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Kahne Holds off Hamiltons, Wins Darlington Truck DebutFOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Emmett Byrd
704.792.2091 (office)
704.425.3262 (cell)
emmettbyrd@aol.com
NASCAR Nextel Rookie sensation Kasey Kahne held off a furious
challenge by the father and son duo of Bobby Hamilton Sr. and Jr. to win
the Darlington 200 at Darlington Raceway in his NASCAR Craftsman Truck
Series debut. Kahne dominated the competition in his Team ASE/CARQUEST
Dodge, leading 95 of the 150 laps contested, but he was forced to earn
the win in dramatic fashion with two late race restarts including a
green-white-checker finish. On the final restart Hamilton Jr. missed a
shift, slammed into the outside wall after an unintentional nudge from
his father and spun to the inside collecting the luckless David
Reutimann. The ensuing melee allowed Kahne to cruise to the checkered
flag under caution, becoming only the third driver in NCTS history to
win in his first NCTS start.
"Just to win at Darlington Raceway - this is definitely one of my
favorite tracks if not my favorite track," Kahne said after the race.
"It's a lot of fun to win here. It's a tough track. It's pretty neat to
race underneath the lights tonight. The Team ASE/CARQUEST Dodge I drove
tonight was just awesome. We had great pit stops, and the truck was
perfect."
Kahne started the event in the fourth position and quickly established
his truck's superiority. He moved to the lead by lap 20 and led the race
on four separate occasions. In the end it was a battle of new tires
versus old tires as both Hamiltons, Ted Musgrave, Carl Edwards and Steve
Park all stopped for fresh tires after a caution with 31 laps remaining
in the event. The drivers with fresher tires were closing on Kahne in a
striking fashion when NCTS Championship contender Dennis Setzer was
involved in a fracas with Josh Richeson with just 12 laps remaining.
Kahne was able to hold off Hamilton Jr. on the first of two late race
restarts. Todd Bodine then spun on lap 145 setting up the final
green-white-checker crash.
"I would have rather gone back to green and just finished the race off,"
Kahne said. "Yeah, I'll take a win any way I can get it for sure, but I
really feel we could've held him off. The truck was really good. I
could've run flat through turns one and two and strong through three and
four. I think we could have run two laps really good and just won under
racing conditions. On restarts, you just barely touch the throttle and
your tires are spinning. I was just trying to be as smooth as I could to
pick up the throttle and shift to third. So, yeah, I saw it in my
mirror, I saw it happen. I guess it was just a missed shift, and
Hamilton, Sr., was right on him. There was really no place for the No. 4
to go. Bobby Jr. was definitely the second-best truck tonight, though."
Ultra Motorsports crew chief Trip Bruce made the call to leave Kahne in
the lead with the older tires with just 31 laps to go. That call proved
to be the correct one and helped provide Kahne with his first NASCAR
Touring series win of 2004.
"I thought about it a little bit each way, just trying to figure out
what was going on," Kahne said. "My spotter was letting me know where
the No. 59 was because he was on fresher tires. He was definitely moving
up on us, slowly. I stepped it up there at the end. I think we
definitely had a big enough lead to hold on at the end. I wasn't sure
what was going to happen on that final restart. The crash didn't come up
until the front stretch, and I'm not sure, but we had probably opened up
a three car length lead on the No. 59 with seven laps to go, or whatever
it was. I think we definitely had them covered tonight. I'll definitely
feel better waking up tomorrow, knowing I've won my first race of the
year. As much as we race and test and try to win races, it sure is nice
to win a race no matter what it is. I'll wake up happier in the morning,
and hopefully we'll be able to take some of that and run really strong
in the Cup car."
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