By Aaron Bearden, Motorsports Editor
SPARTA, Ky. — Alex Bowman is still in position to make his first Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series playoff appearance leaving Kentucky Speedway. But his margin for error will be slim moving forward after a disappointing night in the Bluegrass State.
Bowman was contending for top 10 in Saturday’s Quaker State 400 when a flat tire sent him careening into the outside wall. The hit eliminated Bowman from the race after 108 laps, resulting in a 39th-place finish and his first DNF of the year.
“We were the last guy that didn’t have any DNF’s we made it one week farther than everybody else,” Bowman said afterward. “But, it’s a bummer, we popped a right front (tire) there. Don’t know if a brake rotor caused that or if we just had a tire go down. It’s unfortunate, but we will move on from it and go to the next one.”
The 2018 season had been a quiet one for Bowman, but he entered his 100th-career Cup start at Kentucky in a good position to make the playoffs. He sat 15th in the standings after three-straight top 10s. That left Bowman on the playoff bubble due to 18th-place Austin Dillon’s Daytona 500 win, but he had a 19-point cushion on 16th-place Ricky Stenhouse Jr., with Paul Menard a full 55 points back in 17th.
Early on it appeared that Bowman would increase his advantage in the regular season’s final race on a 1.5-mile oval. Stenhouse suffered tire problems early on and fell multiple laps down, while Bowman ran quietly in the back half of the top 15. A two-tire pit stop at the end of Stage 1 helped elevate Bowman into the top five, and while he lost a few spots on the ensuing run, the 25-year-old continued to show pace.
Instead he left Kentucky with his worst result of the year. That allowed Stenhouse to crawl within nine points of the final playoff spot despite his own challenging night, with Menard just 23 points back after an 11th-place run.
In the event of a surprise winner, the entire trio will be in trouble. Bowman’s Hendrick Motorsports teammates Jimmie Johnson and Chase Elliott are the next drivers trying to clinch a postseason spot on points, and they lead Bowman by 57 points and 42 points, respectively.
Barring any changes, the seven remaining regular season points races will be a battle between three drivers for a spot in the postseason. Thanks to Bowman’s disappointment in Kentucky, the battle promises to be a close one for the foreseeable future.
“We are right in the thick of the points stuff, so we can’t afford this, this will hurt us quite a bit,” Bowman said. It’s a big bummer for my guys and for Axalta and Nationwide and everybody that makes this deal happen.
“Really unfortunate, but it’s not something that we could prevent it’s nothing that we caused and there is not much you can do about it. You pop a right front and have a long time to star at the wall and then you hit it and then you’ve got to move on.”