Brad Keselowski and his No. 2 Discount Tire team are burning the Saturday late night oil at Daytona International Speedway in an effort to repair their car after a wild incident earlier in the day.
During the second Daytona 500 practice of the day on Saturday, Brad Keselowski had an incident where he slammed into a gate with the right side of his car to avoid slamming into Ryan Newman’s car as the two were headed back to the track (click here to view video of the incident).
The damage inflicted in the incident was severe. But not too severe for the team to scrap their primary car.
Keselowski, 35, took total blame for the incident.
“I hit the fence,” Keselowski said. “Literally the fence. Hit the jack posts and it tore it up…
“…Everything else on the car is great. It’s really fast. Got it handling really good in the one run we didn’t draft. We should be in really good for the 500 from what we can tell.”
The Michigan native has stayed with his team and even helped in the repairs in an effort to atone for his mistake and to showcase his desire for a Daytona 500 victory (Keselowski is 0-for-10 in Daytona 500 win attempts).
“Just trying to make sure everything is right and to be as supportive as I can be,” Keselowski explained of spending more than four hours helping his team. “Different group of guys and they’re all really hungry and motivated and just want to make sure they know I am too.”
Keselowski, the 2012 NASCAR Cup Series champion, may have made a huge mistake earlier in the day, but what he has done in the aftermath is incredibly respectable. And it proves that while some drivers just show up, drive their car and leave, that he has a passion that goes past driving. He truly cares for his team it seems and wants to do everything he can to ease the pain for his crew.
After the four hour mark of the team making repairs, Keselowski was gracious enough to answer questions about what happened with media. Bob Pockrass of Fox Sports shared video of the conversation to Twitter.
Brad Keselowski takes the blame for a mistake during Saturday’s Daytona 500 practice. pic.twitter.com/dzDH1RnpQk
— Bob Pockrass (@bobpockrass) February 9, 2020
