Around Iredell Sports

2007 Sep-04

Earnhardt downcast with Chase hopes dwindling

By Mike Mulhern
Media General News Service

For Dale Earnhardt Jr. and crew chief Tony Eury Jr. it looks like it’s all over, no shot at this year’s title.

They go to Richmond this week for Saturday night’s race needing to make up 128 points on 12th place Kevin Harvick in order to make the Chase for the Nextel Cup, or 141 points on Kurt Busch, in 11th.

Harvick can clinch a spot in the playoffs by finishing 32nd or better; Busch can clinch by finishing 36th or better.

Earnhardt was emotionally and physically drained Sunday night at the end of the race: “I don’t know much about the (points) system. I never cared to. I just go out and run as hard as I can.

“It doesn’t look like we’re going to make it, but we’re not going to quit trying until they tell us we’re not.”

Eury too was drained: “Everybody wants to be in the Chase. But somebody has to lose, and we had too many errors.

“We’ve run in the top-five I don’t know how many times, and then have a motor blow up or power steering go out. The craziest stuff like that.

“It’s luck. It’s rotten luck. Some of it was brought on ourselves.

“But there is nothing you can really do about it.

“You can’t sit back on the couch and say ‘We’ve had a terrible year,’ because we haven’t. You’ve just got to keep your guys pumped up.”

? Robby Gordon had a tough Sunday night, getting turned around and crashing early on.

“It was my spotter’s fault,” Gordon said. “He didn’t tell me somebody was on the outside, and I drifted up. “I had Reed Sorenson on the inside, and I saw him, but I never saw (Clint) Bowyer come around the outside.

“About the time I hit Bowyer, he was like ‘Somebody is on the outside.’ I was like ‘It’s too late.’

“That last run we almost passed Tony (Stewart) for 10th, so we could easily run in the top-10. It’s just unfortunate we’re going to take a big hit in the points.”

Whatever Carl Edwards and crew chief Bob Osborne have hit on, their teammates don’t seem to be make it work.

Greg Biffle, as through most of the season, was never a factor, finishing 17th. “We just missed the set-up again, and it’s frustrating,” Biffle said. “I don’t know what it is, but we’ll keep working on it.”

Teammate Jamie McMurray wasn’t much better: “We haven’t finished without me running into the wall in about five weeks…. So it wasn’t a bad night.

“The car was really fast in the beginning; we just didn’t keep up with the track. But Larry (Carter, his crew chief) did really well making some good pit calls and kept us on the lead lap.”

? David Ragan, the newest member of the Roush gang, didn’t do badly, finishing 13th. “Other than my mistakes - speeding on pit road and blending in a little too early - we might have had a car that could have finished in the top-five or contended for a win.”

Matt Kenseth, who won here in the spring, didn’t have much going for him but still finished seventh. “It was kind of frustrating. We took off at the beginning of the race, drove to the front, and thought we had a pretty competitive car ... and as the track changed we just kept getting farther and farther off and couldn’t figure it out.”

The heat? It was a big worry right up until the moment the race started, and then drivers, most of them, put it aside. “I had an ice pack the first half of the run … but once the sun goes down it’s 100 percent better,” Ragan said. “When you have a good handling car, you kind of forget about the heat.”

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