Trouble in Turn2

One of the first topics to come up when a Cup race at Michigan is mentioned is fuel mileage. That is something that usually sets Michigan apart, but this year has already featured four such finishes including the June Michigan race. What is it about Michigan that lends itself to fuel mileage races? I suspect it has to do with a lack of cautions thanks to a wider racing surface plus the ability to pass without incident. It doesn’t explain everything, but it will be a factor come Sunday.

What Happened Last Year

Rain happened. A lot of rain that delayed the race for two days. When the track finally dried on Tuesday morning Kurt Busch was the dominant car, leading 92 laps and winning his second race in three weeks. To be honest, it was a rather uneventful race which seems to fit the mold of rain delayed races. Everyone usually wants to get it over with, pack up and go home.

Notes

• Only 44 cars are on the Michigan entry list. Quick quiz: When was the last time a race only had 43 cars entered? Hint: It’s probably more recent than you think. Last year’s Daytona 500 featured a 61 car entry list. Now the number of willing participants has dwindled to 44. Granted Michigan is longer trip from Charlotte, but the bottom rung teams are really struggling to afford cars each week. [2004 at Rockingham was the last Cup race to feature only 43 entrants, while the 2002 Loudon race was the last with a short field].

• Tony Stewart is entered in this weekend’s Nationwide race and he will sport a special paint scheme publicizing the “Give the Kids the Wolrd view-A-Thon”.
  

  the #20 Old Spice Car will have a new look as it races to help special children from around the world. Give Kids The World, the nonprofit organization that provides week-long, cost-free vacations to Central Florida for children with life-threatening illnesses and their families, will be honored with its very own “Give Kids The World Village” design. The brightly colored car was designed by Wish child Emily Marsala and will be driven by Joe Gibbs Racing driver Tony Stewart.

  In celebration of this unique partnership, Give Kids The World is encouraging NASCAR fans everywhere to participate in a View-A-Thon to help us raise $25,000, or $100 for every mile of the race.

  

• Brad Coleman will make his Cup debut on Sunday, when he takes the wheel for Hall of Fame Racing’s #96 car. Coleman is only 20 and is a legitimate prospect. He will need to qualify on time, but given his solid Busch/Nationwide qualifying record (16.7 avg start) he shouldn’t have a problem. It will be interesting to see whether he can improve on JJ Yeley’s numbers for 2008. While Yeley definitely struggled this year, I don’t think it was all his fault. The team could probably use some veteran feedback to set a workable baseline. You know, someone like Mike Skinner. Unfortunately for HoF Racing, Toyota’s official/unofficial consultant is already booked this weekend for Michael Waltrip Racing.

Champs, Chumps and Sleepers

Champ: David Ragan Ragan is inching closer to winning and there won’t be a better chance than at the track that Roush owns (not in the literal sense like Roger Penske formerly did, but in the Jimmie Johnson, My House! sense).

Chump: Kyle Busch Yeah I said it! He wasn’t great at Indy and was decent at Pocono. I think he’s due for a crash this weekend.

Sleeper: Mark Martin Martin is phenomenal at Michigan: 4 wins, 16 top 5’s and 27 top 10’s. He also has an 81.3 driver rating in the past seven events and that includes two cool Batman paint schemes.

Who Will Win?

Matt Kenseth. I don’t need to explain why. He’s due, he’s good at Michigan and Roush cars always win at least once at Michigan. Plus I want to see more robot commercials.

If you missed Sunday’s race at Pocono here is a quick recap in a segment I like to call, “Pocono in a nutshell”: Carl Edwards won(again) the race on fuel mileage, Mark Martin was undone by no fault of his own (again), Jimmie Johnson looked strong(again) and the Deathstar(Kyle Busch) appears to be penetrable(slightly). Meanwhile my kitchen remodel is coming along nicely.

Pocono ended i a fuel mileage race which is becoming a trend this year. I have a theory why. The CoT is so hard to drive that teams are willing to take more risks with strategy because it’s so difficult to pass under green. The fact that there are fewer cautions late with the car also means longer green flag runs at long speedways like Pocono and Michigan which also contributes.

