Pole-starter a solid pick; Hamlin to drop to rear after engine change
Because Phoenix is a rhythm track, practices are the most important sessions of the weekend. Drivers with good records often jump to the top of the speed charts immediately, but there is plenty of time for others to erase the deficit.
Qualification did not hold very many surprises with pre-race favorites occupying the first four rows, but practice helped clarify who should be this week’s favorites and dark horses.
Mark Martin was listed as a dark horse in this week’s fantasy preview based largely on his modest salary cap. He confirmed his worth and should actually be elevated to favored status based on his pole winning run, plus his fastest laps in both of Saturday practices.
Phoenix has not been very kind to Jimmie Johnson since it was reconfigured and repaved in fall 2011. He knows he needs to improve on this track, particularly because it hosts a Chase race, so he entered the Dollar General 200 for the NASCAR Nationwide Series. The extra seat time contributed to a qualification effort of third for the Subway Fresh Fit 500, but most importantly he posted the fastest 10-lap average in the first practice session and the fifth-best average in Happy Hour.
Danica Patrick struggled in qualification, but improved to 35th in Saturday morning’s session; she was 34th in Happy Hour. This is a track that rewards seat time. It is important to note that she improved from a qualification of 37th last fall to finish 17th. In fact, she improved over qualifications in all but two of her attempts last year.
Denny Hamlin felt a vibration in practice and the team has elected to change engines. Dropping to the rear of the field to start the race certainly does not help matters any, and it could keep the No. 11 from getting the track position needed to win the race, but he should be able to earn a top-10 and possibly add to his two-race streak of top-fives. Players should take note that his official starting position is still eighth, which what the pass differential will be based on.
One of this week’s dark horse selections, Aric Almirola did not make very much noise in practice or qualification. He rolls off the grid mid-pack in 18th and posted only the 27th-fastest lap in Saturday morning’s session. His fastest lap in Happy Hour improved to 12th-best, but his 10-lap average in that session ranked in the middle of the chart. At 312 miles in length, this is a sprint by NASCAR standards and that does not give him much time to work on the car.
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Crossover gates to be one focus of inquiry
AVONDALE, Ariz. — NASCAR will bring in outside experts to examine potential changes to race track fencing in the wake of last weekend’s accident at Daytona that injured several spectators, and could apply any short-term improvements to the next restrictor-plate event at Talladega in May.
Steve O’Donnell, NASCAR’s senior vice president for race operations, said Saturday that the car of Kyle Larson, which flew up into the Daytona catchfence, will be reconstructed at the sport’s Research and Development Center in Concord, N.C. The sport will also involve outside experts, including SAFER barrier developer Dean Sicking and fence engineering firms, to examine potential improvements that could include the relocation of crossover gates.
“To do this right, we’ve got to take the time to reconstruct the car, reconstruct the fence, reconstruct the accident,” O’Donnell said at Phoenix International Raceway, “and then go out and say — OK, here’s what we know happened, and what would prevent that moving forward?”
Larson’s car flipped onto the frontstretch fence as part of a massive final-lap accident that marred last Saturday’s Nationwide Series opener. Although all the drivers involved walked away, several spectators were injured after parts of Larson’s car — including the tires and engine — penetrated the fencing. Two of those spectators remain hospitalized at Halifax Medical Center in Daytona Beach, Fla.
O’Donnell said Larson’s car and its parts were impounded by NASCAR, and initially remained in Daytona so track officials and their fencing experts could inspect the wreckage. The vehicle is now on its way to North Carolina, where it will be examined both by NASCAR engineers as well as the Turner Scott Motorsports employees who built it.
“The team hasn’t had a chance to look at it,” O’Donnell said. “We want to talk abut how car was constructed, how it was fabricated, what we can learn jointly as they look at the car.”
Outside experts will also be involved. O’Donnell said NASCAR would include Dr. Dean Sicking, director of the Midwest Roadside Safety Facility at University of Nebraska-Lincoln, who worked closely with NASCAR to develop the SAFER barrier, as well as officials from Indianapolis Motor Speedway and fence engineering firms. It was a collaboration with a fence engineering firm that led to a new fence at Daytona in the wake of a 2009 accident at Talladega that involved Carl Edwards’ car flying up into the catchfence, and debris from the vehicle getting into the grandstands.
