MARTINSVILLE, Va. — Stephen Nasse stood by his late model stock car Friday afternoon at Martinsville Speedway, shook his head and said to one of his team members, “I don’t know.”
Nasse had hoped to make his ValleyStar Credit Union 300 debut at the .525-mile track, but instead he’ll have to wait another year. He withdrew from competition prior to qualifying Friday evening after battling an ill-handling race car during four hours of practice earlier in the day.
Nasse, who was aboard a car fielded by Jamie Yelton’s Fat Head Racing team, threw the kitchen sink at the car during Friday’s four-hour practice. Unfortunately, everything they did only made the car worse.
“We’ve changed everything you can change on a race car, literally,” Nasse said. “My guys have been thrashing. I think have a rear-end issue. Something is definitely bent. Everything we do and change on the car won’t give the car a different attitude. It just got worse and worse and worse. That also tells me that it’s probably a rear-end issue.
“It’s definitely unfortunate. I’ve had a rough little string of races I guess you could say here recently. I’m ready to bounce back from it, but it ain’t going to happen today or tomorrow.”
Nasse said that even if the crew had a spare rear end to put in the car, they wouldn’t have been able to get it changed in time for qualifying. That would have meant starting at the back of one of the four heat races Saturday afternoon that sets positions three through 40 for Saturday night’s 200-lap finale.
For Nasse, a veteran asphalt super late model driver with limited late model stock car experience, it just wasn’t worth the risk of tearing up the car in an attempt to race into the ValleyStar Credit Union 300.
“I don’t want to start in the back in a heat race with this car and have to risk getting tore up. It’s just not worth it to me,” Nasse said. “These race cars are a lot of money and there is a lot of time invested. We’ve been racing for a long time and we took big swings at this car and to get little to no changes out of it, it’s tough.
“We’re not going to go out there and look like fools. We’re going to take it back home and work on it. Like I said, something is clearly bent. It sucks. But that’s racing sometimes. Especially when you don’t have a backup car.”
Despite the setback, Nasse said he has every intention of returning to Martinsville for another shot at racing in the ValleyStar Credit Union 300.
“It’s not like a deal where we’re giving up. We just know something is wrong,” Nasse said. “It’s tough, but I’m going to be back. I’ve had a lot of fun. It’s definitely a cool race track.”