Difficult weekend for Earnhardt Jr and Kyle Busch

April 20, 5:15 PMAtlanta NASCAR ExaminerJeremy Dunn

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AP Photo/Steve Helber

At certain points during the Subway Fresh Fit 500 at Phoenix, Dale Earnhardt Jr and Kyle Busch seemed to be well on their way to solid finishes.  Earnhardt Jr led 63 laps on Saturday night before he hit the wall due to contact with former Hendrick Motorsports teammate Casey Mears. 

After losing the lead to Tony Stewart, he began to backslide, as the handling began to rapidly worsen before the contact with Mears. 

On the cool down lap, Earnhardt Jr was far from ‘cooling down’ as he gave Mears a little bump, just to let him know that he was none to pleased with his former teammate.  Mears kindly returned the favor.  The two drivers could face penalties from NASCAR. 

“I didn’t mean to get together with Dale Jr.  I think he was trying to save fuel and make it to the end without stopping and I wheel-hopped the car getting into the corner and ended up making contact with him.  I guess he was a little bent out of shape,” said Mears who finished in the twentieth position.

“We just couldn’t get it right tonight and we were very loose at the end.  If felt good to lead some laps.  We’ll get ‘em at Talladega,” Earnhardt Jr said following the disappointing 31^st place finish. He is now nineteenth in the championship standings, 103 points behind Matt Kenseth who owns the twelfth spot. 

This is not the first time this season that Earnhardt Jr has allowed his frustration to get the best of him.  His sub par results at Phoenix will continue to allow the critics and detractors to nitpick at NASCAR’s most popular driver. 

Kyle Busch’s night quickly turned sour, as a pit road speeding penalty on the final pit stop with under ten laps remaining in the race derailed any hopes of a top five finish. 

“At the last box they said we were .005 too fast leaving pit road,” said Busch’s crew chief Steve Addington.

Busch would have restarted right behind the eventual race winner Mark Martin with six laps to go. It would have been an interesting restart. Instead, he had to restart at the end of the longest line in the seventeenth position, which is where he ultimately finished. 

Busch spent most of the race in the top ten after qualifying second. 

“The guys had a great stop and they said were too fast exiting in the last pit stall and it killed our day,” said Busch.