• Nice run for Chad McCumbee in the #45 Petty Enterprises car. He finished a career high 17th on Sunday. It was only the 3rd top 20 of the season for the team as they scramble to crack the top 35. They still sit in 40th place and Kyle Petty will return to the seat next week at Watkins Glen. Last year when Petty drove at the Glen he got in a wreck, finished last and injured himself after slamming his hand in frustration. In an unrelated story Petty Enterprises is ordering extra steering wheel padding.

• One of the silliest graphics during a broadcast is the “estimated fuel gauge”. Whenever there is a fuel mileage race, the networks pull that one out. It’s inaccurate, doesn’t really show the viewer anything they didn’t already know and usually all the drivers listed on the graphic are all low on fuel. Thanks for the info, TV.

• Speaking of no fuel, did anyone else think it was funny when Dale Earnhardt Jr and Jeff Gordon drag raced to the finish line as both ran out of fuel? It was like a photo finish in speedwalking.

• Kevin Harvick regained his spot in the top 12 with a 4th place finish. He spun on the first lap, but incredibly didn’t hit anything. Despite the 4th place result, he didn’t gain many points on his closest competition because David Ragan finished 5th, Clint Bowyer 6th and Matt Kenseth led a lap and finished 11th. Only 19 points separate the four drivers with only five races left. While everyone from TV, news and nerdy, stats-based bloggers will talk about the Chase and how close the points battle is, Harvick will take a different approach, “You just go out and race as fast as you can. That’s about all you can do.” And Harvick is exactly right. Everything else is out of his control. According to Sports Club Stats, Harvick has a 69.2% chance of making the Chase while Ragan in 14th has a less than 50% chance. It’s going to stay crazy until Richmond.

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It’s Indy time for the Cup guys. That means speeds over 200 mph, a huge purse (last year was over $8 million) and tight racing. With not a lot of room to pass in the corners, horsepower on the straightaways is a driver’s best friend. Dale Earnhardt Jr participated in the recent Goodyear tire test and he also quelled concern about tires.

Tire wear was a big issue. When we first started out, you recall last year and in years past, when we first get there, we go to the cords in about five laps. It takes the whole weekend to build the rubber up on the track before that goes away. We did that again, and we found a tire that will work with another tire that lasted quite a bit longer and ran just as quick.

Because Indianapolis is such a large track, tires can wear out quickly. It’s compounded by the fact that the Trucks and Nationwide cars don’t see the track. That also minimizes the amount of rubber buildup. The fact that Earnhardt is happy with the durability and quality of the tire is a good thing for the level of racing and safety.

What Happened Last Year

Dale Earnhardt Jr dominated the early stages of the race but blew an engine. It was one of three engine failures in the final seven races before the Chase, completely souring his chances to make the Chase or win a race. Tony Stewart took advantage and went on to cruise to an easy win. The win also produced two of the more memorable quotes from Stewart. While closing in on Kevin Harvick, Stewart casually uttered “Here kitty kitty” over the team radio. Then after his win he swore in Victory Lane on live TV. In a post Janet Jackson-FCC crackdown society, Stewart was fined. It didn’t help that it was ESPN’s first broadcast of their new television deal.

Notes

• In the short history at the Brickyard Jeff Gordon owns almost all of the records. 4 wins, 11 top 10’s, 433 laps led, and three poles are all tops.

• In 9 Indy starts Dave Blaney has never led a lap. Every driver with more than 4 starts has led at least one lap.

• Chevy has won the last five races and nine of 14 overall at Indianapolis. Dodge and Pontiac have one win each while Ford has three, although none since 1999. Toyota is tied with Oldsmobile and Scion at zero.

• James at One Bad Wheel has an interesting article on the history of victory lane celebrations. Todd Parrott is credited with starting the brick kissing tradition in 1996. It’s interesting to see how different traditions start and what makes one action stick while others are considered lame? Kissing bricks, climbing fences and drinking milk. They all make perfect sense. In a way it’s like nicknaming yourself. You can’t try too hard and make it intentional or it looks desperate. His article also reminded me of the time in 2005 when Kurt Busch won the fall Richmond race and kissed the asphalt. No one has done it since, thankfully.

• Bill Elliott will attempt to make his 15th Brickyard race. While he is no longer a threat to win races, Elliott can still get it done at select tracks. He has never finished worse than 23rd at Indy and has 5 top 5’s and 9 top 10’s in his career. That includes his 2002 win where he led 93 laps.

