Natalie Decker ran a clean race last Friday, where she had to overcome learning a new track on the fly with only two practice sessions to prepare.
After she got a feel for the track she was able to get up to pace, avoid some late carnage and secure a 17th place finish at the Monster Mile on her first ride.
This coming weekend the circumstances are different, in terms of familiarity. This will be Decker’s third career trip to Kansas Speedway, the first time in the Trucks though. Her previous two trips came in the ARCA series.
Her first appearance came on October 20th of 2017, where she started 19th and finished 12th in the 26 car field. Then in 2018 she went back, started 15th and then battled her way up front for a 6th place finish, even taking the lead for a lap.
This action did come in ARCA, so it’s not entirely obvious how Decker’s performance will line up. I’m not here to predict, just to outline the facts. Here are a few of those facts.
In Decker’s first mile and a half race this season back at Atlanta Motor Speedway, she expressed the need to grow and learn the track style. It was her first mile and a half in a truck; she raced a mostly clean race, spun out twice, protecting the car each time from obtaining from much damage, learned the track and had just 5 green flag passes in the race.
The next weekend she goes to Las Vegas Motor Speedway, and the for the first time at the track mind you. She qualifies 12th, at the start of the race she gets up into 8th before falling back near the end of stage one in the race. She ends the race down a lap but climbing up to a 13th place finish. That race, she made 33 green flag passes, with 18 of the passes being of a truck running in the top 15.
Now you look ahead to this weekend in Kansas, the third mile and a half of Decker’s truck career. There looks to be a correlation between familiarity and performance, which quickly has adjusted itself in Decker’s career.
One unfamiliarity will be this coming as Decker’s first night race in the truck series. On the flip side though, both of her ARCA races at the track were on Friday nights.
Signs point to a strong performance Friday night from Decker at Kansas Speedway as the DGR-Crosley racer takes her No. 54 N29 Technologies LLC Toyota Tundra to the track for the first time. However, only time will truly tell the story.
It will be one day of action Friday, May 10th, with gates opening at 10:30 am, first practice then gets underway at 10:35 am. The second and final practice session will be at 1:35 pm. Then after a brief offtrack period, the truck will return to the track for a 4:05 pm qualifying session.
After 6:05 qualifying for the Cup series concludes, Decker and the other truck racers will hit the stage for driver intros at 7:00 pm. Then it’s time to buckle up and get ready for racing action as the Gander Outdoor Truck Series takes the green flag in the Digital-Ally 250 at 7:30 pm, you can tune in via FS1 or on the radio via MRN.
(Image Credit: Josue Rodriguez / The SkyBoat)
