April 27, 2013
- Harvick wins at Richmond: #29-Kevin Harvick won the Toyota Owners 400 Sprint Cup Series race at Richmond International Raceway for his 1st win of 2013, 3rd win at Richmond and 20th career win. He easily took the lead after starting 7th on green white checker restart, behind several drivers on older tires. #15-Bowyer finished 2nd, followed by #22-Logano, #42-Montoya (who was leading the race until the final caution), #31-Burton, #99-Edwards, #20-Kenseth (who started from the pole and led the most laps on the night), #43-Almirola, #78-Busch, and #88-Earnhardt, Jr.
There were 10 lead changes among 7 drivers and 11 cautions for 75 yellow flag laps. The average speed was 92.141mph.
Starting this season, NASCAR doesn’t release the track attendance.
See race results, awards, money won, laps led, cautions and more on the Richmond Race Results page (pdf) and check out the Richmond Penalty Report (pdf) - Race Fast Facts – Richmond:
Kevin Harvick won the 59th Annual Toyota Owners 400, his 20th victory in 439 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series races.
This is his first victory and second top-10 finish in 2013.
This is his third victory and 16th top-10 finish in 25 races at Richmond International Raceway.
This is his fifth career victory at short tracks in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series.
Clint Bowyer (second) posted his ninth top-10 finish in 15 races at Richmond International Raceway. It is his fifth top-10 finish in 2013.
Joey Logano (third) posted his second top-10 finish in nine races at Richmond International Raceway.
Jimmie Johnson leads the point standings by 43 points over Carl Edwards.
(NASCAR Integrated Sports Marketing)(4-27-2013) - 2013 Sprint Cup Driver Championship Points Standings:
[after Richmond, race 9 of 36]
1) #48-Jimmie Johnson [2 wins], 343
2) #99-Carl Edwards [1 win], 300, -42
3) #5-Kasey Kahne [1 win], 297, -46
4) #88-Dale Earnhardt Jr., 297, -46
5) #15-Clint Bowyer, 290, -53
6) #2-Brad Keselowski, 284, -598
7) #18-Kyle Busch [2 wins], 278, -65
8) #16-Greg Biffle, 272, -71
9) #29-Kevin Harvick [1 win], 271, -72
10) #27-Paul Menard, 271, -72
11) #43-Aric Almirola, 258, -85
12) #1-Jamie McMurray, 245, -98
2012 Chase drivers out of top 12
#20-Matt Kenseth [2 wins], 13th in points
#24-Jeff Gordon, 14th
#56-Martin Truex Jr., 15th
#14-Tony Stewart, 22nd
#11-Denny Hamlin, 28th [missed 4 races with injury]
(ties broken by 1sts, 2nds, 3rd, etc)
See drivers championship points standings on the Drivers Points Standings (pdf) and the owner points standings on the Owners Points Standings page (pdf). - NASCAR and Gibbs talk about #20 team penalties: NASCAR Vice President of Competition Robin Pemberton discussed NASCAR’s penalties to the #20 team Friday afternoon:
PEMBERTON: As everyone knows there are a few things that are understood in the garage area that are big. When you talk about engines, you talk about tires, and you talk about fuel. That’s a common thread that’s been understood, and it’s stood the test of time for the last 65 years. Don’t mess with those areas, and the penalties are severe. But when you look in the case of an engine, the only time we really get a chance to look internally at an engine is post-race. Some of our most severe penalties over time have surrounded engine infractions.
Q. Why was the team penalized rather than the manufacturer?
PEMBERTON: That’s tough too. Because when you look at, in their particular situation, we probably don’t know all the details, but we do know they come from an outside vendor for the most part, and I don’t know how you would go — it’s very difficult to go to an outside vendor and penalize them whether it’s springs or shocks or parts that are bought and bolted on race cars. That’s why in today’s world we all know and relate to the fact that it stops at the crew chief and stops at the owner and stops at the organization that is here to compete.
