{"id":23908,"date":"2019-03-01T19:25:28","date_gmt":"2019-03-02T01:25:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/?p=23908"},"modified":"2019-03-02T15:48:51","modified_gmt":"2019-03-02T21:48:51","slug":"hard-work-in-offseason-pays-off-in-speed-for-rcr-chevrolets","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/2019\/03\/01\/hard-work-in-offseason-pays-off-in-speed-for-rcr-chevrolets\/","title":{"rendered":"Hard work in offseason pays off in speed for RCR Chevrolets"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service<\/em><\/p>\n

LAS VEGAS \u2013 Friday\u2019s opening Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series<\/a> practice at Las Vegas Motor Speedway<\/strong> was not yet over, and other drivers already were turning a jealous eye toward the Richard Childress Racing Chevrolets<\/strong> of Austin Dillon<\/strong> and Daniel Hemric<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Austin Dillon, driver of the #3 Dow SILASTIC Silicone Elastomers Chevrolet, practices for the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Pennzoil 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway on March 1, 2019 in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Photo by Sarah Crabill\/Getty Images)<\/p><\/div>\n

Brad Keselowski had the No. 3 and No. 8 RCR Chevys as the fastest cars on the track, and the speed chart backed up that assessment. Dillon, the 2018 Daytona 500 winner, put up the fastest lap at 180.294 mph in preparation for Sunday\u2019s Pennzoil 400 (3:30 p.m. ET<\/a>, FOX, PRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). Hemric was second on the board at 180.078 mph.<\/p>\n

And where other organizations, particularly those that field four cars, hooked up in drafting practice to try to elevate their collective speeds, the RCR Chevrolets didn\u2019t need help to top the speed chart. Following a year in which Dillon\u2019s victory in the season-opening race was the organization\u2019s only win, the grandson of team owner Richard Childress was justifiably proud.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, I\u2019m very proud of RCR,\u201d Dillon said. \u201c(Chief technology officer) Eric Warren has put a ton of work and effort together working with (Vice President of Competition) Andy Petree, working with our guys in the aero department, to really put a big effort into this new package, to come out as the guys to beat.<\/p>\nhttp:\/\/racedaysa.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/Vegas_MENCS_DillonA_030119.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n

\u201cAnd I felt like we left the Vegas test (Jan. 31-Feb. 1) as the fastest car, and I wondered how we would come back, and I felt like we brought the exact same speed back. The guys definitely closed in on us. I felt like they learned some stuff from us at the test.\u201d<\/p>\n

Las Vegas wasn\u2019t the only place where the Childress cars showed speed. Hemric, in particular, was fast at both Daytona and Atlanta, though his finishes of 34th and 20th didn\u2019t do justice to the quality of his car.<\/p>\n

At Las Vegas the Cup drivers will compete with the second variation of NASCAR\u2019s new higher-downforce, lower-horsepower competition package, and there are still many unknowns.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think there\u2019s still some variables on what is the best way to go about this racing,\u201d Dillon said. \u201cI think that\u2019s the one thing everybody doesn\u2019t know. I think in our minds, we\u2019ve put a lot of work into simulation and wind tunnel and just trying to combine it all to figure out what direction you should go mechanically or aero-wise, to figure out how it\u2019s going to race the best.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo that\u2019s the variable we don\u2019t know. We saw at Atlanta some guys were really good for a little while and then they faded. We\u2019re just trying to figure out the best way to race around each other, because we know we\u2019re going to be closer together more often.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service LAS VEGAS \u2013 Friday\u2019s opening Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series practice at Las Vegas Motor Speedway was not yet over, and other drivers already were turning a jealous eye toward the Richard Childress Racing Chevrolets of Austin Dillon and Daniel Hemric. Brad Keselowski had the No. 3 and No. 8 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":676,"featured_media":23891,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[11],"tags":[67,16],"class_list":["post-23908","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nascar","tag-las-vegas-motor-speedway","tag-nascar"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/racedaysa.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/mencs_lvms_ad3ontrack_030119.jpg?fit=3941%2C2472&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7hzTZ-6dC","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23908","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/676"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23908"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23908\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23915,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23908\/revisions\/23915"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23891"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}