SPARTA, Ky. – Alex Bowman had a fast No. 88 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet at Kentucky Speedway Saturday night.
Unfortunately, Bowman suffered an early exit from the Quaker State 400 after suffering a catastrophic brake rotor failure shortly after the start of Stage 2.
In his 100th career Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series start, Bowman started 15th and held his own, but as Stage 1 motored on, crew chief Greg Ives elected to keep Bowman on the track.
Circling to the race lead as pit stops cycled, Bowman finally pitted on Lap 64 for four tires, fuel and chassis adjustments. The late pit stop put Bowman a lap down, but the Tucson, Ariz. native was able to catch leader Martin Truex Jr. in the closing laps to un-lap himself and finish Stage 1 20th.
A gutsy call by Ives to pit for two right side tires at the end of Stage 1 vaulted Bowman through the running order – restarting third.
While the two-tire stop offered track position for the Hendrick Motorsports rookie, Bowman faded in the opening Stage 2 laps – with Bowman just outside the top-10 when his night unraveled.
On the backstretch on Lap 109, sparks began to shower from underneath Bowman’s No. 88 Axalta Chevrolet sending the driver uncontrollably into the outside Turn 3 wall.
Bowman gingerly brought his wounded race car to pit road where the damage was deemed terminal sending the team to the garage and out of the event.
Bowman was the first car retired from the race, finishing 39th.
“I’m fine, Hendrick Motorsports builds good safe race cars,” offered Bowman. “My Hendrick carbon seat held up well, everything is good. Unfortunate we blew a tire. Kind of looked like it might have broken a brake rotor before that, but it’s hard to say because you break the brake rotor when you hit the wall anyway, so part of it. We will move on and evaluate what happened.
“Pretty early to blow a tire. So, my Axalta, Hendrick Motorsports guys will work hard, and we will be better next week.
“We were the last guy that didn’t have any DNF’s we made it one week farther than everybody else. But, it’s a bummer. It’s unfortunate, but we will move on from it and go to the next one.”
Initially, Ives believed that Bowman lost a right-front tire, but upon further examination in the garage, the team noticed the brake rotor exploded unleashing the domino effect to their night.
The finish was disappointing not only because of the speed in Bowman’s Chevrolet Camaro ZL1, but the 25-year-old’s bid to make the post-season Playoffs.
Entering the race, Bowman was on the cutoff line with a 19-point cushion over Ricky Stenhouse Jr. Stenhouse and others made a huge dent into their deficit to Bowman with seven races remaining in the regular season.
Bowman vows to rebound.
“We are right in the thick of the points stuff, so we can’t afford this, this will hurt us quite a bit,” added Bowman. “It’s a big bummer for my guys and for Axalta and Nationwide and everybody that makes this deal happen. Really unfortunate, but it’s not something that we could prevent it’s nothing that we caused and there is not much you can do about it.
“You pop a right front and have a long time to star at the wall and then you hit it and then you’ve got to move on.”
Follow Chris Knight on Twitter @Knighter01.
