NASCAR, etc.

SEC Bowling

2011-12-28T17:24:00.000-08:00

I haven't gotten interested in the college football bowl season yet. How could I? The SEC hasn't started playing yet.

The Southeastern Conference sends nine of the twelve teams to bowls this year, beginning with Mississippi State vs. Wake Forest in Friday's Music City Bowl and concluding on January 9 with LSU and Alabama playing for the national championship. (Roll Tide!) Ole Miss, Kentucky and Tennessee are staying home this bowl season.

This is one of those odd years when there are no games on New Year's Day; it falls on a Sunday. The traditional New Year's Day games are on Monday and stretching out through the week.

The SEC bowl schedule:

Friday, December 30
Music City Bowl -- Mississippi State vs. Wake Forest, 6:40 p.m. ET

Saturday, December 31
Liberty Bowl -- Vanderbilt vs. Cincinnati, 3:40 p.m.
Chick-fil-A Bowl -- Auburn vs. Virginia, 7:30 p.m.

Monday, January 2
Gator Bowl -- Florida vs. Ohio State, 1 p.m.
Outback Bowl -- Georgia vs. Michigan State, 1 p.m.
Capital One Bowl -- South Carolina vs. Nebraska, 1 p.m.

Friday, January 6
Cotton Bowl -- Arkansas vs. Kansas, 8 p.m.

Monday, January 9
BCS National Championship -- LSU vs. Alabama, 8:30 p.m.

Two teams will join the SEC next season, Missouri and Texas A&M. Missouri scored on their first five possessions of Monday's Independence Bowl and cruised past North Carolina 41-24. The Aggies play Northwestern this Saturday in the Meineke Car Care Bowl.

Notice that three SEC teams all play at the same time on January 2, leading to a lot of channel changing early, followed by a couple of games that I don't care a lot about. Those three games at 1 p.m. should be among the best of the bowl season, featuring teams that appear to be pretty evenly matched.

NASCAR

2011-10-09T16:35:00.000-07:00

Image via Wikipedia

Six races left, and the Chase for the Sprint Cup is shaping up nicely.

Jimmie Johnson dominated at Kansas, running up front most of the day and holding off Kasey Kahne on a green-white-checkered restart for the win. Brad Keselowski was third and Matt Kenseth fourth. Carl Edwards and Kevin Harvick came on strong at the end to finish fifth and sixth respectively.

It all fell apart at the end for Tony Stewart and Jeff Gordon. Stewart gave up track position for four tires on a late stop, then had trouble getting into his stall on the final stop. Gordon's engine blew to set up the GWC finish. (Race results)

Six races left, and Edwards leads Harvick by one point in the standings. Jimmie Johnson sits just four points back and we're heading to one of his best tracks, Charlotte Motor Speedway, next.

Six races left. Eight drivers within 20 points of the lead. (Points standings)

SEC Football

2011-10-09T02:24:00.000-07:00

It's all shaping up nicely in the SEC West. The November 5 LSU/Alabama game at Tuscaloosa should decide the division. The top two teams in the country both looked impressive Saturday; LSU beat up on the Florida team Alabama destroyed last week and Alabama shut out Vandy.

The East is a little more complicated. South Carolina and Georgia are tied at 3-1 in conference action. South Carolina has the edge after winning the head-to-head matchup last month. But Florida is lurking at 2-2 with games still upcoming against the leaders. South Carolina dismantled dismal Kentucky and Georgia handled Tennessee to give Coach Richt his 100th career victory.

If you're a praying person, put in a few words for the Ole Miss Rebels. They're 2-3 overall and 0-2 in the conference. They were off this week, but play Alabama, Arkansas and Auburn the next three weeks and then LSU a couple of weeks later. Their November 5 game against Kentucky will probably determine the worst team in the league, depending on how the rest of the year goes for Vandy.

Week Six Scores:

#1 LSU 41, #17 Florida 11
#2 Alabama 34, Vanderbilt 0
#10 Arkansas 38, #15 Auburn 14
#18 South Carolina 54, Kentucky 3
Georgia 20, Tennessee 12
Mississippi State 21, Alabama-Birmingham 3

Cup - Kyle Busch Wins Inaugural Kentucky Race

2011-07-10T22:27:00.000-07:00

Image via Wikipedia

Kyle Busch held off Jimmie Johnson on a late restart to win Saturday night's Quaker State 400, the inaugural Cup race at Kentucky Speedway.

Busch dominated the event, leading a race-high 125 (of 267) laps, but had to hold off Johnson on a restart with two laps to go to take home the trophy. The pair entered Turn One side-by-side on the restart, but Busch had the momentum in the outside lane and pulled ahead coming out of Turn Two. Johnson then had to contend with a hard-charging David Reutimann. Reutimann passed Johnson for second place as they came to the stripe.

It was Busch's third win of the season, tying him with Kevin Harvick for the most in the Sprint Cup Series. It was his 22nd career Cup victory, and his 99th victory in the three national series combined.

Ryan Newman finished fourth, followed by Carl Edwards. Matt Kenseth, Brad Keselowski, David Ragan, Kurt Busch and Jeff Gordon rounded out the Top 10. (Race results)

It's never a good sign when the big story after a race is the traffic, but the race was a snoozefest until the end and the traffic jam was the mother of all traffic jams.

It seems that Kentucky Speedway is just another 1.5-mile cookie cutter oval where aerodynamics are king. The bumps in the track that were supposed to add drama didn't, and the only good racing came on the restarts. There were long stretches of green-flag runs where the field got strung out and the leader, racing in clean air, checked out.

But the traffic jam was what will be remembered for years to come. The line of cars stretched some 20 miles down Interstate 71 and track officials ran out of places to park cars. After many spent hours trying to get to the track, they were turned away when officials began reversing the traffic patterns to get everyone out after the race was over. Track owner Bruton Smith estimated that 15,000-20,000 ticket holders never made it in.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. continued his free fall in the points standings for the fourth straight week. He pitted under green late in the race and took fuel only, then blew his left front tire as he re-entered the track. The tire shredded and destroyed his fender, bringing out a caution on Lap 254. Clint Bowyer spun and hit the wall just a couple of laps after the restart setting up the final two-lap sprint to the checkers.

With the win, Busch jumped two spots to take the lead in the series points standings, four points ahead of Edwards. Harvick (-10) dropped two spots to third, followed by Kurt Busch (-18), Johnson (-19), Kenseth (-22), Gordon (-72), Earnhardt (-76), Newman (-86) and Denny Hamlin (-94). Tony Stewart is just three points behind Hamlin for the tenth spot. Bowyer dropped out of the Top 10 and is now 16 points behind Hamlin. Ragan holds one wildcard spot for the Chase. Keselowski is just three points behind Joey Logano for 20th place in the standings and the other wildcard spot.

Nationwide - Keselowski Stretches His Fuel Mileage to Win at Kentucky

2011-07-10T15:21:00.000-07:00

Image via Wikipedia

Brad Keselowski dominated Friday night's Feed the Children 300 at Kentucky Speedway, leading 132 of the 200 laps, but it came down to fuel mileage at the end. Keselowski conserved enough to take the checkered flag.

Keselowski's only real challenge came from Kevin Harvick, who was also in fuel conservation mode. But Harvick's crew made a crucial mistake in the closing laps, calling Harvick to the pits for fuel, then changing their minds at the last minute and telling him to stay out. A car had spun out and they were looking for a caution that never came. Harvick couldn't make up the lost time, allowing Keselowski to cruise to a 1.180-second victory.

It was Keselowski's first win of the season and the 13th of his career. It was his first win at Kentucky Speedway in his fourth start.

On Lap 134, Robert Richardson spun and backed into the wall to bring out the fifth and final caution of the race. Keselowski took fuel only and was the first off of pit road. Keselowski pulled away on the restart and led the rest of the way.

Kyle Busch started in the rear of the field after wrecking in practice and switching to his backup car. He quickly worked his way toward the front, but never challenged Keselowski and Harvick. He finished third, followed by Kasey Kahne and Elliott Sadler. (Race results)

Sadler took over the lead in the series points standings from Reed Sorenson, who finished 17th. Sorenson had pit troubles earlier in the race, leaving the pits with the track bar wrench still in the back of the car. Sadler now leads Sorenson by four points. Ricky Stenhouse Jr. (-27) is third, followed by Justin Allgaier (-43) and Jason Leffler (-73).

Trucks - Busch Finds a Way to Win at Kentucky

2011-07-08T00:46:00.000-07:00

Image by Getty Images via @daylife

It didn't seem like Kyle Busch had the truck to win, but, after some great late restarts and some misfortune for most of the other contenders, he cruised to victory in Thursday night's University of Northwestern Ohio 225 at Kentucky Speedway.

Busch started in the rear of the field after missing the drivers' meeting, but quickly charged toward the front, finally taking the lead for the first time on Lap 61. He led twice for 61 laps, including the last 18. Toward the end, his was not the fastest truck, but most of the other contenders fell by the wayside.

Polesitter Johnny Sauter passed Busch for the lead on Lap 103, but broke a rear axle while trying to leave his pit on a green-flag stop on Lap 124. About eight laps later, Austin Dillon challenged Busch for the lead, but his hood came loose and folded back over his windshield. He had to pit to have it cut loose.

With ten laps to go, Charlie Vest spun. He didn't hit anything, but NASCAR finally had to throw the caution because he was blocking the entrance to pit road and couldn't get the engine restarted. About the time the caution waved, Steve Arpin spun straight toward Vest, but he finally had it running again and moved out of the way in time to avoid the collision.

That set up a restart with five laps to go. Busch got a great restart, but Joey Coulter did not. He dropped back and bunched the rest of the field up. Nelson Piquet Jr., another contender, got pushed back in the middle of a three-wide pack. He got into the rear of the other Brazilian in the race, Miguel Paludo, and they both went hard into the wall.

That set up the green-white-checkered finish. Again, Busch got a great jump, but Jason White did not. Busch cruised to victory. Parker Klingerman, Brendan Gaughan and Todd Bodine got around White to finish second, third and fourth respectively. White came home fifth. (Race results)

It was Busch's first win at Kentucky Speedway, his fifth Camping World Truck Series win of the season and the 29th of his career. It was his 98th national series win, third most all-time. The race went 152 laps, two past the scheduled distance.

Ron Hornaday made the bonehead move of the race. After a restart on Lap 76, he was challenging Cole Whitt for fourth place. Hornaday got loose and came up into Whitt and they both went into the wall. That would have been the end of it if Hornaday had stayed on the brakes, but he tried to straighten out his heavily damaged truck and keep moving. He slammed Jack Smith into the wall, then slid down the track and took out John King and Josh Richards.

The series points standings were shuffled a bit. Sauter stayed in first, and even gained three more points on Whitt (-23). Dillon (-25) moved up a spot to third. James Buescher (-32) and Klingerman (-35) each moved up three spots to fourth and fifth respectively as Hornaday (-37) dropped three spots to sixth.

Cup - Ragan Gets First Career Win at Daytona

2011-07-03T10:22:00.000-07:00

Image by jerbec via Flickr

David Ragan cruised to his first career Cup Series win in Saturday night's Coke Zero 400 at Daytona International Speedway.

Racing in the two-car drafts that have become commonplace at the superspeedways, the top four finished in single file. Ragan was pushed to victory by his Roush Fenway teammate Matt Kenseth. The tandem of Joey Logano and Kasey Kahne didn't try to challenge the finish and finished third and fourth respectively.

A sedate race by Daytona standards turned treacherous at the end. It took two green-white-checkered finishes and ten extra laps to settle this one. With two separate wrecks occurring simultaneously on the final lap, NASCAR let it play out to the finish and didn't throw the caution until the leaders had crossed the line.

After three cautions in the first 50 laps, the race settled down into a long green flag run from Lap 53 to Lap 157. Then with just three laps left to go, Kahne got together with his Red Bull teammate Brian Vickers, pushing Jeff Gordon up into Kyle Busch and Logano. It was slight contact, but was enough to send Gordon sideways in traffic. Gordon made a tremendous save to get the car straightened out again, but that brought out the caution and set up the first GWC attempt.

The first attempt didn't make it through Turn Two. Racing three wide through the turn, Mark Martin drifted down on Logano, triggering the Big One. Somewhere in the neighborhood of fifteen cars were involved in various degrees.

They lined up again for a second GWC. Ragan got a great push from Kenseth to stay out front, but Ryan Newman and Denny Hamlin challenged. Logano and Kahne went outside to make it three wide, and Newman and Hamlin were stranded in the middle and fell back. On the final lap, Landon Cassill got together with Marcos Ambrose, triggering a multi-car crash. As that one was playing out, Jamie McMurray got together with Dale Earnhardt Jr., triggering another melee closer to the front of the field.

Kyle Busch finished fifth, followed by Gordon, Kevin Harvick, Paul Menard, Juan Montoya, and A. J. Allmendinger. (Race results)

Ragan atoned for a big mistake at the Daytona 500 in February. Leading the field to green on a late restart, Ragan was penalized for changing lanes before he crossed the start/finish line, ending his chances for a win.

Daytona 500 winner Trevor Bayne's hopes for a repeat at the track ended early on Lap 5. A push from Brad Keselowski hooked him into the wall and ended his day.

Carl Edwards's day also ended early. On Lap 23, he was hooked by his Roush Fenway teammate Greg Biffle. Biffle slapped the outside wall; Edwards slid through the infield and smacked the inside wall hard. Edwards came into the race with a 25-point lead in the series points standings, but finished 37th and relinquished the lead to Harvick.

Harvick now leads Edwards by five points. Kyle Busch jumped two spots to third, ten points behind Harvick. Kurt Busch (-16) is fourth. Kenseth (-22) is fifth. Jimmie Johnson (-22) got caught up in the last-lap melees and finished 20th, dropping him three spots to sixth in the standings. Earnhardt (-52) is seventh, followed by Gordon (-67), Clint Bowyer (-81) and Newman (-88). With just nine races left before the Chase, Hamlin has closed to within three points of tenth. Tony Stewart is just four points behind Newman now. (Points standings)

From the Twitter Machine

2011-07-02T07:39:00.000-07:00

One of the big stories before Friday night's Subway Jalapeno 250 at Daytona International Speedway was Kevin Harvick Inc.'s four-car mega-team that was entered in the race. KHI had cars for Harvick, Tony Stewart, Clint Bowyer and Elliott Sadler.

Harvick won the pole, followed by Stewart, Sadler and Bowyer to give KHI a sweep of the first two rows. It was the first time in series history that a team had started a race 1-2-3-4. Things didn't go so well after that. Harvick turned Bowyer into the wall on Lap 80. All the other cars were wrecked on the final lap.

This was Harvick's wife DeLana's reaction on Twitter after the race...

Well that was expensive.....Sat Jul 02 01:43:14 via SeesmicDeLana Harvick
DeLanaHarvick

Nationwide - Busch Pushes Logano to Daytona Win

2011-07-02T07:22:00.000-07:00

Image by Getty Images via @daylife

Joey Logano got a big push from his Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Kyle Busch to win Friday night's Subway Jalapeno 250 at Daytona International Speedway. Logano held off a late charge by Jason Leffler to win by 0.040 seconds.

Logano started at the rear of the field after his crew made unapproved modifications to his car before the race. He was turned early in the race by teammate Brian Scott as they tried to go below the yellow line to pass the slower car of Kevin LaPage, but somehow saved it. Logano didn't lead in the race until the final half-mile.

It was Logano's ninth career Nationwide Series win, his first of the season and his first at Daytona.

As Logano crossed the stripe, the Big One unfolded behind him. Mike Wallace ran Danica Patrick up into the wall. She bounced back down into the pack, triggering an eight-car crash.

Reed Sorenson finished third and collected the first of four $100,000 Dash 4 Cash bonuses Nationwide is giving away this season. Busch was fourth, followed by Justin Allgaier and Michael Annett. Kenny Wallace took seventh place going through the infield grass. The wrecked cars of Elliott Sadler, Aric Almirola and Patrick made it across the line to round out the Top Ten. (Race results)

On Lap 44, Eric McClure was turned hard into the wall by Mike Bliss. McClure walked away from the wreck, but was taken to the infield care center, then to a local hospital for further evaluation.

The top eleven spots in the series points standings stayed the same, but Sorenson extended his lead to nine points over Sadler. Ricky Stenhouse Jr. (-31) is third, followed by Allgaier (-37) and Leffler (-73).

NASCAR News

2011-06-29T01:26:00.000-07:00

Crown Royal has announced that they are significantly scaling back their involvement with NASCAR. They will end their sponsorship with Roush Fenway Racing and Matt Kenseth's No. 17 Ford at the end of the year. Also, parent company Diageo will not renew their deal as an official NASCAR partner.

RFR has thus far only renewed their sponsorship deal with 3M. It appears that their other major sponsors, Aflac and UPS, are waiting to see if Carl Edwards re-signs with RFR and how the rest of the silly season shakes out.

Crown Royal will concentrate its NASCAR involvement on their annual "Your Name Here" race, which has been held at Richmond International Speedway in September.

Geico has signed a three-year deal to sponsor the fall Sprint Cup Series race at Chicagoland Speedway. It's Geico's first naming-rights agreement in any sport.

Jeremy Fuller, a contract employee and tire changer for Red Bull Racing and Turner Motorsports, has been fired from both jobs for homophobic tweets he posted after the race at Infineon Speedway Sunday.

UPS will honor Ned Jarrett's induction into the NASCAR Hall of Fame with a throwback paint scheme on David Ragan's No. 6 Ford at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. The throwback design, which resembles Jarrett's 1965 Ford Galaxie, was unveiled Sunday at Infineon Raceway.

Cup - Kurt Busch Dominates at Sonoma

2011-06-27T00:26:00.000-07:00

Image by Getty Images via @daylife

Kurt Busch notched his first career road course victory Sunday, winning the Toyota/Save Mart 350 at Infineon Raceway. He made it look easy, leading 76 of the 110 laps (including the final 23) and crossing the finish line 2.685 seconds ahead of his nearest competitor.

It was Busch's first Cup win of the season and the 23rd of his career, tying him with Ricky Rudd for 26th on the all-time wins list.

The real battle was for second place between Jeff Gordon and Carl Edwards. Both struggled early in the race, then seemed to appear out of nowhere at the end by staying out on old tires. Gordon passed Edwards for second on the final lap. Clint Bowyer finished fourth, followed by Marcos Ambrose. (Race results)

The real story of the race was all the "boys, have at it" action going on behind Busch. Juan Montoya played the part that Jeff Gordon played so well last year, tangling with everyone he got near. Two incidents stand out: On Lap 37, he tangled with Kyle Busch, shoving him off the track in Turn 11 and starting a multi-car pileup. On Lap 104, he tried to force Brad Keselowski into the grass. Keselowski returned the favor by spinning him out.

The first incident ended Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s day and started a feud between Tony Stewart and Brian Vickers. Stewart pushed Vickers into the cars that were slowing in front of him, then spun him around. Vickers got his revenge on Lap 87. Stewart was challenging Busch for the lead when they came up on Vickers. After Stewart went by, Vickers turned him when he slowed for Turn 11. Stewart came to rest with his rear end up on the tire barrier.

Montoya also tangled with Kasey Kahne, trying to force his way through when there really wasn't anywhere to go. The move spun Kahne, but also cost Montoya a few spots. Joey Logano got together with Robby Gordon early in the race, leaving Gordon to ponder doing "a Richard Childress" on the younger driver.

Edwards increased his lead in the series points standings by five; he now leads Kevin Harvick by 25 points. Harvick rebounded from a tough day to finish ninth. Jimmie Johnson finished seventh, but climbed two spots in the standings to third, 33 points behind Edwards. Kurt Busch climbed three spots to fourth, 34 points out. Kyle Busch (-37) is now fifth, followed by Matt Kenseth (-52) and Earnhardt (-65), who dropped four spots in the standings. Clint Bowyer (-77), Gordon (-93) and Ryan Newman (-98) round out the Top 10.

Nationwide - Sorenson Wins Wild One at Road America

2011-06-26T00:44:00.000-07:00

Image by jerbec via Flickr

It took three green-white-checkered finishes, then it took NASCAR several minutes to review the mayhem, but they made the right call and awarded Saturday's Bucyrus 200 to Reed Sorenson. Sorenson inherited the lead on the final lap under caution when Justin Allgaier ran out of gas on the way to the finish line.

It was Sorenson's fourth career Nationwide Series win, the first in 58 races dating back to July 2007 at Gateway International Raceway.

It was a pretty sedate road course race for most of the way. The biggest excitement early on was the battle for the lead between Michael McDowell and Jacques Villeneuve. But Villeneuve was penalized on a restart on Lap 25 (of 50) when he changed lanes before crossing the start/finish line.

McDowell seemingly took the lead for good on Lap 43, passing Brian Scott and quickly pulling away from the field. But Doug Harrington spun with four laps to go, bringing out the fourth caution of the day and setting up the first green-white-checkered finish.

Villeneuve made the bonehead move of the race on the restart, diving outside to try to get back into contention. He got his right-side tires in the grass, then got into Scott and Max Papis, spinning them out into the gravel pits.

McDowell got a good jump on the second green-white-checkered restart, but slid off the track on Turn Five, giving the lead to Allgaier. Moments later, he slid off again, ending any chance of winning, but starting a chain reaction wreck that brought out the caution again.

Allgaier got a good jump on the last green-white-checkered restart and took the white flag, but more bumping and banging left Aric Almirola in the gravel pit and brought out the final caution. All Allgaier had to do was make it back around to the finish line to win, but he was out of gas and the win belonged to Sorenson.

Then there was confusion. Apparently, Ron Fellows did not see the caution waving. He blew past Sorenson and was still at race speed until the pace car pulled out in front of him. Sorenson and Fellows crossed the finish line side-by-side behind the pace car. Fellows was initially declared the winner, but NASCAR reviewed the tape and determined that Fellows had passed Sorenson after the caution came out.

