NASCAR notes: Danica finishes seventh; Gibbs’ son begins treatments

Danica Patrick continues to make strides in her Sprint Cup career, turning in her best performance in months Sunday.

Patrick had a seventh-place run at the STP 500 at Martinsville Speedway, tying the second-best finish in her career. She had a career-best sixth-place finish last August at Atlanta, but hadn’t posted a top-15 run in her last 16 races [including her first five this year].

“It feels good,” said Patrick, whose best finish at Martinsville had been 12th in the spring of 2013. “This is the kind of stuff we need ... it was fun racing and we have to do it more often.”

Sunday’s run also marked Patrick’s fifth career top-10 finish, tying her with Janet Guthrie for most by a female driver.

More important, though, is that the communication between Patrick and her crew chief, Daniel Knost, is getting better. It was the eighth race the two have worked together and their best finish to date.

Patrick is hopeful it’s a sign of things to come.

“I think that we’re on our way and we’re learning what changes I feel and the best way to communicate,” Patrick said.

Gibbs update

Joe Gibbs used words such as “courageous” and “hero” when addressing his son J.D.’s medical issues before Sunday’s Sprint Cup race.

J.D. Gibbs, the 46-year-old president of Joe Gibbs Racing, has been dealing with concussion-type symptoms that impact his speech and processing functions for the past six months, and is beginning to undergo treatments for it.

The direct cause of the condition is unknown, Joe Gibbs said. J.D. Gibbs played college football at William & Mary from 1987-90, and also enjoyed activities such as racing cars and motor bikes and snowboarding.

“His situation medically — there’s very few answers,” said Joe Gibbs, the three-time Super Bowl winning coach. “We can’t point to any one serious thing that happened to him, certainly any injury is a possibility that led us into some of the symptoms that he’s experiencing now.”

This isn’t the first serious medical issue the Gibbs family has dealt with. J.D.’s son, Taylor, was diagnosed with leukemia at age 2 in 2007 and is now cancer free.

Joe Gibbs thanked the NASCAR community for its prayers during Taylor’s fight, and asked for the same for J.D. in a near-five-minute statement in which he didn’t take questions.

“J.D., at our team meeting earlier this week, got up and basically said, ‘I know God has a plan and God puts us through things for a reason,’” Joe Gibbs said. “J.D. gains his strength from the fact that he has a personal relationship with the Lord, and I have got to tell you that he’s my hero when I kind of watch him.

“I don’t know that anybody has ever dealt with anything as courageous as J.D. does.”

Super sub

Regan Smith has become the go-to guy should something prevent a regular Sprint Cup driver from racing. It happened again Sunday, when he filled in for Kyle Larson, who fainted after an autograph-signing session Saturday.

Tests came back negative and Larson felt fine to race. He was held out based on doctors’ advice.

That pushed Smith into another replacement situation. He filled in for Kurt Busch the first three races this season, as Busch served a suspension.

“I went to bed mentally prepared for if something happened, I’m ready to race,” said Smith, who finished 16th.

“These situations, they’re not easy. You are hopping into somebody else’s car, somebody else’s setup, somebody else’s team, somebody else’s guys and trying to plug yourself in as best you can and do as good as you can for that team and for those guys.

“With that said, you try to make the most of it.”

This story was originally published March 29, 2015 at 5:43 PM with the headline "NASCAR notes: Danica finishes seventh; Gibbs’ son begins treatments."