Ryan Newman News and Information

Ryan Newman will be starting Sunday nights race in 17th. He qualified right about where he thought he would.

“That’s about right. I figured the worst 18th and the best 12th. I said that to someone before I went out. It was a decent pickup from where we were. Obviously, the track is a little quicker; we went almost a half-second quicker. It was decent run for the Kodak Dodge, but not at all where we want to be. Tomorrow is super important. The first (practice session) will be a little more difficult than the second, but either way you can see where you’re at compared to the competition. We’ve run well here, but we’ve been struggling at these (two-mile) tracks this year. The only people having fun are the 18 and 99. That’s pretty obvious.”

Newman’s practices today were a lot better than his first practice yesterday where he was 24th fastest. Today he was 13th and 14th fastest in practice.

Newman finished 10th here earlier in the spring right after he won the Daytona 500.

A problem that Newman and other drivers could run into is engine problems. This is a 500 mile race that can really wear on the engines. Kasey Kahne, who is one of the hurdles that Newman has to get over to get into the chase had engine problems here back in the spring.

Newman needs to out perform Clint Bowyer (12th), David Ragan (13th) and Kasey Kahne (14th) in order to have keep his chase hopes alive. In fact the best case scenario would be for Clint Bowyer to blow an engine (safely - no one gets hurt, I like Clint Bowyer) finishing dead last. Newman then gets at least a top ten and out performs Kahne and Ragan. That would set up Newman pretty good for next week.

Of course, can we expect the best case scenario….no. But we can keep our fingers crossed and hope that Newman can make up some ground in the points. It is possible to make up 161 points in one race…possible, not likely.

Good luck to Newman and the #12 Kodak Dodge team tomorrow night at California…Auto Club Speedway.