Jeff Gordon has "no clue" why seatbelt came loose during Cup race
Jeff Gordon had a scary moment during the Cup race at Pocono, having his seatbelt come loose on a restart.
Jeff Gordon, Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet
Action Sports Photography
Gordon was subbing for a sidelined Dale Earnhardt Jr. in this race, his second consecutive week filling in.
On a Lap 110 restart, Gordon was running inside the top ten, but suddenly dropped to the inside and rapidly fell back before Turn 1.
He initially told the team he would have to pit, but managed to buckle his belts on his own, radioing "We're good, I got it" and continuing on.
“Yeah, it’s the first time I’ve ever had that happen with this type of mechanism where you just plug it in and it latches. I’ve had it happen under the old system with the old buckle. I was actually at Sonoma one time leading the race and we went right off the next corner when it happened. I was able to get that one latched.
The issue first popped up on pit road, but returned on the restart and the veteran driver made a veteran decision to pull out.
"I thought I had it latched because it happened actually on pit road one time. And I got it latched and lost some time. And then we were in a pretty good position on the restart and went to take off and as soon as I went into second and third, just that little bit of a side movement just pulled it out. It would go in and sort of latch, but when you wiggled it from left to right, it would pop right out. So, I don’t know if there is something lodged in there, or what happened or why it took so long for that to play out.
"But I knew I couldn’t go down into Turn 1 on these crazy restarts without a right-side seat belt. So, I came in under that stop. We worked on it and now it’s good. I have no clue. It’s unfortunate. The No. 88 Nationwide Chevrolet is pretty good. We just need track position. We finally got it and I’ve been having some decent restarts and things were going good. I hate that that happened.”
Gordon went on to finish 27th with rain ending the race 22 laps prior the scheduled finish.
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