By Caleb Whisler, Staff Writer
Despite finishing 11th in the First Data 500, Aric Almirola struggled throughout most of the day.
The problem for the No. 10 team was trying to get the handling right in the car. The team was unable to find the sweet spot with the balance of the car.
“We struggled most of the day to get a handle on our car. We fought the balance back and forth. We never could quite get it right. We battled all day. That was tough,” Almirola said.
At one point of the race, Almirola drove through the field to the fifth position thinking they had found the sweet spot, but one minor adjustment on pit road provided trouble.
“We drove from 15th up to fifth and thought we had a really good shot there. We only made one more minor tweak and the car just lost its handle again. I don’t know. I am just frustrated,” he said.
“I thought we had a really good Smithfield Ford Fusion going into today and thought we could capitalize on an opportunity here at Martinsville. For whatever reason, all of our cars were off a little bit. We didn’t have the speed and grip that we had here in the spring race.”
With just two races remaining before the final cutoff race at ISM Raceway, Almirola understands that he must win if he wants to go for a championship shot.
“Going into this round, we felt pretty confident that we needed to win to make it to Homestead. You look at the performance of all these guys in the top-eight, you have to run in the top-10, top-five, and win these races. We have to keep battling.”
Almirola sits 50 points below the cutoff line going into Texas Motor Speedway next weekend.