Danica's crew chief: 'Happy with her progress'
That honor went to Kyle Busch. However, Patrick finished a career-best 30th. And for Patrick, qualifying 25th for Saturday’s New England 200 was also progress.
The NASCAR rookie was far from Brad Keselowski’s pole-winning lap of 29.376 seconds (129.657 mph). And while the JR Motorsports team was hoping for a 30-flat, Patrick’s qualifying lap of 30.292 seconds (125.736 mph) turned out to be her fastest lap of the weekend.
The goal for Patrick and the No. 7 JR Motorsports team this season is taking baby steps. Any improvement is a step in the right direction.
“Things are going good,” said crew chief Tony Eury Jr. “She tries to say it’s not hard, but it’s got to be hard going from Indy Car to back stock cars. We coil bind springs. We do different things over here. We’ve been pretty happy with her progress. Every time she goes out she gets quicker over here. That’s all we can ask.
“This whole year is going to be about learning. It’s not about how many races we can win or top fives. It’s more about 'let’s learn about these cars. Let’s learn how they race.' That’s what we have to realize. Next year we’ll come back and say, ‘We want to compete for top fives. We want to compete for wins.’ But she’s got a big learning curve ahead of her and this is her third down-force race. So I’m pretty tickled with it. They’re going to be rough and banging and picking each other up out there all day , so we’ll see how she handles that.”
Patrick realizes that her task is to just finish the race. Seat time is the most valuable tool for her right now considering that she has just completed 495 of the possible 672 laps in her first four races. On Saturday, she finished five circuits down after contact with Morgan Shepherd seven laps into the race.
Prior to the race Patrick said, “The worst thing that I could do would be to go out on to the track and make a mistake or lose it and put it in the wall. I mean, that doesn’t look good or help me in any way. It’s going to be really important for me to just make methodical steps forward and, hopefully, we can end up the race feeling good.”
Patrick composed herself after the altercation, offering Shepherd a nudge on a restart and reminded the veteran she was there on pit road following the race.
The shorter track experience was a completely new animal for Patrick compared to IndyCars where “You can’t touch because you’ll crash or flip.” Throughout the course of the race, the rookie turned to Eury for advice on passing other cars.
“How do I set him up,” Patrick asked halfway through the race when she was trying to get around Charles Lewandoski.
Eury replied, “You got to get him like you’re pushing him off the corner.” He further encouraged his driver with, “This is the only time you’re going to be able to learn so go up there and try to pass him.”
Patrick acknowledges that her goal is “small steps” to getting up to speed.
“When mistakes happen, you start to question yourself or question the car a little bit, so it’s about not having those mistakes and building,” Patrick said. “The most important thing that I was reminded of this weekend is to just trust my instincts and trust what I’m feeling in the car and don’t try to make up a feeling that’s not there, really — I mean to not go out there my first run and say, ‘Maybe I’m not doing a good job; let me go again,’ and then you try a little harder, and then you make a mistake and do something silly.
“So it’s to come in and say, ‘Hey, look, I’m loose. I’m sorry.’ If I can’t brake into the corner, and if I can’t get on the power, I’m not comfortable. So it’s about trusting that instinct and, I mean, it’s been something that’s been groomed for 19 years, so I have to trust that.”
Eury has watched Patrick evolve “a ton” since their initial on track introduction seven months ago.
Eury says when Patrick doesn’t perform up to her own and other expectations it inspires her to push even more.
“She’s so determined to do good,” Eury said. “It’s impressive to see her demeanor. She’s hungry — it’s still in her. Every week she gets better. She learns more.
MORE THAN FILLING FIELDS
The buzz in the Nationwide Series garage on Friday morning was a field of 33 for next Friday’s Nationwide Series race at Daytona International Speedway — featuring the debut of the new car.
“It looks like we’re pretty close to having a full field,” Nationwide Series director Joe Balash said on Friday. “I think a lot of that is that the teams are working really hard to finish up their cars. I know I’ve talked to a couple of teams that will be working up to the last minute to get their cars ready for the track. The entry list that went out before that was larger than 33.”
Saturday morning another NASCAR official made it perfectly clear that 45 drivers would attempt to qualify.
Certainly the cost of transitioning cars from the old model to the new, proved costly to all teams from the powerhouses in the sport to the ‘mom-and-pop’ operations. One crew chief estimated a new car would cost his team $100,000 to $115,000 to build plus testing.
Even among championship contenders such as Penske Racing, Kevin Harvick Inc., Roush Fenway Racing and Braun Racing, the competitors were split on which teams built the new cars from scratch (Penske and KHI) and which teams opted to modify used Sprint Cup chassis (RFR and Braun) to fill out their stables.
One benefit of the initially shorter field is the gather of drivers that would not usually have the opportunity to run a Nationwide race including Parker Kligerman. The 19-year-old Penske Racing development driver will pilot the No. 26 K-Automotive Dodge next week. Kligerman, who will make his sixth NNS start at Daytona, won the pole for his debut at Kansas Speedway last October and finished 16th.
GRASSROOTS RACING
Kevin “Bono” Manion, crew chief of the No. 1 Earnhardt Ganassi Racing team remembers the NASCAR contingent coming to New Hampshire when he was just a weekend warrior.
Before Manion made it to the Sprint Cup Series, he considered the modified race at New Hampshire to be “our Daytona 500.” It was an opportunity to put on a show for the stockers to the south.
On Saturday, Manion and his buddies at GP Racing (named for his car chief Gary Putnam) won the Whelen Modified Tour race with Ryan Newman behind the wheel of the No. 7 Aggressive Hydraulics/Menards Chevrolet. Newman’s first win on the tour in his fifth start.
“It brings you back to your younger days when you were racing out of a one stall garage and it’s all your own guys working on the cars,” Manion said. “You work until late in the night and start way early because it’s what you love to do.
“It means a lot to come home and win this race.”
NUMBERS GAME
Kyle Busch led 126 laps at New Hampshire on the way to his 36th Nationwide Series win and broke Mark Martin’s lap leading record of 8.083 circuits with 8,118 laps.
Brad Keselowski finished second at New Hampshire to extend his points lead to 247 markers over second-place Carl Edwards (P3).
Trevor Bayne posted a career-best fifth-place finish as did Danica Patrick (30th).
