Daniel Hemric, No. 11 Cirkul Chevrolet Camaro - Daniel Hemric qualified sixth for the Shriners Children’s 200 at Watkins Glen International.
- Hemric started the race as the first car on the outside lane, after the No. 17 and No. 00 dropped to the rear for unapproved adjustments. Hemric’s No. 11 Cirkul Chevrolet fired off free, dropping back to eighth by lap eight. While avoiding an incident in front of him on lap 11, Hemric steered clear of contact but fell back to 13th, where he finished the opening stage under green flag conditions.
- Hemric remained in 13th, until the first caution came out on lap 22. He pitted under caution for four tires, fuel, track bar and air pressure adjustments. Hemric restarted 17th with 14 laps to go in stage two and was able to move up to 13th by lap 28. When the next caution flag flew on lap 32, Hemric elected to stay out, restarting 12th with seven laps to go in the stage, before moving up to 11th where he finished stage two.
- The first caution of the final stage came out on lap 47. Hemric pitted for four tires and fuel and was reminded to save fuel. He restarted 11th with 32 laps remaining in the race, making his way back into the top 10 by lap 59. With 15 to go, Hemric reported a problem with his No. 11 Cirkul Chevy and made an unscheduled pit stop from eighth place. Unable to address the problem, Hemric went back on track only to pit again, this time, having to drive to the garage for the team to address the issue. After discovering a part failure, the team sent Hemric back out just before the restart with four to go to finish the race. The caution came out almost immediately after the restart before going into NASCAR overtime. Hemric restarted 23rd where he ultimately limped the No. 11 Cirkul Chevy to the end.
“We had really good short-run speed in the Cirkul Chevrolet this weekend, especially in practice and qualifying. I think we just let the racetrack get away from us, and our setup was a bit aggressive. We struggled a bit in the first run and thought we made good changes to get the speed a little better. I thought we were going to be able to salvage a pretty good day and possibly a top-five. Unfortunately, we had a parts failure, and that’s something you can’t control when it happens. Today we didn’t do the little things right, but we get the chance to regroup for next week.” – Daniel Hemric |