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Coca-Cola 600May 30, 2004
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Derrike will be competing in the Coca-Cola 600 in the #50 Dodge. No word yet on who the sponsor might be. Derrike did tell us, "We will be taking the Texas car, which is my favorite, so I am expecting good things in qualifying Thursday night. Wish us luck!" Bennett Lane Winery was the sponsor for the race. In the first practice, Derrike was 24th fastest of 52 cars with a time of 29.891 and speed of 180.656. NASCAR.COM listed Bennett Lane Winery as the sponsor. In Qualifying, Derrike produced a lap of 29.494 and speed of 183.088 which was fast enough for 18th position at the time. At the end of the round, the #50 Dodge was left in 38th position, just enough without having to take a provisional. In the second practice, Derrike was 41st fastest with a time of 31.151 and speed of 173.349. In Happy Hour, Derrike was 35th fastest with a time of 30.662 and speed of 176.114. An excellent article by Tom Rife about sponsorships is at: http://www.naplesnews.com/npdn/sports/article/0,2071,NPDN_15000_2925504,00.html
Derrike started the race in 38th position and finished in 34th.
Derrike updated us with this past weekend's race. "As for the Coca-Cola 600, we had a decent qualifying lap considering it was only 38th quickest. We were a little too tight qualifying, but in practice leading up to qualifying we were 26th quickest and we were leery of loosing the car up too much and making a mistake in qualifying. We do not want to take provisionals!
"For the race the car was very loose
to start! We knew we had to be fairly loose in starting the race to
hopefully have enough adjustment for later in the evening; we just missed
the setup a bit. Late in the race we had been loose and Newman had
apparently lost power. I had a run on him going into turn one and he drove
in back hard along side me and it took the air off my spoiler and we got
loose and slid up into him. So it was not really a good night but, we will
try harder in Dover.
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