Hlas column: Another wreck is the pits for Landon Cassill

KANSAS CITY, Kan. - A little victory for Landon Cassill Sunday was bludgeoned by a ride into the Kansas Speedway fourth-turn wall.

Staying on the track while everyone else on the lead lap pitted during a caution flag in the NASCAR Sprint Cup STP 400, Cedar Rapids native Cassill instantly went from 30th-place to first on Lap 46.

It was the first time Cassill had led a Cup race since last year's Brickyard 400.

Cassill's Phoenix Racing pit crew reacted joyfully. Only nine of the 43 drivers led laps here. Leading a lap in a Cup race means a bonus point in the owner points standings.

The top 35 cars in owner points are guaranteed spots in the next week's Cup event, and James Finch's Phoenix Racing is tied for 31st, so every point matters.

But that led-lap turned out to be about as soothing in the 95-degree heat as a heating pad. For his third straight race, Cassill was involved in a wreck on Lap 119. It took him out of the race for over 45 minutes for repairs, and he finished 35th in the 43-car field for the second-straight week.

Just who was to blame is arguable. Cassill was running 29th and on the lead lap, looking like he was going to make a run at his best finish in nine Cup starts this year with Phoenix. His previous best was 24th.

After being in the middle of three-wide racing, Cassill had gotten ahead of Marcus Ambrose. But coming off the fourth turn, Cassill appeared to get a bit loose, and slid up slightly. Ambrose clipped Cassill's right rear tire, sending him bouncing off the wall.

“You didn't tell me he was up there,” Cassill said with irritation on his two-way radio to his spotter, Phoenix Racing general manager Steve Barkdoll.

“I cleared you low,” Barkdoll said.

“We've got to get back out,” Barkdoll insisted as Cassill began steering the car to the garage. “We can't do this (be knocked out by an accident) two weeks in a row.”

And they didn't. But in reality, they did. Cassill ran his final 71 laps, but no one else dropped out and the team gained little but the therapeutic value of having the car running at race's end, 77 laps behind winner Brad Keselowski.

Keselowski, by the way, is the driver who gave Finch's team its lone Cup win in 168 starts. That was in 2009. Keselowski now races for Roger Penske, who has a considerably bigger and better-funded racing operation than Finch.

Different teams race for different goals. Cassill and company wanted to move in the 20th-to-25th range after going 31-28-29-30-35 the previous five events.

“We're going to go all day, guys,” Cassill said before the race.

“Keep running hard,” Barkdoll told him at Lap 63, after Cassill had passed Bobby Labonte to move into 29th. “We got you a real fast car.”

“Keep on hustling, baby,” Barkdoll told his driver at Lap 92. “You're doing a heck of a job.”

A caution flag put Cassill back on the lead lap on Lap 111, adding to his crew's optimism.

“We're on the lead lap,” Barkdoll said before the restart. “We're going to stay there the rest of the day, all right?”

“Sounds good,” replied Cassill.

To which Barkdoll added “Protect your car, run your butt off.”

A racing outsider might interpret those commands as contradictory.

Three laps after the restart, Cassill's Chevrolet got bumped by Ambrose's car, smacking the wall. Amid all the work done on the car in the garage, white duct tape was used to put a new No. 51 on where the painted number on the right side had been scraped away.

At 21, Cassill is trying to build a reputation at stock car racing's highest rung. No matter how much or how little he was to blame for his mishap Sunday, three wrecks in three weeks tends to scrape a driver's shine.