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 Keselowski
Finishes 21st Following Late Race Spin
Brad
Keselowski, driver of the Penske Racing No. 12 AAA Insurance
Dodge Charger in the NASCAR Cup Series, finished 21st in
the Auto Club 500 at Auto Club Speedway on Sunday. A late-race
spin on lap 223 prevented the third-year driver from challenging
for a top-15 finish.
Penske
Racing teammates Kurt Busch and Sam Hornish, Jr. finished
the race in sixth and 16th place, respectively.
With rain
clouds threatening the area, Sundayís race
began with doubt as to whether all 250 laps would be completed.
Despite the forecast, the race would only be stopped once,
on lap 192, for inclement weather. However, teams were forced
to deal with changing track conditions as the sky alternately
went from sunny to cloudy throughout the day
From the drop of
the green flag, Keselowski was forced to deal with a loose-handling
condition on the No. 12 Dodge. This would be the case for
most of the race. After searching around for the racing line
that would best suit his Dodge Charger, Keselowski began
working the ěhighî line
around the track. The initial caution period on lap 38 allowed
crew chief Jay Guy to begin working on the handling condition.
The car responded to the first round of adjustments as Keselowski
was running lap times comparable to the race leaders by lap
50. He would remain inside the top-20 cars through the midway
point of the race.
As the AAA Insurance car remained loose, Guy
began to get more aggressive with the changes to the chassis.
Under a lap 139 caution period, Keselowski brought his car
down pit road for track bar, wedge, spring rubber and air
pressure adjustments. The result was a better car, but the
team could not tighten up the No. 12ís handling enough for
Keselowski to run his preferred line.
 Light
rain began to fall around lap 179 as teams were preparing
for green flag
pit stops. Guy kept Keselowski on the track as long as possible
in the event that the yellow would fall and the race would
be cut short, giving Keselowski a potential top-five finish.
Unfortunately, this strategy didnít pay off and
Keselowski had to come down pit road for tires and fuel. As a
result, Keselowski lost a lap to the leaders, but he was
able to receive the free pass back to lead-lap racing when
the caution flag finally flew for rain on lap 192.
After
restarting in the 19th position, Keselowski quickly drove
up to the 11th spot in the running order on lap 214 and it
looked like he would make his way into the top-10. However,
he radioed to Guy that his right rear tire was worn out and several
laps later he spun his Dodge while coming off Turn 4 on lap
223. As he worked to get his car to pit road, the left rear
tire came apart and took with it the quarter panel. The No.
12 crew worked through several pit stops to make enough repairs
for Keselowski to finish the race. In fact, he picked up
four positions in the closing laps before taking the checkered
flag.
Following the first two races of the season, Keselowski
is ranked 28th in the 2010 NASCAR Cup Series driver points
standings.
The
No. 22 Penske Dodge Charger team will stay on the West Coast
this week for the Shelby American at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
The race will be seen live on Sunday afternoon, February 28 on
the FOX television network beginning at 3 p.m. ET. The event
will also be heard live on PRN Radio, as well as Sirius Satellite
Radio Channel 128.
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"We
made a ton of progress this week. Certainly,
I've got a lot to learn, but at least we got out with a decent
finish and our car is in not too bad of shape. I think that was important
for us to run all the laps and come out with a good finish. We did
that. We just caught a tough break when the tire cut down and cost
us some spots. We'll learn from it and move on to Vegas next
week."
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