Jeff Wackerlin
Senior Editor
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Posted Wednesday, January 17, 2007 |
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Videos: Busch Praises "COT", Day 7 Recap | Cumulative Speeds | Photos
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. - All eyes turned to Kurt Busch's No. 2 "Car of Tomorrow" Dodge in Jackson Hewitt Preseason Thunder testing after he recorded a lap of 191.188 mph around the 2.5-mile Daytona International Speedway.
Today, which was the final day of NEXTEL Cup testing, teams had the option of bringing out a third car (C) and Penske opted to use their COTs with Busch and Ryan Newman.
Busch's speed in his 2C Dodge, that was using a 1 1/8 plate, was over six mph faster than Jeff Gordon's "Car of Today" speed of 184.596 mph in the a.m. session.
"It's good to have the data," crew chief Roy McCauley said in regards to the 1 1/8 plate. "But I don't see us from my standpoint racing that. If I had to guess it looks like it will be a one inch."
Both of the Penske cars tried a number of combinations throughout the day.
"We worked on gear and plate (one inch and and 1 1/8), Mike Nelson and Ryan did the opposite," McCauley said. "That was the trend just to see what way we would go. We were just trying to get a baseline where things are at."
Newman's team started with a 15/16 plate and then went to a one inch and kept the same gear in it for the first two runs.
With Busch's speed by far the fastest on the day that raised the question in the garage area how legal the car actually was.
"It's 100 percent legal to the rules that I have," McCauley said about the No. 2 Dodge COT.
Paul Menard led the rain-shortened afternoon drafting session with a lap of 187.099 mph, which was the fastest over the two weeks of Cup testing.
Kyle Busch (186.765 mph), Jeff Green (186.722 mph), Dale Earnhardt Jr. (186.606 mph) and David Ragan (185.536 mph) rounded out the top five among the seven sessions conducted at Daytona.
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