Elliott Sadler has finished worse than 30th just once in 2004. Credit: Autostock

Sadler avoids using his mulligan at Dover

Tire issue sends him to 20th place, but damage minimal

DOVER, Del. -- A veteran's savvy helped Elliott Sadler from taking a big hit in the Chase for the Nextel Cup standings.

Sadler finished 20th in the MBNA America 400 at Dover International Speedway, and maintained sixth in the Chase standings behind leader Jeff Gordon.

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As frustrating as that result was for the driver who had run in the top-10 for more than half of the 400-lap race, it could have been much worse for Sadler.

A combination of a tire issue and a hurried trip onto pit road to change tires under green added up to double jeopardy for Sadler and his Robert Yates Racing team.

"I don't know what went wrong with those last set of tires," Sadler said. "It felt like we had like 60 pounds of air in them or something -- I was just bouncing all over the place.

Credit: Autostock

"It felt like I was just sliding all around everywhere -- just bouncing. I mean, even down the straightaway I was bouncing."

Without knowing what the issue was, Sadler dove for pit road, anxious to maintain his top-10 standing.

But Sadler slid as he started onto Dover's tricky pit road, causing him to jump off the brakes and risk a pit road speeding penalty for exceeding the 35 mph limit.

He was nailed for the violation and had to submit to a pass-through penalty at pit road speed.

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The combination of two trips down pit road knocked him back to three laps down. He finished 20th.

But Sadler, who goes to this weekend's third round of the 10-race chase 96 points behind Gordon, was philosophical in defeat.

"I was just hauling butt to get to pit road and it was slicker than I thought," said Sadler, who earlier had seen Matt Kenseth crash when he tried to enter pit road too quickly.

"I knew if I hit the brakes I was gonna spin out and do what Matt Kenseth did, so I figured on taking the penalty and not wrecking the car.

"That was just my fault because it was slicker down there than I thought."

A bystander pointed out that Sadler had at least had the presence of mind to think of the consequences and choose the path that caused him the least trouble, and Sadler readily agreed.

"Oh yeah, so there's something to be said for that," Sadler said. "When I hit the brakes I started getting sideways and said, 'I ain't worried about getting on pit road (too fast). If they catch me, they catch me -- if they don't, they don't.'

Credit: Autostock

"But it was better than wrecking the race car at that point in the race."

No heads were hanging at the Yates Racing transporter, as Sadler vowed to get to the bottom of the reason for the tire mishap.

"We thought we had a flat tire, so I came in and changed rights," Sadler said. "We're trying to find out (what happened). We might have had an equalized tire, so we're going to look through it.

"It's a shame to have a top-six or seven car and make it all the way to the end and then have a set of tires that didn't agree with us (but) it's just one of those days."

Last season, Sadler had a highlight reel crash at Talladega, so he's not getting too unnerved by his Chase status, at least at this point.

"We're like 100 points out -- I don't know," he said. "I want to get through Talladega and then we'll start talking about (the Chase) because if we have problems at Talladega, we'll be way too far out.

"That's a wild card race and anything can happen (but) if we can go down there and run all 500 miles, we should be fine."