Champs, Chumps and Sleepers

Champ: David Ragan Ragan is becoming a serious threat on intermediate tracks. Last year he relied on attrition to score a decent finish. This year he is running in the top 10 and top 15 for the bulk of races.

Champs, Chumps and Sleepers

Chump: Carl Edwards Sure Edwards can win at any track, but so far in his career Indy hasn’t agreed with him. A ninth place finish in 2006 is sandwiched by two mediocre finishes (12th, 18th) with bad driver ratings (69.6 and 67.1).

Sleeper: Mark Martin Martin stayed in the top 5 almost all day at Pocono and has already said he can win at Indy. He is not one to exaggerate.

Who Will Get to 1st Base with the Bricks?

Tony Stewart will surely be a popular choice along with his teammates Kyle Busch and Denny Hamlin. Kasey Kahne has been very good on speedways this summer and Jimmie Johnson and Dale Earnhardt Jr could also show up in strength. Kevin Harvick is also one to watch (no matter what loser bloggers might say about his season, he comes good at Indy). Maybe I’m bored of picking the same four or five drivers each week, but I’m going deeper for my pick this week. Over the last two months
Brian Vickers has quietly ran with the leaders on a weekly basis. His driver rating over the last 8 races is a very neat 92.2. He was the fastest car at Michigan and one of the fastest at Lowe’s, Dover and Pocono. He is ready to win and it will be surprising if he doesn’t have a win by the time the Chase rolls around. Win number one for Red Bull Racing might come this weekend.

I’m a little late to the party (who comes on time to parties anyway?), but here’s a few thoughts, observations and questions about Mark Martin’s plan to run for the 2009 Championship with Hendrick Motorsports.

Saturday night’s race at Daytona was a perfect example of why Kyle Busch and Carl Edwards are having such great seasons. They have each enjoyed dominant stretches during the season, but their ability to take advantage of other’s mistakes and finish well when they’re at less than their best is why they are both early favorites to win the Championship.

Busch was solid early on when swapping the lead with Dale Earnhardt Jr. But then he somehow lost the steering on the car(a theme for the race) and fell to the last car on the lead lap. Meanwhile Edwards only spent 72 laps in the top 15 and didn’t crack the top ten until lap 92. The only lap he led was when he stayed out under yellow on lap 112, but then went to the back of the pack on the next lap. And then with three laps left Edwards and Busch were suddenly both poised to win the race.

Dale Earnhardt Jr, Jeff Gordon, Denny Hamlin and even David Gilliland had greater chances at winning, only to see them all slip from a variety of reasons. What Edwards and especially Busch did is exactly what Jeff Gordon and Jimmie Johnson did last year. They didn’t thrash everyone on a weekly basis, but were very opportunistic and finished races when others didn’t. That’s the quality of a top team.

Kyle Busch now has 60 points towards his Chase score. That’s 40 more than Edwards and Kasey Kahne. If other drivers with title ambitions like Earnhardt Jr, Gordon, Jimmie Johnson and Tony Stewart hope to keep up, they need to rattle off a few wins to close the gap at the start of the Chase.

• Tony Stewart suffered from dehydration and had to have JJ Yeley sub for him midway through the race. The look on Stewart’s face after he exited the car was one of pure exhaustion. Sometimes it’s easy to forget how physically and mentally demanding races can be, especially at restrictor plate where there is no time to relax.
  

  “I thought we were going to be able to (make it) for the first two runs, but once the car got a little bit loose and we had to start really sawing on the wheel, it’s like it zapped the energy out of me and I started making mistakes. It was a situation where I was trying to look out for everybody involved on the race team. I wasn’t doing us any favors by not being 100 percent. It was better to get out as early as we could versus sticking it out with 20 to go and expecting J.J. (Yeley) to get the thing back in the top-five. It’s one of those decisions you have to make early enough, and I knew I wasn’t feeling good and I wasn’t feeling any better and it was getting worse as we were going. Before the race, the nurse said she was going to buy us a couple of hours and we got three hours out of it. We still had to go out there and try.

