After weeks of preparation Thomas “Moose” Praytor wheeled his DK-LOK Ford Fusion on to the high banks of Daytona International Speedway testing for the ARCA Lucas Oil 200.
“The Daytona test was a big day for our DK-LOK team, a rebuilt car, new motor and lots of questions. With all the anticipation we were ready to go at 7:00 AM but Mother Nature had other plans,” said Praytor.
Rain rolled in to Daytona on Thursday and lasted well in to Friday morning putting Friday’s test in jeopardy. The Daytona track crews went to work early and with the track dryers wide open the teams were finally turned loose at lunch time.
“With a new car we wanted to make sure we had everything working properly and we started with a single car run. Everything on our DK-LOK Ford was solid as a rock, the only problem we had was a couple of bad oil lines on the rear end. It took a few single car runs and bunch of brake cleaner before we felt good about drafting with other cars.”
The rain delay had reduced the day long test to just a few hours and the rear oil line issue cost the DK-LOK team valuable drafting time. Drafting will be critical in qualifying for the 2015 Lucas Oil 200 because for the first time at Daytona teams will qualify in packs of 6 and not individually.
“The new drafting qualifying format is going to be a lot more interesting than the old single car method. I still have a lot to learn in the draft but drafting is so much fun, nose to tail at 190 MPH bouncing around there is nothing like it. Our DK-LOK Ford sucked up good and it really liked being out front.” Praytor and the DK-LOK Ford timed in at the 25th spot.
“Really appreciate Brian Finney’s crew coming up to help out, they were a big asset. When they found out Brian’s Dad (Wally) and my Dad were going to be working together, they parked us as far away from the ARCA trailer as you could get. At the end of the day I think they had the most fun. We accomplished a lot of the goals we had for our DK-LOK team going into the test. We’ll go back to the shop and keep tweaking looking for some more speed.”