Kyle Fowler Leads Venturini Motorsports 1-2 in ARCA Wednesday Morning Speed Chart

Kyle Fowler led the speed charts following day one and after the morning session day two, Fowler was still on top of the standings.

Fowler completed 12 laps in the morning session on Wednesday with a best lap of 48.668 seconds (184.926 mph). This lap stands as the best of the two days, also.

“I’m really pleased with (Kyle) Fowler in the 15,” general manager Billy Venturini said. “That’s been a real pleasant surprise. That car has been awfully good, and was really good in the wind tunnel. It’s good to see a kid that’s never been here before run that well.”

His teammate Hal Martin ran 15 laps to end up second on the charts with a lap of 48.697 seconds (184.816 mph).

“Wow, we have fast cars! The PME engine we’re using, that’s a lot of horses under the hood,” Martin told the ARCA Racing Network. “The car is driving really well; we’re hugging the yellow line and slamming the nose to the ground into the corners. It’s driving really fast and flat into the turns. We’re going to continue with single-car lines this afternoon. I’m looking forward to it. It’s been a really solid day so far.”

The 25-year old Louisiana native will race five races for Venturini Motorsports in 2011 – Daytona, Talladega, Chicagoland, Pocono and Michigan.

“I’m really looking forward to hitting the track again at Daytona,” Martin said. “I had a bit of a head start on the field by being able to participate in the Hoosier Tire test here in December for Venturini Motorsports – so I feel I had a good chance to get somewhat acclimated to the track with some laps logged.”

Martin has made six career ARCA Racing Series starts, including one with Venturini. He finished 10th at Talladega last season.

“We’ve got strong talent among all of our drivers, and our reputation stands behind the equipment and support we’re able to provide each and every one of them,” Tom Venturini, a team representative said. “Hal has proven his talent for our organization in the past, as well as on the Gulf Coast Late Model tracks. We’re really excited to see how he’ll perform this season. He has tremendous talent. We’re hopeful he will not only add more top-10s to that resume, but also top-fives and maybe even a trip to Victory Lane.”

Along with Martin, Venturini Motorsports will run rookies Alastair Jackson, Max Gresham, and Darren Hagen in the 2011 season.

Richard Childress Racing development driver Tim George Jr. drove 11 laps to end up third on the charts with a lap of 48.985 seconds (183.73 mph).

“That’s the car we ran at Talladega, and it was really fast at Talladega,” George said after yesterday’s test. “I was comfortable with the car right out of the box; it’s not like getting used to a new car. I’ve been running the banking for the past four days here in the Rolex Series, and we were third on the board there, so it feels good to be back on top of the board with a different tire and a different car.”

Venturini Motorsports driver Steve Arpin finished the morning fourth with a lap of 49.222 seconds (182.845 mph) while Cunningham Motorsports’ driver Dakoda Armstrong ended up fifth with a lap of 49.438 seconds (182.046 mph).

Armstrong, the 2010 ARCA Racing Series Rookie of the Year, plans to run both the February 12^th Lucas Oil Slick Mist 200 at Daytona International Speedway and the April 15^th Talladega ARCA 250 at Talladega Superspeedway, as according to Cunningham Motorsports. Armstrong won two races – Talladega Superspeedway and Salem Speedway – last year for them driving the No. 22.  

Scott Stenzel, Ty Dillon, Joey Licata Jr., Grant Enfinger, and Ryan Glenski rounded out the top 10 for the morning.

For Dillon, it marked his first laps ever on a Superspeedway as he looks to run his first full ARCA racing season.

“It’s awesome,” Dillon said of the experience yesterday. “It’s really exciting. You go really fast. The track’s really smooth, so it’s fairly easy to get up to speed. We have a good car and there’s still some speed to gain. We’re just going to keep working on it. I just want to learn. I’ve got to learn to make our car better, and I’ve got to learn a lot, especially in the draft. We’ll just get as many laps as we can get and hopefully keep it up.”  

Dillon’s teammate George Jr. said he looks forward to working with Dillon after having some years of ARCA experience under his belt.

“He’s been racing cars way longer than I have,” George said. “You know, he’s much younger than I am. I’m going to lean on him for some stuff and he’ll probably lean on me for some stuff on the road courses and maybe the superspeedways. There’s a lot that he’s done in his racing career that I’m looking forward to doing, including winning in the ARCA Racing Series. It’ll be good to have support between him and I, and I’m looking forward to it.”

IndyCar star Milka Duno was 16^th on the speed charts today after being in the top 10 throughout the day yesterday.Other notables include six-time Daytona ARCA winner Bobby Gerhart ended the three-hour session tied for 21st, at 50.007 seconds (179.975 mph), and nine-time ARCA Racing Series champion Frank Kimmel finished 36th, at 50.733 seconds (177.399 mph).

“Well, we wanted to go out and make sure the thing runs real fast,” Kimmel said. “Unfortunately, it’s not running real fast right now. We’ve got some work to do. This is the car we tore up here last year in the race. We qualified 13th, and we expect to be there or in the top 10 by the time we’re done. We have some work to do right now.” 

Drafting testing will take place this afternoon, beginning at 1 p.m. and lasting for four hours. A maximum of six cars per pack will be allowed to test.