HAMPTON, Georgia (Feb. 27, 2015) – – Michael Annett thought the hardest race he’d have to qualify to date in his NASCAR Sprint Cup Series career was for last Sunday’s Daytona 500.
A week later, it proved to be the farthest thing from the truth.
Annett and his HScott Motorsports team found themselves caught up in the technical inspection fiasco, where more than a dozen teams were unable to get through inspection in time to participate in round one of knockout qualifying. and to set the starting grid for Sunday’s 56th annual Folds of Honor QuikTrip 500.
With the issues, Annett found himself one of the 13 teams that failed to post a qualifying lap in round one of knockout qualifying. Among the others? None other than former NASCAR Sprint Cup Series champions Jeff Gordon, Jimmie Johnson, Matt Kenseth and Tony Stewart.
Add even more insult to injury?
Without the luxury of owner’s points, Annett was one of four cars that failed to qualify for the second Sprint Cup Series race of the season.
Five days later after posting a 13th place finish, the best in his NASCAR Sprint Cup Series career in 37 starts – Annett failed to qualify for his first race in any of NASCAR’s three national divisions.
With a late offseason decision to switch from Tommy Baldwin Racing to HScott Motorsports, Annett didn’t have the safety net of owners’ points with him. Instead, those points remained with TBR’s new driver Alex Bowman.
Annett, a two-time winner in the ARCA Racing Series presented by Menards faced an abundance of pressure throughout Speedweeks 2015. And, when it seemed the HScott Motorsport’s team could crumble, the team persevered.
Annett found himself a victim in last Wednesday’s first practice session when Danica Patrick and Denny Hamlin collided, setting off a four-car crash that included Annett and Jeb Burton. With a mangled No. 46 Chevrolet, the HScott Motorsports team elected to revert to a back-up for Thursday night’s duel. But, the backup would not roll off from Annett’s hauler, instead it came courtesy of teammate Allgaier.
Facing adversity, Annett nor his team refused to let pressure overcome their goals. Annett, a native of Des Moines, Iowa wrestled his car to a 14th place finish, good enough to earn one of the coveted transfer spots for the Daytona 500.
After starting 27th, Annett cleverly drafted his No. 46 Pilot / Flying J Chevrolet to a recognizable 13th, eclipsing his previous best score of 16th at Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway last May.
Nearly a week later, Annett’s hard work to kick off a new chapter with momentum was gutted.
Missing the race on Sunday is likely to drop Annett outside the top-30 in driver standings and even potential further drop team owner Harry Scott in the owner standings, putting the No. 46 Pilot / Flying J Chevrolet in a volatile spot moving forward with 34 races remaining.
NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Richard Buck pinpointed the delay in technical inspection to teams pushing the tolerance levels of their racecars under the new aerodynamic package.
“We’ve got a new rules package here, and obviously the history of Atlanta and the grip is so important here, I think we’ve seen that with the test yesterday, teams getting to the limits, and we were open yesterday for all day on the laser inspection station and templates and such, and we had quite a few cars that came through,” Buck explained.
“We did see the area of the laser inspection station where teams were pushing it, and that’s their job. They’re trying to get every bit that they can.
We made every effort ‑‑ our goal was to make sure everybody has a fair opportunity to get through there, so our focus was to make sure that we ran ‑‑ were able to run every car across there at least once to give them an opportunity, and that’s what we did.”
Joining Annett on the sidelines were Matt DiBenedetto, Reed Sorenson and Mike Wallace, all themselves suffering the same fate.
Follow Chris Knight on Twitter @Knighter01.
