Hornish makes most of all-star opportunity
By Jared Turner - SceneDaily Staff Writer
Sunday, May 18, 2008
- TEXT SIZE: Increase Text Size Decrease Text Size Reset Text Size
- No Comments. Leave a Comment
- Digg This
- Add to Del.icio.us
- RSS Feeds
Latest Headlines
CONCORD, N.C – The first order of business for Sam Hornish Jr. was simply making the field for Saturday night’s NASCAR Sprint All-Star Race at Lowe’s Motor Speedway. Once he did, the Penske Racing driver made the most of the opportunity.
Needing to finish in the top two in the Sprint Showdown race to qualify for the main event, Hornish did just that with a second-place finish and backed it up with a solid seventh-place showing in his all-star race debut.
“I’m real happy about how all the guys on the Mobil 1 Dodge did,” said Hornish, who has struggled at times in his first full Cup season. “They’re making me really proud. We keep trying to advance all the time and we think we’re heading in the right direction and we just need to get the monkey off our back and get a little bit more luck.”
For a while, it appeared Hornish may not be in the all-star race. Starting seventh in the two segment, 40-lap Sprint Showdown, the former open wheel star moved up just two spots in the first segment. But after electing not to pit with some of the leaders between segments, Hornish moved up to third for the second stanza. He then needed just 13 laps to chase down and pass Roush Fenway Racing’s David Ragan for the coveted runner-up spot.
The result placed Hornish 23rd out of 24 cars on the all-star race grid. He quickly found trouble in the main event, scrubbing the wall in the opening laps after contact with Chip Ganassi Racing’s Juan Pablo Montoya.
“We scraped it pretty good, too,” Hornish said. “We had a really good car. I thought we had a car that was capable of running in the top-10 here. Once we got out there running I think we had one that was capable of winning. I went down into that turn and I was right behind [Montoya].
"He’d been running the bottom and he moved up and it was either me go up in the marbles and try to keep from crashing or run over him. I did what I thought was the right thing to do and I had to move up a little bit and I got in the marbles and got the back end which drug the front.”
The mishap left Hornish two laps down but he got both back after twice earning the free pass under mandatory cautions. From there, he rallied into contention, thanks in large part to an outstanding third segment in which he passed nine cars.
“We were really good,” he said. “I think we would have probably passed about 15 in the first segment if we hadn’t got up there and got into the wall and then we would have been able to take our time from then on out. The big thing was that we knew we had a really good car it’s just how do we get back on the lead lap. In all the all-star races that I’ve ever seen there’s been about 12 cars running at the end because everybody else was wrecked. This year there’s no yellows other than the mandatory ones. It was a strange deal but we got back on the lead lap.”
But most of all, Hornish was just happy to be on the track for the main event.
“I’m just really, really blessed that I got to come down here and be part of the all-star race," he said. "It’s one of the coolest things I’ve ever done, that’s for sure.”
- Mentioned Drivers:
- Sam Hornish Jr.
No Comments
Be the first to comment on "Hornish makes most of all-star opportunity". Login or sign up for a free account below to post your comment