Despite "mistake" at Kentucky, Erik Jones looks to double up at Dover
The bad news for Erik Jones is he is in a dire position in the series standings one race into the inaugural NASCAR Xfinity Series championship Chase. The good news is the site of the next race – Dover (Del.) International Speedway.
Erik Jones, Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota
Action Sports Photography
With 12 laps remaining in last weekend’s race at Kentucky, Jones and Ty Dillon – another top Chase contender – wrecked on a restart and both were taken out of contention for the win.
After the race, Jones took the blame for the incident but said Dillon was crowding him on the restart.
Jones’ 28th-place finish left him ninth in points, three out of eighth-place. The three (of the 12) Chase drivers lowest in the series standings without a win following the Oct. 7 race at Charlotte are eliminated from title contention.
A place he has won at
Jones has good reason to remain upbeat heading into the Saturday’s race at Dover – he and his No. 20 Joe Gibbs Racing team won there in May and picked up the $100,000 Dash 4 Cash bonus after leading 76 laps.
“Dover is a place where we’ve always had a lot of speed and is one of my favorite tracks. We had a really good package in the spring and we’ve improved on it even more since then,” Jones said.
“Last week, I made a mistake laying it all out on the line for a win, but we definitely had the speed, and that’s encouraging heading in to this weekend.”
In two career starts at Dover, Jones has led a combined 146 laps and averaged a fifth-place finish.
Looking to advance
A win Saturday would lock Jones into the second round, along with last week’s winner, Elliott Sadler. Even a strong finish should put him back in good position to advance on points if he can also do well at Charlotte.
“At this point, we’ll need to focus a little more on points racing and go to Dover with that mind set and try to go out and get a solid finish,” Jones said. “I think we can get a top-five finish the next two weeks and hopefully that will put us in a good position to move on to the next round and keep us in contention for the championship.”
Jones’ crew chief, Chris Gabehart, said if Jones and the team can simply finish to their potential they shouldn’t have any problems advancing to the next round of the Chase.
“We have shown speed and the ability to win nearly every weekend just like we did last weekend at Kentucky, but often times not gotten the finish to show for it,” he said. “We won at Dover earlier this year with a pretty dominate car.
“I feel confident we are bringing a better car this time with a great shot at repeating that performance.”
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