Tuesday
Gilliland Geared Up for First Plate Race with Front Row
Press Release‘Anything Can Happen at Talladega’
The Taco Bell team is preparing for Sunday’s race with some wind tunnel work this week. They will also rely on the experience of veteran crew chief Peter Sospenzo in its approach to the race weekend.
Sunday’s event will be Gilliland’s sixth career start at Talladega. His best trip to the track came in 2007 when he started from the pole and finished eighth.
Comments from Taco Bell Driver David Gilliland on Talladega Superspeedway:
“This will be my first superspeedway race with Front Row Motorsports this season actually, but we’re going to prepare for it just like we do for any other race. We’ll use all the available information we have, both from our own experience and from our teammates. We won’t have to qualify on time, so that will be a help to us. We’ll be able to go and just work on race trim and concentrate on getting our Taco Bell Ford Fusion driving well in the draft. That’s the biggest thing.
“All the cars drive good by themselves at Talladega because it’s so smooth thanks to the good job they did repaving it. But the biggest thing is seeing how your car drives in the draft and getting it comfortable and stable. When you’ve got to qualify in on time, you can’t do that.
“Part of the deal with Front Row Motorsports this year was that I didn’t get to do the earlier restrictor-plate races. But I’m excited I get to do one here at Talladega and I’m looking forward to it. It’s a lot of fun. I did some testing with Joe Gibbs Racing this year at Talladega and the test went really well, so I learned a little bit there. Getting out there and testing really made me miss it.
“(Crew chief) Peter Sospenzo has a lot of experience, so he will be a big asset going in to this weekend. He’s been around the Cup Series for a long time on some very successful teams. Plus, he got to run the superspeedway races earlier in the year, so we’ll lean on some of his knowledge that he learned in those races. And I’ve done some restrictor-plate racing and had some good success in the past. So we’ll put those together and go have a great day, hopefully.
“Last year in this race, we were running fourth or fifth and Matt Kenseth got loose, got into Jeff Gordon and spun him out and collected me. And those are guys that don’t crash on a weekly basis. So, anything can happen to anybody. You can be in the wrong place at the wrong time and you can get your car totaled and not be able to finish. There’s no safe place. Stuff happens in the back, in the middle and in the front. There’s nowhere to hide.”
About Front Row Motorsports with Yates Racing:
Front Row Motorsports was formed in 2005 by restaurant entrepreneur Bob Jenkins. Since that time the team has entered a car in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series and NASCAR Nationwide Series. In 2010, Front Row Motorsports will partner with Ford and Roush/Yates Engines to field a three-car operation based in Statesville, N.C. The team fields the Long John Silver’s Ford driven by Travis Kvapil, the Taco Bell Ford driven by David Gilliland and the A&W All American Food Ford driven by Robert Richardson Jr.
- Breaking Limits Marketing for Front Row Motorsports with Yates Racing, Press Release
Article Tags: AMP Energy Juice 500, David Gilliland, Ford Fusion, Ford Racing, Front Row Motorsports, Front Row Motorsports with Yates Racing, HALLOW-DEGA, NASCAR, NASCAR Sprint Cup Series, No. 37 Taco Bell Ford Fusion, NSCS, Talladega Superspeedway, TSS, Yates Racing
