Mark and the Viagra® (sildenafil citrate) Race
Team picked up six positions in the final five laps of Sunday’s Dodge Save
Mart 350 at Infineon Raceway to run to a 15th-place finish in the season’s
first road course race. Mark started the race third and ran inside the field’s
top six until getting called for speeding on pit road after the team’s first
pit stop on lap 34. The infraction forced Mark to serve a pass through back
down pit road, dropping him back to 30th position; the team was never able
to fully recover from the penalty and Mark would be forced to fight for
position the remainder of the race.
“It was just a tough day,” said Mark after the race. “The car was never as
good as it was in practice on Saturday and then I made a mistake speeding on
pit road and that put us in a hole that was really hard to dig our way out
of.
“We were able to get back up to 11th or 12th, but then the cautions fell and
we came out on the short end of the stick on the way the fuel mileage came
out and it put us in the back again. We were able to fight our way back to
15th there at the end and bring home a solid finish, but we had been hoping
for a lot more. We’ll just have to regroup and go back after it next
weekend.”
Mark was eventually able to fight his back to as high as 11th place by lap 68,
just before the day’s sixth caution was issued. Mark and the team came into
the pits on lap 70 for four tires and enough fuel to go the distance, while
some teams on different pit schedules opted to stay out or take fuel only.
The strategy proved correct for those teams, as they were able to go the
distance. Mark restarted in 23rd place on lap 71 and was able to fight his
way back inside the top 20 by lap 79. The day’s seventh and final caution
on lap 102, allowed majority of teams in front of Mark who opted to stay out
to make it on fuel, while Mark was forced to fight for position down to the
final lap, when he picked up two positions to finish 15th.
The solid finish allowed Mark to maintain his 5th-place finish in the points,
while gaining ground on first place. Currently Mark is 30 points behind fourth
place and race winner Tony Stewart and 228 points outside of first. The team
will head to Daytona next weekend for the Pepsi 400 for the third of four
restrictor plate races of the season.
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