Video: Wrecks take out JGR's Joey Logano, Denny Hamlin at Michigan

By Brian De Los Santos | CBSSports.com Staff Writer

It was a rough race at Michigan for the Joe Gibbs Racing organization on Sunday.

The first to take a hit was Kyle Busch , who suffered engine issues for the third straight race. His 18 team was able to make some repairs in the garage and get him back out on the track, but he was saddled with a 32nd-place finish.

Pocono winner Joey Logano was the next to go down on Lap 126, when he wrecked trying to avoid the slow car of David Gilliland. The wreck also took out Kasey Kahne.

"It was just restarts," Logano said. "There was a slower car in front of us and the 17 (Matt Kenseth) was right in front of me. The slower lapped car -- we all waved around and we were all trying to turn down underneath him and just got loose. I thought I had it saved and over-corrected and went in the wall.

"A little frustrating, but we had a top-10 car today, I think we have a top-10 coming to us here. Maybe even a top-five. We're still on a roll and we've still got a really good race team -- really good cars here so we're not going to let this take us down. We'll go back out there next week and win that one."



Not long after, on Lap 133, Denny Hamlin's day went up in smoke as he spun through the grass coming out of Turn 4. The ride through the grass broke something fairly important as his car went up in flames as he tried to drive it back to the pits.

"We're all scrambling on restarts -- everyone is doing everything they can to get position," Hamlin said. "Unfortunately, with the tire change we had, it forces everyone to be aggressive like they were on restarts. We were four-wide and I was on the bottom line, but the 39 (Ryan Newman) tried to stick it right there in the very, very low line and there just wasn't any grip down there. There's not any rubber down there so there was no way his car was going to stick. I knew I was in trouble being on top of him. When he slid up into us, it just spun us around.

"Evidently it knocked something off with either the oil or the fuel -- it caught on fire and that was okay, but when I was stopped I don't know why, but it completely engulfed the whole car.

"I've never actually been in that position before. I'd seen it with other guys, but I've never known what it's actually like but it gets hot. I thought for a second there I was OK. It was just in the back and then something exploded in the front and it caught on fire. Thankfully we got everything that we have safety-wise."

You May Also Like
 

Biggest Stories

CBSSports Facebook Twitter
COMMENTS
Conversation powered by Livefyre

Latest

Most Popular