One focus of the investigation will be crossover gates. Larson’s car impacted the Daytona fence at the site of a gate, which allows access from the grandstand to the infield. O’Donnell said NASCAR will look at the placement of gates specifically as it applies to Talladega, given the similarities between that track and Daytona.
“I think because of where it hit, it having pieces that did get through, and it being a gate area, I think that’s really going to be the focus for us,” he said. “We’ll certainly look at fencing in general. But I think that particular area, the fact that it is a gate, did that impact it. We know the gate was locked, we know it was secure, but does that provide as much stability as the rest of the fencing? We believed it did. But we’ve got to now take a look at that based on this impact.”
O’Donnell said the search for fencing improvements will involve all tracks, but restrictor-plate venues — where vehicles are more likely to become airborne — will come first.
“Superspeedway racing at Daytona and Talladega is going to be the first concentration for us,” O’Donnell said. “We have a race coming up in May at Talladega, so anything we can learn in the in the immediate future that we can apply to Talladega, we’ll do that.”
O’Donnell also addressed other issues Saturday:
— The injury Nationwide driver Michael Annett suffered in an earlier crash last week, he said, is concerning. Annett suffered a fractured and dislocated sternum in a head-on crash, and Thursday required surgery that used a metal plate and screws to pull his sternum back to its original position. Although Annett is already out of the hospital, he could miss up to two months.
“That’s an injury that we have not seen for some time now,” O’Donnell said. “So we’re going to look through that car now … That’s something that we’ve got to take a hard look at it, and make sure all the things that were in place worked for Michael, and anything we can improve on, we will.”
— Nationwide driver Jeremy Clements, recently suspended indefinitely by NASCAR for using a racial slur in front of an MTV reporter at Daytona, will work with Richard Lapchick, who founded the Center for the Study of Sport in Society and is now chair of the sports business program at the University of Central Florida. Lapchick is renowned for his efforts in furthering diversity and human rights activism within sports.
“We’ll have Jeremy work with Dr. Richard Lapchick,” O’Donnell said, “and get him back in the race car as soon as possible, and as soon as we deem fit.”
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Auberlen, Dalla Lana 2-for-2 in Turner BMWs
Austin, Texas — The Red Dragon returned to Victory Lane in the GRAND-AM Rolex Sports Car Series after a long absence Saturday. Jon Fogarty and Alex Gurney won the GRAND-AM of The Americas Presented by GAINSCO and TOTAL in their No. 99 GAINSCO/Bob Stallings Racing Corvette DP in an unpredictable race on the 3.4-mile Circuit Of The Americas.
The pole-winning car led the final seven laps – its only stint out front – as Fogarty and Gurney won in the Rolex Series for the first time since late 2011. The GAINSCO/Bob Stallings crew appeared destined for a runner-up finish until Brendon Hartley in the leading No. 8 Starworks Motorsport Ford/Riley made contact with a GT car and stopped off circuit.
Gurney was one of the first drivers to make his final pit stop, which came 20 minutes before the race’s last full-course yellow. As each of the cars in front of Gurney pitted, he moved up to second at the restart.
“It’s great to be back,” Gurney said. “We finished second quite a few times last year, and man, what a day! We pushed it so hard the whole way. It was an incredible battle at the end with [Ryan)] Dalziel and [Scott] Pruett, and it feels amazing to hold them off. We had 500 GAINSCO guests today, and we created 500 new racing fans. They were all going crazy.”
Dalziel and Alex Popow were second in the No. 2 Starworks Ford/Riley. Championship leaders Pruett and Memo Rojas were third in the No. 01 TELMEX Target Chip Ganassi Racing BMW/Riley.
In GT, Bill Auberlen went from 12th to a class victory in Turner Motorsport’s No. 94 BMW M3. He and Paul Dalla Lana capped a remarkable day after winning in the Grand Sport class of the Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge on Saturday morning. They are the only drivers to win races in both series on the same day, having previously accomplished the feat in 2011 at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
In the Rolex Series race, they came from two laps down after an early spin on the uphill run to Turn 1.
Auberlen made what turned out to be the winning pass with seven minutes left when he got around Andy Lally in the No. 44 Magnus Racing Porsche GT3 Cup. Alessandro Pier Guidi in the No. 63 Scuderia Corse Ferrari 458 crossed the finish line first in the GT class but was assessed a one-lap, plus 90-second penalty after the race for avoidable contact with Lally five minutes from the end.
