Retired NASCAR driver and Eldora Speedway owner Tony Stewart was clearly in his element when he was talking about setting up Eldora’s dirt oval for this week’s Race Formerly Known As Mudsummer Classic. After the race, he hooned a new Ford Raptor around the track—as you do when you own the place.
Retirement’s definitely treating Smoke well. He gets nicely sideways on the big dirt oval once he’s up to speed, and I can all but feel his giddiness for this truck from several states away.
Naturally, the land around Eldora was fair game for a rip, too.
Can confirm: few things are more fun than “I need to check out the dirt path around the track for, uh, reasons?” in something can handle itself off-road.
Everything looks more bad ass when it’s sideways in the dirt, which means that this really should become a new default track test for cars.
“Yes, the new Lada Kerblammwagen ran a 7:04 on the Nürburgring, but how sideways can it get on dirt?”
That’s relevant information we as consumers need to know. It looks like we know at least one ex-racer who’d be down for the test, too.