Lucky.
That’s the best way to describe Carl Edwards’ ninth place finish in Sunday afternoon’s AAA Texas 500 at Texas Motor Speedway.
“We got super lucky there at the end and my guys never quit,” said Edwards post-race.
Edwards one of the Chase hopefuls, had a miserably slow No. 99 Aflac Ford Fusion through the early, middle and late stages of the 34th race of the season. In fact, the Columbia, Missouri native had even fallen to a race low 30th at Lap 360, but somehow, someway, perseverance kicked in and the Edwards rally began.
However, his impressive, yet stealth-like comeback didn’t come without some help.
Edwards received the beneficiary pass from the eighth caution of the day. From there, consistent changes to his car from veteran crew chief Jimmy Fenning, with an ever-changing track, proved to be the savior of the Roush Fenway Racing team.
Slowly and steadily and through an array of cautions and late-race attrition, Edward’s climb became more significant and invaluable, just 40 laps from the finish.
Sitting 25th on Lap 300 wasn’t pretty, but, the continual cycle of yellow flags and stacking carnage allowed the No. 99 car to quietly thread its way through the needle, finding himself 16thwhen the 11th caution flag waived on Lap 320 for an incident involving Kasey Kahne and Trevor Bayne.
Steadily over the final 21 laps, the 34-year old driver sawed his way through the field to take the white flag in ninth, but rose two more spots to take the checkered flag in seventh.
“I am so proud of my guys, Edwards added. “I have no idea where we are at in points but we certainly finished better than we should have tonight. It was a great night when for a while it didn’t look like it was going to be.
“We get to move on to Phoenix now and we will know what we have to do there. We will take it. My guys didn’t quit and I know they won’t quit and we are going to go next week and go for this thing.”
The 23-time NASCAR Sprint Cup Series winner leaves Texas sixth in the championship standings, 13 points behind leader Joey Logano and just one point behind the cutoff – currently controlled by Jeff Gordon.
Phoenix, the smaller, yet highly demanding short track though may not be as forgiving as Texas is.
If Edwards and the No. 99 Roush Fenway Racing team come to next weekend’s event as a non-factor, as they were in Sunday’s AAA Texas 500, their championship hopes ended with their 14th top-10 finish of the season.
Follow Chris Knight on Twitter @Knighter01.