• Kyle Petty and Bill Weber were trying to name other recent substitute drivers, but never answered their own question. Ricky Rudd subbed for Stewart in 2006 at Dover after Stewart hurt his shoulder at Lowe’s. Petty subbed for Kevin Harvick at Bristol in August 2004 when Harvick’s arm went numb. Dale Earnhardt also required subs at Loudon (Martin Truex) and Pocono (John Andretti) after his fiery accident in a Grand Am event at Infineion in 2004.

• DEI had a mixed bag this weekend. Paul Menard was the surprise pole winner and led the first ten laps. Mark Martin started 2nd and spent the majority of the race in the top ten before finishing 10th. On the other hand Regan Smith hit Menard from behind in the pits and later wrecked on the last lap and Martin Truex Jr was involved in numerous incidents before finishing 16th. Three cars in the top 20 is nice, but only Martin had a car good enough to hang with the top cars.

• For the second year, the Wide Open coverage was great. Seeing nearly all of the on-track action was exciting, especially in a race with a lot of great action. What would make it even better is if the announcers would be less, um, Wide Open. For example, Weber mentioned Yeley several times and what a great story that would make if he won the race. It’s true, that would have been a great story, but Weber shouldn’t try to force the story, especially when it obviously wasn’t going to happen. Wally Dallenbach, who I tend to like, could also have a bigger impact by saying less. Yelling over Petty and Weber doesn’t add anything and interrupting with a “Whoa!” when cars are single file, also doesn’t enhance the broadcast. Overall the broadcast matched the tempo of the race and did an exciting night justice.

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NASCAR’s Silly Season is kind of like a big game of Jenga. The year begins with everything in a solid block but then slowly a piece gets pulled from the bottom and moved to the top. After a while a lot of holes appear, the formation begins to sway until all it takes is removing one more piece and every block in the structure is affected. Right now the entire Jenga puzzle is teetering on a few major moves, none more important than what Tony Stewart decides to do in 2009. Once that decision is announced (my guess it’s already been made) the aftershock will affect at least 10 drivers.

Last year the pieces were more sequential. Dale Earnhardt Jr, clearly the top free agent in NASCAR, made his decision, then Kyle Busch moved to Gibbs, Mark Martin slid into the #8 car and JJ Yeley moved to Hall of Fame Racing. It was more like a draft where you took the best player left on the board. This year is much more complex because drivers are looking for slightly different things. Stewart does not need to upgrade, he’s already with the top Cup team. He is looking for a place with ownership possibilities. Mark Martin is rumored to be looking for one more shot a the title belt. Martin Truex Jr and Ryan Newman are looking for the best long term shot at winning races and championships. There is at least one new team, Richard Childress’ 4th team that should attract a top driver. This variety of goals makes it muddier than last year.

It really looks like Stewart is going to leave Gibbs Racing, which automatically opens up one of the elite rides in the sport. Unless Stewart goes to RCR’s 4th ride, he will take someone else’s job. If he becomes an owner, that could affect the other drivers in that company as well. Would he be able to attract other high profile free agent drivers to his new company? A lot depends on where Stewart goes. If he decides to take the best ride available, he would probably head to Hendrick Motorsports’ #5 car. Based on rumors, that would throw a wrench in Martin’s plans for a full time run in 2009 with Hendrick.

Whatever happens, Casey Mears is out of the #5 car. It looks like it’s true and isn’t a big surprise. Like his old teammate Jamie McMurray discovered when he joined Roush-Fenway, an upgrade to elite equipment doesn’t necessarily mean an upgrade in success. Mears had his best Cup season in 2007, but it simply is not good enough for what the Hendrick cars are capable of. Now, ironically, it looks like Mears will be competing with McMurray for the whatever second-tier options are available.

If Martin exits DEI, that leaves a huge void. Will the Army be willing to re-sign with DEI knowing that Aric Almirola can’t match Martin’s on-track success, merchandise sales or visibility? Martin Truex Jr is not signed and appears willing to see what else is available. If he leaves, then DEI would take a very big dive. Sure Paul Menard, Almirola and Smith are young, but that doesn’t equate to immense talent or success. DEI is also already struggling to fully sponsor four teams, and that’s including Menard’s essentially personal sponsorship. What happens if Army and Truex leave? It’s hard to see Bass Pro Shops wanting to hang around either.

