Joe Nemechek’s 11th-place finish in Sunday’s Sprint Cup race at Talladega Superspeedway was a career-best result for the 3-year-old Furniture Row Racing team, eclipsing the previous best of 18th set at Daytona in July.
“We had an awesome car, awesome motor and an awesome weekend of racing,” said Nemechek, who qualified seventh. “We put it all together and the performance will give our Furniture Row team a big morale boost for the closing races.”
Nemechek was in position to win the race as he was running in second place behind Tony Stewart when the race restarted with 10 laps remaining.
“I had a shot at the end, but lost my position in the draft,” noted Nemechek. “I think I gave Tony too good of a push. It must have helped—he won the race.”
“When you get shuffled out of the draft like I did with a few laps left, it’s a very lonely feeling,” added Nemechek. “But we did manage to pick up a few spots to finish 11th. That’s not a bad result, but we had a top-five car today. My hat’s off to our crew chief Jay Guy and every member of this team for giving me such a great car.”
Nemechek kept his cool on the 2.66-mile oval as he went from the front to the back and then back to the front. And more importantly he just missed the big 12-car accident on Lap 175 of 190.
“I snuck past that wreck, don’t know how I did it—I guess you can say a little luck was on our side for a change,” explained Nemechek. “This was the kind of weekend that we’ve been working so hard for. There will be more.”
The next race for the Denver, Colo.-based Furniture Row team will be Saturday night (Oct. 11) at Lowe’s Motor Speedway near Charlotte.
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