Remembering a difficult finish last year at the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course in Lexington, where a final lap incident relegated the No. 54 Joe Gibbs Racing (JGR) team to a 23rd-place finish, the 2014-winning team was hopeful to complete this Saturday’s Nationwide Children’s Hospital 200 race with a better result. Although momentum started early with the team’s sixth pole-qualifying position earned this year, their race would also conclude early when they were forced back to the garage area without completing the event, due to an expired engine. The disappointing result cost the JGR team its points lead in the season’s Owner’s Championship points battle, moving them into second place behind the No. 22 Penske Racing team.
The race weekend started well when Monster Energy athlete Sam Hornish Jr. paced the fastest lap times in the No. 54 Camry during practice one and followed that up again with fast times in practice session two, before a similar fate was presented to the team. Hornish Jr. had difficulty shifting from second to third and instead threw the gear into first which caused a seizure for the Toyota engine, that ended their final practice run. The JGR crew would work late Friday night and early Saturday morning to replace the motor in time for qualifying early on race day.
Then, without missing a beat, Hornish and the No. 54 team paced the field fastest during the morning qualifying session with an 84.787-second lap at 95.873mph. The time earned Hornish and team the Coors Light Pole Award, Hornish’ s second pole and sixth top-10 start this season and his first lead-position grab at the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course, a facility close to his heart and hometown.
Saturday afternoon the event’s green-flag waved at the start of the 2.258-mile road-course for a scheduled 90-lap contest. Within the first lap Hornish was immediately challenged for position and dropped to third place briefly, then overtook second place when the first yellow-flag caution happened on lap four. “Tough rear grip right now,” the driver was heard relaying over the radio to his team. He remained in second place until the first of two scheduled pit stops occurred at lap 26, when the team replenished Goodyear tires, Sunoco fuel and made a chassis adjustment to tighten up the car’s handling.
Hornish Jr. liked the adjustments made and at lap 33 overtook the lead from the No. 2 car of Brian Scott. “Save fuel,” crew chief Adam Stevens was heard advising his Monster Energy athlete who remained in first place through another caution period. The green-flag restart at lap 46 was difficult, though, with hard-charging front runners and the black and green machine slipped to second place at lap 50, just past the event’s halfway point. The team would never know whether their veteran series driver would regain and hold onto the lead again, for a race win, as their day ended early on the following lap 51.
Hornish was heard over the radio, “I missed a shift and the engine is rough.” He immediately drove it back to the garage area where the No. 54 team made quick work of assessing the damage. Because the motor was still running, they thought they had a chance to get back out onto the race track and salvage some much needed points for the Owner’s Championship points battle. After some time in the garage the team asked Hornish to start up and drive back towards the racing surface, however, he didn’t get far before they realized he would not turn one complete lap. Therefore they pushed the No. 54 car from a sitting position on pit road, back to the garage one final time and accepted a 30th-place finish.
Hence the car owned by J.D. Gibbs dropped to second place in the Owner’s Championship points standings, now 21 points behind the No. 22 Roger Penske Ford. With a similar result in the 2013 event, the No. 54 team was essentially in the same points position then, at the time 22 markers behind the No. 22 team. So the JGR team this year is within one point of where it stood last year after this event. Coincidentally the No. 54 missed winning the Owner’s Championship in 2013, to the No. 22 Penske team, by one point. Needless to say the 2014 season is molding a similar points battle that will continue, no doubt, all the way until the checkered flag at Homestead-Miami (Fla.) Speedway in November.
Chris Buescher of Roush-Fenway Racing won the event, his first victory in 30 career Nationwide Series starts. Regan Smith followed in second place while Brian Scott, Chase Elliott and Alex Tagliani rounded out the top-five finishers. There were five caution periods for 17 laps of the race along with six lead changes across five drivers. Hornish Jr. led the field one time for 12 laps of competition.
The NASCAR Nationwide Series competes again on August 22 in the Food City 300 at Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway with television broadcast starting at 7 p.m. ET on ESPN. Kyle Busch will make his 17th start of the year behind the wheel of the Joe Gibbs Racing No. 54 Monster Energy Camry.
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