Catchfence

STATESVILLE, N.C. — Few race fans realize Reed Sorenson gained seven spots in the closing laps Sunday at Dover. That jump in the finishing order came because Sorenson and his Richard Petty Motorsports team decided to fix a severely wrecked race car following damage from Joey Logano’s spectacular accident on lap 32. Instead of loading the No. 43 and driving home, the Sammy Johns led crew spent about 217 laps fixing the front end and returned Sorenson to the track around lap 250. By competing in the final quarter of the race, Sorenson moved from 42nd to 35th place gaining about 21 points.

Sorenson Quotes:

SORENSON: “That isn’t fun for anybody. Nobody wants to spend the race fixing the car or watching them fix the car. But it is something you have to do. We gained seven spots which translates into 20 some points. As tight as the points are in our sport that could move a couple of positions at the end of the year. That’s important. Our guys have a crash plan. If you watch, each person has a job to do and they do it whenever one of our Petty cars crash. You’ll see guys from our other teams come over the help out. Everyone pitches in to get the car back on the track. We were just at the wrong place at the wrong time Sunday and got wrecked. But we didn’t give up and we gained a bunch of spots in the garage because we got it fixed so fast and back out. It wasn’t fun to go out there and make laps at the end, but its my job and like I said, it could pay off at the end of the year.

KANSAS— “We’re due. At Dover and Atlanta we got caught in other people’s wrecks. Hopefully at Kansas this weekend we can avoid that mess and get a good finish.”

Addition Notes of Interest;

· Follow Sorenson and other Petty drivers at @rpmotorsports on Twitter

· To join 6,900 Richard Petty Motorsports fans on Facebook and view the latest news, videos and pictures click here

· Sunday marks Sorenson’s 138th Sprint Cup race. He owns five top-five and 14 top-10 career finishes. He has led 145 laps

· Sorenson finished seventh at Kansas Speedway in 2007
· Richard Petty Motorsports owns only one DNF in 2009 among its four cars.

· Sorenson’s 54 race streak without a DNF is the longest of any Sprint Cup driver in non-consecutive races. He did not compete at Infineon in 2008. Sorenson’s Petty teammate Elliott Sadler is tied with Tony Stewart at 51 consecutive races without a DNF.

· Visit www.richardpettymotorsports.com

- Richard Petty Motorsports, Press Release