Bowyer wins Sprint Showdown; Wise a surprise winner of Sprint Fan Vote
May 16, 2014
By Reid Spencer
NASCAR Wire Service
CONCORD, N.C.—
In a race that ran according to form, Clint Bowyer beat AJ Allmendinger
to the
finish line by 2.547 seconds Friday night at Charlotte Motor Speedway,
as the drivers finished 1-2 in the Sprint Showdown and advanced to
Saturday night's NASCAR Sprint All-Star Race.
The
biggest upset of the evening, and one of the biggest in recent NASCAR
history, came in the Sprint Fan Vote, with Josh Wise elected to the
all-star event over odds-on favorite
Danica Patrick, who will sit out the event in her second full season of
NASCAR Sprint Cup Series racing.
Allmendinger
grabbed the lead from pole winner Austin Dillon on the opening lap and
held it until Bowyer passed him with two laps left in the first of two
20-lap segments.
Bowyer restarted the second segment in sixth place, as the first car on
four new tires, but it didn’t take him long to overtake Dillon, who
made a two-tire stop under caution between the segments.
Bowyer
passed Dillon for the lead on Lap 24 of 40 and held it the rest of the
way, gradually pulling away from Allmendinger, who like Dillon took two
fresh tires on his pit
stop.
After a
disappointing start to the season, and a particularly frustrating race
last Saturday night at Kansas Speedway, Bowyer and crew chief Brian
Pattie hashed out their performance
issues during the week.
“I
spent a lot of time with Brian in the shop this week, and we really
talked about a lot of things,” Bowyer said. “I feel like we got to the
bottom of a lot of our problems.
We came here with a little bit different setup than we’ve been running
at these mile-and-a-half [speedways].
“It’s a
huge improvement. I’m really excited about all of this. I’m really more
excited about the way our car handled… It’s not too many sporting
events in the world that pay
a million bucks to win, and it’s nice to have a shot at it [Saturday]
night.”
Allmendinger,
who also had campaigned actively for the Sprint Fan Vote, and promised
to do the “Worm” across the driver introduction stage if he won, earned
the second transfer
spot on the track.
Allmendinger had a story similar to Bowyer’s, relative to his performance on intermediate tracks.
“We’ve
really struggled on these mile-and-a-half race tracks this year,”
Allmendinger said. “We’re not quite where we want to be yet, but I feel
like we’re definitely making
the car better.”
Casey
Mears ran third Friday night, followed by Richard Petty Motorsports
teammates Marcos Ambrose and Aric Almirola. Kyle Larson, Rick Stenhouse
Jr., Dillon, Paul Menard and
Patrick completed the top 10.
Eighteenth-place
finisher Wise, whose Phil Parsons-owned team recently picked up
sponsorship from Dogecoin and Reddit.com, got huge support in the Fan
Vote from the on-line
community.
“I’m
still trying to wrap my head around it,” said Wise, whose campaign
gained momentum after a posting by a teenager on Reddit.com. “They (the
Reddit community) started voting
for this, and I thought it would be a pretty tough thing to accomplish,
but they did it.
“It’s unreal. I’m just glad to be a part of it.”
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