Driver: Paul Menard
Car: No. 15 Menards Chevrolet Impala
Track: Talladega Superspeedway (Oct. 7, 2007)
Bio: Paul Menard discovered, as so many drivers do, that sometimes it just doesn’t matter where you are when the Big One hits, it can reach out and get you just the same.
Menard, running 14th in the fall race at Talladega Superspeedway, was in just such a situation that day on the big 2.66-mile oval. Coming around to complete lap 145, Menard was in the high line off Turn 3 when Bobby Labonte’s car, trailing behind Ryan Newman, suddenly angled down the track and into the bottom-running Kyle Busch.
The cars crashed together and, obeying the laws of physics, slid up toward the wall...where Menard’s Chevrolet was hugging the concrete barrier. On the way down, Labonte clipped Robby Gordon’s car, and David Reutimann was also swept up into the mess. The combined weight of the cars of Labonte, Busch and Reutimann crashed into the side of Menard’s car and that was that.
Menard went from running 14th in the lead pack to 38th after the crash, which also collected Jamie McMurray, Brian Vickers and David Ragan.
The bright yellow paint that characterized Menard’s cars has faded to near white after several years in the Racecar Graveyard, one of many from that era in the woods around Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s homestead.