If Martin is indeed planning on a one year run for the title that means the #5 car would then have another new driver in 2010 (likely Brad Keselowski or Landon Cassill). That’s four different drivers in four years. Is Hendrick willing to do that? Is a longtime sponsor like Kelloggs willing to do that? Would Martin really have a serious shot at a title run?

There will be a lot more people, sponsors and teams affected by what happens in the next two months. It’s a good thing this post isn’t printed on real paper because by next week when everything I just wrote proves false you would have to rip it up anyway.

Other Thoughts off the beaten path

The Euro 2008 tourney wraps up on Sunday. Germany plays Spain. Overall the tournament has been fantastic. Games have had dramatic late goals, great individual skill and a welcome absence of boring, defensive soccer. The final should be another good game and with the potential for rain in New England, do yourself a favor and work the “previous channel” button on your remote.

I haven’t seen any movies lately (it’s too nice outside), but I have taken a peak at the summer movies. Here’s a few recommendations.

Let’s start with a few questions for New Hampshire. Will this race be in Kentucky or Las Vegas next year? Will we see a tight contest with lots of battles for the lead? Will we see a rout like Clint Bowyer’s 6 second win last fall? I don’t have any idea what will happen with Bruton Smith’s personal game of track Monopoly. As far as the race goes, I will hope it’s as exciting as the Phoenix race this spring, but will be keeping a pillow on standby.

In fairness, Loudon is a fine track. It’s tight and flat like Phoenix but lacks some of the quirkiness. The leaders usually don’t check out, but it is very hard to pass. This of course often leads to frustration. Frustration leads to emotion manifested as aggression. Aggression leads to contact. Contact leads to more emotion which leads to helmet tossing. And helmet tossing always equals fun. As a bonus, this year’s race is 301 laps instead of the lame 300 laps like prior years.

What happened last year

Dave Blaney was a surprise pole winner, the first for Toyota, but faded after the first pit stop. Jeff Gordon, Dale Earnhardt Jr and Martin Truex Jr each took turns leading before Denny Hamlin grabbed the lead with a late two-tire stop and held on for his only 2007 win. Jeff Gordon made a late run, but ran out of time. Hamlin edged Gordon by 0.068 seconds, the closest Loudon finish ever.

Some dudes who like Loudon

• Tony Stewart owns the best driver rating (117.9) at Loudon. He has 2 wins, 10 top 5’s and 11 top 10’s in 18 career starts.

• Martin Truex Jr scored two top 5’s last year. He led 47 laps and also won the 2005 Busch race. He is good at the flat tracks and also tends to shine in the Northeast.

• Jeff Gordon has three wins, but none since 1998. He does have three straight top 3 finishes.

Champs, Chumps and Sleepers

Champ: Kevin Harvick Flat tracks and the #29 car just fit well together. He won the 2006 fall race at Loudon and has led 264 laps in his Cup career.

Chump: Kasey Kahne The Chump is again a tough choice, with almost everyone in the top 12 capable of running in the top 5 or winning. Kahne only has one top 5 and Evernham has never been great at Loudon or Phoenix.

Sleeper: Aric Almirola It’s a big stretch, but Almirola will likely drive the same car that Mark Martin nearly won with at Phoenix and finished 3rd at Richmond. Almirola can obviously drive, but with such a sporadic schedule it’s a Fantasy risk.

Who Will Win

The way Tony Stewart has run this year, he is overdue. It would actually be a pretty good publicity stunt for Stewart to begin paying late fees to charity for being overdue on his victory celebration. He is always strong at Loudon and barring any tangles with Ryan Newman, is usually around at the end. I’m really tempted to take Dale Earnhardt Jr, who has done nearly everything at Loudon but win. It’s hard to call him a darkhorse, but watch out for Matt Kenseth. Like Earnhardt Jr, Kenseth has been successful at New Hampshire albeit sans victory.

Now that Dale Earnhardt Jr has scored his breakthrough win for 2008, who is the next driver to win for the first time this year? Nine different drivers have already won at least one race this year, but there are still a lot of big names looking to kick in the door to Victory Lane. Here’s a list of candidates in order of likeliness.

Aside from crazy circumstances, a team finding something revolutionary, or a road course ringer, I can’t see any other drivers challenging for wins this year. Anyone else you see winning this year?

