NASCAR DFS: Toyota Owners 400 Practice Notes

Final Practice for Toyota Owners 400

Final practice was rained out and cancelled. The Practice to Qualifying table will be out after qualifying happens at 5:40 pm ET.

Through Final Practice

Opening Practice for Toyota Owners 400

Richmond Raceway

Friday, April 12 11:00 am ET

50 minutes in length

Weather

Upper-60s for the air temp with cloudy skies that kept the track temp down a bit cooler than normal

Penalized Drivers

Kevin Harvick (30-minute penalty in final 30 minutes of practice)

Top-20 Speeds (single lap)

Best Lap Averages

Items of Note:

• A lot of teams are in race trim this session since it is an impound race this weekend meaning the cars can’t be worked on after qualifying.
• There are a lot of cars doing shorter runs and then heading to the garage to make adjustments.
• Kyle Busch is simply making fine-tuning adjustments to the car already this weekend. They feel confident in the car they unloaded from the hauler.
• Denny Hamlin is second on the speed charts with 15 minutes elapsed in practice after running 11 laps in the session.
• Chris Buescher and David Ragan are in the top-five laps run with 18 minutes elapsed in the session.
• Most cars are hugging the bottom line early on in practice which is to be expected as it’s a very green track so far.
• With 20 elapsed in practice, Kevin Harvick began serving the 30-minute practice hold. Prior to that he ran 28 laps and they love the long-run speed in the car and he’s shown better speed than pretty much everyone that’s in the neighborhood of laps run.
• With 25 minutes elapsed in the session, Kyle Larson jumped to the top of the speed charts on his 20^th and 21^st laps of the session.
• Joey Logano is sitting ninth on the speed charts with 31 minutes elapsed but they are just doing minor adjustments to it since they are overall happy with the car.
• Brad Keselowski is trying to get air where they want it to go and are making chassis adjustments and he is currently 22^nd on the speed chart with 15 minutes to go in the session.
• The aero package this week is similar to the package that was on the cars here in the Fall 2014 race despite it being 4.5 years ago.
• Hedrick Motorsports drivers sit no better than P15 in single lap speeds with 10 minutes to go in practice. Alex Bowman leads the way at 15^th with the other three 20^th-28^th.
• The lead engineer for the 1-car was with Martin Truex Jr. the last few years and has experience with making cars go very fast hence the start for Kurt Busch.
• Kurt Busch is making series of about 10-lap runs to get the balance dialed in but overall he is quite happy with the car and how it’s handling on the track.
• With six minutes left in practice, eight Chevys are in the top-20 on the single-lap charts along with eight Fords.
• Kyle Larson is so happy with his car that with 15 minutes left in the session he pulled off the track and left the garage area. They only have minor tightness in the car but other than that he is very happy with the car.
• Chris Buescher feels that they have a strong short track program and they ran strong at Bristol and ran well in first practice here. He feels they have to work on long-run speed for the next and final practice.
• Chase Elliott ran the most laps in this session with 68 run but sits at 24^th on the speed charts at the end of the session.
• Daniel Suarez snuck up into the top-six at the end of practice on his final run of the session.