'Nothing to lose' for Chasers Dale Jr., Logano

Posted on September 22, 2013 by Nascar

Johnson’s 2006 run proves Earnhardt Jr., Logano aren’t out of the Chase despite slow starts

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LOUDON, N.H. — Joey Logano and Dale Earnhardt Jr. have a difficult task ahead of them. Not an impossible one, but an improbable one.

The two NASCAR Sprint Cup Series drivers must find a way to climb back into contention in this year’s Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup, the 10-race playoff run that is now only nine weeks from completion.

Those clouds of smoke trailing Logano a week ago at Chicagoland Speedway were warning signs that the engine in his car wasn’t planning to stick around for the checkered flag. It didn’t.

Logano, 23 and making his first appearance in the Chase, won the Coors Light Pole and led laps but none of that mattered when he pulled his No. 22 Penske Racing Ford behind the wall after just 175 of 267 laps.

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Previously sixth in points, he finished 37th, and fell to 12th in the 13-car Chase field. The gap between himself and points leader Matt Kenseth is a gulf greater than a full race — 52 points.

The engine in Earnhardt Jr.’s No. 88 Chevrolet lasted a little longer, but the Hendrick Motorsports driver eventually coasted into the garage with a 35th-place finish. His reward for the unexpected start? He’s holding down the rear of the Chase field, 53 points out of the lead.

"It’s unfortunate when something like that happens because we had a really fast race car last week, one that I felt like could have won the race, and instead we came home with a 30-something-place finish and that part is just really hard, but it happens," Logano said following his qualifying run Friday at New Hampshire Motor Speedway. "That’s what our sport is — you have to rely on a lot of things and sometimes you have a mechanical issue like that and the guy who wins the championship usually doesn’t have that, but that’s not to say we can’t come back.

"This team is strong. We’ve been digging out of a hole all year, and every time we get our head just above water, we get pulled back under again and we keep fighting to get back up. We’ll be fine. I’m not worried about it."

Logano will start sixth in Sunday’s Sylvania 300. The first of his three career Cup wins came here in 2009. On Saturday, he was 13th and eighth, respectively, in the day’s two practice sessions.

Earnhardt Jr. will line up a bit deeper after putting his car 17th on the 43-car grid. What happened the previous week seemed to be of little concern — Earnhardt Jr. was more focused Friday on getting his car to turn better on the 1.058-mile track before Sunday’s race.

"We haven’t talked about (last week) much," Earnhardt Jr. said. "We’re just trying to qualify here and get through the day.

"We’ll practice our car (Saturday) and see if we can make a good car out of it. That’s all we’ve been thinking about. Just worried about my car today … worried about trying to win this race this weekend."

Perhaps the focus on what’s ahead and ignoring what’s behind will pay off. Earnhardt Jr. was second fastest in Saturday’s opening practice and fastest overall in the final shakedown.

Time and opportunities are limited. Success stories are few for those who have found themselves falling behind early in previous Chases. Jimmie Johnson finished 39th in the first Chase race in 2006 at New Hampshire but came back to win his first of five titles.

"You can’t give up hope," Johnson said.

"Last year I had two bad races — really one in Phoenix where we crashed — and still had a chance going into Homestead. So I think there’s still a chance for them. Unfortunately they’re losing control, and that’s what no one wants to have happen."

Johnson had an outside chance a year ago, but the timing of his Phoenix troubles left him punching at air, hoping to land a haymaker in the final round at Homestead.

It never landed.

"It is, I think, slightly deflating for the driver and probably the team," said Chase points leader Kenseth, the last driver to win a title before the advent of the Chase. "They’re like, ‘Oh man, we just got ourselves who knows how many points behind because we busted something.’

"Nobody likes to have that happen early; I’ve been in that spot a lot where we’ve had problems the first couple of weeks and been so far behind. You keep (up) the talk and you keep thinking it and you keep working toward it. Anything can happen. They can have trouble and (you’re) right back in it.

"But it is somewhat deflating to start it off with a bad week."

Jeff Gordon won all four of his titles before 2004 and the arrival of the Chase. The Hendrick driver took a hit last year in the opener when he finished 35th. Already 12 points behind the leader before the start of the 10-race playoff, the result put him 47 points behind with only nine races in which to make up ground.

"I think that in that position, you have absolutely nothing to lose," Gordon said of the situation faced by Earnhardt Jr. and Logano. "Instead of maybe having a game plan where you were going to try to fine tune a setup, you can just go completely outside the box and just go for broke and make very gutsy calls on pit road. You can be more aggressive as a driver. The engineers can be more aggressive in the set-up as well.

"I think there is a part of you that just says ‘OK, let’s just see how high up in points we can get’ and there is a part of you that says ‘we go for broke, and if we get on a heck of a role, we can still do this.’ You certainly never stop giving up hope."

It’s not an uncommon feeling, Logano said, adding that his team has "had to fight like that and fight from behind all year.

"We’ll just have to keep doing that," he said.

Ryan Newman will start from the pole for Sunday’s race, with fellow Chase driver Kasey Kahne also on the front row. Gordon, Kurt Busch and Martin Truex Jr. will line up third through fifth, respectively.

Kenseth, the series’ points leader, will start ninth.

