Avondale, AZ – Paul Menard was primed for a pole running qualifying effort at Phoenix International Raceway on Friday afternoon.

Menard logged a lap of 27.386 seconds on the first lap of his qualifying run in his No. 15 Johns Manville/Menards Chevrolet, but made contact with the wall on lap two – ruining what could have likely been a pole winning lap speed.

 “Definitely hit the wall the second lap.” Menard said.  “Every run we made in practice seemed like it took a good lap for the sticker tires to come in and I was going for it on the second lap.  I picked up the gas hard and it just got tight and ran out of room coming off two.”

Despite the slight damage to the right side of Menard’s Chevrolet, he remained positive on the potential ahead for race day.

“This is a brand new racecar that has never seen the track before today.  The guys at DEI have done their homework.  This is the newest car out of DEI right now so it’s a pretty good one.”  

Menard took the Green Flag for Sunday’s race and fell back to 27th place by the time the first caution flag flew on lap 15. He reported to the crew that the car was rolling tight through the center of the corners, yet free in and off.  

The team made a four tire, fuel and adjustment stop and Menard restarted the race in 28th place.  By lap 85 the caution flag flew for the second time.  Despite the fact that Menard had worked his way up to 23rd place, he was just about to go a lap down and the caution was a welcome sign.  

After another round of tires and adjustments he resumed his forge to the front and was shown in 15th place by lap 119.  

Following a caution flag and a trip to pit road, Menard thought he had right rear tire going flat and fell back several positions to 24th place.  The next trip to pit road included a four tire stop which spelled additional trouble as Menard reported those tires felt flat and not as comfortable as the previous sets.  On lap 225, Menard went one lap down to the leaders, but a caution flag three laps later allowed Menard the Lucky Dog free pass back on the lead lap.  

Despite having a solid run through the first half of the event, Menard’s late race pit strategy hurt the outcome more than it helped.  

“We put two tires on it there at the end and that was a big mistake.” Menard said. “I wanted to do four.  The previous run we put four tires on and they just weren’t as good.  I thought it was a bad set so I wanted to do four, we took two and suffered the consequences.”  

While Menard finished the day in 22nd position, he remained hopeful for things to come with next year’s Car of Tomorrow program.

“This is a new COT car and it’s pretty good.  We have something to look forward to for next year for sure with the COT program.  We had a top-10 car for sure and got a little off-sequence and then just made a bad call at the end and it really hurt us.”