PEMBERTON: It’s a part that didn’t meet spec. It’s not a gray area. There are numbers in the books. If you look at numbers in the books and what’s going on in the garage area and across our national series those numbers for a connecting rod have been in the book since around the time we went to a single-engine rule, which is probably 12 years ago. So you take that and the amount of engines and engine components in the garage area, and then every given weekend it’s done right the vast majority of the time.(NASCAR)
AND #20 team owner Joe Gibbs also addressed the media Friday at Richmond:
Joe Gibbs: I want to say that we value our NASCAR partnership very much. We’ve been together, working together for 22 years and we value our relationship with them. Certainly, we do not want to be on the wrong side of any rules. That’s our goal. I wanted to emphasize that. I want to make a point [that] we have a great partner in TRD (Toyota Racing Development). Over the six years we’ve been together at different times — this is a big deal, a lot of things come up — NASCAR’s a big deal for us and a big deal for TRD. It’s what we live. Through the process over these six years at different times we’ve stood behind them as we go through something — in support and be there with them. At different times, they have been behind us. That’s what good partners do. We think we have a great partnership with them and we’re going to stand together and work our way through this and again try to handle it the right way. We believe that we are going to be together for a long time. I think everyone at this point has probably heard that in tearing down our motor after last week’s win, one of the connecting rods was found to be light. That goes against the rules and we understand that. We know that there’s going to be a penalty for that. What we’re going to appeal is the severity of the penalties. In looking at that motor and where all the connecting rods were placed and the weight of all the connecting rods, when you have motor experts look at it basically what they would say is there is no advantage to having that one light rod in that motor. That’s one thing that is very important to me is the intent here was not to get an unfair advantage in any way. That’s very important to me. The other point that I would like to make is since we started out this year there has been 10 TRD motors torn down — eight of them have been Joe Gibbs Racing motors. Nothing with those other motors has found to be wrong in those motors in anyway. Those motors were found to be legal there. I think basically that’s what our appeal is going to be. We want to go forward and go through that process and what we’ll be appealing will be the severe nature of the penalties.”(Toyota Motorsports)(4-27-2013) - Ten years since Nadeau’s injury: NASCAR’s annual spring visit to Richmond International Raceway marks the 10-year anniversary of Jerry Nadeau’s near fatal accident at the track. Nadeau crashed driver’s-side first into the outside wall between Turns 1 and 2 during a May 2, 2003, practice at Richmond. He was airlifted to Virginia Commonwealth University Medical Center in critical condition with a moderate to severe head injury, partially collapsed left lung, fractured shoulder blade and left-side rib-cage injuries. It took 20 days for Nadeau to regain full consciousness and begin to speak again, and four more before he was transferred to Charlotte Institute of Rehabilitation to begin physical, occupational and speech therapy. Nadeau was in inpatient care until June 6, and in therapy until July 25. When NASCAR returned to Richmond in September that year, Nadeau made an emotional visit to VCU Medical Center to thank the medical staff. He went on to form World Karting Endurance at Charlotte Motor Speedway, and has done some driver coaching, but never raced again in NASCAR.(Associated Press)(4-27-2013)
- Special scheme for the #11 at Richmond: Brian Vickers will drive a special #11 FedEx Delivery Manager Toyota in Saturday night’s race at Richmond International Raceway (RIR). FedEx Delivery Manager, which launched earlier this week, provides delivery options for FedEx residential package recipients to fit their schedule. It offers personalized options that allow customers to request how, when and where they want their packages delivered. FedEx Delivery Manager can be used online, through mobile browsers and with the FedEx app.(FedEx Racing), see an image of the car on the #11 Team Schemes page.(4-27-2013)
- Patrick, Gilliland meet about differences: Before NASCAR Sprint Cup practice began at Richmond International Raceway on Friday, #10-Danica Patrick visited #93-David Gilliland at his transporter to discuss their differences. Patrick wanted to set the record straight with her fellow competitor regarding how she felt he was racing her last week. Over her radio at Kansas Speedway, Patrick said, “He tries to take me out every time.” After the race, Gilliland delivered the message through his public relations representative, “shut up and drive.”