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Posted on September 21, 2013 by

Truck Series regular wins for Penske at Kentucky; Dillon finishes second, Crafton third

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It wasn’t a NASCAR Sprint Cup Series competitor that the NASCAR Nationwide Series field had to worry about at Kentucky Speedway. Instead, it was a NASCAR Camping World Truck Series standout, Ryan Blaney, who stole the show and won Saturday night’s Kentucky 300.

Blaney’s first Nationwide Series win came in his 15th career start and just his second start of 2013. Blaney’s triumph in the No. 22 Discount Tire Ford Mustang marked Penske Racing’s 10th win of the year with its fourth different driver. AJ Allmendinger, Joey Logano and Brad Keselowski collectively made up for nine of those victories.

The win didn’t exactly come easy for Blaney, a development driver for Penske Racing. Blaney, was nearly collected by teammate and current NNS point’s leader, Sam Hornish Jr. on a restart with 15 laps to go. As Hornish Jr. attempted to inherit the lead from Blaney, Hornish Jr.’s Ford broke loose on the bottom of the track and immediately walked up the racetrack, nearly colliding with Blaney. While, Hornish Jr. faded, Blaney kept his foot on the gas and kept Austin Dillon in his rearview mirror until the caution flag waived a lap later, when Parker Kligerman pounded the frontstretch wall after contact with Cole Whitt.

In the early stages of the Kentucky 300, Hornish Jr. appeared to have the car to beat in his No. 12 Alliance Truck Parts Ford Mustang and even fended off challenges from the RCR duo of Dillon and Brian Scott, but Jeremy Bullins, Blaney’s crew chief kept making adjustments to his rookie’s blue oval, which allowed the High Point, N.C., native to methodically work his way to the front and overtake Dillon for the lead on Lap 101, just past halfway.

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Blaney continued to lead the way until Harrison Rhodes brought out the caution for dropping fluid on the racetrack on Lap 107. The yellow flag sent the leaders to pit road, where Elliott Sadler opted for a different pit strategy from his competitors and assumed the race lead.

Blaney, the son of NASCAR Sprint Cup Series driver Dave Blaney, rocketed by Sadler immediately after the restart and held the point until final pit stops occurred with 38 laps to go following a caution when Brad Sweet crashed on the backstretch. Quick work by the Penske Racing organization allowed the 19-year-old to remain first for the series of late-race restarts.

On the final restart of the night, Dillon in the No. 3 AdvoCare Chevrolet Camaro attempted to make the pass on Blaney entering Turn 1, but Blaney powered the outside line and pulled ahead from Dillon and the rest of the field over the final nine Laps to net Ford’s 12th win in 27 races.

"Yeah, we had a great car all night," said a relatively calm, but jubilant Blaney as he debriefed with reporters. "We kept working on it throughout the race, just little tweaks here and there. We were really strong to start out the race and just got better and better as the runs went on. It was really tough the last few restarts to really know what was going to happen. The way the restart rule is now, you never know how big of a push someone can get. I was a little worried being on the outside, but we had a great car to be able get through one and two good and be able to clear them by three and four."

Austin Dillon, Hornish’s rival for the Nationwide championship, finished second, ahead of Richard Childress Racing teammate Matt Crafton in third. Hornish Jr. rebounded for fourth, while Alex Bowman in the RAB Racing entry posted his first top-five run since the season-opener at Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway in February.

Dillon, the grandson of Richard Childress, failed to record his fourth series victory at the 1.5-mile, but did however notch his 10th top-five of 2013 and capitalized on his sixth place run at Kentucky in June.

"We knew we would be good coming here, it’s one of our better tracks and I’m just thankful we had a good run tonight," said Dillon, still winless in his sophomore season. "It was a solid run, there was just one car better. We needed something. Just a little bit more, we were too tight all night on exit and we tried to get it out of the car and (we) just couldn’t. That 22 has been very tough all year long, no matter who’s gotten in it. They’ve won with four different drivers this year. That’s pretty impressive."

When asked about his deficit to Hornish Jr., with less than two months of racing remaining, Dillon remained optimistic.

"Just let it (points) come to us. We’re going to stay here and keep running hard every week. We have to run top-five from here on out."

Crafton, the current NASCAR Camping World Truck Series points leader, tied his best career finish (third) in the NNS. The driver of the No. 33 Rheem/Menards Chevrolet Camaro also finished third in the tripleheader weekend at the Sparta, Kentucky-based track in June.

"We were tight, tight, tight, for most of the race until the last stop," Crafton said. "I then got loose, but went back to tight, but I can’t thank Menards, Rheem and RCR for the opportunity. A good night."

Drew Herring, taking the reins for Kyle Busch this weekend, finished sixth, followed by Brian Vickers, Jeb Burton in his NASCAR Nationwide Series debut, Whitt, driving for Tri-Star Motorsports, and Michael Annett.

While, Blaney has led only 65 Laps in his full-time campaign on the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series tour, he led a race-high 96 laps Saturday. Blaney last competed on the circuit in June at Iowa Speedway, where he finished ninth after starting sixth.

With six races remaining on the tour, Hornish Jr. leads Dillon by 15 points.

In the race for the owner’s championship, Roger Penske (No. 22) leads J.D. Gibbs (No. 54) by 23 markers.

Next up for the NASCAR Nationwide Series is their annual fall trip back to Dover International Speedway for the running of the 5-Hour Energy 200 Benefiting Living Beyond Breast Cancer, set for 3:30 p.m. ET Saturday, Sept. 28.

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