NASCAR Cup

Kahne talks about his Daytona practice crash

Team Chevy Racing press release

Edited: Feb 23, 2012, 12:29 AM

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Damaged car of Kasey Kahne, Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet

KASEY KAHNE, NO. 5 FARMERS INSURANCE CHEVROLET – crashed during NSCS Practice 4 and will go to a back-up car.

Damaged car of Kasey Kahne, Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet

Photo by: Eric Gilbert

DID YOU GET HIT BY JUAN PABLO MONTOYA OUT THERE? “I don’t know if he hit me or not but right as he got there, this car started moving all over. I know I got hit from behind, but I don’t know if it was necessarily him or how it worked. But when he hit me, I was just gone.”

ARE YOU GOING TO A BACK-UP CAR? “Yeah; a back-up car.”

HOW WAS PRACTICE GOING? “We were slow the first session, so we were trying some stuff and it was actually a good bit better. I was pretty happy with it. And then that happened. Actually, our back-up car is just as good, but the problem is we still have the (Qualifying Duels) 150’s and a couple more practices. We haven’t gotten off to a real good start yet. We might need to bring more cars down at this rate.”

HOW TOUGH IS IT TO DRIVE THESE CARS NOW WITH ALL THE RULES CHANGES? “It’s actually real easy to drive until you get hit in the wrong spot. And then it’s really hard to drive. But until you get hit, it’s actually pretty easy to drive.”

TALK ABOUT WHEN YOU FELT IT GOING, AND THEN BOTTOMING OUT THROUGH THE GRASS “Yeah, just the front dug in so bad when it hit the grass and it just tore the front end off of it, basically. There is pretty much nothing you can do about that; just pull another car down.”

HOW FINE IS THAT LINE BETWEEN WRECKING AND NOT WRECKING IN TERMS OF WHEN YOU’RE COMING UP ON SOMEBODY “It’s where you push them and where you’re at on the race track. Your car gets the lightest off of Turn 4 here and it’s the transition and it was about the same time that Montoya got to the back of me. It was perfect timing for a wreck, you know; just where it all happened.”

SO IS MONTOYA AT FAULT FOR SOMETHING LIKE THAT? “It’s hard to point fingers at anyone, you know? It’s just that everybody is trying to get speed and go. But I didn’t spin out by myself. But it’s not like he was trying. He was trying to push you and get you going; he just hit me in the wrong spot at the wrong time.”

WHAT TYPE OF SETBACK IS THIS FOR YOUR TEAM? “They have lots of cars and they do a nice job preparing. So our back-up car is just as good. The problem is that we don’t have another one after that. So we’ll have to start figuring that out. Maybe I’ll have to go borrow someone’s.

WHAT HAPPENED OUT THERE? “I was right behind the No. 24 (Jeff Gordon) and we were going pretty good and got hit like right off Turn 4. (Juan Pablo) Montoya got a big run and came up and just barely touched me from behind and just instantly I was just spinning.”

IS THIS ONE OF THOSE DEALS WHEN THE CLOSING RATE IS SO QUICK OUT THERE? “It’s all about where you hit him and where you hit him on the race track. And if you do it in the right spots, you’re not going to have a wreck. If you do it in the wrong spots, you will. And it’s not intentional; it’s just part of the racing and what we have right now and the way the cars are, but there’s a way to do it and a way not to do it if you’re going to wreck or not.”

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