NEWTON, Iowa: With musical chairs occurring at such a frenetic pace in the NASCAR Cup Series, Noah Gragson has to make the most out of every opportunity he is presented.
The driver of the No. 10 Stewart Haas Racing Ford did just that on Friday at Iowa Speedway by posting the fastest time in practice as the Cup tour prepares to make its debut in Iowa.
Gragson’s lap of 22.828 seconds (137.988 mph) was quickest of the 36 drivers on the 0.875-mile track.
“We had a pretty good pace in the car throughout practice,” Gragson said. “I was on top of the board and then started making mock (qualifying) runs at the end. We put some tires on it and I ripped off a pretty fast one. So I’m pretty happy with the Bass Pro Shops, Winchester Dark Horse Mustang.
“It’s definitely an edgy track with the repave. The tire feels like you’re on a knife’s edge. You go in there and you have grip—a ton of grip—and you’re going really fast.”
Gragson is familiar with finding speed at the track. He won the pole in his Craftsman Truck Series debut at the track in 2017 before finishing sixth. In his second season with Kyle Busch Motorsports, Gragson qualified third and finish second behind Iowan Brett Moffitt.
The 25-year-old racer had similar success in the Xfinity Series with JR Motorsports. In 2019, Gragson finished sixth in his NXS debut and improved to fourth when the tour returned five races later.
But that was five years ago. When NASCAR decided to add Iowa Speedway to the 2024 Cup schedule, the sanctioning body elected to patch the 18-year-old track.
“If you over drive it just barely and get too aggressive with your steering inputs, turning to the left, then you’re going to be chattering the right rear tire and be loose,” Gragson said. “Entry is kind of an issue for some of the other guys I was talking to after practice. And I think, as the run goes on, you’re just going to have to keep the front of the car turning and be able to out wrap guys and not get too tight on throttle.
“You’re too loose on entry. You’re too tight on exit. It’s hard to really get that balance perfectly matched to be neutral all the way through the corner. But you’re definitely going fast around here. Our guys at Stewart-Haas did a great job making adjustments there in practice.”
Five competitors—Ty Gibbs, Ross Chastain, Austin Cindric, Tyler Reddick, and Christopher Bell—weren’t so lucky. All experienced tire issues throughout the 50-minute practice. Cindric and Bell, who performed the tire test last month, will go to backup cars for Sunday’s Iowa Corn 350.
“It’s definitely a different Iowa than we’ve known in the past with the repave,” Gragson said. “Getting into that new asphalt kind of grips the whole car up. But you also feel like you’re on the razor’s edge there.
“So it’s a big risk versus reward on how much throttle you want to carry into the corner and how fast you want to go without chattering the right rear tire and spinning out.”
Gragson anticipates the drivers to gravitate to the patched asphalt to find grip and speed.
“It’s all in the new asphalt,” Gragson said. “It’s just new, fresh asphalt and a lot of rubber being laid down. In all three practices—ARCA, Xfinity and Cup practice—they all three started getting faster and faster as the practice went on. So that’s where you’re going to see guys only in that really dark area of asphalt on the race track. You’re not going to see them up in that gray stuff—the top two lanes.
“This place was a lot of fun back in the day. You could go bottom, middle, top, Now we’re kind of limited. It’s going to be interesting to see if we can get that second lane working. It seemed like in practice the bottom was the place to be. There wasn’t really much grip as you went higher.
“But as you get races run on the race track, rubber laid down on restarts on that outside lane, you’ll start to see more two-wide racing.”
Under the direction of crew chief Drew Blickensderfer, Gragson was having a banner year at Stewart-Haas Racing. In his first season with the organization, the driver was setting the pace for his veteran teammates with a career-best third-place finish at Talladega and five top 10s.
After the announcement two weeks ago that SHR would be shutting down at the end of 2024, Gragson’s strategy changed. Once again, the Las Vegas native found himself in audition mode and in search of a ride for 2025.
“First off, we have great partners that support not only myself, but our team,” Gragson said. “And I would have liked to know yesterday (his plans for next year). I don’t know to answer your question. But yeah, I do feel like I’m auditioning. Walking through the garage, everything I do is auditioning for next year.
“It definitely does distract you a little bit too. Once you can sign a deal, you can kind of just focus solely on racing, but we’re not to that point yet.”
Gragson and his crew chief lead the list for a ride with Front Row Motorsports. But given his relationship with Johnny Morris and Bass Pro Shops, a deal could be in the making for a move to Richard Childress Racing.
“I’m still looking for an opportunity to prove myself in the Cup Series,” Gragson said. “Today was obviously a big stepping stone for myself in my career, being fastest in the Cup series.
“Knowing that, ‘Hey, I should belong here in the Cup series and racing on Sundays.’ But I’m still looking for an opportunity for next year and hopefully be able to bring our partners with us.”
Follow Lee Spencer on Twitter @CandiceSpencer or email her at: [email protected].
