loses its momentum. Plus, the cars are running significantly faster than before — Keselowski said he ran a 199 mph lap while leading (not with a run), which was eye-opening.

“I was trying to make moves, but you just have to accept the pack being single-file or you’re going to be at the back of it,” Harvick said.

So that’s it. The drivers wanted to go and were eager to make something happen, but there was no overcoming the momentum deficit with so few cars and a single-file lane up top.

2. Now what?

The big question now is whether the Duels and the Daytona 500 itself will be less than exciting (or whatever term you want to use), as was the case with the Clash.

As Jones noted, the Duels on Thursday night will probably look similar to what fans saw Sunday because it’s an impound race and teams already have their race setups installed — which are close to the setups in their Clash cars.

And the 500? It’s obviously a concern, but Harvick said not to worry yet.

“I’ve seen this a little bit before (in the small field of the Clash),” he said. “It’s just different when you get all the cars out there.”

As for the contenders for the remainder of Speedweeks? Well, it would be a surprise if anyone but a Ford won the 500.

Fords have looked so strong on plate races over the last couple years (they’ve won seven straight plate races!), and they finished 1-2-3-4 in the Clash. What was especially striking was Harvick said his car was comfortable and stable despite losing the draft — which was the opposite of what other drivers were saying about handling.

Logano, too, said his car didn’t feel much of a change from last year after the team made a few adjustments.

“Not as much (change) as I thought it was going to be when I went to sleep last night,” he said.

If that’s the case, the Fords will return to the track Thursday night with a significant edge on the rest of the field.

3. Team orders?

As the Team Penske cars ran 1-2-3 in a line with the laps winding down, you may have wondered to yourself if Ryan Blaney and Logano would just be content to push Keselowski to the win.

No way.

“I don’t know about you guys, but for the last 20 laps, I was in there going crazy waiting for someone to make a move,” Logano said. “I was ready to go.”

Of course Logano and Blaney wanted to win for themselves. It’s just they were in a similar situation as everyone else, realizing they needed help to make something happen.

Blaney eventually tried it and made a move coming to the white flag — but all it did was drop him through the field. That move wasn’t the original plan, but it was perhaps his best option in the moment.

“I feel like I was in a good spot because Joey was behind me, and he would have gone with me for the win no matter where I went,” Blaney said. “I was going to kind of hang out until the lane started to form and then I’d jump out. It just never did.”

Roger Penske and Keselowski agreed if that scenario happened again in the Daytona 500, it would be an every-man-for-himself situation in the final laps (like it was with the Toyotas a few years ago). So there’s little chance all the drivers would have just stayed in line while Keselowski just cruised to a win.

4. Rules are rules

Ricky Stenhouse Jr. passed below the double yellow line, which is a penalty. You can’t do that.

NASCAR’s rule is it will overlook such a pass if the driver was forced below the line by another driver — but Stenhouse wasn’t.

Stenhouse, his team and a whole mess of people on Twitter argued otherwise, but NASCAR’s call was extremely consistent and fair compared to how officials have called it before.

The 2008 Regan Smith/Tony Stewart incident is the defining moment for this rule. If that wasn’t forcing someone below the yellow line, it clearly must be very obvious for NASCAR to call it.

So you might not like it, but NASCAR made a fair call in this case — which is all anyone should hope for.

Stenhouse had a run coming, but it looked like Busch’s car had already started to move down (Busch said his car got sucked down there and he wasn’t trying to go that low). Could Stenhouse have forced the issue with a wreck? Sure, but what’s the point?

It’s not unlike a driver getting a huge run on the outside and the leader moving up to block. What happens then? If the oncoming driver presses the issue, they’re both in the wall. So most of the time, they back out of it.

Stenhouse tweeted next time he could just turn Busch and wreck the whole field, but he either A) Could have backed out of it or B) If he felt that was impossible given his momentum, he could have given the position back and there would have been no penalty. So it’s not like that was the only option.

5. The new pit stop ballet

NASCAR took away a pit crew member from each team in the offseason, which forced crews to rearrange their choreography. Plus, tire changers now have to all use the same pit gun. There was much talk about how it would look and impact the races — and rightfully so.

But although the stops were significantly slower (FOX said more than four seconds!), it was hardly noticeable.

We probably won’t see the true impact until there’s a “race off pit road” situation at 1.5-mile tracks — where track position really matters. Daytona doesn’t make that big of a difference (although Keselowski did use a two-tire strategy to take the lead).

Overall, though, it just didn’t seem like a big thing. A month from now, we probably won’t even give it a second thought.

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DraftKings Fantasy NASCAR picks: 2018 Daytona Clash

I’m playing DraftKings this season and will be posting my picks here each week. Disclosure: If you want to play and sign up using this link, DraftKings will give my website a commission. Note: I am not an employee of
DraftKings and do not have access to any non-public information…these are just my personal picks.

