Drake Eager For K&N Pro Series East Return To New Hampshire
• BMR Driver Looks Forward To Second Half Of Season
ROSEVILLE, Calif. (July 14, 2015) – Nick Drake has been looking forward to the NASCAR K&N Pro Series East returning to New Hampshire Motor Speedway for nearly a year.
He was leading last year’s series race on the last lap, when contact from another car led to a crash.
“Last year, it was our race to win,” said the 19-year-old driver of Bill McAnally Racing’s No. 15 NAPA AUTO PARTS Toyota.
But Drake’s not been looking back, and neither has his team. Instead, they have been looking forward to getting back to the 1.058-mile track in Loudon, New Hampshire. The series returns to the track, known as the Magic Mile, for the Granite State 70 on Friday.
“We should be good there,” Drake said. “We’ve been looking forward to it since the race ended last year. We’re taking a new car with the new style body. So, it should be a little different.”
Although they ran well there last year, Drake and his BMR team know it’s important to work hard to remain competitive.
“The competition is a little tougher than it was last year,” he said of this year’s field of K&N Pro Series East competitors.
New Hampshire was not the only one-mile track where Drake performed well last year. He capped his rookie year by winning the NASCAR K&N Pro Series West season finale at Phoenix International Raceway. He shines on the bigger tracks.
“They’re more my style, being able to move around and work with what the car is doing,” said the former open-wheel sprint car driver.
In addition to New Hampshire, Drake is also looking forward to other similar size tracks in the second half of the K&N Pro Series East schedule – including Richmond (Virginia) International Raceway, Dover (Delaware) International Speedway, and a second visit to Iowa Speedway. Drake won the pole and finished third at Richmond last year and scored a series-best second-place finish at Iowa in the spring of 2014.
“It should be our time to shine,” the Mooresville, North Carolina driver said of the second half of the season. “We’ll see if we can finish out the year really strong.”
Drake is seventh in the championship standings, with four top-10 finishes in the first seven races.
The Granite State 70, the eighth event on a 14-race schedule, will be televised on NBCSN on July 23. New Hampshire has been a traditional stop on the circuit since 1990. It has hosted 60 series events, more than any other track.