{"id":9388,"date":"2012-04-01T07:15:18","date_gmt":"2012-04-01T11:15:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/?p=9388"},"modified":"2012-03-31T22:14:49","modified_gmt":"2012-04-01T02:14:49","slug":"moffitt-scores-top-5-finish-drove-from-back-to-front","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/2012\/04\/moffitt-scores-top-5-finish-drove-from-back-to-front\/","title":{"rendered":"Moffitt Scores Top-5 Finish; Drove from Back to Front"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"NASCAR<\/a>Greenville, SC \u2013 Hattori Racing Enterprises driver, Brett Moffitt overcame odds to finish 4th and Sergio Pena experienced engine failure to finish 29th in the Kevin Whitaker Chevrolet 150 at Greenville, SC on Saturday March, 31, 2012.<\/p>\n

Both cars were fast in practice. Pena topped the charts for both practices of the afternoon. Moffitt was 2nd quick in the first practice and 14th quick in the second practice though they did not do a mock qualifying run.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe car was real good in race trim,\u201d explained Grimes, IA native, Brett Moffitt. \u201cWe just fine tuned it and worked on our race set up during practice.\u201d \u201cWe drew the first qualifying position so we are a little worried about that, but the car is good so we will be fine.\u201d
\n
\nPena was real happy after practice as well, \u201cMy car is fast. I am real happy with the balance and the forward bite. We have a great shot at the pole and winning the race tonight.\u201d<\/p>\n

Moffitt was the first car out to qualify and proved he was a car to beat, earning the provisional pole and being the first car to break into the 20 second bracket with a time of 20.980. However, after only six cars, the rain came and qualifying was subsequently cancelled due to weather.<\/p>\n

Hattori Racing is a new team so they did not have owner points from 2011. Therefore Moffitt and Pena were relegated to 21st and 22nd starting positions. They earned their starting spots by race wins in 2011. Both had three series wins, Moffitt finished 3rd in the driver point standings, Pena was 5th.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m excited,\u201d Moffitt said. \u201cWe have a good car, I can be patient when needed and I know we can work our way through the field.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pena, a Winchester, VA native, wasn\u2019t too worried either, \u201cIt is what it is. We are starting better than I thought we would, but we have a great car and will be fine.\u201d<\/p>\n

When the green flag dropped, the cars paced themselves and waited for the field to spread out. Unfortunately, Pena was the first caution flag of the night when his #1 JMS Toyota Camry lost a motor early in the race.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt started losing power down the backstretch,\u201d confirmed Pena. \u201cThen just quit all together. It is so disappointing as I had a fast car all weekend long. We had such a good car and I am proud of my team.\u201d<\/p>\n

Moffitt started 21st and was mired in traffic the first part of the race. He cracked the top-10 at lap 64 and began to steadily pass car after car until he raced into 2nd position, where he rode for over 60 laps.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was trying really hard to save my tires,\u201d Moffitt stated. \u201cI just rode in second hoping to save enough for the end of the race.\u201d<\/p>\n

With a restart at lap 127, Moffitt had his chance. He got his nose underneath leader and eventual race winner, Darrell Wallace, Jr. and led lap 128 but Wallace, Jr. got his nose back under Moffitt and put him in the outside lane where two more cars managed to get underneath. Moffitt finished the race in the 4th position.<\/p>\n

My (#11) Kobe Toyopet Camry was real fast,\u201d Moffitt confirmed. \u201cBut I ran out of tires at the end. I just used up too much coming through the field. If we had started up front where I know we would have qualified, it might have been a different ending. But from where we started, 4th isn\u2019t too bad.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we are moving in the right direction,\u201d team owner, Shigeaki Hattori said. \u201cWe were the best cars in practice and would have started up front had we qualified. The cars performed well as did the teams.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hattori Racing Enterprises next heads to Richmond International Raceway on April 26, 2012 for their next event.<\/p>\n

Visit NERacingForum.Com<\/a> for latest New England Racing community News.<\/p>\n

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Greenville, SC \u2013 Hattori Racing Enterprises driver, Brett Moffitt overcame odds to finish 4th and Sergio Pena experienced engine failure to finish 29th in the Kevin Whitaker Chevrolet 150 at Greenville, SC on Saturday March, 31, 2012. Both cars were fast in practice. Pena topped the charts for both practices of the afternoon. Moffitt was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[45,4456,14972],"tags":[31],"class_list":["post-9388","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nascar","category-nascar-kn-pro-series","category-touring-series-news","tag-brett-moffitt"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9388","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9388"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9388\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9388"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9388"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9388"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}