NORTH WILKESBORO, N.C. — Joey Logano, William Byron and Ty Gibbs got a look at the brand new asphalt on North Wilkesboro Speedway Wednesday, as they participated in a Goodyear Tire Test leading into the NASCAR Cup Series All-Star Race on May 19.
Logano’s No. 22 Team Penske Ford, Byron’s No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet and Gibbs’ No. 54 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota shook down the 0.625-mile track and tried different tire compounds to test tire wear and grip around Wilkesboro’s fresh, new surface.
“They did a good job, there’s still some character, it’s still a unique shaped race track, which is all good. There’s a pretty big bump down in turn one, I think where the wall was out too long and they cut it, and it’s kind of an interesting area. There’s a huge bump leaving four, which really kind of upsets the cars. I don’t think that’s bad. I’m OK with that,” Logano said.
“That’s something that made this race track so cool in the past, was that it had a lot of character, it was bumpy, you were forced to move around on it because it was challenging. You can make the thing like glass, I don’t know if that really makes the racing better. I think the fact that it’s got a couple of bumps and some areas where your drivers can make mistakes and jump out of the groove and do different things is just going to promote passing so that’s a good thing.”
Completed last November, the resurfacing process included milling approximately two inches of the old track, repairing failing spots, sealing and adding a specially designed asphalt mixture in the same configuration as the original track, including the 13 degrees of banking in the corners.
Similar to the process used for the most recent Atlanta Motor Speedway repave, Speedway Motorsports used a special mix that is expected to age faster than traditional asphalt, creating a more “worn-in” surface more quickly.
Carl Rose & Sons Asphalt, the original paving contractor for North Wilkesboro Speedway, supplied nearly 2,000 tons of specialty asphalt for the project, while North Carolina-based Delta Contracting managed the milling process. Summers Taylor, a contractor from nearby Johnson City, Tennessee, used a process called echelon paving to lay a seamless surface across the roughly 50-foot-wide track.
“I think it being a short track it would probably be a lot like Richmond was when they repaved it, so I don’t know, I vividly have seen some of those races and I feel like it was pretty treacherous, a lot of guys would get in crashes or there would be a lot of restart wrecks, so I think the racing could actually be pretty exciting with a repave on a short track,” Byron said.
“But yeah you won’t have the style of comers and goers I don’t think. The guys who are up toward the front will be racing hard and there’s probably just going to be more wrecks.”