Villeneuve finished third, followed by Elliott Sadler and Mike Wallace. The race went seven laps beyond the regulation distance on the four-mile course. (Race results)

The victory puts Sorenson back in the lead in the series points standings. He's five points ahead of Sadler. Ricky Stenhouse Jr. (-7) drops two spots to third after finishing eighth. Allgaier (-34) is fourth; Jason Leffler (-73) is fifth.

Cup - Logano Takes the Pole at Sonoma

2011-06-25T14:30:00.000-07:00

Image by Getty Images via @daylife

Joey Logano grabbed the pole for Sunday's Toyota/Save Mart 350 at Infineon Raceway. Logano, who doesn't have much of a reputation as a road racer, turned a lap of 76.821 seconds (93.256 mph) on the 1.99-mile course. Logano was as surprised as everyone else, "This is the last place that I figured we'd get a pole."

It was Logano's second career pole. The other came at Bristol in March 2010. Logano is the youngest driver (21 years, 1 month) to win a road course poll, besting Parnelli Jones (24 years, 9 months, 18 days) at Riverside in 1958.

Jamie McMurray (76.848 seconds, 93.223 mph) will start on the outside of the front row. Paul Menard starts third, followed by Denny Hamlin and Ryan Newman.

Tony Ave, a road race specialist substituting for Travis Kvapil in the No. 38 Front Row Motorsports Ford, was the only driver to fail to qualify for the race. (Race lineup)

Kurt Busch was trying to earn his fourth straight pole. He led the first practice session, giving him the final run in qualifying, but he was a half-second off of Logano's time. He starts eleventh. McMurray was fastest in the second practice. Brad Keselowski was fastest in Happy Hour.

Series points leader Carl Edwards canceled his plans to run the Nationwide Series race at Road America. After a poor first practice and qualifying run, Edwards decided he needed the extra practice time at Infineon. He starts 23rd Sunday.

NASCAR News

2011-06-23T00:36:00.000-07:00

This weekend's NASCAR Cup race is at Infineon Raceway in Sonoma, California. The Toyota/Save Mart 350 is one of just two road course races on the schedule.

The entry list for the race has 44 names. Only one car is going home after qualifying Friday.

There's not much NASCAR news until the teams get to the track Thursday.

There's a small adjustment to the 2012 schedule. The spring race at Dover will move back to early June right after Memorial Day. Attendance sagged when they moved the race to May, so they're moving it back.

Michigan International Speedway and ESPN have combined forces to put a race title sponsorship and media sponsorship package together for Michigan's tourism bureau. This story is really only interesting in that it answers the question of how much money is thrown around to put one of these NASCAR races together.

But the money is nothing compared to what it takes to put on an F1 race. The Austin city council is voting Thursday, basically signing on the dotted line to officially put on the American Grand Prix.

It seems that a yes vote by the seven-member council would finally allow race promoters to take advantage of the money in the Texas Major Events Trust Fund. The promoters would pay $4 million a year for ten years and get back $25 million a year for ten years to give to Bernie Ecclestone and F1 management for the privilege of holding the race.

A host of other problems are rearing their ugly heads, including the fact that Austin, Texas, a town with virtually no extra hotel rooms, has never held an event of this size before. The latest wrinkle in the saga is that two educators and an accountant have filed a lawsuit to block payment of the subsidy to the race promoters.

NASCAR News

2011-06-21T23:26:00.000-07:00

Joe Gibbs Racing: It turned out just as expected -- no points penalties, but hefty monetary fines for bringing the unapproved oil pans to Michigan. The three crew chiefs -- Mike Ford, Dave Rogers and Greg Zipadelli -- were fined $50,000 each. The crew chief, the car chiefs and competition director Jimmy Makar were all put on probation until the end of the year.

Red Bull Racing: The news that Red Bull was pulling out of NASCAR seems to have leaked a lot quicker than the company might have liked. Anyway, they're searching for a buyer to keep the team going and will even throw in some sponsorship. Whatever it takes.

Silly Season: Carl Edwards is still the top free agent. His decision -- to stay at Roush Fenway or move on -- will affect everyone else, but the situation at Red Bull throws a big monkey wrench into the works. It's currently a two-car team, but Kasey Kahne is going to Hendricks next season and Brian Vickers's contract is up at the end of the season. And what about Mark Martin...and Clint Bowyer and Danica Patrick and Juan Montoya and all the others?

It's a strange weekend coming up for the new official sport of North Carolina. No Truck race, but the Cup and Nationwide Series are both at road courses -- just not the same one. The Cup race is at Sonoma, California, at Infineon Raceway. The Nationwide race is in Wisconsin at Road America.

Road courses? Yea or nay? I think they're fun and take a lot of driver skill. I'd like to see maybe one more road course track on the Cup schedule, maybe even during the Chase.

NASCAR News

2011-06-21T00:52:00.000-07:00

Some stories to check out:

The news has leaked out that Red Bull will be leaving NASCAR at the end of the season. It sounds like they are going to concentrate on their much more successful Formula One team. They've had some bad luck and made some bad decisions since they've been in NASCAR, but I thought they were finally turning the corner. Oh well.
Did you notice Hendrick's terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day at Michigan? Mark Martin had the best finish of the group (ninth), but that was after he ran Junior into the wall with about 15 to go.
Carl Edwards has become the lead spokeman for doing something about the downforce in the Cup cars. "I'm really hoping that NASCAR will take the opportunity in 2013 to take downforce away, so the fans can see the guys race race cars and not race downforce. That would be cool."
And Fox is trying to work out an agreement with NASCAR to allow them to move some of their races to Speed. This is probably good news unless you don't have Speed. Eh, it probably won't happen for a couple of years anyway.

Cup -- Hamlin Outruns Kenseth at Michigan

2011-06-19T20:53:00.000-07:00

Image by Hans J E via Flickr

Denny Hamlin got out of the pits first on the final stop of the day and held off Matt Kenseth in the closing laps to win Sunday's Heluva Good! 400 at Michigan International Speedway.

Hamlin beat Kenseth to the line by 0.281 seconds for his first win of the season. It was Hamlin's 17th career victory, putting him in a tie with Kevin Harvick, Marvin Panch and Curtis Turner for 44th on the all-time wins list. It was Hamlin's second win at MIS.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. brought out the final caution of the afternoon on Lap 192 of 200. His Hendrick Racing teammate Mark Martin pinched him up into the wall. Moments later, a tire went down and Junior smacked the wall again. He finished 21st, his worst showing of the year.

Hamlin was first out of the pits on the money stop, almost running down one of his crew members in the process. Hamlin led the field to green with five laps to go. Kenseth spun his tires on the restart, but got a great push from Carl Edwards allowing him to challenge Hamlin for the victory. Hamlin's car was better on the short runs and he was able to hold Kenseth off.

Roush Fenway drivers dominated the race until Hamlin took charge at the end. Greg Biffle led a race-high 68 laps, Edwards 39 and Kenseth 17. Edwards had a lead of about 1 1/2 seconds when the final caution flew. Hamlin led just eight laps.

Kyle Busch finished third for the second week in a row. Paul Menard was fourth for his best finish of the season. Series points leader Edwards was fifth, followed by Ryan Newman, Tony Stewart, Clint Bowyer, Mark Martin and Brian Vickers. (Race results)

Jimmie Johnson had a rough afternoon. He spun coming out of Turn Two on Lap 7 to bring out the first caution of the day. He didn't hit anything, but blew three of his four tires and broke his front sway bar. He lost two laps while his team made repairs and finished 27th.

Carl Edwards stretched his lead in the series points standings to 20. Kevin Harvick finished 14th, but jumped two spots in the standings to second. Earnhardt (-27) remains in third. Kyle Busch and Johnson are fourth and fifth, both 29 points back. They're followed by Kenseth, Kurt Busch, and Newman. Hamlin finally cracked the Top 10 for the first time this season; he's now ninth, tied with Clint Bowyer 77 points behind Edwards. Stewart is just one point out of the Top 10 now.

Cup -- Kurt Busch on the Pole, JGR Rules Violation at Michigan

2011-06-18T20:37:00.000-07:00

Image by Photography by Hank via Flickr

Kurt Busch won his third pole in a row, edging David Reutimann by three one-thousandths of a second Saturday to take the pole for Sunday's Heluva Good! 400 at Michigan International Speedway.

Busch turned a lap on the two-mile track in 38.156 seconds (188.669 mph) to edge Reutimann's 38.159-second effort. It was Busch's 15th career pole and the fourth in a row for Penske Racing. Brad Keselowski started the streak at Charlotte in May.

Matt Kenseth will start third, followed by Brian Vickers and Regan Smith. Series points leader Carl Edwards starts 23rd. Tony Raines, Brian Keselowski and Mike Skinner did not make the race. (Race lineup)

The oil pans for all three Joe Gibbs Racing cars -- those of Kyle Busch, Denny Hamlin and Joey Logano -- were confiscated by NASCAR during opening day inspection Friday. The teams had to change out the oil pans before practice began Friday. The confiscated parts were 25-30 pounds heavier than those normally used and could give an aerodynamic advantage by lowering the cars center of gravity.

Because the oil pans were never used in competition, NASCAR seems to be inclined to treat this as a simple case of failing to submit the part for approval. In that case, the teams might be penalized financially, not by taking points away.

Jeff Gordon weighed in on Twitter...

All I'm going to say about Gibbs cars oil pan is that we had 100 point penalty for a flared left front fender that never went on track. #JGFri Jun 17 18:49:58 via Twitter for BlackBerry®Jeff Gordon
JeffGordonWeb

Sprint Cup Series Director John Darby explained that this would be similar to Michael Waltrip Racing using unapproved radiator mounts at Texas last year. In that case, the crew chiefs were fined $25,000 and put on probation.

"The whole issue has absolutely nothing to do with whether the oil pans are legal or illegal," Darby said. "But, quite frankly...we never had the opportunity to make that decision.

"When we open the rulebook, we don't have to flip through pages to get back to the oil-pan section. We open the book and we stop on the first page and the very first paragraph says you've got to have stuff approved before you can use it. We don't have to make a judgment of the pan. We don't have to decide whether it's too heavy or too light. We don't have to decide if it's an aerodynamic device or not an aerodynamic device...

"The Hendrick fender flares [in 2007], every square inch of the car body, there's a drawing that supports how exactly it has to be," Darby said. "The wing mounts from Dale Earnhardt Jr [in 2007], those were an exact part that had to comply with the design drawings that were given to all the teams.

"Oil pans, the teams have flexibility to work on them with oil pickups, depths and a little bit of widths. There's some real basic parameters that surround the oil pans, but there is some leniency to work on an oil pan, much like you would have a leniency to port a cylinder head to your liking."

Penalties will be announced Monday or Tuesday.

Nationwide -- Edwards Outruns Stenhouse at Michigan

2011-06-18T19:27:00.000-07:00

Image via Wikipedia

Carl Edwards outran his Roush Fenway teammate Ricky Stenhouse Jr. to win Saturday's Alliance Truck Parts 250 at Michigan International Speedway. It was Edward's fourth Nationwide Series win of the season and the 33rd of his career.

Stenhouse passed Edwards for the lead with 21 laps to go, but Edwards ran him down and the two dueled for the win in the closing laps before Edwards finally retook the lead with less than ten laps to go and pulled away for a 1.669 second victory. Edwards led a race-high 62 (of 125) laps, including the final eight.

Stenhouse finished second to give Roush Fenway a 1-2 finish. Kyle Busch finished third, followed by Paul Menard and Trevor Bayne. (Race results)

Mark Martin was on pit road when the third and final caution of the day flew over Aric Almirola's spin in Turn Two. Martin inherited the lead when the leaders else pitted during the caution, but he fell back and finished seventh.

Stenhouse took over the lead in the series points standings, two points ahead of Elliott Sadler, who finished eighth. Reed Sorenson recovered from a early pit road commitment line violation and pass-through penalty to finish 11th, but fell from first to third in the standings, four points behind Stenhouse. Justin Allgaier is fourth, 17 points back. Aric Almirola and Jason Leffler are tied for fifth, 54 points behind Stenhouse.

Cup -- Penalties for Kyle Busch

2011-06-14T01:50:00.000-07:00

Image by fdtate via Flickr

Kyle Busch's No. 18 car failed post-race inspection at Pocono Raceway. In the past, penalties for such violations were announced on the following Tuesday, but NASCAR moved it up a day and announced Busch's penalties Monday.

The car was about 1/16th of an inch too low on the left front, violating Sections 12-1 (actions detrimental to stock car racing); 12-4-J (any determination by NASCAR officials that race equipment used in the event does not conform to NASCAR rules); and 20-12.8.1B (body height requirements - car failed to meet the minimum front car heights) of the 2011 NASCAR rule book.

Busch was docked six driver points. Car owner Joe Gibbs was docked six owner points. Crew chief Dave Rogers was fined $25,000. This is the first such technical violation since NASCAR adopted a new points system at the beginning of the season.

Busch finished third in Sunday's 5-Hour Energy 500. He remains fifth in the series points standings, now 31 points behind Carl Edwards.

MLB -- Heating Up

2011-06-12T22:43:00.000-07:00

Image by Getty Images via @daylife

Have you checked out the baseball standings lately? Six divisions and the biggest lead heading into the middle of June is two games. This could shape up to be a very interesting season. I think I'm going to have to start paying more attention.

The Atlanta Braves have put together a six-game winning streak, and moved solidly into second place in the National League East, just two games behind the Phillies, who have the best record in baseball at the moment. The Braves offense still scares me quite a bit, but it has shown some signs of life during the streak. The Braves are winning most of these with great pitching. They beat the Astros 4-1 Sunday; Tommy Hanson struck out 14 to get his third win in a row. The Braves go for the four-game sweep Monday.

In the National League Central, the Brewers just completed a three-game sweep of the Cardinals to move ahead of them by a half-game. Prince Fielder hit a 440-foot, 2-run blast for today's 4-3 win.

The Giants lead the Diamondbacks by one game in the National League West. Arizona plays Florida Monday, then hosts a three-game set with the Giants.

The Red Sox have the best record in the American League and the biggest lead, two games over the Yankees in the East. In the West, the Rangers have a 1 1/2 game lead over the Mariners. The Indians have lost four in a row and now their lead in the Central is down to just percentage points over the Tigers. And on top of all that, Derek Jeter is now just seven hits away from becoming the 28th member of the 3000-hit club.

Fasten your seatbelts!

Cup - Gordon Wins at Pocono

2011-06-12T21:56:00.000-07:00

Image via Wikipedia

Jeff Gordon won Sunday's 5-Hour Energy 500 at Pocono Raceway. His crew was able to get him out the pits ahead of Kurt Busch under caution on Lap 156 (of 200), then increased his lead on a later green-flag stop. Gordon beat the elder Busch to the line by 2.965 seconds.

It was Gordon's 84th career Sprint Cup victory, tying him with Darrell Waltrip and Bobby Allison for third on the all-time wins list. It was his second win of the season, solidifying his chances of making the Chase as at least a wild-card entry. This is the first time since 2007 that Gordon has won multiple times in a season. It was his fifth victory at Pocono, tying Bill Elliott for most wins at the track.

Kyle Busch was third, but his car failed post-race inspection. It was too low in the front end. Penalties should be announced Tuesday. This will be the first penalty assessed under the new points system. Jimmie Johnson was fourth; Kevin Harvick fifth. (Race results)

Harvick tangled with Kyle Busch very early in the race, running him very low on the track on the front straightaway on the second lap, then bumping and banging with him a few laps later. NASCAR stepped in and reminded both teams that they still had a week of probation left after their run-in at Darlington and warned them that they were being watched. There were no further run-ins after that.

Harvick says that Busch "knows he's got one coming. I just wanted him to think about it. Busch said, "It's not my fight. He's trying to turn it into one."

It was a clean race. There were just four cautions, all for debris. Greg Biffle had the most interesting ride. He spun coming out of Turn Three and went sideways through some traffic, past the commitment cone marking the entrance to pit road. He didn't hit anything so the race stayed green. Biffle pitted for four fresh tires and got back to it.

Mechanical problems were the big story of the day. NASCAR changed the gear ratio which necessitated more shifting, adding to teams' woes. Series points leader Carl Edward broke a valve and spent most of the day in the garage, finishing 37th, 141 laps down. Both Stewart-Haas Racing cars, Tony Stewart's and Ryan Newman's, lost third gear. Marcos Ambrose, Brad Keselowski and Juan Montoya also had transmission problems.

Denny Hamlin had a strong race car. He led a race-high 76 laps and appeared to be on his way to his fifth win at the track. But bad luck found him again, a common theme this season. On a caution-flag stop on Lap 156, something sheared off the valve stem on his left rear tire. He had to come all the way back around to change it and was mired back in the field. A part of the shredded tire got wrapped around the brake lines, leaving Hamlin without brakes late in the race. He finished a disappointing 19th.

The top seven positions in the series points standings remained the same, but Edwards's lead over Johnson shrank by 34 points. Johnson is just six points behind now. Dale Earnhardt Jr. (-10), Harvick (-11), and Kyle Busch (-25) round out the Top 5. Kurt Busch is sixth, followed by Matt Kenseth, Clint Bowyer, Stewart and Newman. Gordon moves up two spots to eleventh, just six points behind Stewart and Newman.

From the Twitter Machine

2011-06-12T21:53:00.001-07:00

The 11 guys pulled this off the rear end housing. http://twitpic.com/5aqebuSun Jun 12 21:04:38 via Seesmic for AndroidMarty Smith
MartySmithESPN

24 HEURES DU MANS 2011

2011-06-12T02:20:00.001-07:00

24 HEURES DU MANS 2011, a photo by geoffroy.barre on Flickr.

Wow! An amazing photo from the 24 Hours of Le Mans. They were very lucky that no one was seriously hurt in the car or in the photographers' area.

Trucks -- Black Flag Gives Hornaday a Texas Win

2011-06-12T00:41:00.000-07:00

Image via Wikipedia

Ron Hornaday won the WinStar World Casino 400k at Texas Motor Speedway Friday night when Johnny Sauter was black-flagged for changing lanes on the final restart.

Sauter took the lead from Hornaday on Lap 130 (of a scheduled 167), but was penalized for moving down in front of Hornaday on a green-white-checkered restart before crossing the start/finish line. Both Sauter and Hornaday spun their tires on the restart. Sauter finished ahead of the field, but was shown the black flag at the stripe; he was scored with a 22nd-place finish, the last car on the lead lap. Sauter later contended that he left Hornaday a lane to race in, but doesn't have much of a case.

It was Hornaday's 48th career Camping World Truck Series win, the first of the season, and his third at the track. The race went one lap beyond the scheduled distance.

Since this week's Cup race is 1500 miles away in Pocono, this was a exclusively a Truck Series regular affair. Rookie Parker Klingerman, making just his tenth career series start, finished second. David Mayhew was third for a new career-best finish. Brian Ickler recovered from a spin of Lap 50 that put him a lap down to finish fourth in his first start of the season. Rookie Joey Coulter was fifth, matching his career-best finish set last week at Kansas. (Race results)

Sauter still managed to increase his lead in the series points standings by eight points. He now leads Cole Whitt, who finished 28th, by 20 points. Hornaday (-33) jumped three spots into third, followed by Austin Dillon (-35) and Matt Crafton (-41).

The Fight or Altercation or Whatever It Was

2011-06-06T00:11:00.000-07:00

If you're a NASCAR fan, you're probably aware that there was an altercation between Richard Childress and Kyle Busch after Saturday's Truck race. I was trying to wait to say anything about it until I knew more about what happened. Finally, it looks like some facts are coming out.

Busch, who owns his own Truck team, was racing hard for fifth position with Joey Coulter, who was driving a Childress-owned truck. Coulter won the position, finishing ahead of Busch. On the cooldown lap, Busch pulled alongside Coulter and their trucks bumped.

It may or may not have been a congratulatory tap; Busch claims it was, several stories on the incident have said that Busch was showing his displeasure but I've haven't heard anything to see how they draw that conclusion. In any case, that kind of bumping is quite common on cooldown laps.

But Childress didn't like it. He and Busch have had several disagreements over Busch damaging RCR equipment. There has been some history between Busch and RCR drivers, most recently at Darlington with the pit road/unattended car incident. After Saturday's Truck race, the 65-year-old Childress put the 26-year-old Busch in a headlock and punched him three times.

NASCAR president Mike Helton gave a statement Sunday morning in which he cleared Busch of any wrongdoing: "We've concluded that the driver of the No. 18 truck, Kyle Busch, did nothing to provoke or to cause the reactions that, in our opinion, would have violated probation. He did nothing that would have warranted the actions of Richard Childress."

Childress was not ejected from the track, but his movements were restricted during Sunday's STP 400. He was not allowed on pit road. It looks like more penalties might be forthcoming. NASCAR met with Busch, Childress, and Joe Gibbs, the owner of Busch's Cup car, then issued a harsher statement than the earlier Helton statement, including...

"Richard Childress' actions were not appropriate and fell far short of the standard we expect of owners in this sport. We have met with Childress this morning and made our position very clear to him. Further, we expect he will make it clear to all in his organization to ensure this situation does not escalate any further. We will announce our actions [in] regard [to] this incident Monday.

"Kyle Busch remains on probation with NASCAR, and we continue to watch his actions carefully. However, we have determined that Kyle's involvement in this incident does not violate his probation, and no further action is required."

Busch and RCR driver Kevin Harvick are on probation until June 15 for the incident at Darlington.

From the Twitter Thingy

2011-06-05T21:46:00.000-07:00

Jimmie Johnson, a few hours after the race...

Man... came home to a house with no power. Tonight should be fun.Mon Jun 06 00:21:46 via Twitter for AndroidJimmie Johnson
JimmieJohnson

A little later, there was this...

Yes the power bill has been paid (Haha) and I have my gen up and running now. We have a few things working... my beer is cold so I'm happy.Mon Jun 06 00:57:55 via Twitter for AndroidJimmie Johnson
JimmieJohnson

Cup -- Keselowski's Fuel Strategy Pays Off at Kansas

2011-06-05T21:27:00.000-07:00

Image via Wikipedia

Brad Keselowski's fuel strategy paid off with a win in Sunday's STP 400 at Kansas Speedway. Keselowski got 57 laps out of his final tank of gas and finished 2.813 seconds ahead of Dale Earnhardt Jr.

