Race report

NASCAR Cup Texas

Menard's evening ends early at Texas

Richard Childress Racing's No. 27 Chevy drops out of the top 10 in points.

Lee Spencer

Edited: Apr 12, 2015, 4:46 AM

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Paul Menard, Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet

FORT WORTH, Texas – Paul Menard exhibited tremendous speed in the Duck Commander 500 at Texas Motor Speedway.

The No. 27 Chevy had just passed Brad Keselowski for fourth-place on Lap 215 when Menard reported, “I hear something knocking.”

Menard came to the pits. After the Richard Childress Racing team diagnosed the situation, they sent Menard to the garage. He finished 41st.

I was coming down the backstretch to pit and was slowing down and it broke.

Paul Menard

“We broke a water hose, I guess,” Menard said. “The main line that goes in the motor just broke. It pushed a bunch of water out. No warning. The temperature gauge never moved.

“I was coming down the backstretch to pit and was slowing down and it broke. We popped the hood but couldn’t see anything. So, we went back out but then had no power.”

Menard entered the weekend sixth in the point standings after completing 1815 of 1816 laps in the first six races. His DNF at Texas was Menard’s since Talladega Superspeedway last fall.

“Yeah, the car is really fast,” said Menard, who dropped to 16th in the point standings. “The Quaker State/Menard’s Chevy was really good and qualified eighth and I fell back there when I got blocked in on a pit stop, but drove back up into the top 10.

“The guys always give me good pit stops. Things were looking good. We had decent speed. When the sun went down, it came to life.”

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