Wood’s Fuel Strategy Comes Up Just Short at Charlotte

Venue: Charlotte Motor Speedway

FINISH: 25th

Start: 22nd

Laps Led: 0

NCTS Point Standings Position: 17th

Jack Wood, driver of the No. 91 Adaptive One Chevrolet Silverado RST was poised for a solid top-10 finish in Friday night’s 134-lap event but came to a heartbreaking halt after running out of fuel in the closing laps. Wood had a tough qualifying lap earlier in the afternoon that set him to line up 22nd to start the NC Education Lottery 200. A green-flag shuffle broke out and forced the young driver back to 25th which it very difficult to gain any track position. The driver of the No. 91 settled for a 26th-place Stage One finish and reported to his team that he started out super tight in the run but it backed down towards the end of the stage. Crew chief Kevin Bellicourt brought the No. 91 Chevrolet down pit road for four fresh tires, fuel and a slight adjustment to free up the young driver’s race truck.

Restarting 22nd, the laps quickly rolled by which allowed for an uneventful Stage Two run. The driver of the No. 91 Chevrolet continued to work with spotter Tyler Monn on the best strategy to move through the field as Wood was really starting to struggle with the front end of his race truck, causing him too lose too much time in traffic. The Loomis, Calif. native settled for a 24th-place Stage Two finish and came down pit road under the stage break for four tires, fuel and an air pressure adjustment. A solid stop by the pit crew allowed Wood to gain a few spots on pit road and restart the closing laps, 21st.

A quick yellow on the opening lap saw Wood some room to move up a few spots as a multi-car incident arose. With 58 laps to go, Kevin (Bellicourt, crew chief) started to think about how he wanted to play the final laps. The team reported to the young driver he was going to stay out and continue to save fuel little by little. As the green-flag pit cycle started to roll through, with 20 laps to go, Wood made his way up to the top five. The driver of the No. 91 was hitting max saving strategy and was doing all he could to salvage a top-10 finish until with just three laps to go, the young driver ran out of fuel coming to the white flag. Wood made it down pit road to fill up his race truck but was forced to an unfortunate 25th-palce finish at Charlotte.

Jack Wood Quote:

“Tough night. We tried something and it almost worked but it just was not in the cards for us tonight. Again, it is not the result this team deserves and it is really difficult to be in this situation with all the hard work this team puts in. Nashville is up next. We will go back to the drawing board this week and look to improve on our mistakes and hopefully come out on the other end with a better result.”