HAMPTON, Ga. – Should Sam Hornish Jr. go on to win his first NASCAR Nationwide Series championship at the end of the season, he might look at the month of August as where he made the push.
Hornish finished third Saturday night in the Great Clips / Grit Chips 300 at the Atlanta Motor Speedway. While he never led a lap, running inside the top 10 all night kept Hornish out of trouble and in contention should an opportunity arise. The final restart with seven laps to go provided such an opening as Hornish went from sixth to the top three.
“It was a good set of calls and really having a good lane choice there at the end, being in the right place,” Hornish said afterwards. “So many times you get stuck out here by being in the wrong lane, but tonight it really worked out for us and we were exactly where we wanted to be. Our Ford Mustang was really good on the long run and I was glad we were able to make solid adjustments on it to be able to make it good for that last short run.”
The top three finish was the fourth in five weeks for Hornish, his worst finish of the month being 12th last weekend in Bristol. That consistency has Hornish in control of the NNS title fight; he extended his point lead on Austin Dillon to 10 heading into Richmond next Friday night. Nine races remain in the season.
“We sure hope so,” Hornish said when asked if his team had regained their early season consistency.
“Last week we ran on seven cylinders for about three-quarters of the race, so to get a 12th out of that was pretty good, so I’ve been real happy with the performance that the guys have been giving me as far as the race cars.”
Saturday night Hornish drove a brand new car and said he feels confident the team is continually evolving, bettering themselves and that there’s the potential for the same amount of success at each of the remaining tracks. Of those he’s battling for the title, Hornish is one of three in the top 10 who have a win already this season.
“I feel like our bad days need to be a 12th place finish, so the fact that we can take days like [Saturday] where we weren’t as good as we probably needed to be and were probably a fifth place car, and were able to get a third out of it, that’s great.”
Even with the championship battle long from over, Hornish can look ahead with eagerness He’s won at Phoenix, which the NNS will head to late in the season and the mile-and-a-halfs have been where the No. 12 Penske team have performed their best this season.
“We look at places like Charlotte coming back around and Kansas and places I feel we’ve got a great opportunity to go there and run well, and then we go to a couple of short tracks like Richmond and Phoenix that I’ve traditionally run very well at, so my outlook couldn’t be any better,” said Hornish.
“The tracks that we’re going to, Bristol was the last one where I felt like that could be a downfall for us. I feel like if we go to these next ones and we race the way that we should, we’ve got a pretty good shot at it.”