I always used to refer to Dover’s track as Bristol on Steroids. Of course now that is probably cause for a congressional hearing and it would only drag Miles the Monster through the mud. Dover is an exciting track because it’s made of concrete, tough to pass and drivers can get frustrated. One of my favorite finishes of any race in recent years was the duel between Jeff Burton and Matt Kenseth. Burton was on fresh tires but Kenseth made it impossible to pass until the very end. Not only is Dover a track that’s enhanced beyond normal tracks, but so is the name of the race: Best Buy 400 Benefiting Student Clubs for Autism Speaks.

What Happened Last Year

Rain pushed the race to Monday morning and Martin Truex Jr led 216 laps to score his first career Cup win. Unforutnately for Truex, the win was overshadowed by two other events. Kurt Busch was parked after confronting Tony Stewart in the pits and nearly hitting a crew member. Did I mention he was still in his car?

The race also ended on a sad tone when it was announced that Bill France Jr had passed away.

Five Drivers who love Dover

Ryan Newman has 4 poles, 3 wins, 6 top 5’s and 8 top 10’s in 12 career starts. He was a top two car almost the entire race last spring, but unfortunately Martin Truex Jr was simply dominant.

Jimmie Johnson 3 wins, 4 top 5’s and 7 top 10’s in his career at Dover. Johnson almost ran down Truex in last spring’s race but suffered a flat tire in the final green flag run.

Matt Kenseth 1 win in 2006 and 5 top 5’s to boot. Kenseth has led 549 laps since 2004.

Kyle Busch For people that are tired of seeing Shrub run up front and threaten for wins, they might want to turn away. He owns the 5th best driver rating at Dover, 101.5. He has 4 top 5’s in six career starts and probably would have had a fifth top 5 if not for an engine failure at the fall 2006 race.

Greg Biffle won the 2005 spring race. In the last six Dover races he has the highest average driver rating (113.7) among all Cup drivers. He also has 3 top 5’s and 6 top 10’s in 11 career races. Biffle tends to excel at the tight, challenging tracks like Darlington and Dover.

One driver who doesn’t

It’s not that Tony Stewart doesn’t like Dover–he’s won two races– but lately he hasn’t had a lot of fun. In 2006 he had to drive with a broken shoulder blade before getting replaced by Ricky Rudd. Last spring he was headed for a top ten finish when he got together with Kurt Busch and both cars wrecked. That of course set off Busch who used his car to confront Stewart and his crew in the pits. In the last six races Stewart has a 67.7 driver rating, which is almost unheard of for a driver like Smoke.

Other Notes

• Hendrick Motorsports has won 10 races, more than any other team. The last HMS driver to win was Jimmie Johnson in 2005 when they used a tricked-out, although technically legal, shock package. And by technically legal, I mean that NASCAR outlawed the package immediately after the race.

• Mark Martin has led more laps (1799) at Dover than the total number of laps run of 16 drivers on the entry list. That shows two things. There are a lot of drivers with less than three Cup seasons of experience, and two, Mark Martin is awesome.

• The date sneaked up on us, but Sunday is Fox’s final broadcast for 2008. Aside from the Digger nonsense, it has been an outstanding run for the Fox crew. The ball gets passed to TNT for Pocono. Take that for what it’s worth.

• Joey Logano! Joey Logano! Mark Martin has been touting Logano as Cup ready since 2005. Even with Martin’s solid recommendation, the expectations and hype surrounding Logano are nothing short of outrageous (name another Busch East driver that has their own diecasts for sale). Logano’s much anticipated NASCAR Nationwide debut happens this Saturday, and for those that haven’t heard of him, he’s like NASCAR’s answer to LeBron James. Except that LeBron looked like he was a 29 year old linebacker when he entered the NBA at the age of 18. So far in his young driving career Logano has won in almost every series, but the Nationwide series is his biggest challenge yet. The trouble is I think some people will expect him to have immediate success and if he doesn’t, might label him a bust faster than you can say Casey Atwood. We all need to settle down, he hasn’t even made a Cup driver like Denny Hamlin mad yet.

Champs, Chumps and Sleepers

Champ: Matt Kenseth If Kenseth is going to rebound this season, he’d better start now. His record at Dover is excellent in recent years.

