The Official Danica Patrick Fan Site

Daytona 2012

Discuss the Daytona races here.

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Permalink Reply by Sidney on March 3, 2012 at 12:10pm

Jim Huntington said:

Just checked lap speeds. Danica was fastest on track on lap 153 @ 201+ MPH....whatta shame. She has gutted out as much as she is going to get in terms of points, if she is able to finish in P38

Where did you find lap speeds for the race. I have not been able to find anything that shows the speeds for each practice or the race. I like the reports that Indycar had for their events, but have not been able to find anything similiar for NASCAR.

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Permalink Reply by David Williams on February 22, 2013 at 1:30am

February 21, 2013

I was just over on the nascar.com site looking at a video billed as "Daytona 500 Memories 2012." One of the choices of video clip to watch is "Danica Patrick Sets Off Big Wreck" with a subheading of "when Patrick gets into the back of James Buescher setting off a late-race wreck that brings out the red flag."

I find that offensive. There are only two camera angles in which that crash can be seen accurately and both of them, to me, show the 30 car coming up the track into Danica’s left front and causing the wreck. When one of the clips is played, Andy Petrie, describing what he’s watching, says, "There’s really nothing.... You can see Danica has the spot there." And Darrell Jarrett says, "Yeah, she’s all the way against the wall."

The second good camera angle is out Danica’s windshield from her on board camera and shows Danica moving forward, the wall very close to her on the right. Her spotter is saying, "Come on" to her and continues saying "Come on" as James Buescher in the 30 comes up into her. As the crash happens, the spotter says, "Hold on.... Keep digging right there... Probably have some front end damage, that 30 car came up....

This seems to me an example of what Tony Jr. called "other drivers leaning on her, expecting her not to fight back." Buescher evidently expected her to check up and give him room to move into the spot, but she did what her spotter was telling her to do, what she had every right to do – hold your line and keep coming, it’s your spot, in your lane. So I think it is visibly untrue that she "set off" the big wreck.