Rough situation for 35, 77 Cup teams after Bristol DNQ

Rare is it that there’s really much attention paid to cars that fail to qualify for NASCAR Sprint Cup Series races. But when two teams have had such rough starts to the season, it’s at this point you can’t not feel some sympathy.

Front Row Motorsports’ third car, the No. 35 Ford, has gone through three drivers in four races, but only has made the field once. Eric McClure missed the Daytona 500 and Blake Koch only went one-for-two in his two outings.

Now today, David Reutimann, a past Cup Series winner, couldn’t get the car in the show at Bristol. Reutimann’s time of 15.154 seconds, 126.620, wasn’t slowest by any stretch but was exactly one one-thousandth of a second slower than Danica Patrick in 36th (15.153) of the first round of knockout qualifying.

Factor in seven provisionals utilized to those higher up in owner points, and Reutimann’s MDS Transport-backed car went home.

The car is in this tenuous situation because it wasn’t particularly high up in the 2013 owner points, and Josh Wise left in the offseason. That’s already three of a possible four races that car has lost out on additional prize money to help support FRM’s two other full-season cars, driven by David Ragan and David Gilliland.

Randy Humphrey’s No. 77 Ford, meanwhile, is now an imperfect 0-for-4 making the field with new driver Dave Blaney. The team’s Daytona practice accident destroyed the primary car and has now had a hangover effect for the following three races.

Blaney was two tenths off Reutimann’s time in the first round so was left further out of a shot to make the field.

For the team and crew sake, here’s to hoping they can make the show soon as the 2014 season begins to roll into a rhythm.

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