By Sarah Handy, Staff Writer
The 2020 NASCAR Cup Series season didn’t start out the greatest for Stewart-Haas Racing driver Aric Almirola, with finishes of 22nd and 21st to start the year. However, all of that would change on Sunday’s in the Auto Club 400 at Auto Club Speedway.
Almirola’s No. 10 Smithfield Foods Ford Fusion rolled off the starting grid sixth for the 200-lap event with his Ford consistently running inside the Top-10 during the first stage. Almirola complained of tight conditions early on and loose conditions as the stage came to a conclusion. The No. 10 went on to finish fourth in the first stage, and Almirola was able to capture some valuable stage points, pit for four tires, fuel and resume stage two scored ninth.
Dropping to tenth early on in the second stage, Almirola’s complaint was again that his Ford Fusion was tight, especially in traffic. With tire fall off a common thing yesterday, Almirola reported grinding of his tires on lap 84 and came in for his green flag pit stop on lap 90 seeking four tires, fuel and a wedge adjustment. Almirola opted to stay out on the 2-mile track during a caution on lap 94 as he restarted in 10th and saw himself finishing out stage two in the 13th after falling back as low as 16th for a time period.
Reports of being tight went on to plague Almirola in the final stage as well and what looked like to be a seventh-place finish dropped him to eighth on the final lap as Denny Hamlin caught Almirola as they were approaching the finish line.
“I have to clean up some things and we have to clean up some things as a team,” expressed Almirola. “I thought we had a top-five car and we just kept giving away all of our track position. We have to do better, but we are building, and we got a top-10 and we will take that and move on.”
Almirola’s eighth place finish is his first Top-10 of a long 2020 season, and also bests his previous best finish at Auto Club Speedway of ninth one year ago.
Additionally, Almirola hasn’t finished outside the Top-12 at Auto Club Speedway since joining Stewart-Haas Racing in 2018.
“I think we have a lot of potential. I think Bugga and all the guys did a great job with the car and I felt like we had a Top-10 car going into today and we proved that,” stated Almirola. “We ran in the top-10 most of the day but I feel like with track position and a few other things going a little better, a little smoother, we could have had a lot better result. Overall, it was still a decent day and we will take the points and move on.”
Almirola and his No. 10 team will have another chance to check a win off in the win column next Sunday as the series heads to Phoenix Raceway for the FanShield 500.
In 18 previous starts at the 1-mile track, Almirola has two top-five and five top-10 finishes. His best finish of fourth has happened twice and back-to-back in the fall of 2018 and the spring of 2019.