Elliott hurt by fuel mileage, late-race sprint

BROOKLYN, Mich. -- Considering where he finished Sunday, both on the track and in the Winston Cup points, Bill Elliott had a good day at the office -- Father's Day-style.

	Bill Elliott Credit: ASP

But considering he had a shot at a win, and a sizeable points jump, his 11th place finish in the Sirius Satellite 400 felt a bit hollow. "All-in-all, it was a decent day," Elliott said.

That's a veteran's gratitude. And reasonable, upon review.

Entering Sunday's race, Elliott had three top-finishes in his last five points events, including a season-best second two weeks ago at Dover. He finished 30th last week at Pocono thanks to a blown engine, but had rebounded at Michigan with a fourth-place qualifying effort.

Early in Sunday's race, he made it stick, leading twice for 31 laps. But Elliott ran out of gas on the backstretch before pitting around lap 145, and the misfortune knocked him out of the top 10. He spent much of the rest of the race finding his way back into contention. Which he did.

With 20 laps remaining, Elliott had worked back to ninth. He was the first to pit on the race's last green-flag stops, a sequence dropped him to 14th. NASCAR officials threw the red flag following Elliott Sadler's spin with five laps remaining, and sitting in sixth, Elliott and crew chief Mike Ford decided against tires.

"There wasn't a lot you could do," Elliott said. "You were just in one of those positions. Should you pit and get four or stay out? We stayed out. It didn't hurt us that bad."

In the final sprint, Elliott found himself boxed in the midst of the lead pack. He avoided Ryan Newman's and Jimmie Johnson's near-miss. Watched Dale Jarrett nearly catch eventual winner Matt Kenseth.

And his 11th-place finish did boost him in the Cup standings; he moved from 11th in the points to 10th.

"It was just one of them days," Elliott said. "We had a good car, led some laps and moved in the standings."