While the battle for the lead captivated viewers, few eyeballs (and almost no cameras) were fixated on the very back of the field near the end of Friday’s NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race.
But suddenly, three trucks nowhere near the front of the suffered significant damage after a major crash on the frontstretch. The race was red-flagged, and TV cameras only caught part of the story, but Motorsport.com was among a group of reporters who uncovered the rest by later speaking with two of the drivers involved.
Jake Garcia was trying to limp around the track after an incident on the backstretch, where he got turned up into the wall after pinching Tanner Gray and Andres Perez in a three-wide battle for position. He then cut down a tire soon after, hitting the wall as the entrance of Turn 3, but the race remained green.
Garcia was well off the pace, and attempted to turn down across the track at the exit of Turn 4, but trucks were still coming. Justin Haley evaded Garcia through the infield grass, only to have his nose dig in, forcing his Ram 1500 up into a wheelie as it jumped off the ground and then slamming the outside wall. Conner Jones, who was following Haley, made significant contact with Garcia, tearing the left-side body from his Nice Motorsports Chevrolet and exposing the chassis.
All drivers were checked and released from the infield care center, and Motorsport.com’s Matt Weaver was among those who caught up with Garcia and Jones back in the garage.
Garcia was following spotter’s guidance
Watch: Garcia, Jones crash hard in late caution
“I’m going probably 50mph, and those guys are going nearly 180mph,” explained Garcia. “It’s really hard to see out of those mirrors much further than about five car lengths back — especially out of the left-side mirror. In that situation, the spotter says clear down, and you gotta come to pit road, you got a flat tire. So, I did what I thought he wanted me to do. Obviously, we were not clear down.
“I really feel bad about that. It could have been much worse. I’m glad everyone is okay, but I don’t know, just a really bad deal.”
Garcia then expanded on the entire chain-of-events, and reiterated the fact that he was merely following the directions of his spotter.
“I was kind of in the hornet’s nest and I gathered it up,” said Garcia. “I was chasing it down the race track and I barely touched the 26 (Dawson Sutton). And then it started to smoke. About two laps later down the backstretch, it started to hit the race track, so the left-front tire was down. Got up by the wall in Turns 3 and 4, got slowed, trying to make it to pit road. I was slow and cars kept going by and eventually they were by, and my spotter said I was clear down. I was trying to make it to pit road and we were not clear down. I don’t know what I would do any different, but obviously I shouldn’t have came down the race track but I thought it was fine to do. Just really want to apologize to everyone that was involved.”
As for Jones, he wasn’t even battling anyone for position. He was riding around, several laps down, and was caught off-guard when Garcia’s truck appeared in front of him.
“I was riding behind Haley,” Jones told Motorsport.com. “I just figured he was riding too. We were so far back, and then I guess he (Garcia) just decided he was going to cut across the field. I don’t really know what goes through your mind in that situation. He came up to me and told me his spotter cleared him. If so, then he needs to find a new spotter pretty quick.”
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Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: motorsport.com
