A 16th-place finish in
Michigan kept Mark in 14th place in the Winston Cup
point standings.
With a little luck, the finish
could have been much better. Around the halfway point of the race, Mark
lost time on the track as he fought his car's handling. During a pit stop
on lap 12, a lug nut jammed in the air gun, costing him more time. By lap
163, he was lapped by the leader, Jeff Gordon. Mark fought hard, but was
unable to get his lap back. He finished in 16th place -- the first driver
one lap down.
"We were pretty good on the short runs today," he said. "But
we didn't get enough of those. That was our strong suit and we were pretty
weak on long runs. We had a poor call on an adjustment that that was my
call. Combined with the lug nut jam, that cost us a lap. If we could have
stayed on the lead lap, we probably would have had a reasonable finish.
The best we could do was be the first car one lap down. We still gained in
the points a little. We're still 14th, but we're closer to 10th than we
were."
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