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TALLADEGA, Ala. – Ignore the dateline to the left. For accuracy’s sake, list this one from CARE CENTER.
Because that’s where we found Joey Logano, previously the race leader, following Saturday’s Sparks Energy 300 NASCAR XFINITY Series race at Talladega Superspeedway.
Maybe he won the ride to get the medical once-over, but he wound up 27th when the official race results were posted.
The Team Penske driver wasn’t injured. Blake Koch, a series regular, wasn’t either; he had already returned to his team’s truck in the garage by the time Logano walked out of the infield care center.
Both were involved in a last-lap crash, one of those hard, grinding, lift your car up off the asphalt incidents Saturday at Talladega. It was one of those that took officials several minutes to sort out and left Victory Lane sitting temporarily empty.
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Logano called it “just typical superspeedway racing … racing for the win at the end.”
Koch confirmed it’s not something he wants “to go through again.” But quickly added “it’s definitely not going to hold me back from trying to make the big move coming to the checkered flag.”
A race that went three laps beyond its scheduled distance came to a head on the final circuit, with Logano leading and Elliott Sadler (JR Motorsports) trying his best to alter the outcome.
When Sadler slid inside as they came to the tri-oval, the back of Logano’s Ford went the other way. Contact sent Sadler’s Chevy to the apron. It sent Logano into the wall front-end first.
Koch, on the outside and trailing the leaders, slammed into the right rear of Logano’s entry.
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“It is what it is,” Logano said afterward. “That is speedway racing. If you put 40 cars in a pack going 200 mph racing for a win, we are going to crash. Let’s be honest.
“It is exciting, though, and our cars are really safe. That is the hardest hit I have ever taken. I am impressed with the way the car held up and the way Team Penske built my Mustang — they made sure to make safety first, and that says a lot about us.
“Yeah we hit hard, yeah the ego is a little hurt but I am OK.”
He wasn’t, he said, “dumped” by Sadler, the eventual winner. “I’m sure he was there and I turned down.”
When Koch was located in the garage, the results were still being tabulated. “I’ll feel different depending on where we finish,” he said. “When you take a risk like that at the end, you want it to pay off.”
Officially, score the No. 11 of Koch in 24th.
“I could have stayed in the bottom lane and finished 10th, 11th, 12th, wherever we were,” Koch said. “I had that run and went to the top and it was working until the 22 (of Logano) got spun.
“When you’re going 200 mph you can’t just stop. I tried to turn as much as I could but you’re in the tri-oval, your car is loose there anyway … I just wanted to get to the finish line.
“I got there, just not the way I wanted to.”