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| Sadler pads his point lead |
Sadler caught a break when
an ill-timed caution flag trapped Stenhouse’s dominant Ford deep in the field following
a pit stop in the late going. Stenhouse slashed his way through the field and was
closing quickly on Sadler when Sam Hornish, Jr. turned Kyle Busch’s Toyota into
the outside wall, collecting Brendan Gaughan and triggering the race’s final caution
with just seven laps remaining.
That stoppage erased
Sadler's lead, but the Richard Childress Racing driver bested Stenhouse on a
green-white-checkered flag restart, using a push from Justin Algaier to claim
his third victory of the season and eighth of his NASCAR Nationwide Series
career. Stenhouse finished second, followed by Allgaier, Kenny Wallace and Michael Annett. Austin
Dillon, Parker Kilgerman, Hornish, Cole Whitt and Ryan Truex completed the
Top-10.
"I knew we had to get a
good restart there," said a hoarse Sadler in Victory Lane. "I knew
Justin had to push me and push me straight."
"I felt like Elliott
had good restarts all day and (Stenhouse) struggled a little bit," said winning
crew chief Luke Lambert afterward. "I hoped that would work in our
favor."
Sadler credited his doctor
and pit crew for the win, which earned him a $100,000 bonus from the Nationwide Dash 4
Cash program. A lingering stomach virus left him at
approximately 60% of capacity for the race, but he left Chicagoland Speedway leading
Stenhouse by 11 points in the battle for the 2012 Nationwide Series title.
“The guys worked
hard yesterday,” said Sadler. “We knew we had a good car on the long run, and
we knew we had to make it better on the short runs today. Luke made a great call,
made some good adjustments at the end. It was all about track position (and) our
car was really fast out front.”
Photo
Credit: LAT Photographic
" Sam Hornish, Jr. turned Kyle Busch’s Toyota into the outside wall"
ReplyDeleteI truly hope Kyle is keeping a scorecard.
No apology from Hornish? I guess when a man is under the microscope of NASCAR you can pretty much do whatever you like to him. Did NOT look like an accident of any kind. I think this is a write off year for Kyle. Too bad he can't pay some of this back.
ReplyDeleteDoug from NJ
Congrats to Elliot! And I hope that if Almendinger doesn't come back that Roger Penske looks for someone other than Sam Hornish Jr. To fill the 22 in Cup.
ReplyDelete“Sam Hornish came over and apologized to us. He ran into us on the backstretch and turned us into Brendan Gaughan. Sam came over and apologized, Brendan Gaughan came over to see if Kyle was okay. Of course, Kyle had already left. Sam came over and talked to Mike Beam (crew chief) and I and Chad, his crew chief came over and talked. None of those guys are really people to go out and wreck people. To happen in the middle of the straightaway, we knew something happened.”
ReplyDeletehttp://www.kylebusch.com/news/entry.php?nid=490
Onward to next week. Unfortunately KB gets punted, apologies or not.