David Reutimann isn’t ready to turn the other cheek, yet.
During Denny Hamlin’s run to the front of the field and the eventual win in Monday’s rescheduled Pennsylvania 500, Hamlin got behind Reutimann on lap 174 pushing his Toyota hard enough to spin Reutimann around and into his Michael Waltrip Racing teammate Marcos Ambrose.
Reutimann finished 29th while Ambrose finished 34th.
But the worst news for Reutimann was the point’s loss. He came into Pocono in 13th place with a legitimate shot to make the top 12 and earn a spot in the Chase for the Championship. He lost three spots and is now 16th.
“I’m not happy. I’m aggravated. I’m mad as heck,” Reutimann said Wednesday during media event for Lowe’s Motor Speedway in Charlotte.
“I’m not sugarcoating any of that,” he added. "I’m still really, really aggravated. Maybe we can get things sorted out.”
Sunday after winning Hamlin explained what he felt happened.
“I got to him coming off turn one. I drove into turn two, got to him, nudged him actually in the middle of the corner. I let go of him,” Hamlin said. “He pulled away about a car length, but then he slammed on the brakes obviously to let me know he was upset.
"I plowed him off of two really hard. I said, ‘Man, all right, I understand, I get it.’ In turn three, I got to him again. He got really loose off four. When I got to him and pushed him, I was hoping he was just going to come off the corner, straighten up, I was going to push him down the straightaway. Instead, kept my throttle on him, and when I did I spun him into his teammate.
"It was a lot of emotion. I got guys in my mirror that I know I got to race for the win. I’m racing for a win on a particular weekend where it means more than any other weekend. I think emotion was probably part of it. But I got to make it up to those guys somehow, cut them some breaks on the track or something.”
Wednesday Reutimann said that he and Hamlin had exchanged text messages and that Hamlin had apologized.
"If a guy says he's sorry I tend to believe it," Reutimann said. "Everybody's capable of making mistakes. I'm a forgiving guy if he sincerely apologizes or says he was in the wrong.
"In the end I'm still confused at why it happened. It wasn't just one shot. It was multiple shots."
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