Just like last week's Sprint Cup race at Charlotte, a long green flag run at the end made it a fuel mileage race. And also like last week, Earnhardt came up on the wrong end of the fuel strategy game. Junior ran out of gas on the way to the win at Charlotte and coasted home with in seventh place. This week, he finished second waiting for Keselowski to run out.

It was Keselowski's second Cup win; he got his first win at Talladega in April 2009, sixty races ago. His previous best finish at Kansas Speedway was 13th in 2009.

Earnhardt should have had enough gas to move up and put some pressure on Keselowski. Earnhardt made his last stop on Lap 215, five laps later than Keselowski. But he was in fuel conservation mode at the end and didn't try to force the issue. The same was true of Denny Hamlin, who, like Earnhardt, also ran out of gas at Charlotte. Hamlin also had to conserve at the end and finished third.

Jeff Gordon finished fourth. Carl Edwards was fifth. They were the top finishers among those that had to top off with gas in the closing laps. (Race results)

Tony Stewart appeared to have the winning strategy. He pitted on the same lap as Keselowski and had a big lead, but his crew finally decided they didn't get enough gas in the car. He pitted for a splash in the closing laps and finished eighth.

Polesitter Kurt Busch dominated, leading 152 of the 267 laps, including most of the latter stage of the race. He didn't get the caution he was looking for, and his final splash of gas gave him a ninth-place finish.

Edwards's lead in the series points standings got four points larger. He now leads Jimmie Johnson by 40 points. Earnhardt moved into third place, just one point behind Johnson. After an eleventh-place finish, Kevin Harvick dropped two spots to fourth, 43 points behind Edwards. Kyle Busch is fifth, 60 points back.

Kurt Busch, Matt Kenseth, Tony Stewart, Clint Bowyer and Ryan Newman round out the Top Ten. Hamlin is eleventh, just one point behind Newman, and Greg Biffle is just five points out. Jeff Gordon could claim one wildcard spot in the Chase. Keselowski is now seven points behind Paul Menard to crack the Top Twenty; if so, Sunday's win would make him eligible for the other wildcard spot.

Nationwide -- Allgaier Coasts to Victory at Chicagoland

2011-06-04T21:22:00.000-07:00

Image by Getty Images via @daylife

Justin Allgaier coasted to the win in Saturday night's STP 300 at Chicagoland Speedway, finishing 1.719 seconds ahead of Carl Edwards. Both Allgaier and Edwards ran out of gas on the final lap, but Allgaier ran out a few seconds after Edwards and had enough momentum to coast to the stripe.

It was Allgaier's second career Nationwide Series win, and the second win of the season for a Nationwide-only driver. It was Allgaier's first win at Chicagoland, the hometown track for the Riverton, Illinois, native.

With a long green run at the end, fuel became an issue for a lot of the field. Carl Edwards dominated the race, leading 144 of the 200 laps, but it appeared to be a two-car race with Edwards battling Elliott Sadler for most of the final quarter of the race. Edwards finally got around Sadler and led 24 of the final 25 laps. Allgaier was running a distant third, but was slowly reeling in the leaders as the laps wound down. Sadler had to pit with a tire going down with just six laps to go, ending his hopes for a victory.

As they began the final lap, Allgaier was close behind Edwards. Edwards ran out of gas as they were going into Turn Three. Allgaier swerved around him, then ran about 100 yards further before running of of gas himself.

Trevor Bayne, who made his return to the track after a six-race layoff due to a mysterious illness, finished third, the first car still under power. After the race, he lamented that maybe his team had tried to conserve too much gas at the end. If they had run a little harder sooner they might have been able to take advantage of the race leaders running out of gas in front of them. Aric Almirola finished fourth, Jason Leffler fifth. Allgaier, Bayne, Almirola and Leffler all scored their highest Nationwide finishes of the season. (Race results)

The tire going down cost Sadler the lead in the series points standings. Reed Sorenson, who finished sixth, moved ahead of Sadler, who finished 11th, by two points. Ricky Stenhouse Jr. (-6) is now third, followed by Allgaier (-11) and Almirola (-46).

Trucks -- Bowyer Dominates at Kansas

2011-06-04T17:12:00.000-07:00

Image via Wikipedia

Kansas native Clint Bowyer dominated Saturday's O'Reilly Auto Parts 250 at Kansas Speedway. Bowyer led 124 (of 167) laps and cruised to a 1.695-second victory over Johnny Sauter.

Bowyer picked up his third career victory in just his eleventh start in the Camping World Truck Series. It was his first start at Kansas Speedway. It was his first victory in front of his hometown crowd in any NASCAR national series. He has two second place finishes at the track -- one in the 2007 Cup race and one in the 2008 Nationwide race.

Bowyer's only real snag occurred on a restart on Lap 112. Bowyer pitted and took four tires and enough fuel to finish the race. With the cars that stayed out and those that took just two tires, Bowyer was mired back in 11th position on the restart, but he moved quickly through the traffic and regained the lead on Lap 122.

Bowyer led the final 46 laps. He briefly battled for the lead with Sauter on the final restart on Lap 138 before pulling away to the easy victory.

Todd Bodine finished third, followed by James Buescher and Joey Coulter. (Race results)

Sauter takes over the lead in the series points standings after Cole Whitt's 15th-place finish. Sauter leads Whitt by 12 points. Austin Dillon (-30), who finished 12th, moved ahead of Matt Crafton (-32) to take over the third spot. Timothy Peters (-47) rounds out the Top Five.

A Qualifying Tweek

2011-06-01T02:01:00.000-07:00

NASCAR is still fine-tuning the new rules on qualifying order. On Tuesday they announced a change for the Nationwide and Truck Series effective this weekend.

The order teams qualified used to be set by a random draw. At the start of the season, NASCAR changed the rules, setting the qualifying order by practice speeds with the slowest cars going out first. The cars were split into two groups -- the cars that were locked into the race qualified before the go-or-go-homers. Now, in the Nationwide and Truck Series, starting this weekend at Chicagoland and Kansas respectively, the entire field will be sorted for qualifying based on practice speeds.

Update: NASCAR later announced that the Sprint Cup Series will also make the change, but it won't happen until next weekend at Pocono.

Tweet of the Week

2011-05-30T20:50:00.000-07:00

I hope we can keep it a while! RT @JimmieJohnson: Hey @KevinHarvick, can I have my horseshoe back? Please?Tue May 31 00:11:51 via Seesmic for AndroidKevin Harvick
KevinHarvick

Hope you can follow Twitterese.

Cup -- Harvick Snatches an Improbable Win

2011-05-29T22:02:00.000-07:00

Image via Wikipedia

There was no way NASCAR was going to top what happened today at Indy, right? I don't know; they might have pulled it off.

Kevin Harvick came out of nowhere to win Sunday night's Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway when Dale Earnhardt Jr. ran out of gas the last time down the backstretch.

Just like Indy, it came down to fuel mileage. A lot of cars were running low on gas, and then there's a green-white-checkered finish to push the issue further. Earnhardt and Kasey Kahne were on the front row for the final restart, both a long time past the last win and both running on fumes. Kahne ran out of gas on the restart, stacking up traffic behind him. There were a few cars sliding around and going in the grass, but nobody was hitting much of anything so NASCAR kept it green.

Harvick dove down low around the jam and was suddenly in third. Ahead of him was Denny Hamlin who was trying to chase down Earnhardt. Earnhardt was about a half-mile from breaking a 104-race winning drought. Then, coming down the backstretch for the last time, Earnhardt was suddenly out of gas; Hamlin too, and Harvick scooted by both of them to grab the win. "We'll take them any way we can get them," Harvick said on the radio after the win.

David Ragan finished second, followed by Joey Logano, Kurt Busch and A. J. Allmendinger. Earnhardt coasted home seventh, Hamlin tenth. (Race results)

It looked like Greg Biffle might be headed for a classic Coke 600 victory. His car was junk and the problems were mounting during the day, but when night fell the car came to him and he was gone. But when Jimmie Johnson's engine blew to bring out the final caution with four laps to go, Biffle couldn't go the extra distance and pitted for gas just before the race went green again. During the caution, Harvick got a gas-saving push from his RCR teammates Clint Bowyer and Paul Menard. The green-white-checkered restart extended the race two laps past the regulation 400-lap distance.

Carl Edwards finished 16th, but extended his points lead to 36. Harvick moved up three spots to second. Johnson finished 28th and fell to third, 37 points back. Earnhardt remains fourth, 43 points back. Kyle Busch dropped two spots to fifth, 53 points back. Kurt Busch, Matt Kenseth, Clint Bowyer, Tony Stewart and Ryan Newman round out the top 10. (Points standings)

The Indy 500 -- Wheldon Snatches an Improbable Win

2011-05-29T17:43:00.000-07:00

Image via Wikipedia

Dan Wheldon picked up an improbable, jaw-dropping victory in the 100th Indy 500 Sunday.

It came down to fuel mileage. Danica Patrick led late, but didn't have enough for the end. Neither did Bertrand Baguette. When they pitted for fuel in the closing laps, rookie J. R. Hildebrand inherited the lead. The only question seemed to be if Hildebrand had enough. Then, going into Turn Four, close enough to coast home if he ran out, he went high to go around a lapped car, got up a tad too high and slid right up into the wall. Wheldon took advantage, flying past Hildebrand before the caution came out and grabbing the victory.

Wheldon celebrated in Victory Lane, but IndyCar officials huddled for about two hours before declaring him the official winner. The question seemed to be if Wheldon was in front of Hildebrand before the caution came out freezing the field, but that seemed pretty obvious on a quick replay.

Hildebrand was hoping to be the first rookie to win the Indy 500 since Helio Castroneves in 2001; instead, Wheldon, in a one-race deal with Bryan Herta Autosport, claimed his second Indy 500 victory. Ironically, Hildebrand took Wheldon's ride at Panther Racing this season.

Hildebrand coasted across the line to claim second, followed by Graham Rahal, Tony Kanaan and Scott Dixon. (Race results)

Nationwide -- Charlotte Results

2011-05-28T15:44:00.000-07:00

Image by fdtate via Flickr

Matt Kenseth out-dueled Carl Edwards to win Saturday's Top Gear 300 at Charlotte Motor Speedway. It was Kenseth's first Nationwide Series start this year, and his first in the new Nationwide car.

The race became a battle between Kenseth, Edwards and Kyle Busch, but the two Fords quickly pulled away after the final restart on Lap 154, leaving Busch to settle for third. Kenseth, filling in for Trevor Bayne, passed Edwards on Lap 197 (of 200) and pulled away to win by 0.763 as Edwards ran out of gas coming to the finish line. Roush Fenway Fords have now finished 1-2 in the last two Nationwide races -- a first for the team in the series. Polesitter Ricky Stenhouse Jr. finished fourth to give the team three of the top four finishes. Reed Sorenson finished fifth. (Race results)

Bayne, the 2011 Daytona 500 winner, now seems to be fully recovered from the mysterious illness that sidelined him since April 23. The team set him down for one more week as a precaution, and he's expected to be back on the track for next weekend's race at Chicagoland Speedway. Stenhouse will make his Sprint Cup debut tomorrow subbing for Bayne in the Coca-Cola 600 in the No. 21 Wood Brothers Ford.

Kimi Raikkonen made his Nationwide Series debut. It was not a success. An ill-handling car, a pit road speeding penalty and damage to the front splitter combined to give Raikkonen a 27th-place finish.

Elliott Sadler, who finished tenth, saw his series points lead shrink to just a single point over Stenhouse. Sorenson is just two points back. (Standings)

Indy 500: Bump Day

2011-05-22T22:47:00.000-07:00

Danica Patrick and Marco Andretti finally made it into the 33-car field for the 100th running of the Indianapolis 500, but their Andretti Autosport teammates Mike Conway and Ryan Hunter-Reay were bumped.

Patrick failed a technical inspection after a parts change and had to go to the back of the qualifying line. There she had to sit through a rain delay as the clock ticked down to the close of the qualifying session. She finally got her chance and turned in a four-lap average of 224.861 mph to qualify 26th.

Andretti sat on the bubble as seven drivers tried to claim his spot. Alex Lloyd finally knocked him out with a 223.957 mph run. Andretti got back out on the track and started his run with only 55 seconds left on the clock. He ran 224.628 mph to qualify 28th and knock Hunter-Reay out of the race.

The starting lineup for the May 29 race:

1. Alex Tagliani, Sam Schmidt Motorsports, 227.472 mph
2. Scott Dixon, Ganassi Racing, 227.340 mph
3. Oriol Servia, Newman/Haas Racing, 227.168 mph
4. Townsend Bell, Sam Schmidt Motorsports, 226.887 mph
5. Will Power, Team Penske, 226.773 mph
6. Dan Wheldon, Bryan Herta Autosport, 226.490 mph
7. Buddy Rice, Panther Racing, 225.786 mph
8. Ed Carpenter, Sarah Fisher Racing, 225.121 mph
9. Dario Franchitti, Ganassi Racing, no time (ran out fuel)
10. Takuma Sato, KV Racing Technology-Lotus, 225.736 mph
11. Vitor Meira, A. J. Foyt Racing, 225.590 mph
12. J. R. Hildebrand, Panther Racing, 225.579 mph
13. James Hinchcliffe, Newman/Haas Racing, 225.572 mph
14. Bertrand Baguette, Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing, 225.285 mph
15. Davey Hamilton, Dreyer & Reinbold Racing, 225.250 mph
16. Helio Castroneves, Team Penske, 225.216 mph
17. John Andretti, Andretti Autosport, 224.981 mph
18. E. J. Viso, KV Racing Technology-Lotus, 224.732 mph
19. Bruno Junqueira, A. J. Foyt Racing, 224.691 mph
20. Justin Wilson, Dreyer & Reinbold Racing, 224.511 mph
21. Jay Howard, Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing, 224.483 mph
22. Tomas Scheckter, KV-SH Racing, 224.433 mph
23. Tony Kanaan, KV Racing Technology-Lotus, 224.417 mph
24. Simona De Silvestro, HVM Racing, 224.392 mph
25. Paul Tracy, Dreyer & Reinbold Racing, 224.939 mph
26. Danica Patrick, Andretti Autosport, 224.861 mph
27. Ryan Briscoe, Team Penske, 224.639 mph
28. Marco Andretti, Andretti Autosport, 224.628 mph
29. Charlie Kimball, Ganassi Racing, 224.499 mph
30. Graham Rahal, Ganassi Racing, 224.380 mph
31. Alex Lloyd, Dale Coyne Racing, 223.957 mph
32. Pippa Mann, Conquest Racing, 223.936 mph
33. Ana Beatriz, Dreyer & Reinbold Racing, 223.879 mph

Nationwide -- Iowa Results

2011-05-22T20:40:00.000-07:00

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Ricky Stenhouse Jr held off Carl Edwards and Brad Keselowski to win the John Deere Dealers 250 at Iowa Speedway Sunday. It was Stenhouse's first NASCAR win and the first Nationwide win for a non-Cup driver since Justin Allgaier won at Bristol in March 2010.

Stenhouse and his Roush teammate Edwards swapped the lead several times in the late stages of the race, but Stenhouse took the lead for good on Lap 232 (of 250). Edwards finished second, followed by Keselowski, Reed Sorenson and Elliott Sadler. (Race results)

The race marked the first time that three women competed in the same Nationwide race. Jennifer Jo Cobb was joined by the Cope twins, Angela and Amber, who were making their series debuts. The Cope twins spun out on almost the same spot on the racetrack just a few laps apart -- Angela on Lap 117, Amber on Lap 129. Cobb finished 26th, Angela 28th, and Amber 32nd.

Elliott Sadler still leads the series points standings. Reed Sorenson is second, now just seven points behind. Stenhouse moved into third, just eight points back. Justin Allgaier (-20) dropped to fourth, followed by Jason Leffler (-43).

The Sprint All-Star Race

2011-05-22T01:47:00.000-07:00

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Carl Edwards won the race off pit road, then pulled away on the restart and led every lap of the final ten-lap segment to win the 2011 Sprint All-Star Race at Charlotte Motor Speedway Saturday night.

Edwards won the second and third segments (both 20 laps each) of the four-segment race. After the third segment, the cars lined up on pit road for a ten-minute intermission. The cars then left pit road under yellow, then returned for a mandatory four-tire change. Edwards beat Kyle Busch off pit road, then dominated the final segment, a ten-lap shootout, to win the $1,000,000 grand prize. In all, Edwards won $1,203,300, the largest amount ever in a single All-Star Race.

Edwards beat Busch to the finish by 0.443 seconds. David Reutimann finished third, followed by Tony Stewart and Greg Biffle. Biffle, who won the first segment, a 50-lap affair, led twice for a race-high 46 laps. (All-Star Race results) It was Edwards's first All-Star Race win in six starts. He becomes the eighth different All-Star Race winner in the past eight years.

As All-Star Races go, it was a pretty low-key affair. No drama, no feuding, very few incidents, just a lot of hard racing. There were only two cautions for accidents. Both were one-car slides. The only real incident of the evening occurred on Lap 2 of the preliminary event, the Sprint Showdown. Landon Cassill's left rear tire blew causing him to spin. He came up the track in front of Derrike Cope, who T-boned him in the driver's side door.

Carl Edwards had some issues after winning the race while attempting a celebratory spin through the grass. He went across a paved strip, then, when he hit the grass again, the nose of his car dug in and almost flipped the car over. The front end of his car was destroyed, and NASCAR had to move the Victory Lane celebration to the front straightaway.

Eighteen drivers qualified for the All-Star Race. David Ragan and Brad Keselowski raced their way into the All-Star Race by finishing first and second respectively in the Sprint Showdown. Dale Earnhardt Jr. got into the All-Star Race by winning the fan vote.

NASCAR: Talladega Results

2010-11-01T03:48:00.000-07:00

Image by Getty Images via @daylifeNSCS: Amp Energy Juice 500

It took a few minutes but NASCAR finally decided that Clint Bowyer was the winner of Sunday's Amp Energy 500 at Talladega. After a review of the videos and loop data, they determined that Bowyer was just ahead of his RCR teammate Kevin Harvick when the race ended under caution.

Bowyer was in the inside lane being pushed by Juan Montoya. Harvick was on the outside with David Reutimann glued to his back bumper. As they came to the stripe to take the white flag, Harvick was inches ahead, but a few seconds later, when the caution came out and the field was frozen, Bowyer was just ahead of Harvick.

It was Bowyer's fourth career win, his first at a restrictor-plate race, and his second of the Chase. Montoya finished third, followed by Reutimann and Joey Logano. (Race results)

Bowyer and Harvick almost weren't there at the end. On Lap 141 (of 188) Bowyer got into the rear of Marcos Ambrose in Turn Two, turning him in front of Harvick. Both RCR cars suffered front-end damage, but were able to continue. Harvick made a lengthy pit stop to put tape on the nose of his car.

The race was tame by Talladega standards. There were just five cautions, and one of those was for debris. The only accident that would come close to being a "Big One" was the wreck that brought out the final caution and ended the race a couple of miles too soon. A. J. Allmendinger got the worst of that one. He spun, flipped up on his side, and slammed hard (still on his side) into the inside wall. Tony Stewart, Kasey Kahne, Scott Speed, and David Gilliland were also involved.

On Lap 134, Dale Earnhardt Jr., who led a race-high 24 laps, tried an ill-timed bump draft on Jeff Burton. The contact put Burton into the wall, where he collected Earnhardt, finishing both of their days.

Kyle Busch pushed his JGR teammate Denny Hamlin to the front and was in position to win, but got shuffled back at the end of the race and finished 25th. All of the Roush Fenway Chasers -- Matt Kenseth, Carl Edwards, and Greg Biffle -- suffered the same fate. They finished 16th, 17th, and 19th respectively.

Denny Hamlin's day almost became a disaster to ruin his championship hopes. On Lap 77, while cruising around in the back of the field to stay out of trouble, he lost contact with the pack and fell out of the draft. Running by himself, he fell behind quickly at the rate of about four seconds per lap and was eventually lapped on Lap 105. Once he got back in the main pack, he was able to stay up near the front, and eventually got his lap back during the caution for the Bowyer-Harvick-Ambrose incident on Lap 141.

It was a three-man race for the championship coming into this race, and it's an even tighter three-man race now. In fact, this is the closest race between the top three contenders with three races to go since the Chase format started. Jimmie Johnson, who finished seventh, increased his lead over Denny Hamlin, who finished ninth, from six to 14 points, but Harvick is now just 38 points behind Johnson. Jeff Gordon, who finished eighth, jumped back ahead of Kyle Busch to fourth in the standings, but he's 207 points out. (Points standings)

NCWTS: Mountain Dew 250

Kyle Busch beat Aric Almirola to the line to gain a controversial win in Saturday's Mountain Dew 500 at Talladega. Busch's margin of victory was 0.002 seconds, the closest in Camping World Truck Series history and tying Ricky Craven's win over Kurt Busch in a Cup race at Darlington in 2003 for the closest win in the three national series since the introduction of electronic timing in 1993.

Johnny Sauter finished third, followed by Matt Crafton and Ricky Carmichael. (Race results)

They came out of the final turn in a single-file line with Busch seemingly ready to just push Almirola to the victory, but Sauter went low and Busch went down to block. Sauter gave Busch a push, then moved up high and the three crossed the line side-by-side-by-side. That final push from Sauter got Busch out of shape and his left tires went below the yellow line, out of bounds, as he struggled to keep control. That had Almirola's team complaining that Busch should have been disqualified. NASCAR let it slide.

It was Busch's sixth Truck Series win of the season, his second at Talladega, and the 22nd of his career.

The Big One came on Lap 91. Grant Enfinger bumped series-leader Todd Bodine, turning him and triggering a wild wreck that saw Ron Hornaday's truck flip several times before coming to rest on its roof. Bodine finished 18th and took a big hit in the points standings, but still has a comfortable 216-point lead over Almirola with just three races remaining.