“I didn’t see what happened with Andy and the Ferrari, but it slowed Lally down and he came back to me,” Auberlen said. “I had a move ready and I put it into action. It got tight, we bumped a few times and ran out a few times. Andy got mad, and I apologize if he felt I did him wrong, but I don’t race dirty. This was a great win for Turner. This team is good enough to win races, so there’s no reason we shouldn’t try to win everything we get our hands on.”
Lally and John Potter were second, and the No. 59 Brumos Racing Porsche GT3 Cup of Andrew Davis and Leh Keen finished third.
BGB Motorsports won in GX with drivers Dr. Jim Norman, Jeff Mosing and Spencer Pumpelly. The trio led all but 12 laps of the race, and Norman was two laps clear of Sylvain Tremblay in the No. 70 Speedsource Mazda 6 GX at the checkered flag. Tremblay, who drove with Tom Long, lost time with a fuel line issue.
The next Rolex Series race is the Porsche 250 at Barber Motorsports Park in Birmingham, Ala., on Saturday, April 6.
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Busch overcomes pit road penalty to take back first
RELATED: Dollar General 200 results
AVONDALE, Ariz. — Nothing was going to keep Kyle Busch out of Victory Lane on Saturday at Phoenix International Raceway.
Not a pit road speeding penalty. Not a spate of cautions that kept bunching the field. Not Brad Keselowski, who in the past has found magic out front on old tires.
The prohibitive favorite in the Dollar General 200 after he won the pole in a laydown earlier in the day, Busch overcame a speeding penalty that dropped him to 22nd position for a restart on Lap 44.
That was a momentary setback. Working his way through traffic in short order, Busch passed Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Matt Kenseth for the lead on Lap 89. He lost the top spot briefly by pitting under caution on Lap 152, as Keselowski and three other drivers remained on the track, but Busch regained the lead on Lap 164, clearing Keselowski as the cars streaked into Turn 3.
Busch stayed out front the rest of the way. The victory was his first in the No. 54 Toyota and a record 52nd in the Nationwide Series.
“It’s great to be back, working with (crew chief) Adam (Stevens) and these guys,” said Busch, who was winless last year in the Nationwide Series driving for his own team. “It was a bummer deal not to be able to get a win at KBM (Kyle Busch Motorsports) last year, but (owner) Joe (Gibbs) putting me back in his operation and being back with the Joe Gibbs Racing side of things and Mark Cronquist engines, it’s a phenomenal day for us to get back to Victory Lane, to feel the taste of it again."
"I was almost nervous, feeling like it was my first win, although it’s win No. 52 in the series. It’s nice to be back.”
Keselowski held second by stretching his fuel to the end without pitting. Justin Allgaier ran third and leaves Phoenix tied for the series lead with Sam Hornish Jr., who came home seventh. Trevor Bayne and Elliott Sadler completed the top five. Jimmie Johnson, using a rare Nationwide Series appearance to get some extra laps on a track that has befuddled him since its resurfacing in 2011, finished 12th.
Even though he tried a contrarian strategy, Keselowski knew that tactics alone wouldn’t be enough to overcome Busch’s advantage in speed.
“I knew I had a shot if something happened to Kyle, and we had to put ourselves in position for good things to happen,” Keselowski said. “But Kyle’s car was so fast. I probably could have had four tires and he could have had none, and it still wouldn’t have mattered. He’d still have drove through the field.
“When you have that much speed, you’re pretty much immune to strategy.”
Beginning his fifth full season of Nationwide racing, Allgaier is off to the best start of his career.
"The first five (races) kind of get you kicked off for the next 10 or 15,” Allgaier said. “This has been huge for us, for Turner Scott Motorsports. Our program has come a long way during the offseason. I’ll be the first to tell you that, at the end of the year last year, we were kind of scratching our heads. We knew we had a great organization. We just didn’t know what we were missing.
“Everybody at the team really buckled down… This is the strongest season start I’ve had. I hope we can keep that going and transfer it into a championship.”
