Filed under: Carl Edwards, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Kyle Busch, Nationwide Series, Joey Logano, Danica Patrick, NASCAR

LOUDON, N.H. -- The NASCAR education of Danica Patrick continued Saturday with a hard-knocks 30th place finish -- five laps down to winner Kyle Busch -- in the New England 200 at New Hampshire Motor Speedway.

It was a day of frustration, tough lessons and small accomplishments for the IZOD IndyCar Series starlet, whose effort Saturday is actually her best showing in four Nationwide Series starts.

It didn't feel like that for Patrick, however. She spent most of the day mired in the back of the pack carefully avoiding the race leaders as a dominant Kyle Busch led 126 laps to become the all-time laps leader in Nationwide Series history.

Patrick brought out the first caution of the day only eight laps into the race -- spinning out after a collision with veteran Morgan Shepherd. Frustrated, she radioed to her crew, "He totally took me out." And then later asked, "Doesn't he get some sort of penalty for that?''

On the ensuing restart and again as cars parked on pit road after the race, Patrick handed out her own justice -- driving her No. 7 GoDaddy.com Chevrolet into Shepherd's rear bumper to let him know she didn't appreciate the run-in.

"I obviously got dumped in the first corner,'' Patrick said. "It's hard to recover from that. ... but I guess that's racing.''

 

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