And I remember thinking one day to race in NASCAR was my dream.'Įven after his F1 career, which yielded a single podium from 75 race starts between 20, Kobayashi found that his NASCAR dream remained in the back of his mind. 'What I saw when I was really young was a NASCAR race, because it was an oval. 'And the first time when I raced a go-kart, honestly I didn't know Formula 1. Joining Toyota Racing Development USA president David Wilson on stage, Kobayashi revealed that he 'was for a long time' searching for the right opportunity to go stock car racing as 'actually my memory, first racing on TV was actually NASCAR'. We were just one spot short it seemed like most of the day from being where we needed to be.Kobayashi will take over the #67 car previously driven by Travis Pastrana to an 11th place finish at the Daytona 500 for his first outing in a stock car, following in the footsteps of fellow ex-Formula 1 racers Kimi Raikkonen, Daniil Kvyat and Jenson Button who have all made Cup debuts in the last 12 months. “The car had a tremendous amount of speed and handling pretty much from the drop of the green flag. “Our car was really, really strong, so fifth place just doesn’t cut it,” said Reddick, who led once for 28 laps.

He said when he hit the wall with his Toyota, he “watched the life fade away” from his race car. The race was going well for Reddick before he spun off turn four and then later collided with Kevin Harvick on lap 358 and sent Harvick spinning through the frontstretch apron. The thing I love about racing is you get to show up and it’s a new opportunity, a fresh set of downs and you go out and compete.” “We’re hitting our stride,” Wallace said. He also finished second in the NASCAR All-Star race. “I felt like I gave him a lot of room and a lot of respect, and he started mouthing off and saying a lot of bad things and cussing at me after he shot me the bird, so I just wasn’t gonna take that.”Īlmirola believes it’s over because he “got his point across” to Wallace.ĭespite the issues, Wallace now has four top-five finishes, including three straight, this season. “I just went by and asked him why you shot me the bird,” said Almirola, who finished 25th. Bubba Wallace and Aric Almirola on the pit road shove.

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