The race wasn’t two laps old when Johanna Long drove hard into Turn 3 and tagged the back of the Ford of Hornish, the series leader entering the race. With the front of her car damaged by the contact, Long slapped the wall exiting Turn 4, triggering a chain-reaction wreck that collected five other cars, including those of Hornish (who had fallen behind her) and Travis Pastrana.
"I don’t know; it just took off on me," Long said of her contact with the wall. "I got in a little too hard, there (into) Hornish, felt bad, got under him. I got into the gas, and it just took off.
"I definitely didn’t want to finish like this. It’s really disheartening. I feel really bad. I don’t know what else to say."
The aftermath of the wreck turned bizarre when the scoring transponder from Jamie Dick’s car (another victim of the accident) lodged in the nose of Hornish’s Ford. Though Hornish lost two laps on pit road while the transponder was removed, NASCAR restored the No. 12 to the lead lap because the extraction — to prevent Dick’s car from being scored improperly — was ordered by the sanctioning body.
Hornish’s travails weren’t quite over. After restarting sixth on Lap 109, Hornish spun in Turn 2 a lap later to bring out the fifth caution but remained on the lead lap. The nose and hood of his car heavily taped, Hornish salvaged the seventh-place finish.
JGR driver followed by teammates Vickers, Kenseth to round out top 3
RELATED: Starting lineup/Practice results
After finishing second and first, respectively, in the two practices ahead of the second Nationwide Series event of the season, Kyle Busch earned the pole with the top overall speed in qualifying on Saturday afternoon at Phoenix International Raceway.
The Joe Gibbs Racing driver ran a time of 27.056 with a best speed of 133.057 mph in the 1-mile oval in preparation for Saturday’s Dollar General 200 fueled by AmeriGas on ESPN2 at 4:30 p.m. ET.
Runner-up Brian Vickers was nearly a full mile-per-hour behind Busch, running a lap of 27.234 with a speed of 132.188. Matt Kenseth, Trevor Bayne, and Justin Allgaier rounded out the top 5. Austin Dillion placed sixth with a top speed of 131.844 after finishing at the top in the first practice and 13th in the second.
Daytona 500 champion Jimmie Johnson, running in a Nationwide Series event for the first time since 2011, followed up his runner-up finish in the final practice by placing seventh in qualifying with a speed of 131.709.
RELATED: Friday practice speeds
Aric Almirola — filling in for the injured Michael Annett, who had surgery Friday on his broken and dislocated sternum — was eighth-fastest in the No. 43 Richard Petty Motorsports Mustang.
Reigning Sprint Cup champion Brad Keselowski turned a lap of 27.380, good for ninth overall.
Elliot Sadler, winner of last season’s March Phoenix event, was 15th with a best speed of 130.819.
Ryan Sieg, racing in place of the suspended Jeremy Clements, was 35th in the No. 51 Chevrolet.
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Martin follows Coors Light Pole Award with fastest times in both Saturday practices for Subway Fresh Fit 500
Mark Martin can’t be stopped.
After earning the pole position on Friday and earning the top spot in Saturday’s early practice, the 54-year-old veteran again found himself atop the leaderboard in the afternoon session in prep for Sunday’s Subway Fresh Fit 500 Sprint Cup Series race at Phoenix International Raceway in Avondale, Ariz.
Martin’s top speed of 134.248 mph, achieved on his seventh and final lap, was followed by Kyle Busch’s 133.904 just shortly after the Joe Gibbs Racing driver notched the pole for Saturday evening’s Nationwide Series event.
Reigning Sprint Cup Series champion Brad Keselowski turned his 31st lap in 26.926, placing him third on the leaderboard. The top 5 was rounded out by Carl Edwards (133.601 mph, starting 7th Sunday) and Clint Bowyer (133.526, 3rd).
RESULTS: Sprint Cup practice and starting lineup
Kasey Kahne, slated to start alongside Martin in the front row, was eighth in the second practice session with a time of 27.015 on his fifth lap.
Denny Hamlin, winner of last season’s early Phoenix race, suffered engine trouble before the final practice and will start in the back of the pack on Sunday. He was 15th on the leaderboard at the end of the day.
Tony Stewart ran the most laps — 56 — and finished up practice for Sunday’s event by placing seventh.
Daytona 500 winner Jimmie Johnson was 14th, while Daytona pole winner Danica Patrick bumped the wall hard at one point and earned the 34th fastest speed.
