Joe Gibbs Racing Driver Brad Coleman was testing a Gibbs NASCAR Sprint Cup Series car
at Toyota Arizona Proving Grounds earlier this week and came onto the radio and told his
crew something rather unusual. "Guys? I hit a coyote," Coleman said.
Coleman was running close to 200 mph around the 10-mile test track
when he saw the animal wander under the outside guardrail.
"I'm in the middle of the corner, and I'm doing like 190," Coleman
said Friday at Nashville Superspeedway before practicing his
Nationwide Series car. "I'm just cruising. You run the high line
there, because that's where the most banking is. It's the high-speed
lane. There's just a guardrail there like on the freeway.
"I see this thing, it must've been 100 feet in front of me, just jump
out. Right when I saw it come out from under the guardrail, I was like,
'That's a coyote!" "It just started smoking like crazy," Coleman said. "And it smelled
terrible.I didn't see anything in the mirror, so I was like, 'I wonder where it
went?' I said, 'Guys, I hit a coyote. I'm going to come in because I think it
screwed up the radiator. I think it my have clogged up the grille a
little bit.'"