Chump: Kevin Harvick: It’s doubtful that Harvick will finish in the 30’s, but it’s equally doubtful that he’ll finish in the top ten.

Sleeper: Mark Martin: His record speaks for itself (4 wins, 20 top 5’s, 27 top 10’s). Plus, wouldn’t it be funny to see Martin pose in Victory Lane with Miles the Monster?

Who Will Win?

Kyle Busch is really, really good at Dover. I thought about Greg Biffle or Matt Kenseth, but something is off with Roush lately. Biffle’s pit crew isn’t reliable enough at this point. Dale Earnhardt Jr has shown he can run in the top 5 and lead laps in any and every race, but he is hit or miss at Dover. Right now it’s Shrub’s world.

Almost every driver has that one track where they just can’t seem to win. It’s like Charlie Brown trying to kick the football. No matter how well the approach is, how many different tactics he tried, it always ended with Lucy pulling the ball away. \Here’s a list of ten drivers still waiting for the big breakthrough at different tracks. The list features a lot of domination in the form of fruitless laps (laps led without winning), some close calls and plenty of heartbreak.

• Ryan Newman at Lowe’s In 14 career starts Newman has started from the pole times, scored three top five finishes and five top tens. He has also led 243 laps, the most of any active driver without a win at Lowe’s. He nearly won the 2007 fall race but a flat tire with three laps left sent him into the wall.

• Sterling Marlin at Short Tracks You would think someone with the credentials of Sterling Marlin would be able to score at least one short track win in a career spanning 32 years and 162 short track starts. Marlin has led 1221 laps and finished in the top five 12 times, but never as the top dog.

• Jeff Gordon at Texas-Gordon has 5 top fives and 326 laps led in15 career Texas starts. Texas and Homestead are the only Cup tracks where Gordon has been shut out of Victory Lane. It’s still hard to rank too high on the agony chart when you have won virtually race at almost every track on the circuit.

• Kurt Busch at a road course Busch has led 99 laps at the two Cup road courses, Sonoma and Watkins Glen. That is the highest number for all drivers without a win to show for it. He has finished 3rd, 4th and 5th at Sonoma. While he doesn’t have a top five at Watkins Glen, he did win the 2006 pole and lead 38 laps before getting caught entering the pits before they were open, ruining his chance at a win.

• Denny Hamlin at Richmond He only has five Cup starts at his home track, but has already seen his share of disappointment. He has two poles, two top fives a second, third and sixth place and led 448 laps but no champagne. He won the 2006 pole for the fall race, but then lost a cylinder. Then this year dominated the race only to cut a tire in the final 20 laps.

• Dale Earnhardt Jr at Martinsville 748 laps led and seven top five finishes in 17 career starts. Junior is still waiting for that first grandfather clock.

• Matt Kenseth at Chicago For a track without much history, Matt Kenseth has had several close calls at Chicago. In 2005 he dominated the race leading 176 laps but was snookered by Dale Earnhardt Jr on the final pit stop. In 2006 he again dominated leading 112 laps but was bumped and spun by Jeff Gordon with four laps left. He finished 2nd again last year to Tony Stewart.

• Jeremy Mayfield at almost everywhere Of active drivers, Mayfield has led the most laps that didn’t result in a win at Bristol and Darlington, Rockingham and the second most at Dover. With his recent struggles, it’s easy to forget that Mayfield was a pretty good driver in his prime.

• Tony Stewart at Talladega Eight second place finishes at the Alabama track show how close Smoke has come. In 2005 he was narrowly beat by Dale Jarrett when the caution flag flew on the final lap. He has also led the last nine Talladega races and 244 total laps in his career. At least his consolation was a Nationwide win this spring.

• Mark Martin at Daytona It’s hard to tell if Martin hates Daytona because he can’t seem to win there, or he can’t win because he hates it. Feelings aside, he nearly pulled off the feel good win last year before Kevin Harvick was declared the winner when the official sat on the caution flag. In 46 career starts, Martin has nine top 5’s, 16 top 10’s, 241 laps led, and a best finish of 3rd.

So what do you think? Who will be the first one off this list? Maybe Sterling Marlin will crush at Bristol.