Early practice recap
Mark Martin continued to turn in blazing speeds in the desert, following up his pole position secured on Friday with a top practice speed of 135.45 mph in the first Saturday test run ahead of Sunday’s Subway Fresh Fit 500 at Phoenix International Raceway in Avondale, Ariz.
The 54-year-old, who earned his 56th career pole, ran his fifth lap with a best time of 26.578. He was third in yesterday’s practice.
Daytona 500 champ Jimmie Johnson maintained his hot start as well, turning in the fourth-fastest lap on the 1-mile oval after earning the third-overall spot in qualifying.
Kasey Kahne checked in at 22nd on Saturday, but figures to be in a good spot after running the most laps in practice Friday and will start alongside Martin in second position on Sunday.
Matt Kenseth, Friday’s practice leader, dropped down the leaderboard in qualifying (ninth) and Saturday’s early practice (10th). His Joe Gibbs Racing teammate, Kyle Busch, will start fourth on Sunday and made the early Saturday practice count, checking in as the runner-up on the leaderboard with a best speed of 135.201.
Denny Hamlin, the 500-kilometer race’s defending champ, was 12th with a time of 26.798.
Kevin Harvick, November’s 2012 Advocare 500 at PIR winner, ran the most laps — 47 — in the practice session, notching the fifth-fastest time.
Rookie Danica Patrick, who will start 40th on Sunday, turned in a best lap speed of 132.553, placing her 35th overall.
The second practice of the day is at 3 p.m. ET on Speed.
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Despite early damage, Penske driver leaves with Nationwide points lead
AVONDALE, Ariz. – Sam Hornish Jr. wasn’t sure if he held on to the points lead, but he knew he was extremely fortunate.
“Blessed” is how the Penske Racing driver described overcoming several obstacles en route to a seventh-place finish in the March 3 Dollar General 200 at Phoenix International Raceway.
“To think about all those things … how bad it could have been; we could have popped the radiator there on the second lap and been 25th today,” Hornish said following the season’s second NASCAR Nationwide Series event. “For as bad as the weekend had been … to have it over with and get out of here in seventh, that’s a pretty good day.”
Hornish did in fact depart PIR as the points leader — officially he and Justin Allgaier each have 79 points through two races, but Hornish had the better finish at Daytona, and thus is the leader.
He maintained the top spot in spite of a crash on Lap 3, a spin on Lap 110, and having a fellow competitor’s transponder (used to transmit scoring information) stuck in the front bumper of his No. 12 Ford.
A bad qualifying effort (he started 19th) put him in a precarious position, Hornish said, and “around two cars on the start that I thought might give me a little trouble. One of them ran into me going into Turn 3, then I was back behind him again and (he) wrecked and we were right there, front row for it.”
Johanna Long bounced off the wall coming out of the fourth turn on lap 3, into the path of Jamie Dick. Hornish had nowhere to go, plowed into the No. 55 of Dick and the impact left Dick’s transponder stuck in the front bumper of Hornish’s car. Travis Pastrana, Juan Carlos Blum and Alex Bowman were also involved in the crash.
“They said we ran about a half a lap with it (there),” Hornish said of the additional transponder.
After repairs to his car on pit road, and the removal of the second transponder, Hornish was able to race his way into the top 10. The solo spin on Lap 110 however, forced him to once more work his way back through the field.
“Hopefully,” he said, “it means when we have a couple of good days, that we’ll win some races. It’s all a part of the growing process and to be as far off as we were this week … just real glad that we did as well as we did, nobody hit us when we spun there (late) and we were able to soldier on. … To be able to take bad days and make them into something decent, that’s what you have to do.”
• JR Motorsports driver Regan Smith improved five positions, from 11th to sixth, in the point standings with an 11th-place finish. But that was of little solace to the former Cup regular.
“In a perfect world, best-case scenario I think we could have finished fifth or sixth,” Smith said. “No better than that even if we got track position. We just missed it a little bit.
“We don’t have much of a notebook that we’re working with here. We have to build that as we go. You’re going to have struggles in doing that; obviously we’re disappointed in 11th but look on the bright side, we didn’t wreck.”
• Five-time Cup champion Jimmie Johnson made his first Nationwide Series start since 2011, driving the No. 5 Chevrolet for JR Motorsports at Phoenix.
