Submitted by NASCAR Ranting and Raving Blog

Clint’s crew chief, Gil Martin, went with a more conservative engine package. Being more conservative hurt as far as power and racing for the win at the end, but it helped Bowyer’s championship hopes as he stayed within arm’s length of Jeff Gordon in the Championship.

Apparently, all of the motors broke in the same place, “When you open the hood, now you know what to look for,” said Steve Hmiel, competition director for DEI, during the race. “We had two, now we have three. The hole is in the same place in the oil pan. It’s breaking something inside and it’s breaking it in all three engines.”

One saving grace in all of this is that any rumours insisting on a DEI plot/conspiracy over Dale’s 6 engine failures this season can now be put to rest. Since all of the engine failures are happening in the same place in the motor of each car then it is clear that all of the DEI/RCR cars are getting the same engines.

Another saving grace, if you can call it that, is that Paul Menard crashed out of the race before his engine blew and he had the same engine package as all those who did blow up. That means they can take apart Paul’s engine and see where the problem might be

Hopefully they can get this thing fixed before this weekend’s race, as they are running the same engine packages as they did this past weekend at Talladega.

Photo Credit: sportsillustrated.com