Danica Patrick qualified 29th and was a lap down for much of Sunday’s Hollywood Casino 400 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race at Kansas Speedway in Kansas City.
But she finally got her lap back with 30 circuits remaining and moved from 23rd to an impressive 16th-place result. That allowed her to smile big when she parked the No. 10 Aspen Dental Chevrolet SS of Stewart-Haas Racing (SHR) in the garage.
Coupled with her seventh-place finish in May there, Kansas is quickly becoming one of her favorite tracks. And she now has six top-20 finishes in her last eight races.
“We finished strong,” Patrick said. “The Aspen Dental car was good, but we just could not get our lap back. I think we were down a lap for like 200 laps, but when we got it back, we made the move. Tony Gibson (crew chief) and the guys gave me a good car, and I’m happy with where we finished up.”
She started 29th and, with the first 72 laps going under green, she went a lap down early to leader and teammate Kevin Harvick. From there, she was stuck in the mid-20s. As the cautions in the race added up she was always one car away from getting the “Lucky Dog” award, which gives the first car one lap down the chance to get back on the lead lap.
On lap 237, Patrick was in 23rd when the eighth caution came out, due to Kasey Kahne’s accident on the backstretch. Gibson brought her to pit road, and she restarted 23rd and on the lead lap with 28 laps to go. From there she worked her way up through field, running 16th when the checkered flag fell.
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