“I need to get better here,” Johnson, who has four Cup wins on the 1-mile track but none since 2009, said. “I need reps. That’s the biggest thing.”
From a mechanical standpoint, Johnson said there isn’t a lot of information that can be transferred between the two series. “Two different animals,” he said. “My opinion, it does not apply every week.”
• Pastrana’s second start of the season in the Roush-Fenway Racing Ford went awry almost from the start as the former action-sports competitor finished 28th when he was caught up in the day’s first wreck.
Although he was able to complete the race following repairs to his car, Pastrana said little was learned on a long day in the desert.
“I thought I could get to the inside and I just wanted to try to get down, so once I got in the marbles the first lap and was loose, the second lap came in and I saw them crashing in front of me,” he said. “I kind of let off, but I just got in the marbles again, so, unfortunately, it was a pretty useless day for learning.
“We just drove around all day. The team did such a great job. If you see the front tire, it’s folded over completely, so I don’t know how the car survived.”
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Drivers appear to have put incident behind them but it’s still on the minds of many
AVONDALE, Ariz. –- Clint Bowyer said he had “plenty of good ones,” when asked about his favorite memories of racing at Phoenix International Raceway.
“Only one bad one,” the Michael Waltrip Racing driver said behind a look that was part grin, part grimace. “I’ll take it. I’ve had a lot of good memories; one was really bad.”
A glimpse of the “one bad one” can be seen in television spots promoting this weekend’s Subway Fresh Fit 500, the second stop of the 2013 season for NASCAR’s Sprint Cup Series.
Kevin Harvick was the race winner the last time Cup teams competed at the 1-mile PIR facility. But Harvick’s victory, which took place last November, likely isn’t what most fans recall. Instead, it is a late-race altercation between Bowyer and Jeff Gordon, their on-track incidents escalating into a monumental shoving match in the garage between crewmen from the two teams.
"I can’t run every lap worrying about every guy I’ve ever had an incident with."
— Jeff Gordon
Video of the incident, and Bowyer running down pit road, into the garage and up on the back of Gordon’s transporter, has been shown plenty of times since the incident took place, and portions of it are included in the television spots for this weekend’s race.
Gordon, whose retaliatory move sent Bowyer into the wall with little more than one lap remaining, was fined $100,000, docked 25 driver points and placed on probation following the incident. Team owner Rick Hendrick lost 25 owner points and crew chief Alan Gustafson was placed on probation.
Brian Pattie, Bowyer’s crew chief, was fined $25,000 and placed on probation.
The crash slammed the door on any hopes Bowyer had of contending for the Sprint Cup title –- he trailed the points leader by 36 entering the event, and 52 once the dust had settled and just one race remained.
“I think we all know what (Clint) means,” Waltrip joked as he and his driver took part in a March 1 press conference with sponsor Peak motor oil. “You want to see enthusiasm and passion; there’s a great video of Clint running somewhere (that) shows you how into this thing he is.”
Bowyer will start 13th in Sunday’s race; Gordon will line up a bit closer to the front, his Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet checking in with the fifth-fastest time on Friday.
“It’s hard to get away from it,” Gordon said of the incident. “They’re still using it to advertise for the race and it was a big story.“
With teams attempting to dial in the new Generation-6 car for this weekend’s race, Gordon said he and his team had enough on its plate to work through without worrying about past situations.
“We’re just focused on getting the most out of the car and having a good, solid, and fast race car and a good weekend,” he said.
Still, Gordon is cognizant of the situation and realizes there is interest from the outside. He won’t, he said, race Bowyer any differently should the two cross paths on the track here this weekend.
“We’ll race hard. We’ll race hard for position and hopefully we don’t have any incidents,” the four-time Cup champion explained. “I can’t run every lap worrying about every guy I’ve ever had an incident with.”
Waltrip, co-owner of the three-team organization, made 24 starts at Phoenix as a driver. Yet he agreed with his driver when asked about his least favorite recollections of PIR — last fall’s incident was tops in his book as well.
“Because while (Clint) was running and everybody was running, I was standing there thinking, ‘what the hell am I supposed to do?’ And I never have figured it out,” Waltrip said.
“But we didn’t have a policy in place for that type of occurrence (at that time) and now we do, so we’re smarter.
“So I know what I’m supposed to do now: chase Clint.”
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