FORT WORTH, Texas – Clint Bowyer’s run at a championship title took a huge blow in Sunday’s AAA Texas 500 at Texas Motor Speedway as the Stewart-Haas Racing driver was unable to recover from a sequence of unscheduled pit stops.
After qualifying his No. 14 Rush Truck Centers Ford Fusion second, Bowyer made contact with Denny Hamlin during Lap 1 of the penultimate race in the Round of 8, and while Hamlin quickly faded back, Bowyer soon realized he was in trouble too.
Bowyer pitted on Lap 12 for a flat tire and subsequently found himself two laps down when the competition caution at Lap 30. By the end of Stage 1, Bowyer had climbed the leaderboard but still found himself two laps in the arrears.
During Stage 2, Bowyer stayed on the track – hoping a caution would allow him an opportunity to get one of his laps back, but when the caution didn’t come, Bowyer had to pit under green flag conditions again, losing another lap and sinking further in the running order.
A caution at Lap 225 allowed Bowyer the opportunity to take the wave around and get one of his lost laps back, however, the gamble foiled as the Emporia, Kansas native had to pit for gas only at Lap 244 under green.
Unfortunately, the stop proved to even more costly for the No. 14 team as one of the crew member innocently had his feet laying flat inside the pit box before Bowyer arrived – sparking a penalty from NASCAR for a crew member over the wall too soon.
Bowyer had to serve his Lap 245 penalty under green and ultimately put an exclamation point on any chance of a significant rebound for the two-time winner this season.
The 39-year-old settled for a 26th place finish, three laps behind race winner and SHR teammate Kevin Harvick and now finds himself in a must-win scenario heading to ISM (Ariz.) Raceway next weekend if he wants a shot at joining Harvick in the Championship 4.
“That stinks,” said Bowyer. “First corner of the race. I’m sick. It wasn’t what we were hoping for today. We were having to turn right to get into the corner and were ploughing in the middle. I think something was going on with the car when it was getting in the corner. We’ll go to Phoenix and try to win. This isn’t over yet.”
Entering Phoenix, Bowyer sits eighth in the standings, 73 points behind Martin Truex Jr. in the cutoff spot. The 10-time Cup winner finished sixth at Phoenix in the spring after starting 19th at the track’s final race on the old layout.
Follow Chris Knight on Twitter @Knighter01.
