Danica Patrick had a rough time at practice this week. She wrecked into an outside wall between Turn 1 and Turn 2 and damaged her car so badly that the crew had to bring in the backup car.

“I wheel-hopped it into (Turn) 1 and it just came around. When it wheel hops, it doesn’t slow down very well,” Patrick said. “Caved the whole bumper in. Backed in and then went to the side. If I would have just pancaked it on the side, they probably would have just tried to bang out the wheel wells and fix it. But it crushed the bumper in.”

The time it took to get the backup car ready and on the track was time that Danica couldn’t afford to lose since the practice was the only one before the qualifying session. The backup car hasn’t been used since 2011.

Danica wasn’t the only one fighting the turns at practice, her boyfriend, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. wrecked his primary car between Turns 1 and 2 less than a half hour after Danica wrecked. Ricky Stenhouse was second-fastest and in first place at the time of the crash and Danica was 36th-fastest on the speed chart at the time of her wreck.

Danica finished12th at Martinsville earlier this year in April. It looks like both Danica and Ricky could use some more practice.

Image from Wikimedia Commons.