Elliott Sadler Tops Testing at Lowe’s
Thursday May 8, 2008
CONCORD, NC — When two days of testing wrapped up at Lowe’s Motor Speedway on Tuesday night, there were some smiling faces in the No. 19 Dodge garage.
On Monday night, Elliott Sadler sat atop the speed chart with a fast lap of 28.994 sec/186.245 mph; which was four 10ths faster than the second place car that night. For the afternoon session, Sadler and team were fifth-fastest overall.
When testing returned to action on Tuesday afternoon at the 1.5-mile oval, Sadler and the Gillett Evernham Motorsports team remained consistent with the sixth-fastest time. When the red flag flew on Tuesday night to end testing they had the 19th fastest time, but nobody had equaled the team’s top time from Monday night. Actually, nobody broke the 28-second mark like Sadler did on Monday night. The closest anyone came was Tuesday night with Jamie McMurray’s 29.076 second lap.
That left Sadler and the No. 19 Dodge team with the fastest overall time for the two-day test session.
“We have been very pleased with how our No. 19 Dodge has been from the minute we unloaded,” said Elliott Sadler, driver for Gillett Evernham Motorsports. “This is a brand-new car that we built for the 1.5-mile tracks and I can’t even begin to tell you how much better it feels than before. At one point Monday night, I went out and laid down that fast lap and Rodney (Childers, Team Director) asked how I liked the changes. I just chuckled, that’s all I said. He came back saying, ‘you liked it that much, huh?”
“The racing hasn’t been too great on the 1.5-mile tracks and we really needed some work as a team, too. I have to applaud NASCAR and Humpy Wheeler and Lowe’s for making this test possible. I just hope this all transfers into some great racing in the All-Star and Coca-Cola 600 races this month. This team of mine is incredible how they keep building good cars and making the right changes.
“I’m happy with my car and this test. We, our team, needed this test more than anything after what we did in Atlanta and Texas this year. Now we need to make it work in the Showdown so we can get into the All-Star Race.”
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This report was provided by an outside PR source and posted by Kim DeHaven.
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