Joey Logano’s postseason predicament remains dire with five races remaining in the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series regular season.
WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. — Joey Logano’s postseason predicament remains dire. Watkins Glen International and the I Love NY 355 on Sunday may represent his best opportunity to remedy it.
With five races remaining until the regular season cutoff at Richmond Raceway, the Team Penske driver is 13th in the driver points, 69 behind Matt Kenseth, who controls the last spot for winless drivers to qualify for the 16-driver playoffs.
Logano technically has a win — or at least a trophy — from the Richmond spring event, but a failed post-race inspection led NASCAR to deem the victory “encumbered” or not viable to playoff entry. An uncharacteristically pedestrian stretch ensued, but crew chief Todd Gordon steadfastly asserts it had nothing to do with anything NASCAR might have taken away from a team that began the season with eight top-10s and a win in the first nine races.
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“It’s not the penalty, ” Gordon said after the team finished 27th last week at Pocono, in part because the team illegally changed tires during a drive-through penalty for speeding on pit road. “There’s an aero change that NASCAR went through at Texas and it’s impacted us. It just so coincidentally lined up with when the Richmond penalty was. It’s not an outcome of the Richmond penalty at all.
And really the Richmond penalty was negligible at most. I would say it was, in my opinion, I would say it was a pretty small piece that NASCAR didn’ t like. As far as performance, I would say there’s very little to it.”
Logano in particular and Ford drivers in general have yearned from more speed over the summer, and the 2.45-mile, seven-turn road course where Logano won in 2015 could offer a reprieve. This may not be a must-win, not with Logano having won at four of the remaining tracks — Darlington Raceway, the exception. But it’s close.
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“I am not sure we are at a must-win yet. I feel like this is one of our best shots to go out here and win this weekend, ” Logano said on Saturday. “We also have some great race tracks coming up. Bristol, Darlington has been a good track for us. Richmond as well. We have some good tracks coming up for us. We have won at the next four out of five races that are coming up, so we know we can do it. We just have to do it.”
Logano said he will not alter his approach as time dwindles for the 2016 series runner-up to qualify for the playoffs, even with drivers increasingly cognizant of their points situations personally and in relation to each other.
“Our goal is still the same, ” he said. “Our goal is to win the race no matter what. I am not going to race someone different because of their situation or my situation. I will understand what their situation is. I will understand how desperate they are, but for us we have to stay focused in on our car as much as anybody else’s.”
Follow James on Twitter @brantjames
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