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CLINT BOWYER – 2017 Phoenix II Race Report

Event:               Can-Am 500k (Round 35 of 36)
Series:               Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series
Location:          Phoenix Raceway (1-mile oval)
Format:             312 laps, broken into three stages (75 laps/75 laps/162 laps)
Start/Finish:       20th/13th (Running, completed 312 of 312 laps)
Point Standing: 19th with 845 points

Race Winner:    Matt Kenseth of Joe Gibbs Racing (Toyota)
Stage 1 Winner: Kyle Larson of Chip Ganassi Racing (Chevrolet)
Stage 2 Winner: Denny Hamlin of Joe Gibbs Racing (Toyota)

Stage 1 Recap (Laps 1-75):

  • Clint Bowyer started 20th and finished 12th.
  • Bowyer started fast, climbing to 15th by lap 10.
  • Bowyer said No. 14 needed “a little bit of turn” in turns one and two.
  • Stage 2 Recap (Laps 76-150):
  • Started 11th and finished 10th to earn one race point.
  • Climbed into the top-10 for the first time in the opening laps of the stage.
  • Said his car was loose into the corners and tight off.

Stage 3 Recap (Laps 151-312):

  • Started seventh and finished 13th.
  • Moved from 10th to seventh on the pit stop before the final stage started.
  • Drifted back to 10th in the opening laps because he “couldn’t turn” and had no rear grip.
  • With 80 laps remaining Bowyer pitted under caution from ninth for fuel, tires and adjustments to loosen the handling of his No. 14.
  • A penalty for speeding seconds after exiting his pit stall dropped him to 19th for the restart.
  • Bowyer took four new tires when he pitted under caution with 55 laps remaining and restarted the race in 15th.
  • The No. 14 suffered damage when another driver missed a shift at the front of the field on the final restart with 30 laps remaining.
  • Bowyer had climbed to 13th when the checkered flag fell.

Notes:

  • There were seven caution periods for a total of 41 laps.
  • Eighteen of the 39 drivers in the Can-Am 500k finished on the lead lap.
  • Matt Kenseth won the Can-Am 500k to score his 39th career Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series victory, his first of the season and his second at Phoenix.
  • The Championship 4 contenders, Kevin Harvick, Brad Keselowski, Kyle Busch and Martin Truex Jr. enter the season finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway with 5,000 points each.

Clint Bowyer, driver of the No. 14 USA Network DAMNATION Ford Fusion for Stewart-Haas Racing:

“We weren’t very good on Friday, and my guys worked hard overnight and came up with some changes that made us a heck of a lot better Saturday, and that carried over to today. We had a good car and good pit stops. The speeding penalty hurt us. Dropped us back to 19th, but we fought back. I thought we were going to get a really good finish, but we got messed up with a lot of cars on that restart near the end.”

Next Up:

The next event on the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series schedule is the season-ending Ford EcoBoost 400 on Sunday, Nov. 19 at Homestead-Miami Speedway. The final race of the 10-race playoffs starts at 2:30 p.m. EST with live coverage provided by NBC beginning at 1:30 p.m.