Driver: Alex Bowman
Car: No. 88 Hughes Construction Chevrolet
Track: Phoenix International Raceway (Nov. 12, 2016)
Bio: Alex Bowman had a great weekend going at Phoenix International Raceway in the late fall of 2016, and it would turn out a lot better the following day. But during Saturday night’s Ticket Galaxy 200 for NASCAR Xfinity Series machines, Bowman’s race turned sour faster than the Roadrunner made Wile E. Coyote look like a sap.
After qualifying seventh, Bowman was running in the top 15 just 54 laps into the 200-lap event when something broke in the left front of his Hughes Construction Chevrolet Camaro. It happened in a bad place on lap 55 as he was taking his arc into the sweeping Turn 3 on the 1-mile oval, with predictable results.
As the frame of the car hit the pavement, it snapped it to the right and sent Bowman into the waiting SAFER Barrier at a fairly steep angle, tearing up the right side of the car and ending his night. A few laps earlier, on lap 50, Bowman clipped the front end of Josh Bilicki’s No. 97 machine as the yellow waved for debris in Turn 2. There was no apparent damage at the time, but something must have been amiss to have had the incident in Turn 3 that soon afterward.
Bowman ended up 38th in the 40-car field that night, but Sunday’s race was one for the ages. Filling in for Dale Earnhardt Jr. in the No. 88 Nationwide Chevrolet the following day, Bowman started from the pole and had a chance to win the race only to be involved in a late-race smashup with Kyle Busch and Matt Kenseth.
The car he crashed on Saturday night wound up an occupant of the Racecar Graveyard with the rest of its compadres once the season ended, its shattered right side on full display.