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Ryan Preece: ‘I feel good’ after Talladega accident

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Marty Snider, Steve Letarte, and Nate Ryan discuss Ross Chastain's controversial maneuver that led to a crash at Talladega, and explain why Chastain did nothing wrong.

Ryan Preece says he feels fine two days after he T-boned Kyle Larson’s car at Talladega Superspeedway, but he plans to make some adjustments to his safety equipment.

Preece’s car slammed into the right side of Larson’s car as it shot up the track in overtime. He’s called it the hardest impact he’s had in racing. An in-car camera pointed at Preece showed his body moving and his visor flying open in the crash.

Both Preece and Larson were released from Talladega’s infield care center shortly after the accident. Preece said he was sore Monday but still did his workout.

NASCAR is inspecting both cars from that accident at its R&D Center in Concord, North Carolina. Preece said he is scheduled to meet with series officials Wednesday to discuss the incident.

Stewart-Haas Racing teammate Kevin Harvick talked to Preece on Monday about the accident and Preece’s safety equipment.

“One of the things (Harvick) said was, ‘You moved a lot,’ ” Preece said. “I said, ‘Yeah, I guess I’ve got a lot of mass that those seat belts have to hold in.’

“Kevin made a great point. I kind of had the opinion that everything did its job. I feel great, so why change anything?

“But he brought up the point of you can always make it better. You can look at this as, ‘OK, how do you feel here? What can you do different with your belts or your HANS (device)?’ … Kevin’s really good at helping you raise questions to yourself and to continue pushing, whether that is safety, performance or whatever.

“There’s a few things I’m going to go back and look at and say, ‘Hey, can we look at maybe changing this or this?’ I’m still really happy with everybody at SHR that mounts my seat (and) the way we put the seat belts (in) and the devices that we use for safety. I’m proud of the job they do because at the end of the day, I was able to do everything I wanted to do (Monday).”

One adjustment Preece plans to make is with his helmet visor. He said he doesn’t lock his visor out of habit. He will look to change that moving forward to prevent it from opening in an accident.

He’s not the only one making changes after a crash this past weekend.

Riley Herbst, who competes in the Xfinity Series for Stewart-Haas Racing, had a similar accident as Preece at Talladega last weekend. Daniel Hemric came up the track in the Xfinity race, and Herbst T-boned Hermic’s car.

Herbst was uninjured in the crash. He competed in the Cup race the next day. He said Tuesday that he talked with Preece on the team plane home after last weekend’s Cup race and said “we were complaining about the same things, a little bit of stiffness in the neck and things like that.”

Herbst said he had adjustments made to his seat belts this weekend because of what his body went through in his accident.

“Other than that,” Herbst said, “I feel like I’m good and ready to strap in the car (this weekend) at Dover.”