NASCAR Basics: Impound Races

2010-10-29T23:12:00.000-07:00

Image by fdtate via FlickrOn a typical NASCAR race weekend, Sprint Cup drivers will get some practice time in and qualify Friday, followed by more practice Saturday and the race on Sunday. Crewmembers can set up the cars for qualifying, then dial in a race setup. For an impound race, NASCAR usually shifts to Saturday qualifying, then impounds the cars from after qualifying until the start of the race.

At one time impound races comprised over half of the races on the Cup schedule. It was supposed to be a cost cutting move, a balance between the teams that could afford to set up the car twice, once for qualifying and once for racing, and those who had to make due with just one setup.

The number of impound races has been pared down to just a few -- currently, the two Talladega races and the July Daytona race. Television networks, sponsors, track officials and fans wanted to see more on-track activity on a race weekend. Secondarily, the rules seemed to be hurting the poorest teams the most, the ones the rule was designed to help.

The richer teams were able to be more liberal with their setups. Since they were in the Top 35 in owner's points and therefore locked into the race, they didn't have to strain to get all the speed they could in qualifying. The poorer teams, who were more likely to be go-or-go-homers having to get into the race on speed, were forced into qualifying setups that they had to change into race trim on pit road during the race.

When a car is impounded, two crewmembers are allowed in to turn off the electrical switches, take out the radio, check air pressures and cover the cars. They must then leave the garage. On race day, two crewmembers are allowed in to get the car ready for the race. They can connect the oil heater, open the hood, prime the oil system, start the car, move the car out of the garage, open the oil cooler pressure valve if needed, start the engine, close the hood, check and adjust air pressures, tighten the wheels, put the radio back in the car, put in a water bottle, adjust the tape on the front of the car, replace equipment batteries, and add a limited amount of fuel. All other work is forbidden except with NASCAR authorization which is rarely granted.

NASCAR: NSCS -- Martinsville: Tums Fast Relief 500 Results

2010-10-24T21:04:00.000-07:00

Image by Hans J E via FlickrDenny Hamlin rallied to pick up his third straight Sprint Cup Series win at Martinsville Sunday in the Tums Fast Relief 500, Kevin Harvick finished a surprising third, and we're left with the closest points battle with four races to go in the history of the Chase format. And the true wild-card race in the Chase, Talladega, is up next.

The final 98 laps (of 500) were run under green, a benefit to Hamlin whose car was much better on long runs. On the final restart on Lap 402, Harvick led the field to green with Jeff Burton second and Hamlin third. Hamlin got around Burton on Lap 453, then battled Harvick side-by-side for several laps before finally taking the lead for good on Lap 471.

Hamlin started on the pole and led the first ten laps until he was passed by Marcos Ambrose. By the first caution 47 laps in, Hamlin had faded to 12th. But the crew kept working and the track finally came to Hamlin. He beat Mark Martin to the finish by 2.318 seconds. It was Hamlin's 15th career Cup win, his series-leading seventh of the year, and his fourth at Martinsville, including the last three in a row.

Martin's day started out bad, then got much worse before he put on a furious rally at the end to finish second. By Lap 30, Martin was overheating his brakes and had to baby them the rest of the way. On Lap 226, he spun, backing into the wall and doing considerable damage to his car. He fell two laps down and was 18th on the final restart before rallying to a runnerup finish. He was coming hard at the end and might have won if the race had gone ten laps more. Martin said adjustments didn't make much of a difference. "I think the race track just came to us. We had a good setup in the car for the race track when it was rubbered up in the second half of the race."

Harvick, whose previous best at the track was a seventh-place finish, was expected to lose ground in the points battle. His 36th-place start also added to those predictions. But he quickly moved up through the field. By that first caution on Lap 47, he was in ninth, three spots ahead of Hamlin. He stayed near the front for the rest of the race and led most of that last long green flag run until Hamlin and Martin passed him in the closing laps. Harvick also benefited from a crew swap with Clint Bowyer before the race.

After a long, multi-lap battle, Kyle Busch pulled ahead of Johnson in the closing laps to finish fourth. Johnson, whose car was much better on short runs, held on for fifth, followed by Joey Logano. Dale Earnhardt Jr. led 90 laps around the midpoint of the race and finished seventh for just his second top 10 in the last 14 races. Carl Edwards, Jeff Burton and Brad Keselowski rounded out the top 10.

Burton led a race-high 134 laps before fading at the end. After a restart on Lap 364, he got into an on-track feud with Harvick, his RCR teammate. Burton was running on the outside and attempted to cut down in front of Harvick. Harvick cut him off, then accused Burton of cutting him off. Over the radio, he also accused Burton of doing the same thing at Indy and Loudon. A short time later, during another caution, Harvick bumped doors with Burton. For his part, Burton was perplexed: "I have no clue what he could possibly be upset about. I cleared him and turned to the bottom the same way he cleared me on the restart and turned to the bottom. It's Martinsville, that's what you do." Calmer heads eventually prevailed, and Harvick dismissed the dustup in his postrace press conference: "We were just racing."

Another on-track incident put the final dagger in Jeff Gordon's fading championship hopes. On Lap 384, Gordon was trying to nose ahead of Kurt Busch going into Turn Three. He came in too hot and the two got together. Gordon tapped Busch. Busch got loose and Gordon went around him. But Busch accelerated and caught Gordon coming out of Four. He hooked him and spun him down the frontstretch. Gordon lost a lap as his crew tried to repair the damage. He got the lap back, but lost two more on the final green flag run as his damaged car struggled to keep up. Gordon got inside of Busch again in the closing laps and pushed him up the track. Busch lost one spot as a result and finished 16th. Gordon finished 20th.

Other Chase drivers: Matt Kenseth finished 15th, Tony Stewart 24th, Greg Biffle 33rd, and Clint Bowyer 38th. (Race results)

The top three in the points standings have tightened up with Johnson's lead over Hamlin down to just six points. Harvick gained 15 points on Johnson and is now just 62 points behind. Although no one has been eliminated yet, it really is a three-man race with just four races remaining. With his fourth-place finish, Kyle Busch moved into fourth in the standings, 172 points back. Gordon dropped to fifth, 203 points behind Johnson.

NASCAR: NNS -- Gateway: 5-Hour Energy 250 Results

2010-10-24T02:10:00.000-07:00

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When the caution came out in the closing laps of Saturday's Nationwide Series race at Gateway International Raceway, Brad Keselowski came to pit road and took four tires. The gamble paid off as he was able to slice through the competition to win the 5-Hour Energy 250.

Keselowski appeared to be on his way to a second-place finish behind his Penske Racing teammate Justin Allgaier when Danica Patrick spun into the wall after contact from Stephen Wallace. The top three cars -- Allgaier, Keselowski and Carl Edwards -- took four tires and lined up for the restart behind Reed Sorenson and Josh Wise, who stayed out, and Mike Bliss and Jason Leffler, who took two tires. Bliss got into the rear of Sorenson and got him loose, then got by him for the lead. Keselowski pulled even with Bliss with the white flag in sight. His four tires beat Bliss's two through Turns One and Two and he pulled away to win by 0.227 seconds.

It was Keselowski's 12th career Nationwide win, his fifth of the season and his first at Gateway. He had victory in sight in the July race at Gateway, but Carl Edwards punted him into the wall in the final turns, and he finished 14th.

They were three abreast for third place with Allgaier, who led a race-high 88 (of 200) laps, nosing ahead of Leffler and Edwards. (Race results)

With the win, Keselowski has all but locked up the Nationwide Series championship. He now leads Edwards by an insurmountable 485 points with just three races remaining. In fact, Keselowski will clinch the championship in two weeks at Texas if he finishes just nine points better than Edwards. He can also clinch at Texas just by finishing 20th or better. (Points standings)

Keselowski and Edwards started in the back of the field after relief drivers qualified their cars for them. They were busy with Cup practice and qualifying at Martinsville, and showed up just long enough to race. They both quickly worked their way through the field. Keselowski took the lead for the first time on Lap 77. He led four times for 83 laps.

At the midpoint of the race, Scott Wimmer and Ricky Stenhouse Jr. got loose coming out of Turn Four. That triggered an 11-car melee that sent nine cars to the garage. The race was red-flagged for about 20 minutes to clean up the mess.

This might have been the final NASCAR race at Gateway International Raceway. Dover Motorsports, who owns the track, is looking for a buyer and has not requested any racing dates for 2011.

NASCAR: NCWTS -- Martinsville: Kroger 200 Results

2010-10-24T01:01:00.000-07:00

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Ron Hornaday passed Kyle Busch with three laps to go in regulation and held him off on a green-white-checkered restart to win Saturday's Camping World Truck Series race, the Kroger 200, at Martinsville. It was Hornaday's first win ever at Martinsville, his second of the season, and the 47th of his career.

Hornaday passed Busch on Lap 197 (of 200) just before the 11th and final caution of the day came out for Cody Cambensy's spin. NASCAR officials initially had Busch ahead for the final restart, but went to the television replays and reversed themselves. The race went six laps past the scheduled distance.

Todd Bodine, who was racing just hours after the death of his mother, led much of the second half of the race. He was passed by Busch with 25 laps to go and Hornaday soon followed. Bodine hung on to finish third, followed by Jason White and Aric Almirola. (Race results)

Bodine now leads Almirola by 282 points with just four races remaining. If Almirola were to win all four of the remaining races, Bodine would need to average just a 12th-place finish to take home the championship trophy. (Points standings)

Five drivers made their series debuts. B. J. McLeod finished 17th, C. E. Falk 25th, Amber Cope 26th, Angela Cope 30th, and Cambensy 32nd. The Cope twins were two of a record four women in the race with Johanna Long and Jennifer Jo Cobb.

NASCAR: Martinsville Preview

2010-10-23T02:41:00.000-07:00

Image by sidehike via Flickr
All three of NASCAR's national series are in action this weekend. Saturday's Nationwide Series race, the 5-Hour Energy 250 (3 p.m. ET, ESPN2), is at Gateway International Raceway in Madison, Illinois. The other two races -- Saturday's Camping World Truck Series race, the Kroger 200 (12:30 p.m., Speed), and Sunday's Sprint Cup race, the Tums Fast Relief 500 (1 p.m., ESPN) are at Martinsville Speedway in Martinsville, Virginia.

Sunday's Cup race is the sixth in the ten-race Chase for the Sprint Cup, and going in it's looking like a three-man race for the title. Jimmie Johnson leads Denny Hamlin by 41 points with Kevin Harvick in third, 77 points out. Several other drivers still have a shot, but will need a lot of luck between now and the end of the season. Jeff Gordon (-156) is fourth, followed by Kyle Busch and Tony Stewart, both tied at 177 points out. (Points standings)

Johnson and Hamlin have combined to win the past eight races at Martinsville. Hamlin won three of them including the past two. Gordon leads all active drivers with seven wins at the track, but hasn't won since sweeping both races in 2005. Johnson is right behind him with six Martinsville wins. They both have a long way to go to match the King's record; Richard Petty has 15 wins there.

Hamlin started the weekend off right by winning the pole for Sunday's race. In Friday qualifying he turned a lap of 19.518 seconds (97.018 mph), edging Marcos Ambrose for the pole by just 0.003 seconds. Greg Biffle qualified third, followed by Ryan Newman and Juan Montoya. Montoya's lap was just 0.012 seconds slower than Hamlin's.

In addition to Hamlin and Biffle, only two other Chasers -- Tony Stewart, sixth, and Carl Edwards, seventh -- qualified in the top ten. Gordon starts 11th, Clint Bowyer 17th, Jeff Burton 18th, Johnson 19th, Kyle Busch 26th, Kurt Busch 29th, and Matt Kenseth 32nd. Harvick has his work cut out for him; he starts 36th.
Michael McDowell, Robby Gordon, Terry Cook and Johnny Sauter failed to qualify for the 43-car field. (Race lineup)

Martinsville Speedway is one of the oldest NASCAR tracks. It was on the schedule in the inaugural season of 1949, and is the only track to be on the schedule every year since. At just 0.526 miles, it's also the shortest track, but it packs a lot of excitement in a small package. Drag race down one 800-foot straightaway, make a sharp left around a tight turn with almost no banking, then drag race down the other straightaway to another sharp turn. Repeat for 500 laps or until something, usually brakes, fails.

Saturday's Nationwide race will probably be the last NASCAR race at Gateway. Dover Motorsports, which owns the track, asked for it not to be included on the 2011 Nationwide and Truck Series schedules. It is uncertain if they are trying to sell it or will simply shut it down.

Barring a rainout or some other unforeseen event, Brad Keselowski and Carl Edwards will miss the drivers' meeting and have to start at the rear of the field. They will be spending most of the weekend at Martinsville and will probably show up at Gateway just long enough to jump in their cars and run the race. Keselowski leads Edwards by 450 points and can clinch the Nationwide Series championship if he gains 136 points on Edwards Saturday. Keselowski will win the championship if he averages a 26th-place finish in the four remaining races. Brandon McReynolds and Brad Sweet will be making their Nationwide debuts at Gateway.

Todd Bodine has a commanding 262-point lead over Aric Almirola with five Camping World Truck Series races remaining. Amber and Angela Cope will be making their Truck Series debuts at Martinsville. The 27-year-old nieces of Derrike Cope will be the first twins to compete in the same race in any of the three national NASCAR series.

NASCAR: NSCS -- Charlotte: Bank of America 500 Results

2010-10-17T02:41:00.000-07:00

Image by i heart him via FlickrJamie McMurray got by Kyle Busch on a late restart and pulled away to an easy victory in Saturday night's Bank of America 500 at Charlotte, and Jimmie Johnson added a few more points to his lead in his quest for a fifth straight championship.

McMurray got ahead of Busch coming out of Turn Two on the final restart of the night on Lap 314 (of 334) and pulled away as Busch battled Johnson for second place. McMurray crossed the finish line 1.886 seconds ahead of Busch for his third win of the season, the sixth of his career and his second at Charlotte Motor Speedway. It was only the 13th win by a non-Chase driver in a Chase race since the format was adopted in 2004.

The victory comes almost eight years to the day after McMurray's first career victory. He won at Charlotte in 2002, driving in relief of Sterling Marlin, who had broken his neck in an accident two weeks earlier.

Busch, who led a race-high 217 laps was upset with the runner-up finish. He appeared to be on his way to victory when NASCAR threw a caution for debris on Lap 308. "I don't know what the caution was for. You know, apparently there was a mouse that ran across the race track or something," Busch said. Around the 100-lap mark, Busch had almost a four-second lead on Jeff Gordon when his throttle stuck. That problem eventually resolved itself.

Early on, it looked like it might not be Jimmie Johnson's night. He started tenth, but quickly started falling back with a loose car. It got too loose and he spun it around coming out of Turn Two on Lap 34. He was in the middle of traffic, but somehow managed not to hit anything or get hit. He dropped as far back to 37th, but got up toward the front by staying out when most of the lead lap cars pitted during a caution on Lap 128. He restarted fifth, then moved up to third through a long round of green-flag stops. Johnson finally ran down McMurray and took the lead on Lap 189, holding it for 15 laps until Marco Ambrose spun to bring out a caution that got finally got Johnson back in sequence with everyone else. He was quite happy with his third-place finish.

Denny Hamlin also had to overcome some adversity to finish fourth. Ryan Newman got loose and pounded the wall on the second lap of the race. Hamlin had to slam on the brakes to avoid Newman and flat spotted his tires. After pitting for fresh rubber, he restarted in the rear of the field, but steadily worked his way up toward the front. He finally settled into the top five, but couldn't get the adjustments he needed to challenge for the win.

Only three other Chase drivers finished in the top ten. Greg Biffle finished fifth, Matt Kenseth sixth, and Kevin Harvick eighth.

After putting himself back in championship contention with good runs in the last two races, including a win last week at Fontana, Tony Stewart is back to long odds again. He slowed when Newman spun on Lap 2 and got tagged in the rear by David Gilliland. He made several pit stops to try to repair the damage, but fought an ill-handling car the rest of the night and came home 21st.

Jeff Gordon also had his share of problems. The polesitter led the first seven laps, but fell back with a loose car. On Lap 190, it died on him with a bad alternator. He coasted around to the pits and lost a lap changing out the battery. He got the lap back with the free pass on the caution for Ambrose's spin, but was never happy with the way his car was handling. A pit road speeding penalty on the final stop of the night doomed him to a 23rd-place finish.

Kurt Busch was going for the sweep of the three Charlotte Cup races (including the Sprint All-Star Race), but he spun out on Lap 24. He didn't hit anything, but couldn't quite get going again. He finished 30th, worst of all the Chase drivers.

Other Chase drivers: Carl Edwards finished 12th. Clint Bowyer was 17th. After a spin of his own, Jeff Burton finished 20th. (Race results)

With his third-place finish, Johnson increased his lead over Hamlin to 41 points. Harvick is the only other driver within 100 points of Johnson; he's 77 points down. Gordon stayed in fourth place, but dropped 156 points down. Kyle Busch moved up four spots in the standings to fifth. He's now tied with Stewart, 177 points behind Johnson. With the win McMurray moved past Newman into 13th, best of the non-Chase drivers. (Points standings)

A pre-race stunt caused a fiery mess along the frontstretch of Charlotte Motor Speedway, but no one was injured. Daredevil Spanky Spangler, driving an RV with "Hold my beer. Watch this" spray-painted on the side, was being chased by a police car driven by his son Bryan. There was a series of planned explosions as the vehicles approached a jump, but the bottom of the RV caught fire and landed nose first on some junked cars near the ramps. It took several minutes for rescue workers to pull Spanky from the RV, but he walked to an ambulance that took him to the infield care center. He was treated and released.

NASCAR: NNS -- Charlotte: Dollar General 300 Results

2010-10-16T02:11:00.000-07:00

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Brad Keselowski pulled away from the rest of the field on a restart with eight laps to go to easily win Friday night's Nationwide race at Charlotte Motor Speedway. It was Keselowski's eleventh career win in the series, his fifth win of the season and the second in the new Nationwide car. It was Keselowski's first win at Charlotte.

Keselowski inherited the lead when his crew opted for track position over new tires and he stayed out during a caution on Lap 154 (of 200). Other than a brief battle for the lead with Martin Truex Jr. and a couple of late restarts, he had no problem running the last 56 laps on the same set of tires.

Keselowski crossed the finish line 1.137 seconds ahead of Truex. Justin Allgaier was third. Joey Logano was fourth. Clint Bowyer had the car to challenge Keselowski for the win, but had to rally to finish fifth after a pit road speeding penalty on his final stop. Kyle Busch lead a race-high 84 laps, but faded at the end to finish sixth. (Race results)

That Lap 154 caution, where Keselowski inherited the lead and Bowyer got his speeding penalty, was a strange call by NASCAR to correct a mistake. Brian Scott was given a pass-through penalty for a missing lugnut on Lap 146. When NASCAR officials later determined that there was no missing lugnut, they called the caution to give Scott a chance to get his lap back. Kevin Harvick claimed that the "ghost caution" ruined his strategy and his chance of winning. Harvick fell back on the restart, later pitted for fresh tires and finished tenth. Scott spun out on the front straightaway on Lap 182 to bring out the seventh caution and finished 28th.

Danica Patrick finished 21st, her best showing in nine Nationwide starts. JR Motorsports announced Friday that Patrick will compete in the first four races of the 2011 Nationwide season, including her first trip to Bristol Motor Speedway. She will run a similar schedule to this year's 13-race campaign.

There's no drama in the Nationwide title race now. Go ahead and start engraving Keselowski's name on the trophy. He now leads Carl Edwards, who finished 13th, by 450 points with just four races remaining. (Points standings)

NASCAR: Charlotte Preview

2010-10-15T16:03:00.000-07:00

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A Saturday night Cup race means an accelerated schedule for the weekend. There are two races on the weekend schedule, both at Charlotte Motor Speedway: the Friday night Nationwide race, the Dollar General 300 (7:30 p.m. ET, ESPN2), and Saturday night's Bank of America 500 (7:30 p.m. ET, ABC). The Camping World Truck Series is off yet again, but returns next weekend at Martinsville.

Saturday night's Cup race is the fifth race in the ten-race Chase for the Sprint Cup. Jimmie Johnson increased his points lead last weekend at Fontana; he now leads Denny Hamlin by 36 points. The contenders are now separating themselves from the pretenders. Kevin Harvick (-54) and Jeff Gordon (-85) are the only other drivers within 100 points of the four-time champion, but Tony Stewart lurks back in fifth, just 107 points behind Johnson. (Points standings)

Again, some bad news for those trying to catch Johnson: we're in the middle of a string of Johnson's best tracks. Johnson leads all active drivers with six wins at Charlotte Motor Speedway. His next win at CMS will move him ahead of Bobby Allison and Darryl Waltrip, making him the all-time winner at the track.

Jeff Gordon captured the pole for Saturday night's race in a rare Thursday qualifying session. Gordon ran a lap of 28.192 seconds (191.544 mph) to edge out Carl Edwards (191.455 mph) for the top spot. A. J. Allmendinger qualified third, followed by Mark Martin and Paul Menard. The pole was Gordon's first in almost a year, dating back 34 races to November 2009 at Texas. It was Gordon's eighth pole at Charlotte and the 69th of his career, tying him with Cale Yarborough for third on the all-time list. Gordon has now won a pole in 18 consecutive seasons, tying him with Richard Petty. David Pearson put together a streak of 20 consecutive pole-winning seasons.

Only four Chase drivers qualified in the top 10 -- Gordon, Edwards, Kyle Busch (sixth) and Johnson (tenth). Kurt Busch, who is going for an unprecedented three-race sweep at CMS, starts 15th. Matt Kenseth starts 17th, Jeff Burton 18th, Clint Bowyer 20th, Greg Biffle 22nd, Denny Hamlin 23rd, Kevin Harvick 24th, and Tony Stewart 29th.

