Photo Credit: Noel Lanier
For this weekend’s Geico 500 at Talladega Superspeedway, Ty Dillon will qualify the No. 14 Stewart-Haas Chevrolet as part of this relief driving efforts for Tony Stewart.
Stewart-Haas Racing had already announced that Dillon would take over the car at Dega at the first caution last week when they announced Stewart return to racing. This is due to avoid the chance of Stewart being re-injured as there would be more potential for large high-speed crashes as this is a restrictor plate race.
Notably, Stewart was granted a medical exemption to attempt to qualify for the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup upon his return to racing. The wavier states if he is in the top-30 in points with a victory, he would be in the Chase. By starting the race and then yielding the car to Dillon, he would accrue championship point or potential victory if Dillon would win the race.
“Sounds like Tony’s got to get in and make some practice laps to make it official and then I’ll get in and run some practice and not sure if we’re going to draft or what,” Dillon told SiruisXM. “I’ll qualify the car and Tony will start the race and it sounds like he’ll run to maybe the first caution, but you never know with Tony. He might like his race car and want to stay out there.
“But I think he’ll probably run to the first caution, we’ll try to make the swap as quickly as possible, hopefully not lose a lap, and we’ll go to racing and hopefully get him that win he needs.”
Stewart who is from Columbus, Indiana earlier this week participate in a Goodyear tire test at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
“I’m actually having fun up here,” he said. “This is my last tire test as a driver, so I’ve been having fun working with the Goodyear guys and it’s been kind of fun because three of the main guys here when I started here are at this test, which they don’t always get to come to the same test together. It’s kind of nice to be working with them one last time.
“It’s nice to be home and I think any chance, anytime that we’ve had an opportunity to go test here, I always jumped on it. I don’t like to go test – it’s boring to me – but I’ve always liked any chance I got to come up to Indy and test. That’s something I always wanted to do.”
The Geico 500 at Talladega Superspeedway is on Sunday May 1st.
