Soggy weather won't steer fans from NASCAR All-Star Race

CONCORD, N.C. — The annual 10 Days of Thunder at the Charlotte Motor Speedway kicked off Friday and crews had jet driers ready to go with rain in the forecast all weekend, including Friday night’s N.C. Education Lottery 200 and qualifying for the Monster Energy All-Star Race.

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Channel 9 meteorologists are forecasting on and off rain for Saturday's All-Star race.

Charlene Lapensee drove a recreational vehicle from Canada to Concord to attend Saturday’s Monster Energy NASCAR All-Star Race at the Charlotte Motor Speedway.

She has camped out at the same spot at the speedway for the past five seasons.

“I just love this place,” she said Wednesday afternoon. “This is my favorite track."

Channel 9 meteorologists are forecasting off-and-on rain for the race but Lapensee said she's ready.

"It's NASCAR, so you have to expect rain,” she said. "It's just part of it. I don't think there's ever been a dry race."

Officials at the Charlotte Motor Speedway are ready too.

"We've dealt with this a few times and kind of gotten a system under our belts," Jonathan Coleman, who is with the speedway, said.

Officials said rain won’t stop the popular race.

"So this is one of our 13 jet driers we'll have at the All-Star weekend," operations manager Shawn Johnson said about the machines that dry out the track if it rains.

“What they are is basically old jet engines from (the) '50s and '60s that are no longer airworthy,” Johnson said.

The jet driers will be on standby for when it rains, to dry the track in just a couple of hours.

"If you think of a plane traveling at 500 mph, just how much exhaust actually has to come out of a jet engine -- that's what we're using,” Johnson said. “We're using that right on the racetrack."

For more information on the race, click here.

Cox Media Group