Joe Nemechek, Casey Mears, Mike Bliss, Jason Leffler, Kevin Conway and Johnny Sauter failed to make the 43-car field. (Race lineup)

Charlotte Motor Speedway is a 1.5-mile quad-oval with moderate banking -- 24 degrees in the turns and 5 degrees on the straightaway. The 1500 feet back straightaway is the only straight part of the track; the frontstretch has little doglegs before and after the start/finish line. Since drivers spend about two-thirds of a lap turning, downforce wins races here.

NASCAR: NSCS -- Fontana: Pepsi Max 400 Results

2010-10-10T23:54:00.000-07:00

Image by fdtate via Flickr
Tony Stewart earned his first career victory at Auto Club Speedway, winning Sunday's Pepsi Max 400. Jimmie Johnson began pulling away from the rest of the Chase field in the quest for his fifth straight championship.

Stewart's championship hopes were on life support after the first two Chase races. After four, he suddenly finds himself back in contention again. He was buried back in the field throughout the first half of the race, but his crew made the right adjustments and the car came to life in the second half. It was Stewart's second win of the season and the 39th of his career, putting him in a 17th-place tie with Tim Flock on the all-time wins list.

The race turned on a debris caution on Lap 183 (of 200). Paul Menard and Regan Smith took two tires and led the field to green on the restart with 13 to go. Stewart got by Smith a lap later to take the lead, but another caution soon flew when David Ragan slid up the track and pinched Kurt Busch into the wall. That set up a two-lap shootout and Stewart and Johnson led the field to green. Stewart took the high line and got a good push from Clint Bowyer to keep him ahead of Johnson. Bowyer and Johnson battled side-by-side through the final lap for second as Stewart pulled away to win by 0.466 seconds.

Bowyer won the battle and nipped Johnson at the line for second. Kasey Kahne was fourth. Ryan Newman was fifth. (Race results)

After the race, Bowyer seemed disappointed with a second-place finish. He blasted NASCAR for the debris caution, claiming that he would have won easily if the race had stayed green.

Kevin Harvick, Denny Hamlin and Jeff Gordon finished seventh, eighth, and ninth respectively to keep Johnson in sight in the championship hunt, but it wasn't easy for any of them. Harvick and Gordon overcame pit road speeding penalties. Hamlin had to start the race in the rear of the field after his crew changed his transmission after qualifying.

The rest of the Chase contenders had terrible days. After his run-in with Ragan, Kurt Busch limped home in 21st place. That was two spots ahead of Jeff Burton, who ran yet another lackluster race. Kyle Busch's engine blew on Lap 155; he finished 35th.

After all their past success at Fontana, it was surprising to see the whole Roush Fenway Racing organization's title hopes go up in smoke. Greg Biffle's engine blew just 40 laps in, giving him a 41st-place finish. Just a few laps later, Carl Edwards lost power and had to be pushed to the garage. The trouble was finally traced to a distributor problem and he returned to the track to finish 34th. Matt Kenseth also had engine problems. His car was smoking badly at the end, but he nursed it home to finish 30th.

Johnson now leads Hamlin by 36 in the points standings. Harvick (-54) and Gordon (-85) are the only other drivers within 100 points of the four-time champion. With his win and the other Chasers' misfortunes, Stewart climbed five spots in the standings to fifth. He is now 107 points back with six races remaining. Kurt Busch (-140), Edwards (-162), Burton (-177), Kyle Busch (-187), Biffle (-215), Kenseth (-241) and Bowyer (-247) round out the Chase field.

NASCAR: NNS -- Fontana: CampingWorld.com 300 Results

2010-10-10T11:55:00.000-07:00

Image via WikipediaMake it an even dozen for Kyle Busch. He picked up the victory Saturday in the Nationwide Series race at Fontana to extend the record he set last weekend for most series wins in a season to twelve.

Busch battled hard to keep the lead on the final restart then gradually pulled away from the field to win the CampingWorld.com 300, crossing the finish line 1.034 seconds ahead of Brad Keselowski. Kevin Harvick was third, followed by Carl Edwards and Joey Logano. (Race results)

It was Busch's fourth victory at the two-mile track and the 42nd of his career. He is now just six wins behind Mark Martin for the Nationwide Series career win record.

Busch overcame a pit road speeding penalty on Lap 87 (of 150). That dropped him back to 15th, but he worked his way through the field and was back in the lead on Lap 112. This was Busch's third victory of the season after a speeding penalty.

Harvick, who led a race-high 86 laps, had a better car than Busch on the long runs, but was frustrated by slow pit stops that cost him positions. He came into the pits with the lead on Lap 134 (of 150) but came out sixth. Two cautions in the final 17 laps kept him from challenging Busch for the win.

Danica Patrick, starting her eighth Nationwide race and her second at Fontana, was having her best run of the season until misfortune struck again. Just after a restart with the field still tightly packed, Patrick was running 17th, looking for her first Top 15 finish and her first lead lap finish. She got too close to James Buescher and squeezed him into the wall. A lap later she got close to Buescher again and he turned into her rear, turning her into the wall. Ricky Carmichael and Ricky Stenhouse Jr. also got caught up in the incident that brought out the sixth and final caution and set up the five-lap dash to the finish. Patrick would finish 30th.

Keselowski should start clearing out a space in his trophy case. He now leads Edwards by 384 points in the series standings with just five races to go.

NASCAR: Fontana Preview

2010-10-09T03:31:00.000-07:00

Image by duane.schoon via Flickr
This week's NASCAR action takes place in Fontana, California, at Auto Club Speedway. There are two races on tap: Saturday's Nationwide race, the CampingWorld.com 300 (4 p.m. ET, ESPN2) and Sunday's Sprint Cup race, the Pepsi Max 400 (3 p.m. ET, ESPN). The Camping World Truck Series is taking yet another weekend off; they return on October 23 at Martinsville.

Sunday's Cup race is the fourth race in the ten-race Chase for the Sprint Cup. Jimmie Johnson took over the lead in the points standings after last weekend's race at Kansas, but Denny Hamlin is just eight points behind and seven drivers are within 85 points of the four-time champ. Jeff Burton, in ninth place, is just 101 points back. Tony Stewart (-127) and Matt Kenseth (-149) still have faint glimmers of hope.

Clint Bowyer (-252) is just counting the days until the 2011 season after losing his final appeal of his 150-point penalty after his car failed inspection at the NASCAR R&D Center after he won the first Chase race at Loudon. NASCAR chief appellate officer John Middlebrook did reduce the fines and suspensions for the No. 33 team though. Crew chief Shane Wilson's fine was reduced from $150,000 to $100,000 and the suspensions of Wilson and car chief Chad Haney were lowered from six races to four. Richard Childress Racing competition director Scott Miller will be on the pit box for Wilson beginning this weekend.

The bad news for all the drivers chasing Johnson is that Auto Club Speedway is one of his best tracks. He leads all drivers with five wins. Jeff Gordon and Matt Kenseth, both in the Chase, are the only other drivers with multiple wins at the track; they each have three. Johnson is the only driver to win back-to-back races at Fontana; he won earlier in the year in February and last year's October race.

Hendrick Motorsports (nine wins) and Roush Fenway Racing (seven) have won 16 of the 20 Cup races at Fontana. Auto Club Speedway is the only current track where Joe Gibbs Racing does not have a victory.

Jamie McMurray grabbed the pole for Sunday's race in the Friday qualifying session. McMurray ran a lap in 38.859 seconds (185.285 mph). It was his fourth pole of the season and the seven of his career. Elliott Sadler grabbed the other front-row starting spot with a lap of 184.407 mph. Kenseth starts third, the only Chaser in the top five. Juan Montoya starts fourth, Kasey Kahne fifth.

Only two other Chasers start in the top ten -- Greg Biffle starts seventh and Johnson eighth. Bowyer starts 13th, Jeff Burton 15th, Kyle Busch 16th, Gordon 17th, Carl Edwards 20th, Kevin Harvick 21st, Tony Stewart 22nd, Hamlin 34th, and Kurt Busch 38th.

Bobby Labonte claimed the final starting spot by using a past champion's provisional. Mike Bliss and Patrick Carpentier failed to qualify for the 43-car field. (Race lineup)

Auto Club Speedway is very similar to Kansas Speedway, site of last week's race. Both are wide, multi-groove tracks with moderate banking. Where Kansas was a 1.5-mile tri-oval, ACS is a 2-mile D-shaped oval. Auto Club Speedway's layout is almost identical to Michigan International Speedway. There should be a lot of side-by-side racing, but the field might get strung out as the faster cars leave the slower ones behind. The engines run in the high rpm range all day and one or two usually don't make it out alive. This year, in an effort to make the race more competitive, NASCAR reduced the race from 500 to 400 miles.

NASCAR: NSCS -- Kansas: Price Chopper 400 Results

2010-10-04T00:55:00.000-07:00

Image by fdtate via FlickrGreg Biffle cruised to victory and Jimmie Johnson took over the Chase points lead in Sunday's Price Chopper 400 at Kansas Speedway.

Biffle ran in the top 10 most of the day, but fought an ill-handling car. After the team made some adjustments, he took off and finally grabbed the lead on Lap 188 (of 267). That didn't last long; Jamie McMurray and Paul Menard opted for two tires on a yellow-flag stop and came out first and second. Menard got past McMurray and soon had Biffle on his tail. Biffle blew past Menard on the backstretch on Lap 207 (of 267). He briefly relinquished the lead about 30 laps later to make a green-flag pit stop, but was back in front after the field cycled through stops and held it over the final 29 laps.

It was the Biff's 16th career win and his second of the season. He joins Jeff Gordon and Tony Stewart as the only two-time Cup winners at Kansas Speedway. Biffle also picked up a $100,000 bonus from Ford Racing boss Jamie Allison. On Saturday, Allison promised to pay the bonus to any Ford Chase driver -- Biffle, Carl Edwards, or Matt Kenseth -- who won one of the final eight races of the season.

Stewart, who was 162 points out of first coming into this race, declared Saturday, "I have dug myself a pretty big hole" and said he was in "go-for-broke" mode. He was behind Biffle in second in the closing laps, but first Johnson, then Kevin Harvick battled their way past him. While all that was going on, Biffle just extended his lead and beat Johnson to the finish line by 7.638 seconds.

The top seven finishers were all Chase drivers. Harvick finished third, followed by Stewart, Jeff Gordon, Carl Edwards and Matt Kenseth. The other Chasers fought ill-handling cars and did not fare as well. Denny Hamlin finished 12th. Kurt Busch was 13th, Clint Bowyer 15th and Jeff Burton 18th. (Race results)

Kyle Busch finished 21st, worst of all the Chasers, after two on-track incidents with David Reutimann. On Lap 52, Busch was running behind Reutimann coming out of Turn Two. It looked like Reutimann got loose and lifted off the gas, and Busch got into his rear, spinning him into the wall. On Lap 155, with Busch running in the top 10 and Reutimann several laps down, Reutimann pulled alongside Busch and slammed him up against the same wall. Reutimann spun again from the contact, but did considerable damage to Busch's car. Busch and crew chief Dave Rogers finally decided against taking the car to the garage, and just nursed it along the rest of the way to get what they could.

The first incident appeared accidental, though Busch might have just gotten impatient and decided to move Reutimann out of the way. The second incident was clearly intentional. It seems like there was already some bad blood between the two drivers. After the Bristol night race in August, where the pair finished 1-2 with Busch winning, Busch said,

Reutimann was fast, and he was good, and I’m not going to say why I beat him because then he’ll fix it, but it has to do with behind the wheel...He wasn’t driving the place right. I’m sorry. If he fixes how to drive this place, he’d be right there with me.

Reutimann took exception on a radio show later that week, saying it was "the stupidest comment I've ever heard anybody say."

“I don’t know if [it was] the fact that his Superman cape was flying out the back when I was behind him and I couldn’t see or what the deal was. We got beat fair and square. That’s what it comes down to. We just got outrun. Professor Busch, maybe he can start a driving school at Bristol and the rest of the field can join in and go and [he can] show all of us what we’re doing wrong. I need help.”

Reutimann also hinted that he and Busch had had run-ins before.

“It all comes down to the fact that we just don’t like each other very much,” Reutimann said on the show. “It has been a while. We just don’t like each other, and we agree we don’t like each other and we’re both fine with it.”

In any case, on a day when most of the other Chase drivers were finishing high up on the leaderboard, the second incident took Busch out of contention and put a serious damper on his title hopes.

Wrestler Ric Flair was always fond of saying, "To be the man, you've got to beat the man," and Jimmie Johnson's No. 48 team showed why they're the men to beat Sunday. The four-time champ was running 21st at the mid-point of the race, but the team kept working to make the car better and Johnson kept running them down for his second-place finish.

“Honestly, I drove 400 miles with my tongue hanging out – just sawing at the wheel trying to get everything I could. Very pleased to have walked that fine line and didn’t make any mistakes. My crew did the same. [Crew chief] Chad [Knaus] called a great race. We needed all those things to work together in order to get a good finish and we did that.”

Johnson's efforts were good enough to put him in first in the points standings, just eight points ahead of Hamlin, who slipped to second. The standings are a lot tighter after this race with nine drivers within 101 points of the lead. Harvick (-30) and Edwards (-53) jumped two spots to third and fourth respectively. Gordon (-58) jumped three spots to fifth. Kurt Busch (-70) dropped two spots to sixth. Brother Kyle (-80) dropped four spots to seventh. With the win, Biffle moved up one spot in the standings to eighth, but more importantly knocked 55 points off his deficit; he's now 85 points behind Johnson. Burton (-101), Stewart (-127), Kenseth (-149) and Bowyer (-252) round out the Chase field.

Atlanta Braves & the Postseason

2010-10-03T20:11:00.000-07:00

Image by Getty Images via @daylifeOn the last day of the 2010 regular season, everything worked out great for the Atlanta Braves. The two remaining National League races were decided without any of those pesky one-game playoffs.

Three teams -- the Braves, Giants and Padres -- were battling for the two remaining playoff spots -- the NL West title and the wild card. It could have gotten really messy if the Braves and the Padres had both won Sunday. That would have left all three teams with identical 91-71 records, and would have taken two one-game playoffs to resolve. The Giants and Padres would have had to play to resolve the NL West, then the loser would have had to travel to Atlanta for another game to determine the wild card. Luckily, it didn't come to all that.

The Braves led 8-2 after six innings Sunday, but had to hang on to get the 8-7 win over the Phillies. Tim Hudson (17-9) allowed four runs on just two hits in seven innings, and singled to center in the fourth, driving home a run to break a 2-2 tie. Hudson later said, "This being Bobby's last year, losing today was not an option."

Yes, it was Braves' manager Bobby Cox's last regular season game. He finishes his career with a regular season record of 2504-2001. He ranks fourth in wins behind Connie Mack, John McGraw and Tony La Russa.

After the game, Braves' players watched the conclusion of the Giants/Padres game on the clubhouse television. The Giants blanked the Padres, winning the NL East title and giving the wild card to the Braves. The Braves travel to San Francisco to face the Giants in the first round of the playoffs Thursday. The Phillies play the Reds in the other division series. They begin Wednesday in Philadelphia.

We've known for several days that the Yankees and Rays were both in the playoffs, one as the AL East winner and the other as the wild card, we just didn't know which was which. That too was resolved Sunday as the Rays beat the Royals 3-2 in 12 innings and the Red Sox beat the Yankees 8-4. The Rays won the AL East and will host the Rangers. The Yankees will travel to Minnesota. Both series start Wednesday.

SEC Football -- Week Five

2010-10-03T01:38:00.000-07:00

Oh, doctor! The marquee matchup of the day didn't quite live up to expectations, but there was a real doozy of a game in Baton Rouge.

Tennessee came into their game with LSU a two-touchdown underdog, and it looked to be a long afternoon for the Vols when LSU QB Jordan Jefferson scored on an 83-yard run on the Tigers' first offensive play of the game. But Tennessee put together a 7-play, 64-yard drive and Tauren Poole capped it off with a one-yard run that tied the score just before the end of the first quarter. It stayed that way until Josh Jasper kicked a 31-yard field goal for LSU to open the fourth quarter, but Tennessee answered with a touchdown on the next drive to take their first lead of the game at 14-10.

Fast forward to the end when things got really weird. LSU got the ball with a little under six minutes left in the game and started a drive down the field. On second-and-goal on the Tennessee two with 32 seconds left, Jefferson was stopped at the one-yard line, and LSU suddenly seemed to have no idea of what to do next. Players rushed on the field and others rushed off and the LSU was running around trying to get a play called. Tick, tick, tick. Incredibly bad coaching and clock management. LSU C T-Bob Hebert finally just snapped the ball as time was running out. Jefferson wasn't ready for it, and Tennessee's Nick Reveiz fell on it as time expired.

But hold on! The replay booth called down on the field and Tennessee was charged with illegal participation. As players from both teams were running on and off the field, it appeared that four Vols ran on and three headed off, then one of the players that was going off turned around and came back. Thirteen Vols on the field when the ball was snapped. LSU got one more crack at it. Jefferson pitched to Stevan Ridley and he punched it in for the 16-14 LSU win.

As much as I really hate Tennessee, I have to admit that they might have gotten screwed on the first "final" play. LSU did not appear to get set before the ball was snapped, and after the play, when it looked like Tennessee had the win, an LSU lineman snatched his helmet off and threw it to the ground, which should have been a 15-yard unsportsmanlike conduct penalty.

The final sequence really has to be seen to be believed. Click here!

On paper, the marquee matchup of the day seemed to be Alabama vs. Florida, the best of the west vs. the best of the east. On the field, however, it was all Alabama in a 31-6 win. Mark Ingram had two touchdowns, but only rushed for 47 yards. Marquis Maze threw a 19-yard touchdown pass to Michael Williams out of the wildcat formation. And C. J. Mosely had a 35-yard interception return for another touchdown. The final stats were actually pretty close, but four turnovers -- three interceptions and a fumble -- killed any chance Florida had of getting back in the game. Two of the turnovers came with Florida deep in Alabama territory.

Georgia's losing streak is now at four for the first time since 1990. The Bulldogs were down two to Colorado in the closing minutes, but were within field goal range. They were just trying to run the clock down and maybe punch out a few more yards. But Colorado turned LB B. J. Beatty loose on a blitz. He got to Caleb King in the Georgia backfield just as he was taking the handoff and stripped the ball loose. Colorado fell on it to preserve the 29-27 win.

The scores:

#1 Alabama 31, #7 Florida 6
#10 Auburn 52, Louisiana-Monroe 3
#12 LSU 16, Tennessee 14
Mississippi 42, Kentucky 35
Colorado 29, Georgia 27
Mississippi State 49, Alcorn State 16
Connecticut 40, Vanderbilt 21

NASCAR: NNS -- Kansas: Kansas Lottery 300 Results

2010-10-02T22:51:00.000-07:00

Image by Getty Images via @daylife
Joey Logano got by Kyle Busch on the next-to-last restart with seven laps remaining, and a big push from Brad Keselowski on the final restart helped him seal the deal in Saturday's Nationwide Series race at Kansas Speedway.

Mike Wallace was a few laps short on fuel, but seemed to be trying to stretch it to the end. He finally thought better of it and pitted after Trevor Bayne spun off in Turn Two to bring out the seventh caution of the afternoon. That gave the lead to Busch on the restart, but Logano got inside of him and forced him up the track. Busch had to lift and Logano took the lead, but Aric Almirola crashed in Turns Three and Four one lap later to set up the final restart with just two laps to go.

Logano took the high line and got a big push from Brad Keselowski to stay in front of Busch and the rest of the field for the win. It was Logano's eighth career Nationwide win, his second of the season, and his second in just three starts at Kansas.

Keselowski got by Busch off the final corner to take second. Busch finished third, followed by Kevin Harvick and Martin Truex Jr. fifth. (Race results)

Busch, who led a race-high 64 laps, showed his displeasure with Logano's pass by bumping him in the rear after the final caution flew.

Keselowski extended his lead in the points standings to 374 points over Carl Edwards, who finished 14th. That's an almost insurmountable lead with just six races remaining in the season.

Ricky Carmichael made his Nationwide Series debut, finishing 18th.

Atlanta Braves -- A Fine Mess

2010-10-02T20:13:00.000-07:00

Image via WikipediaSince I started this blog a few weeks ago, I've avoided any talk of the Atlanta Braves mainly through a desire not to jinx them as they've steadily fallen in the standings.

It wasn't that long ago that they had a pretty sizable lead in the NL East -- maybe as high as eight or nine games. But injuries caught up with them and the lead started dwindling away. As the Braves cooled off, the Phillies got hot. The Braves' division lead got smaller and smaller until the Phillies finally caught them and left them in the dust. The Phillies clinched the division a few days ago.

But the Braves always had the wild card to fall back on. Just two days ago, they had a two game lead over the Padres with just three games left in the regular season. After two more losses to the Phillies and two Padres wins over the Giants, the Braves and Padres are now tied for the wild card with only one game left for each team.

On Saturday, a crowd of 54,296 (a Turner Field regular season record) turned out to watch the Braves pay an emotional pregame tribute to retiring manager Bobby Cox. Afterwards, the Braves promptly went out and lost 7-0. The game was scoreless until the 7th and (for the second straight game) turned on a throwing error by Brooks Conrad.

To further complicate matters, the Padres are also battling the Giants for the NL West title. The Giants are now 91-70 and lead that division by just one game. The Braves and Padres are 90-71.

A few scenarios for the last day of the regular season:

The Braves have to be rooting for the Giants to avoid the sweep at the hands of the Padres. If they do and the Braves win, the Giants win the NL West and the Braves win the wild card.

If the Giants win and the Braves lose, the Braves and Padres will play in Atlanta Monday to determine the wild card.

If the Padres win and the Braves lose, the Padres will win the NL West and the Giants will win the wild card.

If the Padres and Braves both win, all three teams will finish with 91-71 records. The Padres and Giants would play Monday to determine the NL West winner. The loser would travel to Atlanta for a game Tuesday to determine the wild card.

As much as I would like to see the Braves win one more World Series title for Bobby, I just don't see it happening. If they even make the playoffs (which is looking more and more doubtful by the minute), I don't think they will advance very far. They've especially had troubles with the Phillies lately and just won't be able to match up if they both advance to play for the league championship.

