Pit road speeding penalty helps drop Danica to 23rd at Dover
Still, it's her best finish in four starts at the Monster Mile
Photo by: Action Sports Photography
Danica Patrick got a late-race pit road speeding penalty and finished 23rd in Sunday’s FedEx 400 benefiting Autism Speaks NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Dover (Del.) International Speedway.
Patrick, driver of the No. 10 GoDaddy Chevrolet SS for Stewart-Haas Racing (SHR), pitted on lap 322 of 400, but her entrance onto pit road was deemed too fast by NASCAR officials. She was forced to serve a drive-through penalty under green, costing her any chance of a better finish.
“It’d be interesting to see where we would have finished had we not had that penalty,” said Patrick after only her fourth Sprint Cup start at Dover. “It didn’t kill us, but it’d be interesting to see. We were pretty rough at the beginning of the race, but we got it better in the later going. Actually we’re running really good laps. We’d just lost a few laps by that point and couldn’t get them back. But we battled through and did OK. It’s our best finish here, and I think we’re getting better.”
Tony Stewart, driver of the No. 14 Code 3 Associates/Mobil 1 Chevrolet SS for SHR, finished seventh. It was Stewart’s 17th top-10 in 30 career Sprint Cup starts at Dover. It was also his 295th top-10 in 534 career Sprint Cup starts.
Kevin Harvick, driver of the No. 4 Budweiser Chevrolet SS for SHR, started 20th and finished 17th. He led twice for 24 laps.
Kurt Busch, driver of the No. 41 Haas Automation Chevrolet SS for SHR, started 24th and finished 18th.
Jimmie Johnson won the FedEx 400 benefiting Autism Speaks to score his 68th career Sprint Cup victory. It was his second straight win and his ninth at Dover, the most of any NASCAR driver, past or present.
Brad Keselowski finished .885 of a second behind Johnson in the runner-up spot, while Matt Kenseth, Clint Bowyer and Denny Hamlin rounded out the top-five. Martin Truex Jr., Stewart, Joey Logano, Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Paul Menard comprised the remainder of the top-10.
There were eight caution periods for 41 laps, with six drivers failing to finish the 400-lap race.
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