Bobby McCarty Almost Back to CARS Tour Form with R&S

“It’s a weird feeling but it’s good to be fast.”

Three-time CARS Tour champion Bobby McCarty hasn’t won since the season finale in 2021 at South Boston Speedway but the journey back to contention goes much deeper than the raw numbers. Last season, his last in the Nelson Motorsports No. 22, was one to forget. Literally so in the sense that McCarty is still feeling a degree of delayed-stress symptoms from a car that just didn’t do what he and crew chief David Triplett Jr. wanted it to do last summer.

“We battled really tight race cars over there,” McCarty said. “Race car drivers are, I don’t know that I have a better way to put it, but we’re repetitive in that we tend to do the same processes over and over again. And what I’m finding now is that I’m extremely scared for the car to be tight.”

McCarty and Triplett moved to R&S Race Cars over the winter, with cars that ran inside the top-five each week, but the three-time champion feels like he’s brought some baggage with him from Nelson Motorsports too.

“What’s been hurting us more than anything right now has been ending up too free at the end of the race,” McCarty said. “I developed some bad habits that I need to kick myself out of. But you know, it does feel good to be back where we should be, feeling like a contender every weekend. I feel really confident that we have at least a top-five car and maybe even one that we can win with.”

The end of the losing streak could come on Friday night at Ace as McCarty has a trump card up his sleeve in the form of former Nelson Motorsports general manager Timothy Peters who oversaw their championships together.

“He’s turning some wrenches with us and I’m really looking forward to working with him again,” McCarty said. “He’s been a really big part of my career and we’re getting the right people over here. It’s starting to feel like home. We haven’t raced together long but we’re in a really good spot. So if we can just keep digging, I think we’re close to winning one of these things.”

Ace has also been good to McCarty with three wins in 12 starts at the 0.4-miler in Alamance County. And testing went well on Thursday afternoon.

“Just working on raw speed,” McCarty said. “I know what I need to feel out of the car here, and (team owner) Marcus (Richmond) knows what he wants to see out of temperatures, air pressures and everything.

“We know where we need to be. So we’re going to focus on race speed. Qualifying still matters but we want to get the car driving good and that tends to qualify well too. From there, tomorrow, it’s going to be up to me.”

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