Earnhardt salvages top 20 but wants more

Earnhardt salvages top 20 but wants more

(September 17, 2011)

LOUDON, N.H.—Given that he suffered two flat tires in Sunday’s Sylvania 300 at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, Dale Earnhardt Jr. could have seen his championship hopes come to an inglorious end in the second race of the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup.

 That didn’t happen, because Earnhardt persevered and managed a 17th-place, lead-lap finish.

 For Earnhardt, whose winless streak reached 121 races, that just wasn’t good enough on a day when he felt he had a car that was fast enough to win.

 “I had an awesome car all day—just pretty frustrating,” Earnhardt said. “I want to win here. We’ve been so good here in a lot of races and would like to win. But, you’ve got to get up front, and we really couldn’t accomplish that all day long. We had a good, quick car, and I’m proud of how we worked on it, happy about what my guys did.

 “The car they brought and how they worked on the car, everything was seemingly going as planned until we got caught a lap down with Landon (Cassill’s) flat tire (which caused the second caution of the race on Lap 156). Then we had a couple flats ourselves that cost us a couple more spots there. It’s frustrating, but I was happy with how the car was driving. As a driver, we haven’t had that all year.”

 Despite the frustration, Earnhardt was philosophical about his position in the Chase. After two races he’s eighth in the standings but only 26 points out of the lead held by Tony Stewart.

 “We’ll take it right now,” Earnhardt said. “It could be worse. We could be sitting in victory lane, but we could be out of the Chase all together. I think, having two flat tires, we got pretty lucky today to get home in the top 20.”

By Reid Spencer
Sporting News NASCAR Wire Service