{"id":29081,"date":"2020-02-29T23:00:29","date_gmt":"2020-03-01T05:00:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/?p=29081"},"modified":"2020-03-01T08:26:25","modified_gmt":"2020-03-01T14:26:25","slug":"nascar-saturday-fontana-notebook","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/2020\/02\/29\/nascar-saturday-fontana-notebook\/","title":{"rendered":"NASCAR: Saturday Fontana Notebook"},"content":{"rendered":"

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

Bounty or no bounty, Kyle Larson will race a truck for fun<\/b><\/p>\n

FONTANA, Calif. \u2013 Kyle Larson started it with a Las Vegas-appropriate tweet that showed three cherries above a FOX: NASCAR post urging fans to congratulate Kyle Busch on winning his seventh straight NASCAR Gander RV & Outdoors Truck Series race.<\/p>\n

Larson\u2019s tweet was intended in good fun, but it inspired driver Kevin Harvick to offer a $50,000 bounty to any NASCAR Cup Series driver who could defeat Busch in one of his four remaining starts this season. Marcus Lemonis, chairman and CEO of the series sponsor put up another $50,000.<\/p>\n

Chase Elliott will take up the gauntlet March 14 at Atlanta Motor Speedway. Larson has announced he\u2019ll try his luck against Busch Mar. 20 at Homestead-Miami Speedway.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was really a joke,\u201d Larson said of his initial tweet. \u201cI\u2019m not offended when Kyle Busch wins Truck races. I actually like it a lot, because I feel like it helps expose the guys that are good and the ones who aren\u2019t. I think when he does win and he has to battle for the wins, I think it shows which kids are really good. So, I just dropped some cherries on there because, when I do win dirt races, I do get a lot of that as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was more of a dig at the NASCAR fans and dirt fans who give me crap also, but in a different series. But I guess it upset (Kevin) Harvick enough that he put a bounty up, which is cool. I think it\u2019s great for the sport and great for the Truck Series. Hopefully, the ratings are even better for these races coming up, and hopefully it\u2019s exciting, too.\u201d<\/p>\n

Even if Elliott dethrones Busch at Atlanta, Larson says he will still race a truck at Homestead.<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah, for sure, I\u2019m going to run,\u201d Larson said. \u201cI\u2019m committed to run. I\u2019d like to beat him and think that I could have $100,000 in my pocket, but, yeah, it\u2019s really not about the money to me. I think it\u2019s a cool fun kind of challenge, and I look forward to trying to beat him.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd if the money is still out there when I do get that chance, it\u2019ll be a lot of fun. But Kyle Busch is the best. It doesn\u2019t matter what type of car he\u2019s in. It\u2019s not going to be easy. It never is, no matter what car or truck you\u2019re in. But it\u2019ll be fun, and I feel like Homestead is my best track and my best opportunity to do it.\u201d<\/p>\n

MARTIN TRUEX JR. FACES UPHILL BATTLE IN SUNDAY\u2019S RACE<\/b><\/p>\n

Martin Truex Jr. picked up his first and only victory at Auto Club Speedway in 2018, but he\u2019ll face a major challenge in trying to become a repeat winner in Sunday\u2019s Auto Club 400 (3:30 p.m. ET on FOX, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).<\/p>\n

Truex\u2019s No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota failed pre-qualifying inspection three times on Saturday morning. By rule, Truex was not allowed to post a lap in time trials, relegating the 2017 NASCAR Cup Series champion to the last (38th) starting position for the third event of the season.<\/p>\n

Though Truex was pleased with the performance of his car in Friday\u2019s practices, he\u2019ll have to work especially hard to make significant progress on the two-mile track. Truex, at least, has the right attitude for the job.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m always optimistic,\u201d he said. \u201cI did feel good about our car (in practice) and seemed like long runs we were strong. Hopefully, we\u2019ll have a lot of those tomorrow and be able to use those to our advantage.\u201d<\/p>\n

Truex said the inspection failures were the result of compounding problems.<\/p>\n

\u201cI guess we failed a small spot on the body the first time through and then fixed it, came back and then got into the LIS (laser inspection station) roulette game. Chased that around a few times and here we are.\u201d<\/p>\n

Making his charge to the front even more difficult is the abrasive asphalt at Auto Club\u2014all but eliminating two-tire calls to gain track position.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s not many opportunities here because of tire wear,\u201d Truex said. \u201cYou have to put tires on. If you don\u2019t, you\u2019re just going to get run over. We\u2019re just going to have to pass some guys and look forward to having some fun.\u201d<\/p>\n

WILLIAM BYRON PROVIDES POST-MORTEM OF FINAL RESTART IN LAS VEGAS<\/b><\/p>\n

What happened in Vegas might not stay in Vegas this time.<\/p>\n

With two laps left in last Sunday\u2019s Pennzoil 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, William Byron restarted second beside race leader and eventual winner Joey Logano.<\/p>\n

Byron didn\u2019t hold that spot for long. Matt DiBenedetto, restarting third, had a strong run to the inside of Byron\u2019s No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet, but DiBenedetto slid up the track into Byron\u2019s left-side door and caused a tire rub on Byron\u2019s Camaro.<\/p>\n

Byron\u2019s tire went flat during the two-lap dash to the finish, relegating the 22-year-old driver to an 11th-place finish. DiBenedetto ran second to Logano, matching his career-best result.<\/p>\n

DiBenedetto reached out to Byron after the race.  <\/p>\n

Yeah, he texted me,\u201d said Byron, who made it clear he won\u2019t forget what happened in Vegas. \u201cWe\u2019ll just race guys like they race me. That\u2019s pretty much how it goes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Was there anything Byron could have done differently on the final restart?<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the third-place guy was in a big advantage last week\u2014that\u2019s the guy who had the best restart,\u201d Byron said. \u201cBut I think you\u2019ve just got to learn from it, see what you can do with your mirrors and try to make a quicker adjustment. And my spotter and I talked a little bit, too, so that\u2019s really all it is.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service Bounty or no bounty, Kyle Larson will race a truck for fun FONTANA, Calif. \u2013 Kyle Larson started it with a Las Vegas-appropriate tweet that showed three cherries above a FOX: NASCAR post urging fans to congratulate Kyle Busch on winning his seventh straight NASCAR Gander RV & Outdoors […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":676,"featured_media":29082,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_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},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[11],"tags":[399,16],"class_list":["post-29081","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nascar","tag-auto-club-speedway","tag-nascar"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/racedaysa.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/NCS_ACS_JJohnson_022920-scaled.jpg?fit=2560%2C1706&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7hzTZ-7z3","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29081","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=29081"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29081\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29083,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29081\/revisions\/29083"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29082"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29081"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29081"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29081"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}