Last season’s results: $110 wagered, $104.50 won in 27 contests.

This week’s contest: $3 Hot Rod game (three entry max)

Clash strategy: With so few laps, there’s a premium on drivers who start toward the back of the 17-driver field. Go for position differential. That’s why most of my picks start outside the top 10.

Clash picks: 

— Brad Keselowski ($9,500): Maybe the best plate racer in the field AND he starts last? Yes, please.

— Kyle Busch ($8,800): Starts 13th and should finish in the top five if all goes well.

— Ricky Stenhouse Jr. ($7,400): A bit of a risk starting so high (eighth), but he clearly knows what he’s doing on plate tracks (won the July race here as well as Talladega spring race) and the Fords draft well.

— Ryan Blaney ($7,100): Again, the Fords draft well and he starts 15th out of 17 drivers. Easy call.

— Kurt Busch ($6,400): Defending Daytona 500 winners starts 14th and should move up. Take those positions for the points.

— Jamie McMurray ($6,200): Starts second-to-last and has four career plate wins (two at Daytona). Take him!

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Las Vegas Testing Day 2: What can we really learn?

With so many unknowns heading into 2018 and so little information to start guessing what will happen, it’s awfully tempting to jump to conclusions based on little nuggets of data from this week’s Las Vegas test.

For example: William Byron was the fastest in two of the four sessions after never getting in a Cup car before this week. The Chevrolets showed speed with their new Camaro. Kyle Larson had the quickest overall lap time when most teams switched to qualifying trim on the final day.

What’s it all mean? Anything? How much can we really tell from a test?

“You never know who is maybe tuned up trying to raise morale within their own team and who is legit,” Brad Keselowski said. “Usually the bigger teams are fairly legit in these tests. … But you never can really tell for certain.”

For example: Keselowski said Team Penske often does not bring its best cars to the test, and Ty Dillon said some teams might not even bring their best motors.

Learning what the car likes and what adjustments work are more important than chasing lap times, the drivers said. And with so many different agendas, it’s tough to tell how much the lap times matter.

“I don’t think you can really judge it to the fullest,” Dillon said.

Plus, there’s no inspection at the tests — so teams can do whatever they want, in theory (although that would seem like a waste of time considering they came all the way across the country for this).

“You never know who is trying what,” Larson said. “And I honestly don’t even know how far our team has pushed the boundaries for the test.”

Did last year’s preseason test tell us anything? Not really. It was held at Phoenix, and Dale Earnhardt Jr. had the fastest overall lap. He was one of four drivers — Larson, Joey Logano and Kevin Harvick the others — who were in the top five for all four Phoenix sessions.

But that wasn’t a good barometer for the season, since only two of them even made the playoffs and the four drivers combined for just two top-fives in the Phoenix races.

So do we know anything after Las Vegas?

I’m going to say yes. First, we know that when most teams actively tried to post a fast lap at the end of the test, it was Larson who had the advantage.

“When we switched to qualifying trim, we were faster than everybody here,” Larson said. “I don’t know how that would be if it were a full field, but I felt happy overall.”

Also, there was a frequent pattern for most of the two days: Larson, Ryan Newman (second-fastest overall) and William Byron were consistently near the top of the charts.

All of those drivers race for Chevy teams, who have a new nose this year.

“I think you can get some sort of an idea (of who is fast),” Larson said. “The Penske group, whenever I’ve done tests with them, they’re not as competitive at the test and then they come back at the race and they’re really fast.

“But overall, our balance felt really good. So you can take that at least and know you’re going to come back to the majority of the mile-and-a-halfs and be competitive.”

Day 2 combined top single-lap speeds (I took the driver’s top speed from the morning and afternoon sessions; most were in the afternoon when they finished in qualifying trim):

Kyle Larson (Chip Ganassi Racing Chevrolet) / 191.259 mph

Ryan Newman (Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet) / 190.027

Erik Jones (Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota) / 190.007

Ricky Stenhouse Jr. (Roush Fenway Racing Ford) / 189.827

William Byron (Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet) / 189.281

Kasey Kahne (Leavine Family Racing Chevrolet) / 189.009

Brad Keselowski (Team Penske Ford) / 188.745

Kurt Busch (Stewart-Haas Racing Ford) / 187.754

Paul Menard (Wood Brothers Racing Ford) / 187.500

Ty Dillon (Germain Racing Chevrolet) / 187.500

Chris Buescher (JTG/Daugherty Racing Chevrolet) / 187.318

Darrell Wallace Jr. (Richard Petty Motorsports Chevrolet) / 187.298

Cole Custer (GoFas Racing Ford) / 186.761

Drew Herring (Toyota wheel force car) / 184.319 *

Justin Allgaier (Chevrolet wheel force car) / 183.824 *

David Ragan (Ford wheel force car) / 180.542 *

* — Wheel force cars are used by manufacturers to gain additional information through advanced telemetry equipment and have a primary objective of gathering data.