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Brickyard 400
Report
POTENTIAL
TOP-10 FINISH DERAILED FOR AMBROSE AT THE BRICKYARD
INDIANAPOLIS, IN — A
possible top-10 finish slipped through Marcos Ambrose’s
fingers when his No. 47 Kroger Toyota was damaged by
another car forcing him to give up valuable track position
for repairs with only15 laps remaining in the Brickyard
400.
It all started when Juan Pablo Montoya got loose and
bounced off the retaining wall. Montoya collected Dale
Earnhardt Jr. and his No. 88 entry made contact with
Ambrose’s machine. Ambrose was running 13th at
the time and marching forward when the incident ended
his chances for a top-10 finish. Ambrose soldiered
on to finish 21st in the 20th race of the NASCAR Sprint
Cup Series season.
“Dale bounced off of Juan and got me,” Ambrose
said. “We had a decent run going. The pit crew
was solid all day on pit road and made the car better.
We may have got a top-10 out of it before that happened.
It’s a shame we worked that hard and had a good
car and left there with the finish we did.”
The Australian driver started the 160-lap event 41st
and set out to meticulously work his way from the rear
of the field to the front of the field. First he had
to deal with a multi-car crash on lap 1 in Turn 2 when
Sam Hornish Jr. and Kyle Busch spun around while Elliott
Sadler, Reed Sorenson, David Reutimann, Todd Bodine
were some of the cars involved. It happened right
in front of Ambrose so he headed to pit road for the
pit crew to clean the grill and check out the splitter
for damage.
“It looked like the No. 77 and the No. 18 got
loose and it was a chain reaction,” crew chief
Frank Kerr said. “We came out of it okay.”
Restarting 33rd on lap 7, Ambrose reported to Kerr
that he was loose into and exiting the corners before
NASCAR’s competition yellow at lap 15. Ambrose
was 21st when he entered his pit box under yellow for
the JTG Daugherty Racing pit crew to change four Goodyear
tires with an air pressure adjustment and half-round
of wedge out of the right rear.
On lap 20 and back to green flag racing, Ambrose was
20th with a loose handling No. 47 Toyota. Juan Pablo
Montoya was first, Jimmie Johnson was second and Mark
Martin was running third at the time.
“We were really loose in and tight through the
center,” Ambrose said. “Loose off.”
On a green flag pit stop at lap 47, the team changed
tires again and put a spring rubber in the right rear
to improve handling. However, at lap 63, Ambrose’s
car remained loose.
“The car didn’t like that change for some
reason,” Ambrose said.
Once again, the pit crew was back at it during a debris
caution at lap 65. This time they dropped air pressure
from both rear tires before they changed four and opened
the left front shock.
Greg Biffle led the field to green on lap 69 and Ambrose
was 23rd.
Back in on lap 96 for more fresh tires, the team made
another air pressure adjustment since Ambrose was tight
in the center. He was running 20th when a debris caution
occurred on lap 116. More tires and another air pressure
adjustment was the call Kerr made this go around. Running
in the top 20, the crew took another shot at it on
the next caution at lap 137. This time they also went
up a quarter-round on the track bar when they changed
tires.
“I couldn’t pass because I didn’t
have the momentum I needed to turn through the center,” Ambrose
said.
The change seemed to help as Ambrose picked off the
13th spot just before incurring damage from the Montoya
accident at lap 145. The pit crew was fast to make
repairs and send Ambrose back out in 23rd place for
the restart on lap 149.
With the incident happening so close to the end of
the race, Ambrose ran out of time and laps and had
to settle for a 21st-place finish.
“We ran good, and it’s disappointing we
didn’t have a better result,” Ambrose said. Courtesy
Jennifer Chapple, JTG Daugherty Racing
Brickyard 400
Results:
1. Jamie McMurray
2. Kevin Harvick
3. Greg Biffle
4. Clint Bowyer
5. Tony Stewart
6. Jeff Burton
7. Carl Edwards
8. Kyle Busch
9. Joey Logano
10. Kurt Busch
21. Marcos Ambrose
Next Race — Sunoco
Red Cross Pennsylvania 500:
Where: Pocono Raceway, Long Pond, PA
Time: Sunday, August 1, 2010
Network & Time: ESPN Television, 1:00
p.m. / MRN Radio, noon
All Times Eastern
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