Crafton on Kes: ‘That’s pretty much an idiot right there’
RELATED: Series standings | Full race results
LONG POND, Pa. — Matt Crafton and Brad Keselowski were involved in an early crash in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series Pocono Mountains 150 on Saturday at Pocono Raceway that left the two-time defending series champion unhappy and in second place in the driver championship standings.
Crafton and Keselowski made contact to bring out a caution on Lap 6 as the points leader entering Pocono went up to the outside and Keselowski made contact with his right side, sending both into the wall near Turn 3.
The wreck left both with significant damage and ultimately Keselowski was out of the race, while Crafton’s crew got to work to get him back on track. The No. 88 ThorSport Racing crew did get him back out, but he finished 56 laps down in 28th-place, his worst finish of the season. Keselowski, meanwhile, finished 30th.
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Crafton came into the race with a 14-point lead in the standings over Tyler Reddick. However, he left Pocono 11 points behind Reddick.
The two national series champions — Keselowski won the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series title in 2012 — had a brief exchange in the garage before heading their separate ways.
“That’s your Cup champion,” Crafton said while walking to examine his damaged truck. “That’s pretty much an idiot right there right-rearing the guy racing for a championship. I guess maybe that’s the way he wants his 19 truck to win the championship, but they’ve got a long ways to come right now. I’m telling you that.”
Crafton later added, “He’s got another thing coming, I promise that truck won’t win it. If that’s the way he wants to do it, we’ll get it done.”
Keselowski, making just his fourth Truck Series start of the season in the No. 29 Ford for his race team, told FOX Sports 1 he wasn’t exactly sure what happened.
“Something happened where obviously we made contact, I’m not entirely sure,” Keselowski said. “After the 33 just passed me under in Turn 2, the 88 got a good run to pass me. We were entering Turn 3, and I heard someone say, the spotter, the 00 (Kevin Harvick) was going to make it three-wide. Then the next thing I knew, it looked like he went straight into the corner is what it looks like. Next thing I knew, we made contact. I was trying to get inline.
“The last thing I want to do is wreck the points leader … and end my own day as well. That’s exactly what happened. These trucks are expensive, and it’ll cost a lot to fix. I feel bad for Matt and his team, but I don’t really know what to do differently. I was trying to fall inline. Somehow we just got together.
“I have no interest in coming to the Truck Series and wrecking someone on purpose. Tyler Reddick is doing good job. He’s got a ways to go to run with Matt. Matt’s an awesome driver, and that’s a great team. The last thing I want to do is go out and wreck him. I have no interest in going out and wrecking somebody intentionally.”
During a media availability on Friday, Crafton shared his thoughts about running with some of the Sprint Cup Series drivers in this race and in the series in general.
“It’s really cool to see the Cup guys come run the Truck Series. I wish more of them would. It always helps the Camping World Truck Series to get some of the Cup guys down here and for the regular Truck guys like myself we love to go race against them because they’re great race car drivers.
“They get to do it a lot more than we do. We get 23 races a year. Kyle (Busch) and Kevin (Harvick) and Austin (Dillon) and all of those guys get to run the (XFINITY) races and Cup races. They’re definitely very good at what they do because they get so much seat time and it’s very good for the series and I wish they ran more of them.”
The NASCAR Camping World Truck Series will be back in action on Aug. 15 at Michigan International Speedway for the Careers for Veterans 200 presented by Cooper Standard and Brad Keselowski‘s Checkered Flag Foundation (1 p.m. ET, FOX Sports 1, MRN, SiriusXM).
MORE: Full 2015 Truck schedule