It takes two: Kasey Kahne knocked out of Pepsi 500 with second late-race crash
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FONTANA, Calif. – One late-race accident couldn’t knock Richard Petty Motorsports driver Kasey Kahne out of the Pepsi 500 NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Auto Club Speedway.
But two could.
After surviving a dustup with Kurt Busch and Greg Biffle with 10 laps remaining, Kahne’s race ended when he slammed into the rear of Jeff Burton’s car during a multicar crash with four laps remaining.
Kahne remained 11th in the Chase For The Sprint Cup standings, but he finished 34th Sunday and fell to 306 points behind leader Jimmie Johnson.
“I was following the 44 [of teammate AJ Allmendinger], so I can’t see anything,” Kahne said. “He turned left to miss the wreck and I hit the wreck. I never heard that there was a wreck, so I hit it.
“We had a top-six or -seven car. Kurt screwed up, and we got in his mess. From there, we got in this wreck. It’s disappointing to go out of the race like that when we had a good car.”
Kahne has two top-10 finishes in four Chase races, but he also has two DNFs: A 38th at New Hampshire with a blown engine and this race in California.
“We got our Budweiser Dodge inside the top 10 and thought that we could pass a few more cars on that restart when the 2 car [of Busch] got into us that just caused a chain reaction,” crew chief Kenny Francis said. “We got all tore up, but got the car running pretty good again. We were looking for a good finish when that second wreck happened that finally knocked us out. It was a bummer of a deal to end a pretty good day."