“Where our cars seem to run on the racetrack is probably the hardest racing on the racetrack, realistically, you know,” Gilliland said. “When you’re in the top 10, you can let guys go and get back in. When the leaders are coming and you’re fighting to risk going a lap down, back there where we’ve been racing, at the end of the day it could mean five or six spots. It’s hard racing. But we talked this morning and feel like we’re on track to race each other the way we feel like we want to be raced. That’s just it – a mutual respect thing that hopefully we got figured out. I think we’re on the same page. We have to figure out what we have to do to make our lives easier on each other. At the end of the day, you want to lose the least amount of time as you can. But we feel good about it going forward.”(Fox Sports) (4-26-2013) - Scott, Piquet tangle after race; crew members arrested UPDATES: Henrico County Police had two adult males in custody Friday night after a fight in the driver/owner lot of Richmond International Raceway following a Nationwide Series race where Richard Childress Racing and Turner Scott Racing crews and drivers nearly brawled. The police department did not reveal details of who was involved in the altercation but Richard Childress Racing confirmed its involvement and multiple sources said Turner Scott Motorsports personnel and driver Nelson Piquet Jr. were talking to police in the motorhome lot. A statement from Richard Childress Racing Director of Communications Tim Packman confirmed the team’s involvement. “We are aware an incident took place outside of the track’s infield following Friday night’s NASCAR Nationwide Series race at Richmond International Raceway involving members of our team and others from another team,” the statement said. “We are cooperating with the local authorities in this matter.” The incident occurred a little more than an hour after the race.
Two separate incidents following the Nationwide Series race involved RCR and Turner Scott Motorsports, sparked by an on-track incident between Piquet and RCR driver Brian Scott. Following the race, both crews nearly came to blows and Scott went up to Piquet, who shoved Scott away and then kicked him in the groin. Piquet later apologized for kicking Scott, saying it was in self-defense.(Sporting News)(4-27-2013)
UPDATE: Police have released the names of two Richard Childress Racing crew members arrested for alleged assault at Richmond International Raceway late Friday night. Michael A. Scearce, 50, and Thomas F. Costello, 35, were taken into custody after a postrace incident spilled over to the driver/owner motorhome lot. The assault injured one of the two adult male victims, whose names were not released. Scearce and Costello are both members of RCR’s #2 team, which fields cars for Brian Scott. Both men were charged with misdemeanors and released early Saturday morning, according to Henrico County police Lt. Linda Toney. A court date for both will be determined at a later time.(USA Today)(4-27-2013)
UPDATE 2: Statement from Richard Childress: “I didn’t witness what took place last night outside of the race track. Our team members were walking to their cars and words were exchanged with members from another team, which led to an altercation. I am still learning all the exact details and, because it did happen outside of the track, local authorities became involved. We are working with them to resolve this matter. We are now concentrating on winning the Sprint Cup race tonight.”(RCR)(4-27-2013)
UPDATE 3: Statement from Turner Scott Motorsports: “Turner Scott Motorsports can confirm that an incident occurred near the Driver/Owner parking lot of Richmond International Raceway following the NASCAR Nationwide Series race on Friday, April 26th. Several members of another race team confronted a group that included Nelson Piquet Jr., resulting in the arrest of two individuals from the other race team. TSM will have no further comment on the incident as the matter is an active case with the Henrico Police Department.”(TSM)(4-27-2013) - Chris Young and Robin Meade to sing National Anthems at Talladega Two well-known national personalities – country music superstar Chris Young and noted news journalist and recording artist Robin Meade – have been selected to sing the National Anthems during Aaron’s Dream Weekend at Talladega Superspeedway. Young will give his rendition of “The Star Spangled Banner” prior to the Saturday, May 4, Aaron’s 312 NASCAR Nationwide Series race. Meade will provide the fans with her version on Sunday, May 5, moments before the start of the Aaron’s 499 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race. In addition, Young will deliver Talladega fans an added bonus with a free Saturday night Infield Concert, held near the historic Talladega Boulevard.(TSS)(4-27-2013)
- Josh Turner replacing Currington for Charlotte pre-race concert: Country music star and double-platinum-selling singer-songwriter Josh Turner will perform a pre-race concert before the green flag waves on the 29th annual NASCAR Sprint All-Star Race on May 18 at Charlotte Motor Speedway, replacing Billy Currington, who was originally scheduled to perform. Turner will bring his baritone voice and soulful gospel-bluegrass repertoire to the heart of NASCAR country for an energetic 90-minute concert that will have fans on their feet and singing along to some of country music’s most recognizable hits. Fans will fill the infield between Turns 1 and 2 to hear their favorite songs from the country crooner before drivers take to the legendary 1.5-mile superspeedway for a fast and furious dash for cash with up to $2 million on the line. “Due to Currington’s recent indictment, we elected to change our act for the NASCAR Sprint All-Star Race,” said Marcus Smith, president and general manager of Charlotte Motor Speedway. “Josh Turner is a native of the Carolinas with six No. 1 hits to his credit, and we know he’ll put on a fantastic show for our fans and sponsors on race weekend.”(CMS)(4-27-2013)
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