Tim Hudson (16-9) gets the crucial start for the Braves Sunday. Cole Hamels (12-11) will get the start for the Phillies, but is expected to stay in the game for just a couple of innings, a little tuneup for the postseason. Roy Oswalt (13-13) should also get a few innings in. Mat Latos (14-9) starts for the Padres against the Giants' Jonathan Sanchez (12-9).

NASCAR: Kansas Preview

2010-10-02T03:38:00.000-07:00

Image via Wikipedia
The Camping World Truck Series is idle until October 23, so there are just two races on the schedule this weekend -- both at Kansas Speedway, just outside of Kansas City, Kansas. The Nationwide Series race, the Kansas Lottery 300, takes place Saturday afternoon at 3 p.m. ET (ESPN2). The Sprint Cup race, the Price Chopper 400 presented by Kraft Foods, kicks off Sunday at 1 p.m. ET (ESPN).

The Cup race is the third in the ten-race Chase for the Sprint Cup. After his dominating win last week at Dover, Jimmie Johnson seems like the odds-on favorite to win his fifth straight Cup championship, but he still trails Denny Hamlin by 35 points. And six other drivers are still within 83 points of the lead, so a lot can happen between now and Homestead in November.

Two points to keep in mind: since the Chase format began, no driver who has led in the points after two races has gone on to win the championship, but no driver has ever had as big a lead as Hamlin after two races.

Greg Biffle (-140), Tony Stewart (-162), Matt Kenseth (-165) and Clint Bowyer (-235) are technically still alive for the championship, but on life support.

Bowyer, who had his 150-point penalty upheld Wednesday after failing inspection at the R&D Center after his win at Loudon, still has one final appeal left with NASCAR chief appellate officer John Middlebrook. Bowyer is convinced that he has no chance of winning that final appeal and therefore has no chance of winning the championship this year. He is vowing to help his RCR teammates Kevin Harvick and Jeff Burton, and might end up doing a little research and development on the track for them. Meanwhile, an analyst who testified for RCR at Wednesday's appeal showed that the wrecker that pushed Bowyer to Victory Lane could have caused the inspection violation. Dr. Charles Manning of Accident Reconstruction Analysis called NASCAR's arguments against his analysis "a bunch of malarkey."

It will be an all-Richard Petty Motorsports front row Sunday. Kasey Kahne turned a lap in 30.920 seconds (174.644 mph) in Friday's qualifying session to grab the pole. His RPM teammate Paul Menard will start in the second spot after his lap of 30.951 seconds. It will be the first time two Petty cars will lead the field to green. It's the 19th pole in Kahne's career and his third for the season, tying Jamie McMurray for the series lead.

Jeff Gordon starts third, followed by Joey Logano and Greg Biffle. Only four Chasers start in the top 10 -- in addition to Gordon and Biffle, Kenseth starts eighth, and Kurt Busch starts ninth. Hamlin starts 12th, Stewart 14th, Kyle Busch 19th, Johnson 21st, Burton 23rd, Harvick 24th, Bowyer 27th and Carl Edwards 31st.

Joe Nemechek, Mike Bliss and Jason Leffler failed to qualify for the 43-car field. (Race lineup)

Kansas Speedway is a 1.5-mile, D-shaped tri-oval. There are several tracks of differing sizes with a very similar layout on the Cup circuit. When the track first opened, the racing was fairly boring because drivers could only run in one groove and it was so hard to pass. As the surface has aged, the track has become multi-grooved and the passing is much easier. There have only been nine Cup races at Kansas Speedway. Jeff Gordon and Tony Stewart lead all drivers with two wins each.

NASCAR: NSCS -- Dover: AAA 400 Results

2010-09-27T00:44:00.000-07:00

Image via Wikipedia
Jimmie Johnson took a big step towards his fifth straight Sprint Cup championship this weekend at Dover. Johnson won the pole, led five times for a race-high 191 (of 400) laps and beat Jeff Burton to the finish line by 2.637 seconds.

It was Johnson's sixth career win at Dover, most among active drivers, and his third victory in the last four races at the track. It was Johnson's sixth win of the season and the 53rd of his career. Johnson has now won 19 of the 62 Chase races he has been in.

Johnson passed Kyle Busch for the lead on Lap 337 and held it until a green flag pit stop on Lap 363. After the field cycled through stops, Johnson was back in the lead again and pulled away for the win.

Five of the top 6 finishers were Chase drivers. Kurt Busch overcame a speeding penalty to finish fourth, followed by Carl Edwards and Kyle Busch. Joey Logano finished third to break up the streak. (Race results)

A. J. Allmendinger seemed to be the only driver who could compete with Johnson. He started second and led three times for a career-high 146 laps, but a flat tire put him two laps down. He rallied to a tenth-place finish.

How quickly the tide can turn in NASCAR. Last week at Loudon, Tony Stewart and Clint Bowyer were running 1-2 in the closing laps and looked like strong Chase contenders. Stewart ran out of gas just before taking the white flag and fell to 24th. Bowyer won, but was penalized 150 points when his car failed inspection. At Dover, the misfortunes continued. Both drivers were caught speeding on pit road and couldn't make up their laps. Stewart finished 21st; Bowyer 25th. Now, both drivers are virtually out of the title hunt.

Matt Kenseth got on the brakes too hard trying to get on pit road and blew a tire. He finished 18th. After his second mediocre finish in two Chase races, his title hopes are just about done too. His Roush teammate Greg Biffle finished just behind him in 19th. He was on pit road when a caution came out and lost a lap as a result.

Jeff Gordon had a good run, but lost a lot of time on the final pit stop when a tire changer dropped a lug nut. His car was too loose at the end, and he fell back to finish eleventh. Kevin Harvick also had handling problems at the end and finished 15th.

Denny Hamlin was quite satisfied with a ninth-place finish at one of his worst tracks. That allowed him to hang on to the series lead in the points standings. Johnson moved up four spots to second, 35 points back. Kyle Busch remains in third, 45 points back. Kurt Busch (-59) climbed one spot to fourth. Harvick (-65) dropped three spots to fifth. The top eight -- including Edwards, Burton and Gordon -- are within 83 points of Hamlin.

Hamlin had an eventful few days at Dover. He made quite a few disparaging comments about Richard Childress Racing to the media Friday regarding Clint Bowyer's penalty and the excuses offered up. Harvick took exception and purposefully ran into Hamlin during a practice session Saturday. Both drivers took their cars to the garage to bang out the sheet metal. Since they were 1-2 in points at the time, they had side-by-side stalls in the garage and took the opportunity to air out their differences in a little shouting match. JGR president J. D. Gibbs later told Hamlin something along the lines of "The next time you have a thought, keep it to yourself."

Meanwhile, RCR's appeal of the penalties is set for Wednesday. The numbers are not on their side. There have been 132 appeals since 1999. 88 were upheld, and only 42 were reduced or overturned. In two cases, the penalties were increased. No penalties have been overturned in six appeals this season. If RCR loses the appeal they can make one final appeal to the NASCAR chief appellate officer, John Middlebrook.

SEC Football -- Week Four

2010-09-26T23:04:00.000-07:00

It was a big week in the SEC with three games between Top 25 teams, two of them intra-conference affairs.

Alabama survived a scare on the road at Arkansas. Just like last week at Georgia, Arkansas was able to get the lead early, but wasn't able to hold it. In the Georgia game, Razorback QB Ryan Mallott was able to make the big play late to pull it out; against Alabama, not so much. Alabama overcame a 13-point deficit and took their first lead with just 3:18 to play, Mark Ingram scoring on a 1-yard run. Two first-year starters in the secondary made big interceptions late for Alabama: Robert Lester's second pick of the day put Alabama in position for the go-ahead score, and Dre Kirkpatrick's pick, on a ball that Mallott was trying to throw away, allowed Alabama to run out the clock on a 24-20 win.

Auburn fell behind South Carolina 20-7, but forced four fourth-quarter turnovers to get the 35-27 win. After Stephen Garcia fumbled twice to end Gamecock drives, the quarterback was pulled for freshman backup Connor Shaw. Shaw led the Gamecocks deep into Auburn territory twice in the closing minutes, but threw interceptions to end both drives. Auburn QB Cameron Newton rushed for 176 yards and three touchdowns and threw for two more.

Defense and special teams carried LSU over West Virginia. The D held the Mountaineers to just 178 total yards. Tiger CB Patrick Peterson returned a punt 60 yards for a touchdown and blocked a field goal. LSU continues to struggle through the air: QB Jordan Jefferson has now thrown for less than 100 yards and no touchdowns in three straight games.

Mississippi State broke a nine-game losing streak against Georgia that dated back to 1974 with a 24-12 win. Georgia is now 0-3 in conference play for the first time since 1993.

Tennessee led Alabama-Birmingham 23-7 at the half and it looked like it was going to be an easy win for the Volunteers, but the Blazers stormed back with two touchdowns and two two-point conversions to send the game to overtime. After trading field goals in the first overtime session, UAB settled for a field goal again in the second. On Tennessee's first play of the second overtime, Matt Sims hooked up with Denarius Moore for a 25-yard TD pass and the 32-29 win. UAB dominated Tennessee in nearly every facet of the game, but kicker Josh Zahn missed four field goals in the loss.

The scores:

#1 Alabama 24, #10 Arkansas 20
#9 Florida 48, Kentucky 14
#17 Auburn 35, #12 South Carolina 27
#15 LSU 20, #22 West Virginia 14
Mississippi State 24, Georgia 12
Tennessee 32, UAB 29 (2 OT)
Ole Miss 55, Fresno State 38

NASCAR: NCWTS -- Las Vegas: Smith's Food & Drug Stores 350 Results

2010-09-26T04:28:00.000-07:00

Image via WikipediaRookie Austin Dillon passed James Buescher with 35 laps to go in Saturday night's Smith's 350 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, then pulled away to win by a commanding 5.588-second margin.

Dillon and Buescher battled over much of the final third of the race, but Dillon finally got around him for good one lap after a restart on Lap 111. Buescher stayed on his bumper until he lost second place to Johnny Sauter on another restart on Lap 119. After that, Dillon, in clean air, pulled away for the victory.

It was Dillon's second Truck Series victory; his first came at Iowa in July, ten races ago. Sauter finished second, followed by Buescher, series leader Todd Bodine and Matt Crafton. (Race results)

Bodine gained five points over Aric Almirola, who finished sixth, in the series standings. Bodine now leads Almirola by 262 points with five races to go. Johnny Sauter (-300) is third. With the win, Dillon (-388) climbed two spots to fourth, the highest ranking of his young career. Timothy Peter, who finished 26th, dropped one spot to fifth, 423 points behind Bodine.

NASCAR: NNS -- Dover: Dover 200 Results

2010-09-26T03:51:00.000-07:00

Image via WikipediaKyle Busch dominated Saturday's Nationwide race at Dover, the Dover 200, leading 192 of the 200 laps and picking up his eleventh series win of the season, That broke the single season series record set by Sam Ard in 1983 and matched by Busch last season.

Busch is rapidly closing in on Mark Martin's all-time record for series wins. Martin has 48; Busch's win Saturday was his 41st.

Busch beat his JGR teammate Joey Logano to the finish by four-tenths of a second. Carl Edwards was third, followed by Reed Sorenson and Kevin Harvick. (Race results)

Edwards cut 53 points off of Brad Keselowski's lead in the points standings, but still trails by 320 points with just seven races remaining. Keselowski finished 17th. Busch (-500), who has competed in just 23 of the 28 races this season, is third in the standings, followed by Justin Allgaier (-764) and Paul Menard (-817).

Danica Patrick prepared for the Monster Mile by competing in Friday's K&N Pro Series East race. She led a few laps and finished sixth to earn her first NASCAR top-10 finish in the low level series. But Saturday was "another character-building day". She botched her qualifying run and started 42nd in the 43-car field, was a lap down 17 laps into the race, then blew a tire and hit the wall on Lap 71. She went to the garage for about 90 laps to repair the damage, then returned to finish 35th, 94 laps down.

Elliott Sadler was involved in the scariest incident of the afternoon. He spun in the middle of Turns Three and Four on Lap 136, backed into the wall and came to a stop in the middle of the track at the exit of Four. Rookie Drew Herring, who was having radio issues, didn't see him until it was too late and plowed into the front end of Elliott's car. The race was red-flagged for almost eleven minutes to clean up the debris, but both drivers walked away.

NASCAR: Dover Preview

2010-09-24T19:21:00.000-07:00

Image by Getty Images via @daylifeAll three of NASCAR's national touring series are in action the next two days, with two of the three races at Dover International Speedway.

First up is the Nationwide Series; they're in Dover Saturday afternoon (3 p.m. ET, ESPN2) for the Dover 200. The Camping World Truck Series race is the second half of the Saturday doubleheader. They're on the other side of the country in Las Vegas for the Smith's Food and Drug Stores 350 (9 p.m. ET, Speed). The main event is Sunday's Sprint Cup race, the AAA 400 (1 p.m. ET, ESPN), back at Dover. It's the second race in the ten-race Chase for the Sprint Cup.

After a dismal 25th place showing in last weekend's race at Loudon, Jimmie Johnson took a positive step toward his fifth consecutive championship by capturing the pole for Sunday's race. Johnson turned a lap in 23.116 seconds (156.736 mph) to edge A. J. Allmendinger, who ran a qualifying lap of 23.130 seconds. Mark Martin initially qualified third, but his lap was disallowed after inspection when the gas pressure in his right rear shock was found to be too high. Martin will start 42nd. Martin Truex Jr. starts third, followed by Denny Hamlin and Juan Montoya.

It was the 25th pole of Johnson's career, the third at Dover and the second of the season. Johnson leads all active drivers with five wins at the track.

Other Chasers: Greg Biffle starts sixth, Kurt Busch eighth, Carl Edwards tenth, Kyle Busch 11th, Matt Kenseth 14th, Jeff Gordon 15th, Clint Bowyer 24th, Tony Stewart 25th, Jeff Burton 27th and Kevin Harvick 33rd.

Jeff Green, Josh Wise and Ted Musgrave failed to qualify for the race. (Race lineup)

Dover International Speedway is also known as the Monster Mile, and for good reason. It's a mile-long concrete oval with high banking (24 degrees in the turns and nine degrees on the straightaways). That translates into a lot of speed, but the track is very narrow, leaving drivers nowhere to go if (when) something happens in front of them. It should be exciting.

After Clint Bowyer's 150-point penalty dropped him from second to twelfth in the points standings, Denny Hamlin now has a 45-point lead over the new second place guy, Kevin Harvick. Hamlin finished fourth back in the May race, but doesn't usually do too well at Dover. In fact, other than Daytona, Dover is Hamlin's worst track in terms of average finish. His 22.8 is the worst among all Chasers. But he was feeling cocky enough to get into a war of words with Richard Childress over Bowyer's rules violation.

Danica Patrick returns to NASCAR for Saturday's Nationwide race. She got some valuable seat time at Dover in today's K&N Pro Series East race where she finished sixth.

Clint Bowyer's Devastating Penalty

2010-09-23T23:53:00.000-07:00

After Clint Bowyer's exciting win last Sunday at Loudon in the first Chase race of 2010, he vaulted from twelfth to second in the points standings, just 35 points behind Denny Hamlin. Now, after a 150-point penalty from NASCAR, he is back in twelfth again, 185 points behind Hamlin and 49 points behind Matt Kenseth, who is eleventh. It's a devastating penalty that has almost killed Bowyer's title hopes for 2010.

We heard some rumblings early in the week. NASCAR announced that the car Bowyer drove in the final race of the "regular season" at Richmond was close to being illegal. That is, the car was legal, but was flirting dangerously close to the tolerance of one of the many, many measurements NASCAR checks. NASCAR officials met with Richard Childress Racing representatives to discuss the problem.

At the time, many NASCAR commentators dismissed this as not a very big deal. It is the job of the crew chief to push the edge of the envelope. If they can do that without going over, they are doing their job. Turns out that it was a very big deal.

“When we work with the teams, when [we] see them heading in a direction that could wind up bad for everybody, we get together and we talk about it,” NASCAR vice president for competition Robin Pemberton said.

“As we’ve done in the past and will continue to do so in trying to regulate the sport, a big responsibility of NASCAR is to work as hard to keep people out of trouble as it is to write penalties,” Cup Series director John Darby said. “Obviously, when it gets to the point that we have to write a penalty, it’s not fun for everybody. So if we can take steps in the interim or in the in-betweens to put something to rest and not have it be an issue, well, by all means we’ll exhaust every effort that we can to do that.

Rewind to last Sunday at Loudon. With the white flag in sight, Tony Stewart ran out of gas, relinquishing the lead to Clint Bowyer, who was running on fumes and trying to hold off Denny Hamlin. Bowyer won the race, then ran out of gas just as he started doing his celebratory burnout. His car had to be pushed to Victory Lane by a wrecker.

The car passed the post-race inspection at the track, but was one of several that was taken back to the NASCAR Research and Development Center near Charlotte for a more detailed inspection. There the car was found to be illegal. NASCAR declined to explain what the violation was or even to state if the violation could have given the #33 car an unfair advantage.

It was left up to Richard Childress to explain that the violation was related to how the body is hung on the frame. The car was too high in the rear, exceeding specifications by less than 1/16th of an inch. Childress claims that the car was legal when it left the shop and that the violation could have been caused by the wrecker that pushed the car to Victory Lane. Also, several cars gave Bowyer a congratulatory tap in the rear on the cooldown lap. Childress has vowed to appeal the penalty.

NASCAR doesn't agree with Childress's assessment.

“We looked at a lot of different things and we have a lot of documentation from cars from the last four years, and we understand that we have had cars with some severe body damage and cars without, and we don’t feel that the incidental contact from a push of the wrecker helped push this car out of tolerance at all,” NASCAR Vice President of Competition Robin Pemberton said.

Childress also said that they were informed by NASCAR that the car would be taken to the R&D Center after the New Hampshire race because they had come so close to failing inspection the week before.

“It doesn’t make any sense at all that we would send a car to New Hampshire that wasn’t within NASCAR’s tolerances. I am confident we fixed the area of concern and the New Hampshire car left the race shop well within the tolerances required by NASCAR.”

Richard Childress was also docked 150 owner points. Crew chief Shane Wilson was fined $150,000. Wilson and car chief Chad Haney were also suspended for six weeks. Wilson and Haney can continue in their appointed roles until appeals are exhausted. Bowyer is still credited with the win at Loudon.

With Bowyer now back at the bottom of the 12-man Chase field, move the other Chasers up a spot in the points standings. Denny Hamlin's lead is now 45 points over the new guy in second, Kevin Harvick.

The penalties, though excessive, are in line with those handed down to Brian Vickers's team for a similar violation in 2008. No problems have been reported with the other RCR cars of Harvick and Jeff Burton.

An interesting side note: Robin Pemberton, one of those charged with handing down the penalties, was once on the other side of the issue. In 1990, Pemberton was the crew chief for Mark Martin when the team was docked 46 points for using an illegal carburetor spacer plate in a victory at Richmond. Martin eventually lost the championship to Dale Earnhardt that year by just 26 points.

SEC Football -- Week Three

2010-09-20T22:33:00.000-07:00

It's still real early, but it looks like a down year for the SEC -- especially in the East.

Georgia and Tennessee are both 1-2, and Georgia already has two tough conference losses, including a last second loss at home to Arkansas Saturday. Tennessee has looked pretty rough all around. Kentucky is winning, but against subpar opponents. Their first real test will come this week at Florida. Vandy is still Vandy, though they did manage to whip up on Ole Miss Saturday, snapping a 10-game conference losing streak. Florida and South Carolina are both 3-0, but Florida continues to struggle early in every game before turning to on in the second half. That might hurt them later on down the road.

The West looks much stronger with Alabama, Arkansas, LSU and Auburn all 3-0. Mississippi State seems to be improving, especially on offense, but the schedule has not been kind. They're 1-2 (0-2) after losses to Auburn and LSU. Ole Miss is going to have a long, long season. They're now 1-2 (0-1) with losses to Jacksonville State and Vanderbilt. Their lone win came against Tulane 27-13 in Week Two.

Arkansas vs. Georgia was the most exciting game of the week. Georgia overcame a 14-point deficit in the fourth quarter, but Arkansas QB Ryan Mallett threw a 40-yard pass to Greg Childs for the go-ahead score with just 15 seconds left. Mallett was 21-of-33 for 380 yards and three TDs for the afternoon and was later named the SEC Offensive Player of the Week.

The scores:
#1 Alabama 62, Duke 13
#10 Florida 31, Tennessee 17
#12 Arkansas 31, Georgia 24
#13 South Carolina 38, Furman 19
#15 LSU 29, Mississippi State 7
#16 Auburn 27, Clemson 24
Vanderbilt 28, Mississippi 14
Kentucky 47, Akron 10

NASCAR: Loudon Results

2010-09-20T00:41:00.000-07:00

Image via WikipediaNSCS: the Sylvania 300

Clint Bowyer's fuel gamble paid off. Tony Stewart's did not.

Coming out of Turn Four with the lead on Lap 299 (of 300) with the white flag in sight, Tony Stewart ran out of gas. Clint Bowyer, who was also running on fumes, flew past him on the frontstretch and held off Denny Hamlin over the final lap to win the first race in the 2010 Chase for the Sprint Cup, Sunday's Sylvania 300 at Loudon, New Hampshire.

Bowyer ran out of gas while doing his victory burnout and had to be pushed to Victory Lane by a wrecker.

Bowyer didn't back into the win. He dominated the race, leading seven times for a race-high 177 laps, but a sputtering carburetor gave him problems on restarts, forcing him to drop back until he could get the car up to speed.

Denny Hamlin also had issues. On Lap 214, Hamlin was rolling through Turn Four when Carl Edwards slid up the track into him causing him to spin. That dropped Hamlin from third to 22nd, but sent him to pit road, allowing him to avoid the fuel issues of the cars that were ahead of him at the end.

