The other J.J. took command of Daytona preseason testing for the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Tuesday afternoon.Instead of reading Jimmie Johnson's name at the top of the speed chart for the fourth-straight session, J.J. Yeley bolted to the top in the first drafting session of Preseason Thunder. The drafting session in which Yeley's No. 96 Toyota was the fastest was the first time NASCAR allowed cars to get into race mode and actually see how their cars handled with other cars on track.
Wednesday morning, Kyle Busch in his No. 18 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota took over the top spot in another drafting session at 187.786mph. Johnson fell to the 5th-place ranking on the grid.
Teams originally started out in packs of about three cars and eventually moved up to around 7 or 8 cars in a pack.
Tire issues also started to take some effect on Tuesday with Reed Sorenson spinning his No. 41 Ganassi Dodge after a tire let go. Casey Mears also scrubbed the wall with a similar issue.
NASCAR and Goodyear have taken the stance that the blistering of right-side tires is normal for testing, and that teams should figure out the issue on their own. Go figure.
Elliott Sadler, however, agreed:
"I think this is a normal issue in winter testing until we get some rubber down on the race track," he told reporters. "By the time we have the 24-hour race and stuff like that, there will be plenty of rubber down, we'll slide around a little bit more and tire problems will take care of themselves."Sadler is correct with the amount of rubber that will be put on the race track. On tap before the Daytona 500 include the Rolex 24 Sports Car race, an ARCA race, the Budweiser Shootout, plenty of Cup, Nationwide, and Truck Series practice, the Nationwide Series race, the Craftsman Truck Series race, and the Gatorade Duels.
That should be plenty of track time to get the track worked in well.
