新闻 - Broken Trucks and Broken Spirits

Broken Trucks and Broken Spirits

The first race of the NASC Truck Series Season 37 offered a lot of promise. Craig Jennings was the clear favorite, but it was anyone's race for the top 10 from there. Lots of rookies mixed with experienced drivers. Unfortunately for Pepperidge Farm Racing and their rookie driver, Snicker Doodle, there was barely a chance to get the seat warm before the truck broke.

"I babied the thing. Our strategy involved barely putting any pressure on the equipment. At best I was pushing 15% of what I could push," said Doodle after stepping out of the truck before the end of stage 1. "I just wanted to run laps and learn the truck in a race environment. I was perfectly happy to sit behind the more aggressive pack and ride around until later in the race; maybe get a decent finish with pit strategy."

Snicker Doodle pulled off the track on lap 33. "I avoided the [Victoria] Kennedy wreck right in front of me, and I was swapping the draft with [Stephen] Bird saving our stuff as a pair. We were riding in I think 5th or 6th right before the pit window was going to open and it just quit. We were executing perfectly, exactly where we wanted to be and the equipment just failed us. I genuinely don't know what I could do different. I was saving everything and it still quit. I guess we'll just have to baby it even more in Vegas. It's pathetic really. I don't care if we finish in 20th, I just want to finish."

Snicker Doodle and the Pepperidge Farm Racing team finished 31st in their first NASC series race thanks to the failure.