Bowyer crossed the finish line 0.477 seconds ahead of Hamlin. Jamie McMurray finished third, followed by Dale Earnhardt Jr. Kevin Harvick struggled all day with handling problems and slow pit stops, but rallied to finish fifth. Stewart coasted around to finish 24th, the last car on the lead lap, a swing of 94 valuable points in the championship race. (Race results)

The win snapped an 88-race winless streak for Bowyer dating back to the May 2008 race at Richmond. It was Bowyer's third Cup win and his second at Loudon. His first Cup win came in the 2007 Sylvania 300.

Kurt Busch had an ill-handling car and was involved in two incidents. On Lap 221, he got together with Jeff Burton and they both spun. That resulted in Jimmie Johnson getting into the rear of Kyle Busch, causing those two to spin as well. Later, on Lap 241, Kurt Busch slid up the track into Joey Logano, putting him into the wall.

Johnson later developed a vibration and had to make an unscheduled stop for tires, putting him a lap down. He couldn't get the lap back and finished 25th, worst of the Chase drivers.

Burton ran out of gas seconds before Stewart, but got it re-fired enough to finish 15th.

Matt Kenseth struggled mid-pack all race and was spun by Brad Keselowski . He finished 23rd.

With one Chase race down and nine to go to crown a champion, Hamlin stretched his lead in the point standings to 35. He now leads Bowyer, who moved up ten spots into second place. Harvick (-45) remains in third. After finishing ninth, Kyle Busch (-62) remains in fourth. Jeff Gordon (-75) finished sixth and moved up three spots to fifth. Johnson (-92) dropped five spots to seventh. Stewart (-124) dropped five spots to eleventh.

NCWTS: TheRaceDayRaffleSeries.com 175

Kyle Busch drove into James Buescher and the wall to win Saturday's Camping World Truck Series race at Loudon.

The race was a battle between Busch and Kevin Harvick, but Buescher snuck in there at the end and almost came away with his Truck Series win.

On Lap 166 (of 175), Harvick forced Busch up the track and Buescher dove underneath the two to take the lead. Busch took the lead and the race on a restart on Lap 174. Buescher restarted on the outside and led Busch into Turn One, but Busch battled ahead coming out of Turn Two. Before he was clear, he moved up the track into Buescher's left front, then slapped the outside wall.

Busch beat Buescher to the finish by 0.280 seconds. Harvick, who traded the lead with Busch fourteen times, finished third, followed by Matt Crafton and Austin Dillon. (Race results)

After the race, Buescher took exception to Busch's tactics:

"He just went to the fence," Buescher said. "He wasn't clear at all. He drove like he had no truck on his outside, and he hit my left front and ended up in the wall. He just drove us dirty and got the win, and we hung in for a second-place finish."

Todd Bodine finished ninth and has a commanding 257 point lead over Aric Almirola, who finished eighth, with just six races to go. (Point standings)

SEC Football Wrapup -- Week Two

2010-09-12T00:55:00.000-07:00

Week Two of the college football season found most of the Southeastern Conference teams facing stronger opposition -- too strong for some. There were even a couple of conference games on the schedule.

It looks like Steve Spurrier might be giving the ground game a try at South Carolina. Freshman RB Marcus Lattimore rushed 37 times for 182 yards and two touchdowns to lead the Gamecocks over the Georgia Bulldogs 17-6. Georgia tried to make a game of it. Down 14-6 in the third, the Bulldogs drove to the South Carolina three. An offsides penalty pushed them back five, then Washuan Ealey fumbled to end the threat.

With injured RB Mark Ingram on the bench for the second straight week, Trent Richardson stepped up and carried Alabama to 24-3 win over Penn State. Richardson rushed 22 times for 144 yards and a touchdown. He also caught four passes for 46 yards. Coach Nick Saban said that Ingram could have played, but he didn't want to put him in without sufficient practice time.

Tennessee led Oregon 13-3 in the first half, then the Ducks went to work. RB LaMichael James ran right and was stopped for a four-yard loss, but stayed on his feet, reversed direction and rumbled 72 yards down the sideline to break a 13-13 tie. It was all part of 45 unanswered points Oregon scored to beat the Vols 48-13.

The scores:
#1 Alabama 24, #18 Penn State 3
#7 Oregon 48, Tennessee 13
#8 Florida 38, South Florida 14
#14 Arkansas 31, Louisiana-Monroe 7
#19 LSU 27, Vanderbilt 3
#21 Auburn 17, Mississippi State 14 (Thursday, 9/9)
#24 South Carolina 17, #22 Georgia 6
Kentucky 63, Western Kentucky 28
Mississippi 27, Tulane 13

NASCAR: NSCS -- Richmond: Air Guard 400 Results

2010-09-11T23:01:00.000-07:00

Image by sidehike via Flickr
Denny Hamlin put in a dominating performance at his hometown track, Richmond International Raceway, Saturday night to win the Air Guard 400 and clinch the top spot in the Chase for the Sprint Cup. Hamlin led six times for a race-high 251 laps (of 400), including the final 69, and held off Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Kyle Busch in the closing laps.

It was Hamlin's second win at the track; he has now won consecutive September Richmond races. It was his series-leading sixth victory of the season and the 14th of his career.

Hamlin beat Busch to the finish line by 0.537 seconds. Jimmie Johnson finished third, followed by Joey Logano and Marcos Ambrose. (Race results)

Greg Biffle clinched his spot in the Chase on Lap 48 when Jason Leffler retired to the garage. That guaranteed Biffle at least 42nd place in the race, all he would need if Ryan Newman, the 13th place driver, could win and lead the most laps. Biffle finished 32nd, five laps down.

Clint Bowyer came into the race needing to finish 28th or better to guarantee his spot in the Chase. He started fourth, led three times for 33 laps, and finished sixth.

Newman finished eleventh and never led a lap.

All in all, it was pretty uneventful for a Richmond race -- no Chase drama and only three cautions on the night. David Reutimann blew a tire and spun to bring out the first yellow on Lap 55. Terry Labonte, who failed to make the race in Friday qualifying but replaced Mike Bliss in the No. 55 Prism Motorsports car, brought out the second caution when he blew a tire and hit the wall on Lap 145. The final caution came out on Lap 226 for some light rain on the track.

The victory gives Hamlin the top seed in the Chase, putting him ten points ahead of Jimmie Johnson going into next week's race at Loudon, New Hampshire. The points are reset now with each Chaser getting 5000 points plus ten bonus points for each victory in the "regular season." This is the first time Hamlin has led the points standings in his career.

The Chase seedings:
1. Denny Hamlin 5060
2. Jimmie Johnson -10
3. Kevin Harvick -30
4. Kyle Busch -30
5. Kurt Busch -40
6. Tony Stewart -50
7. Greg Biffle -50
8. Jeff Gordon -60
9. Carl Edwards -60
10. Jeff Burton -60
11. Matt Kenseth -60
12. Clint Bowyer -60

NASCAR: Richmond - NNS: Virginia 529 College Savings 250 Results

2010-09-10T22:29:00.000-07:00

Image by Bristol Motor Speedway & Dragway via FlickrKevin Harvick held off a hard-charging Brad Keselowski to pick up the victory in Friday night's Nationwide Series race at Richmond, the Virginia 529 College Savings 250. It was Harvick's third Nationwide win of the year and the 37th of his career, third all time in the series. It was Harvick's fifth Nationwide win at Richmond, tying him with Mark Martin for most series wins at the track.

It was an impressive performance by Harvick and Keselowski, the series points leader, in the third race in the new Nationwide car. Harvick led a race-high 170 laps. Keselowski fell two laps down around the midpoint of the race due to problems on pit road, but rallied to take the lead from Kyle Busch on Lap 163 (of 250). Harvick took the lead from Keselowski on Lap 197, and held him off the rest of the way. It was a close thing though. Lapped traffic allowed Keselowski to close in on Harvick in the final laps and challenge him for the win. Harvick slapped the wall on the next-to-last lap, but managed to hang on and cross the finish line 0.256 seconds ahead of Keselowski.

Trevor Bayne finished third, tying a career best in the series. Ricky Stenhouse Jr. was fourth, followed by Reed Sorenson. (Race results)

Kyle Busch was going for a record 11th Nationwide Series win of the season, but had problems on a pit stop on Lap 205. The nozzle broke off on one of the gas cans and Busch drove away with it still stuck in the car. Penalized for taking equipment from the pits, Busch restarted 21st, but rallied to finish ninth.

Keselowski increased his lead in the Nationwide point standings to 373 over Carl Edwards, who finished tenth.

NASCAR: Richmond Preview

2010-09-10T17:19:00.000-07:00

Image by Bristol Motor Speedway & Dragway via FlickrNASCAR is on a tight schedule at Richmond International Raceway this weekend. The Sprint Cup race, the Air Guard 400, is set for 7:30 p.m. ET (ABC). The Nationwide race, the Virginia 529 College Savings 250, is already underway (ESPN2). The Camping World Truck Series is off this weekend; they'll be back next weekend at Loudon.

Unlike past years, there's not a lot of drama going into this final race of the "regular season" over who will make the Chase. Ten drivers have already qualified. If 13th place Ryan Newman wins Saturday night and leads the most laps, earning the maximum 195 points, Greg Biffle needs to finish 42nd or better and Clint Bowyer needs to finish 28th or better to make the Chase field. Bowyer leads Newman by 117 points in the points standings.

Carl Edwards earned the pole for Saturday night's race in the just completed qualifying session. Edwards ran a lap of 21.13 seconds (127.762 mph), edging Juan Pablo Montoya (21.18 seconds, 127.455 mph). A. J. Allmendinger will start third, followed by Clint Bowyer and David Reutimann. Bobby Labonte needed to use the past champion's provisional to make the field. That meant that the provisional wasn't available for brother Terry, who was making his first attempt with a new team, Stavola Labonte Racing. Michael McDowell, Todd Bodine, Scott Riggs and Brian Keselowski also failed to make the 43-car field. (Race lineup)

Mattias Ekstrom will be driving the No. 83 Red Bull Toyota. The two-time German Touring car champ made his NASCAR debut in June at Infineon Raceway. This will be Ekstrom's oval debut. Brian Vickers is scheduled to be back in the car next season.

NASCAR: Atlanta -- Emory Healthcare 500 Results

2010-09-07T00:46:00.000-07:00

Image via WikipediaTony Stewart pulled away from Carl Edwards and Jimmie Johnson to pick up the victory in Sunday night's Emory Healthcare 500 at Atlanta Motor Speedway. It was Stewart's first victory in 31 races dating back to October 2009 at Kansas. It was Stewart's third win at the track and the 38th of his career. Stewart led eight times for a race-high 176 laps, including the final 25.

Edwards beat Stewart out of the pits after the seventh caution of the night on Lap 295 (of 325), but Stewart quickly got by him after the restart. Stewart had trouble on restarts all night spinning his tires, but held on and pulled away on the final restart, which came out for debris from a collision caused by Ryan Newman getting into Kasey Kahne which put him into Kurt Busch on Lap 302.

Carl Edwards finished 1.316 seconds behind Stewart with Johnson right behind. Jeff Burton went a lap down early, but rallied to finish a distant fourth. Kyle Busch overcame a terrible pit stop on Lap 49 to finish fifth. Busch was clocked too fast entering pit road, then his rear tire changer had issues with the gun, leaving him with a loose wheel which he had to make an unscheduled stop to fix. (Race results)

Kahne ran up front most of the night, but the contact by Newman brought on a flat tire that ended his chance of making the Chase. Kahne retaliated with a minor bump to Newman after he got back on the track. Earlier, on Lap 152, Newman got into Greg Biffle and knocked him into Elliott Sadler. Kasey Kahne had a flat tire on Lap 178 that extinguished his slim hopes of making the Chase. Denny Hamlin had a strong car through the early part of the race, but blew his engine on Lap 143 and finished last.

Eight more drivers clinched spots in the Chase for the Sprint Cup, joining Kevin Harvick and Johnson, who clinched last weekend at Bristol. With only Saturday night's race at Richmond left before the Chase begins, Greg Biffle and Clint Bowyer have a virtual lock on the final two spots in the Chase. Biffle only needs to show up at Richmond and finish 42nd or better to clinch his spot. If Ryan Newman, who moved into 13th position after finishing eighth at Atlanta, picks up the maximum 195 points at Richmond by winning and leading the most laps, Bowyer only needs to finish 28th or better.

Other than that battle to clinch the final two spots in the Chase, the point standings are meaningless. After Richmond, the points will be reset with each driver receiving 5000 points plus ten bonus points for each win. This is the way the Chase points work out as of now:

1. Jimmie Johnson 5050
2. Denny Hamlin 5050
3. Kevin Harvick 5030
4. Kyle Busch 5030
5. Kurt Busch 5020
6. Tony Stewart 5010
7. Greg Biffle 5010
8. Jeff Gordon 5000
9. Carl Edwards 5000
10. Jeff Burton 5000
11. Matt Kenseth 5000
12. Clint Bowyer 5000

NASCAR Basics: The Sprint All-Star Race

2010-09-06T19:51:00.000-07:00

Originally published at Meanwhile... on May 14, 2008

The Sprint All-Star Race, formerly known as The Winston and the Nextel All-Star Challenge, is a non-points event held in May at Lowe's Motor Speedway. The race is open to drivers who have won a race in the current or previous season, past Sprint Cup champions*, and former winners of the event.

The Sprint Showdown, held just before the All-Star race, is open to drivers who haven't otherwise qualified. The top two finishers of the Showdown transfer into the All-Star Race. In addition, one driver is also voted in by the fans.

The race was first run in 1985 and has been held at Charlotte Motor Speedway every year except 1986, when it was run at Atlanta Motor Speedway. The format has changed many times over the years. Currently, the race is 100 laps run in four 25-lap segments. A ten-minute "halftime" break follows the second segment. The third and fourth segments are separated by a five-lap caution period. Drivers will make a mandatory pit stop (at least a "stop and go") during the break.

Since no points are on the line, only prize money, look for drivers to take chances that they normally wouldn't take. Because the racing is so hard, drivers almost always prepare separate cars for the Sprint All-Star Race and the Coca-Cola 600, held at Lowe's on the following weekend.

The All-Star weekend's festivities also include the Burnout Competition, the Pit Crew Challenge, and a Camping World Truck Series race.

* The past champions must have won the championship in the past ten years and competed in a Cup race in the current or previous season.

NASCAR Basics: Flags

2010-09-06T18:57:00.000-07:00

Originally published at Meanwhile... on March 12, 2008

In NASCAR posts I'll sometimes talk about the race being red-flagged and drivers being black-flagged or races ending with a green/white/checkered finish. You might not have any idea what I'm talking about, so here's a brief primer on flags, eight different ones...

NASCAR races get off to a rolling start with drivers beginning with a couple or a few laps under yellow. These laps don't actually count, but once the pace car drops onto pit road and the green flag waves, all laps, green, yellow and white, do count in the scheduled distance of a race.

Green

When the green flag waves, at the beginning of the race and after a caution period, the race is on, boys! Boogity-boogity-boogity! Put the hammer down!

Yellow

Yellow means caution. There is a hazard on the track -- an accident, debris, light rain, etc. -- something that makes racing unsafe. The pace car will pull back on the track and drivers must fall in line behind it. Yellow periods usually last at least three laps, allowing drivers enough time to pit and fall back in line behind the pace car. On the last yellow flag lap, the pace car will turn off its roof lights to alert the drivers that racing is about to resume.

The Lucky Dog -- Years ago, when a yellow flew, drivers would race back to the start/finish line for position. Drivers a lap down would race the leader back to the line to get their lap back. Accidents ensued. With the advent of electronic scoring, NASCAR was able to freeze the field when the caution came out. The drivers now slow down immediately and maintain their positions in the field until they pit. Now, whenever a yellow flag flies, the first driver a lap down is the Lucky Dog. He gets his lap back. He must pass the pace car and circle around until he comes to the back of the pack.

Red

All competition must stop. Red flags are typically seen during rain delays and when the track is blocked due to a particularly bad accident. Drivers stop behind the pace car at a point on the track where they won't be in the way or on pit road. A red flag is always followed by a few yellow flag laps to allow the drivers to warm up their engines and tires or make a pit stop.

Additionally, all work in the pits and garage must stop. Crews can look the car over and lay out all the tools and parts needed, but work can't resume until the red flag is lifted.

If an accident happens near the end of a race, NASCAR will wave the red flag instead of allowing the race to continue and end under caution (yellow). Track workers will cleanup the track while the drivers are stopped. Drivers will then make the yellow flag laps that follow a red, but the race will go into overtime -- a green/white/checkered finish -- a two-lap shootout. When the green flag waves, the racing will resume. The next time by the start/finish line, the white flag will wave. The next time by, the checkered flag ends the race. If a yellow comes during the green/white/checkered finish, the field is frozen and the race is over then and there.

2010 Update: NASCAR changed the rules for green/white/checkered finishes. No longer does a yellow flag end the race. As long as the leader does not take the white flag, up to three attempts can be made to end the race under green. If the leader does take the white flag and a yellow flag follows, the field is frozen and the race is over.

Black

Black is not good. A black flag is a "consultation" flag. It means that NASCAR officials need to consult with the driver immediately. You can be black-flagged for breaking a rule such a speeding on pit road or failing to maintain the minimum speed limit. You can also be black-flagged if your car appears to be unsafe, i.e., pieces are falling off of it or it's smoking or leaking fluid on the track. Drivers who are black-flagged must pit within five laps.

Black with a white X

A driver who has been black-flagged and doesn't pit within five laps is shown the black flag with the white X. This means that they are no longer being scored by NASCAR (their laps aren't being counted) until they obey the black flag and return to the pits.

Blue with an orange diagonal stripe

This is the "courtesy" flag. It tells a driver (or a group of drivers) that the leaders are coming up. Please be courteous and get out of the way. The courtesy flag is the only flag that a driver may ignore at his own discretion.

White

The white flag flies only once during a race, signaling one lap to go in the race. Again, if a yellow flag flies on the white flag lap, the field is frozen and the race is over.

Checkered

This is simple enough. The first one to the checkered flag wins the race.

Allison's Memories Vivid For Fans, Not Self

2010-09-06T18:18:00.000-07:00

Image via WikipediaA version of this post was first published at Meanwhile... on March 8, 2008

NASCAR.com has a great profile of racing legend Bobby Allison. It's a tragic story. Thanks to a wreck at Pocono in 1988, he can't remember his greatest moments on the track or the greatest tragedies in his life -- the deaths of two of his sons.
read more

NASCAR Basics: NASCAR? A Sport?

2010-09-06T18:08:00.000-07:00

Originally published at Meanwhile... on Feb. 28, 2008

Another in a series of posts on NASCAR basics. This post doesn't really explain much. It's more of a postscript or footnote...

I just recently finished reading St. Dale by Sharyn McCrumb. I should have read it a couple of years ago, when it was first published, as it combines two of my favorite things in life, NASCAR and the writing of Sharyn McCrumb, but I somehow got out of the habit of reading for a while. I'm trying to get back into the habit, even if just a chapter or two before bed each night. If you love NASCAR, or if you'd just like to learn a little more about it, I highly recommend the book.

St. Dale is the story of the Dale Earnhardt Memorial Pilgrimage, a bus tour to honor the memory of Dale Earnhardt that takes place not long after his death. The pilgrims visit several places, mostly racetracks, that played an important part in Dale's life...and death. The tour guide is Harley Claymore, a fictional washed up NASCAR driver who wants more than anything to get back to the show, to get another ride.

The following scene takes place at the Tri-Cities Airport near Bristol, Tennessee, where Harley is about to meet the tourists who are about to make the pilgrimage. It counters a constant criticism of NASCAR and other motor racing, that it's not really a sport, that it's just drivers going around in a circle...

Harley Claymore found that he was more nervous about meeting this group of tourists than he had ever been about driving 180 miles per hour with Bill Elliott on his bumper and Earnhardt closing fast.

Glad-handling people was not one of his more conspicuous talents. He was not afraid of coming up against a question he couldn't answer. He was more nervous about the prospect of facing a question he had heard so many times that a rude retort would escape his lips before he could stop himself. Candor was his besetting sin.

He remembered an unfortunate encounter with a lady reporter during his racing days. She hadn't been a sports reporter, he knew that. Maybe she had been down to collect recipes from the wives or some such meringue assignment, but he had encountered her at one of the pre-race appearances that sponsors liked to host in hopes of getting their driver more publicity.

The woman in black, swizzle-stick thin and improbably blonde, had tottered up to him on stiletto heels and announced that she was a writer. She named a magazine he'd never heard of, but he nodded and smiled as if she'd said Newsweek. Then she wanted to know if he was a driver. Harley said that he was, and asked politely if she followed the sport.

The woman had attempted to wrinkle her botoxed forehead, and then -- with the air of someone making a startlingly original observation -- she smirked and said, "But it isn't really a sport, is it? Just a bunch of cars going around in a circle for three hours."

"Yes," said Harley. "Yes, it is." He tapped her little green notebook. "And writing isn't very hard, either, is it? Just juggling those same old twenty-six letters over and over again in various combinations?"

In retrospect, he conceded that the remark had not been designed to convert the lady to an appreciation of NASCAR. She had stalked off in a huff, with the word "redneck" hovering on her lips, which Harley didn't mind, because if people are going to think it, they might as well say it, and then you know where you are. He'd ended up going home alone. Maybe the reporter had found someone more willing to humor her. Thinking it over later, Harley supposed that he could have found a more diplomatic answer to the woman's tiresome display of ignorance. Maybe for future reference he should have asked Alan Kulwicki, who had an engineering degree, what technical explanation you ought to give to people who didn't realize that the "simplicity" of the sport was merely their own incomprehension, just as -- to the uninitiated -- opera was noise and modern art a paint spill. The difference was that people felt embarrassed about not understanding music or art, but they seemed almost smug about being ignorant on the subject of motor sports. Stupidity as a status symbol. He never did understand it, but it had long ago ceased to surprise him.

