WATCH: Kahne explains incident with Danica
Danica Patrick took the brunt of contact with Kasey Kahne on Sunday at Auto Club Speedway, sending Patrick’s No. 10 Chevrolet hard into the frontstretch wall.
Patrick’s Stewart-Haas Racing entry was trying to overtake Kahne’s Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet on the low side of the 2-mile track’s frontstraight, but the two cars touched — Patrick’s right-rear fender with Kahne’s left-front.
The contact sent Patrick’s car into the outside retaining wall, causing severe damage and abbreviating Patrick’s day in the 120th of 200 scheduled laps in the Auto Club 400.
Patrick exited the car unassisted, but before walking to the ambulance for the mandatory trip to the infield care center, she stepped toward the race track to raise her arms at Kahne’s passing car — while still staying below the uppermost white line separating the racing groove from the apron.
“She’s moving the car so expect a helmet or a steering wheel being thrown your way,” warned Kevin Hamlin, Kahne’s spotter.
“Glad she’s OK. Definitely didn’t mean to do that,” Kahne told his crew during the caution period. “Was just trying to side-draft.”
Kahne and crew chief Keith Rodden were summoned to the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series hauler for a post-race consultation. The driver remained apologetic after talking with NASCAR officials.
“I felt bad. I’m glad she got out and is all right,” Kahne said after emerging from the hauler. “I passed her in (Turns) 3 and 4, and then she had the momentum off the top and just went back under me going down the frontstretch. So I went just to kind of catch a side draft to make sure that I was in position getting into Turn 1, and it didn’t hold me up when I got there because I was the one coming. I just got too close. Cars moving around, we hit and she had a bad wreck. I felt really bad because it was far from anything but just trying to hold my position that I had just gained.”
Patrick had her own version of events, suggesting that Kahne’s position off the front-running pace may have factored into their full-contact racing.
“I don’t know what kind of day he was having,” Patrick said after exiting the care center. “I just heard he was a lap down, actually, so I feel bad if he felt like he was put in a position to have to be that desperate a lap down, because it’s just unfortunate. He must be having a very tough time.
“I was having a pretty good recovery day, kind of like last weekend, just running good race laps and on the lead lap at the end of the race, back up into the top 20 from a bad starting position, and was looking forward to a good finish and a good off week. Unfortunately now, there’s more work to be done at the shop, which is not, I’m sure, what they want.”
Kahne said he was not surprised to be called in for a post-race discussion with NASCAR competition officials.
“I don’t see the NASCAR hauler very often other than signing-in on Friday mornings,” Kahne said. “So, yeah, I had to go talk to them. They just wanted to make sure that everything is OK from my perspective and that there were no hard feelings prior to the wreck or anything like that. Man, not at all; I’ve never had an issue with Danica at all. It was an avoidable accident in the middle of the straightaway that was far from anything other than just trying to hold my position that I had just gained.”
Said his crew chief, Rodden, of the hauler visit: “I don’t think NASCAR wants anything to start between any of the drivers. Stuff escalated quickly last year. I think they’re just making sure there was no bad blood. Just a normal deal.”
Kahne took to Twitter post-race to offer his apologies to Patrick.
Feel really bad about what happened today with Danica. I’m glad she was ok! That should have never happened and that was all on me.
— Kasey Kahne (@kaseykahne) March 21, 2016