Wednesday’s afternoon practice for the Daytona 500 has ended under a red flag after a seven-car pileup that occurred on the front straight, near the flagstand and start/finish line, and affecting the catch fencing on the outside of the track. The second practice will occur starting at 6:30 p.m. ET, after track repairs.
Contact between Matt Kenseth and Joey Logano, who incidentally were the two that collided in Saturday night’s Sprint Unlimited and caused a major crash in that race, triggered today’s one as well.
Paul Menard was spun up into the outside retaining wall, collected by rookies Parker Kligerman and Ryan Truex, with Dave Blaney in behind it. Kligerman’s car was sent up on top of Menard’s, and then went onto its roof after being hit by Truex. Trevor Bayne was also involved to round out the seven-car incident, but sustained the least amount of damage.
Kligerman’s accident marked the second of the day for the up-and-coming Swan Racing team, whose other driver Cole Whitt lost control earlier in the session, in a wreck that also collected Brian Vickers and Casey Mears.
Here’s a video of the wreck, via FOX Sports’ YouTube channel:
All seven drivers involved in the accident spoke to FOX Sports TV afterwards, and all were checked and released from the infield care center.
“I thought the 20 (Kenseth) was going to the bottom, and it hooked them, that’s partially my fault,” Logano said. “I was working a bit too hard there. Thought he was going to the bottom. That’s just what happens. Unfortunate a lot of cars got torn up there.”
Here was Kenseth’s take: “It kind of started we were running two-wide, and I couldn’t clear the 27. It got tight into (Turn) 3. We all lost a lot of speed. I was trying to stay straight. Kind of clipped my right rear, and it seemed to trigger the wreck.”
Menard, Kligerman and Truex offered their input as well, after the accident.
“I know what happened, the front half of the 20 got squirrely looking,” Menard said. “It turns out Joey was bump drafting him in the pack … and I guess that’s the end result. Fortunately Parker is OK.”
Kligerman’s take: “They slaved on that race car. To have a quick race car in the draft, I was trying to back out of the draft, pack it up and wait until tomorrow. The 22 was being overly aggressive. He’s supposed to be a veteran. Supposed to be the best of the best, but he was racing like the end of the Daytona 500. I don’t quite understand that one. We’ll have to look at our backup car situation.”
And Truex’s: “We were running well in the draft. I was right behind the 22 for a while. I checked up, and I got hit from behind, and that was all I could do. We didn’t deserve that all. Then the 30 was on my windshield. It was a brand new car. We have to race our way in. A shame we lost a really good car. That’s a big wreck for practice.”
Meanwhile, former Daytona 500 champion Bayne and near-2012-winner Blaney said they now face an uphill challenge just to make the race.
“We had a huge run up the middle, and we are trying to figure out what’s working,” Bayne said. “Having to make the race, we need to be careful. That hole closed up. Not a ton of damage but we’ll miss the rest of this practice.”
Blaney, with Randy Humphrey’s team, is in a worse spot with no backup car available at the moment.
“I couldn’t see what started it,” he said. “I was coming in behind Ryan Truex, he checked up. By the time I got checked up… yeah, (that was) bad.
“I told myself I don’t need to be out here. We’ve got no backup car. It got us. At this moment (the dream of making the field) is. I don’t know what Randy Humphrey’s got in mind. We’ll see.”