NASCAR Basics: Qualifying Explained

2010-09-06T17:52:00.000-07:00

Originally published at Meanwhile... on Feb. 10, 2008

It should be that everyone comes to the track, runs two laps and the 43 fastest guys make the race, but that's not the way they do it in NASCAR. A while back, to make sure that the top guys with the biggest sponsors make the race, they decided to lock the top 35 in owner points into the race. That only leaves eight spots up for grabs in qualifying. Everyone goes through qualifying, but the top 35 cars are already in the race; they're just trying to get a good position in the field. The other guys, the "go or go home" guys, are fighting to get in.

The top 35 is everything. That was the biggest problem Toyota had last year in their first year competing in the Sprint Cup. They were with brand new teams that didn't have any owner points and had to try to qualify for every race. Michael Waltrip had the worst time. During inspection for the Daytona 500 last year, he was found to have an illegal fuel additive in his carburator. He was fined and docked 100 points -- points he didn't have because he hadn't competed in a race yet. He made the Daytona 500 field and earned some points, but was still in the hole. He then failed to qualify for several races in a row. For a while, anyone could say, "My life might suck, but at least I've got more cup points than Michael Waltrip. I don't have any, but he's got -22."

For the first five races of the season, they go by owner points from the previous year. This is to ensure that one or two bad finishes do not wreck your chances for the year. After the fifth week, it's a week-to-week thing. You'll see those teams near the bottom of the top 35 trying to stay there and teams out of the top 35 trying to get in.

NASCAR has made a new change to qualifying this season. The teams in the top 35 will qualify first, then all the "go or go home" teams will qualify. As the qualifying goes on track conditions change. More tire rubber is being laid down on the track and the weather might change -- all of which will affect how fast a car can go. By putting all the "go or go home" guys together, NASCAR is leveling the playing field, minimizing changes in track and weather conditions.

There is also the past champion's provisional. A former Sprint Cup champion who doesn't make his way into the race by qualifying gets in just because he's a former champion. Only one championship provisional can be used for each race. It goes to the latest champion who doesn't otherwise make the race by being in the top 35 or through qualifying. Last year, they added a limit to the number of times one former champion can use the provisional to make the field -- six.

You'll see some teams bending the rules a little to get their cars into the race. Dale Jarrett, driving for one of the new Toyota teams last year, used up his allotted provisionals to make the early races, then the provisional fell to Bill Elliott, who was suddenly hired by the Wood Brothers to drive their car that was out of the top 35. This season, Sam Hornish Jr., new to NASCAR from IRL and driving a new car for Penske that doesn't have any points, was given the points of teammate Kurt Busch. Busch, the 2004 Cup champion, will use the championship provisional to make any races he doesn't qualify for. NASCAR's position on the points swap was "Whatever."

I can see what NASCAR is trying to accomplish with the Top 35 rule and even the champion's provisional -- fans are going to be real upset if they come to the track to see Dale Earnhardt Jr., Jeff Gordon or Tony Stewart and they're not in the race -- but they should level the playing field a little. Maybe make it the top 30 or the top 25 to give more guys a chance to get in the race.

Further reading: Guarantee of Top 35 Keeps Pressure on Drivers, Teams

The Daytona 500

If all the above is not complicated enough, NASCAR has made qualifying for the Daytona 500 almost as convoluted as IRL has made Indy 500 qualifying. You start with the top 35; they're in the race. You have Pole Day (which was today). Everyone takes two laps and the fastest two guys get on the front row. Then, later in the week, Thursday, February 14 this season, you have the Gatorade Duels, two 150-mile races. The top two "go or go home" finishers in each race makes the field. Then you have one former champion using a provisional to make the field, if needed.

So the top 35 is in. If a "go or go home" guy finishes in the top two spots on Pole Day that's more spots that are gone. Two more spots go to the top "go or go home" guys in each of the Gatorade Duel 150s. Then another spot, possibly, goes to someone using a championship provisional. However many spots are left to fill out the 43-car field are filled by qualifying speeds on Pole Day. The positions in the starting field are filled by the order of finish in the Gatorade Duels (except for the front row that is filled on Pole Day). Clear as mud, right?

NASCAR Basics: The Bud Shootout

2010-09-06T17:37:00.000-07:00

Originally posted at Meanwhile... on Feb. 8, 2008 and updated over the years to reflect changes in the race

The first race of the NASCAR season is a non-points exhibition race, the Bud Shootout. The Shootout is one of the two non-point Sprint Cup events during the NASCAR season (the other is the Sprint All-Star Race at Lowes Motor Speedway in May.) The race takes place at Daytona International Speedway the weekend before the Daytona 500.

The race started in 1979 as the Busch Clash. In 1998 the name was changed to the Bud Shootout. The "official name" was changed to the Budweiser Shootout at Daytona in 2001, but is still known to one and all as simply the Bud Shootout. Over the years NASCAR has tinkered with the format of the race and the qualifications for entry.

2009 Update: The Bud Shootout will be around at least three more years after Budweiser extended their sponsorship with NASCAR, but the Pole Award is now being sponsored by a rival brewing company (Coors), necessitating a change in the Bud Shootout which had featured the Bud Pole Award winners in recent years. The new format puts the spotlight on the manufacturers: 28 teams will be in the race, the top six teams from each of the four manufacturers based on owners' points and a "wild card" entry that must meet certain criteria. The "wild card" entry can be a past Sprint Cup champion who attempted to qualify for all 36 races last year, or it must be the seventh place car in owner points from the manufacturer. If the seventh place car is no longer active, the next car in owner points would be designated. The race was also increased from 70 to 75 laps with segments of 25 and 50 laps around a 10-minute intermission.

2010 Update: By the start of the 2010 season, Dodge was down to just three Cup drivers, the Penske Racing organization. As this would limit the size of the field, NASCAR decided to put the focus on past Daytona winners -- all past Shootout and Daytona Cup race winners would be eligible to compete in the 2010 race, along with all former Cup champions and the reigning Raybestos Rookie of the Year.

NASCAR Basics: The Points System Explained

2010-09-06T17:27:00.000-07:00

Originally published at Meanwhile... on Feb. 7, 2008.

Two things to keep in mind about the NASCAR points system...

1. Only two Sprint Cup events are non-point races, the Budweiser Shootout at Daytona in February and the Sprint All-Star Challenge at Lowes Motor Speedway in May. Points are awarded at all other races equally -- the winner of the Daytona 500 receives the same number of points as the winner of any other race. There aren't any unimportant races.

2. Unlike most other racing series, NASCAR awards points to every racer who qualifies for the race. Even the guy who crashes on the first lap of the race and finishes 43rd gets some points. Even if you have no hope of winning, you need to keep racing to garner as many points as you can.

The winner of the race receives 185 points (actually 190 -- I'll explain in a moment), second place receives 170. Subtract five points for each position down to sixth place which is worth 150 points. After that, subtract four points for each position down to eleventh place which is worth 130 points. Subtract three points for each position after that. That guy who crashed on the first lap and finished 43rd goes home with 34 points. (See table below.)

Five bonus points are awarded for leading a lap. Every driver who leads any lap gets five extra points. You can only receive this bonus once during a race regardless of how many times you take the lead or how many laps you lead. This is why the winner of the race gets 190 points. He has to lead at least one lap to win even if it's only the final lap. Another five bonus points is awarded to the driver who leads the most laps. So the winner of a race can receive 195 points if he also leads the most laps.

There are 36 Sprint Cup points races. After the first 26 races, the top 12 drivers in points become eligible for the Chase for the Sprint Cup, the championship. NASCAR started this "playoff" system in 2004 and has tinkered with the format a couple of times since. Currently, the top twelve drivers have their point totals reset to 5000 points. They are also given ten bonus points for each race won during the "regular season." The idea here is to make the last races of the season more competitive, to keep a driver from running away with the championship before the season is over.

Jeff Gordon probably would have won the championship last year if not for the Chase. After 26 races he had a commanding lead of over 300 points. After the points were reset he was in second place, twenty points behind Jimmie Johnson.

Owner Points

Just as a driver is awarded points, the car owner is also awarded points based on where the car finishes the race, regardless of who's driving.

Mark Martin, who has been retiring from racing for the past couple of years, is scheduled to drive the DEI #8 U.S. Army Chevy in 26 races this year. Aric Almirola will drive the car during the other races. Mark Martin and Aric Almirola will receive driver points based on where they finish in the races they start. DEI (Dale Earnhardt Inc. -- owned by Teresa Earnhardt) gets owner points based on where the #8 car finishes a race regardless of whether Martin, Almirola, or anyone else is driving.

Owner points primarily come into play during race qualifying. The top 35 cars as determined by owner points are automatically qualified for the next race. Only eight spots are up for grabs to fill out a 43-car field.
Owner points are also awarded to cars that fail to qualify. The car that qualifies 44th and misses the race receives 31 owner points (the 34 points that the 43rd finisher receives minus three.) Keep subtracting three points for every qualifying position. The car that finishes dead last in qualifying receives one point just for showing up.

Manufacturer Points

The winner of a race earns his car's manufacturer nine points. The second-highest finishing manufacturer receives six points. The third-highest finishing manufacturer receives four points. The last manufacturer (there are only four -- Chevrolet, Ford, Dodge and Toyota) receives three points. Manufacturer points are not good for too much except bragging rights. Chevy has dominated the manufacturer points the last couple of years, but Ford is the all-time manufacturer.

Driver Points Table

Finish	Points
1st	185
2nd	170
3rd	165
4th	160
5th	155
6th	150
7th	146
8th	142
9th	138
10th	134
11th	130
12th	127
13th	124
14th	121
15th	118
16th	115
17th	112
18th	109
19th	106
20th	103
21st	100
22nd	97
23rd	94
24th	91
25th	88
26th	85
27th	82
28th	79
29th	76
30th	73
31st	70
32nd	67
33rd	64
34th	61
35th	58
36th	55
37th	52
38th	49
39th	46
40th	43
41st	40
42nd	37
43rd	34

NASCAR Basics: The National Series

2010-09-06T17:02:00.000-07:00

Originally published at Meanwhile... on Feb. 5, 2008

NASCAR is the largest motorsports sanctioning body in the United States, overseeing over 1500 events at over 100 tracks in 39 states, Canada and Mexico, many at a small-town track near you. The Sprint Cup Series, the Nationwide Series and the Craftsman Truck Series are the three national divisions of NASCAR.

The NASCAR Sprint Cup Series

NASCAR's major league is the Sprint Cup Series. Back in olden times (the 40's to the 70's), it was called the Grand National Division. In 1971, RJ Reynolds put down the money to sponsor the series which became known as the Winston Cup. When cigarette advertising was banned, RJ Reynolds was forced to relinquish the series sponsorship. Nextel stepped in and the series became the Nextel Cup. Nextel was a casualty in the Great Cellphone Wars, snatched up by Sprint. Starting this year, the old Grand National series will be known as the Sprint Cup.

It sounds kind of dinky. Sprint means the same thing in auto racing that it does in other types of racing: small, short, quick races. But they're paying the money; they can call it what they like.

Sprint Cup has the best drivers, the best teams, the most prize money. They race 36 times during the season, including ten races in the Chase for the Cup.

The NASCAR Nationwide Series

This is also a new series name, and will probably be harder to get used to. Nationwide Insurance replaces Busch Beer as the series sponsor this year. Anheuser-Busch has been the sponsor since the series began in 1982 and the name "Busch" has always been used to identify the series. The Nationwide Series has roots in NASCAR's old Sportsman division.

If Sprint Cup is the major leagues, the Nationwide Series is probably Triple A. Here you'll find some good, young drivers hoping to make it to the big show. A few of these drivers are almost children, barely old enough to legally drive on public roads. You'll also find quite a few Sprint Cup drivers doing double driving duty in both series for various reasons. These Buschwhackers usually dominate the Nationwide Series. They have more experience, better teams, more money to spend. Sprint Cup regular Carl Edwards is the defending Nationwide Series champion.

The Nationwide Series races are often held at the same track as the Sprint Cup races on the same weekend, but the races are usually shorter. The Nationwide cars usually have a shorter wheelbase and less horsepower than Sprint Cup cars. They race 35 times during the 2008 season.

The Craftsman Truck Series

The Craftsman Truck Series, as the name indicates, is a series that features pickup trucks. The series began in 1995. This series will undergo a name change next year; Craftsman has announced that this will be their final year sponsoring the series.

The Truck Series is almost a senior league. Here you'll find a lot of former Sprint Cup drivers. You'll also newcomers looking to get into the Cup races and the occasional Cup regular. They race 25 times this season, and the races are even shorter than the Nationwide races.

In a typical weekend, the Craftsman Truck Series race takes place on Friday night, the Nationwide Series race on Saturday afternoon, and the Sprint Cup race on Sunday afternoon. Occasionally the races are all at the same track. Often they are not, making it difficult for drivers that want to compete in more than one series.

Update: As indicated above, the Craftsman Truck Series picked up a new sponsor in 2009. It is now the Camping World Truck Series.

Why NASCAR?

2010-09-06T16:32:00.000-07:00

Originally posted at Meanwhile... on Feb. 3, 2008

"There are only three sports: bullfighting, motor racing, and mountaineering; all the rest are merely games."

Ernest Hemingway is usually cited for the above quote. I don't know if he said that or not. Probably not. Hemingway, like Mark Twain and Yogi Berra, is often credited for any quote that sounds like he might have said it. As Yogi once put it, "I really didn't say everything I said."

I don't think much of bullfighting and don't much see the point of mountaineering, but I agree with Hemingway (or whomever) about auto racing. I love all forms of auto racing. I was in a state of panic for about a week recently when my cable provider (rhymes with Bombast) did a little lineup musical chairs and the Speed Channel disappeared. It turns out that they had just moved it to another channel, but they really had me worried there for a while. When I'm channel surfing, I'll always stop at Speed to watch a race. I might not watch past the next commercial, but I'll always stop to check out what kind of cars or motorcycles they're racing, see who's winning, see if I've heard of anybody.

Auto racing is high drama -- man versus man, man versus machine, life and death. Auto racing seems to be an individual sport, but it's really the ultimate team sport. The driver is the individual with his reputation (and life) on the line, but he is just the most visible part of a race team. To bring the checkered flag and the big trophy home, everyone on the team has to do their part.

Compare and Contrast

Back in the Dark Ages, back when the average television set could only receive three or four channels, you couldn't see much auto racing on television. You would see the Indy 500 every year, of course, and you might see the occasional race highlighted on Wide World of Sports, but that was about it.

The United States Auto Club (USAC) ran the show at Indy when I was kid, but split up into rival factions, the Indy Racing League (IRL, or Indy Cars) and Championship Auto Racing Teams (CART, or Champ Cars).

CART was the more dominant of the two leagues in the beginning, but has since declared bankruptcy. Champ Car lives on under another sanctioning body. The last Champ Car race I saw last year was a fairly sad affair with just over a dozen competitors.

Both leagues race technologically advanced open-wheeled racers. The wheels are not covered by fenders. The tires jut out. The cars fly and turn on a dime, but there's no bumping and grinding here. IRL racing is very team oriented with teammates expected to work together.

Formula One (F1) is king in much of the world. Their cars are technological marvels, the creme de la creme of racing. Their cars are also open-wheeled. F1 races take place all around the world, from the United States to Japan to Bahrain, and the races sometimes come on TV here at very odd hours. F1 is the ultimate team racing, with a lot of politics and a little corporate espionage...a little too much for me.

As a son of the South, NASCAR (an acronym: the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing) suits me just fine. It too has its roots in the South, starting with moonshiners who honed their skills by outrunning revenuers going to the dirt track to test their luck. I watched a fair amount of NASCAR growing up. Back in those aforementioned Dark Ages, they provided a lot of those Wide World of Sports highlights, but in February of 1979, CBS tried something new: a wire-to-wire broadcast of the Daytona 500. They had cameras right there at track level where you could almost feel the cars zooming by. They had in-car cameras. And CBS got lucky. Almost the entire Eastern United States was snowed and iced in on that February afternoon. There weren't any other major sporting events on the telly that day. A record audience (a captive audience) saw one of the greatest finishes in NASCAR history...

A lot of NASCAR fans were born that day and the regional sport began moving out of the South. NASCAR now holds Sprint Cup races from Fontana, California to Dover, Delaware to Homestead, Florida. The cars are not so technologically advanced. Juan Pablo Montoya won the NASCAR Sprint Cup Raybestos (everything has a sponsor) Rookie of the Year award last year. He found the biggest adjustment to NASCAR to be the racecar...

"When I first came here, they told me I was running for Raybestos Rookie of the Year, and I was like, 'you've got to be kidding me,'" said Montoya, the 1999 Indianapolis 500 winner and a seven-time winner in Formula One. "I thought I would be an exception or something. In a lot of ways, I really was a rookie. Do I have a lot of experience as a racing driver? Yes, but I've never been in a stock car before, so coming here and getting into it was a big deal. We had a lot of fun...

At Daytona, first race of the year, I thought we had a good car, and we did, but after Lap 5, it was so tight I was just about to get lapped every time it went yellow," Montoya said. "It's just knowing how far off I was when I thought the car was good. When you think you have a good car, you're still miles away, and other times when you're so loose you're about to kill yourself, you're competitive.
"To get that into your system is pretty hard."

But other drivers, including Dario Franchitti, last year's IRL champion, and Jacques Villeneuve, one of only three drivers to win the Indy 500, the CART championship, and a F1 championship, are following Montoya to NASCAR.

NASCAR is a lot easier for the average fan to follow. Almost every Sunday (except for when they race on Saturday nights), the race is going to be on. The schedule is pretty full. They take Mother's Day and a couple of other weekends off, but otherwise they race from February to November, making NASCAR the sport with the longest season. It's especially welcome in February and March, the dead zone for sports when basketball is the only game in town.

In that 1979 Daytona 500, the drivers drove cars that looked a lot like those you could buy from your local Chevy or Oldsmobile dealer. They weren't very safe and occasionally a driver would die.

Life in the pits was rough too. There was no pit road speed limit. Cars zoomed in at 100 mph, past crewmen clad in short-sleeved shirts and work pants. When you had to change right side tires, the crewman had to turn their backs to pit road. Crew members didn't wear helmets -- the better to feel the hair stand up on the back of their necks.

And like all professional and some college sports, the money hadn't mucked up the sport yet. The teams had sponsors, but the cars weren't traveling billboards like they are now. Excepting Richard Petty's #43 STP car, you usually had to look hard to figure out who the sponsors were. The sponsor might even be some local diner or a mom-and-pop hardware store.

To see how much things have changed, tune into this year's Daytona 500 on Sunday, February 17.

SEC Football Wrapup

2010-09-06T13:47:00.000-07:00

The first weekend of the 2010 college football season is in the books. Since most of the SEC teams were playing tuneups against Sisters of the Poor teams, there weren't many surprises. Just one, in fact:

The Ole Miss Rebels blew a 31-10 halftime lead and ended up losing to Jacksonville State 49-48 in two overtimes. It was JSU's first win against an FBS school since September 2007 when they beat Arkansas State, and the largest deficit overcome in the school's history. JSU, a FCS school from the Ohio Valley Conference, outscored the Rebels 21-3 in the fourth quarter to force overtime, then completed a pass to get the two-point conversion and the win. JSU's final touchdown came on fourth-and-30, a pass from Coty Blanchard to Kevyn Cooper.

The North Carolina-LSU game was somewhat of a surprise to me. Although UNC was the higher ranked team going in, I was surprised that LSU had such a hard time in earning the 30-24 win. With 13 players benched due to an NCAA investigation and down 20 at the half, the Tarheels put on a furious rally that came up just a little short. With seconds left on the clock, UNC was on the LSU six-yard line, but two pass fell incomplete. Either UNC has made great strides or LSU has fallen off worse than expected. UNC did capitalize on a bad call on an onside kick and got their final chance after a costly fumble while LSU was trying to run out the clock.

The Scores:
#1 Alabama 48, San Jose State 3
#4 Florida 34, Miami (OH) 12
#17 Arkansas 44, Tennessee Tech 3
#20 LSU 30, #18 North Carolina 24
#22 Auburn 52, Arkansas State 26
#23 Georgia 55, LA-Lafayette 7
Jacksonville State 49, Mississippi 48 (2OT)
Kentucky 23, Louisville 16
Tennessee 50, TN-Martin 0
Mississippi State 49, Memphis 7
Northwestern 23, Vanderbilt 21
South Carolina 41, Southern Miss. 13 (Thursday, 9/2)

A New Blog

2010-09-06T00:51:00.000-07:00

Once upon a time I had several blogs, including one devoted to sports. Demands on my time made it hard to keep up with all of them, so I consolidated everything into one blog. But my disparate interests made that one blog downright unreadable so I've decided to split everything up again.

This is an effort to reestablish a blog devoted to sports. You'll see a lot about NASCAR, some stuff about the Atlanta Braves and SEC football, and other stuff as the mood strikes. You'll also see some older stuff that has been transferred over from my main blog.

Down, set, hike...

NASCAR, etc.

SEC Bowling

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Cup -- Hamlin Outruns Kenseth at Michigan

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Cup -- Penalties for Kyle Busch

MLB -- Heating Up

Cup - Gordon Wins at Pocono

From the Twitter Machine

24 HEURES DU MANS 2011

Trucks -- Black Flag Gives Hornaday a Texas Win

The Fight or Altercation or Whatever It Was

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Cup -- Keselowski's Fuel Strategy Pays Off at Kansas

Nationwide -- Allgaier Coasts to Victory at Chicagoland

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A Qualifying Tweek

Tweet of the Week

Cup -- Harvick Snatches an Improbable Win

The Indy 500 -- Wheldon Snatches an Improbable Win

Nationwide -- Charlotte Results

Indy 500: Bump Day

Nationwide -- Iowa Results

The Sprint All-Star Race

NASCAR: Talladega Results

NASCAR Basics: Impound Races

NASCAR: NSCS -- Martinsville: Tums Fast Relief 500 Results

NASCAR: NNS -- Gateway: 5-Hour Energy 250 Results

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Clint Bowyer's Devastating Penalty

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