“We struggled the whole race but in the end we would have had a solid finish,” said Lia after the race. “I got together with the 21 and that damaged our rear bumper bar. It was hanging and NASCAR decided to bring us down pit road. It was a good call by NASCAR; it probably would have fallen off. But for us, it was definitely a kick in the knees. We went back to 23rd and finished 19th. It’s a top-20 and doesn’t reflect how we would have finished but we know that we are making gains even though we struggled during the race a little bit.”
Lia’s struggles stemmed from the first practice session on Thursday morning when his Chevrolet washed up and into the outside retaining wall. “Part of our problems stemmed from getting into the wall in practice,” explained Lia who made contact with the wall on his second lap around the speedway. “I’ve got to work on that and make sure we take care of these trucks a little better and we’ll be better in the long run.” With moderate damage to the right side of their Chevrolet, the crew went to work to repair the damage before qualifying on Thursday night.
“These guys are working non-stop in the shop to get these trucks ready and I can’t say enough about them,” said Lia of his crew. “They really go above and beyond. Because of them, we’re able to bring real good trucks to the race track every week. We just have to capitalize on that a little bit
better and I need to make a couple less mistakes here and there and I think we’ll be really good.”
In qualifying, Lia laid down a lap of 31.086 seconds at a speed of 173.712 miles per hour, picking up four-tenths of a second over his final practice speed. “Everything is in place for us to run better and run upfront at any type of race track, we just need to put all the pieces of the puzzle together and make it happen,” he said. “I know we’re going too; it’s just going to take a little bit of time which we knew going in. Everything that we’ve been dealing with comes with the territory. I expected it.”
Lia probably didn’t expect his Chevrolet to be “out of control loose” at the start of the race and his frustration showed as he fought the ill-handling condition throughout the race. “We probably didn’t get the body back after practice,” he said to the crew on lap 89. Despite the team’s efforts to adjust on the truck during pit stops, it continued to be tough to drive. “I’ve never driven anything this evil,” said Lia on lap 127. Just 10 laps later, Lia slid into 12th spot and made slight contact with the 21 truck, knocking his rear bumper bar loose. As a result, NASCAR called Lia to pit road to remove the broken bar. Lia gave up 12th spot and restarted the race in 23rd, picking up four spots before the checkered flag fell.
“It’s just a little frustrating when we’re in line for our first
top-ten on a speedway track and kind of get it ripped out
from underneath us,” said Lia. “That’s racing, it goes like
that sometimes. Nobody ever said that you’d have great
weeks every single week. It’s something that you have to
be prepared for. As frustrated as I was, I knew that going
forward we’re only going to get better and Michigan is
going to be a good race for us.”
Lia and the No. 71 NationRides.com Chevrolet will return
to action Saturday, June 14th at Michigan International
Speedway for the Cool City Customs 200. Live television
coverage will begin on the SPEED Channel at 3 p.m. ET
with radio coverage coming to you live courtesy of MRN
Radio.
