_Ladies and gentlemen, after 24 races of preamble we get down to the serious business of the season: The 2012 Chase for the Sprint Cup. The regular season is in the books, the elite field of a dozen is set and ten races remain before we crown this year’s champion at Homestead-Miami on November 18th. There isn’t really any other place to start this week’s edition of Five Points to Ponder._
Jeff Gordon climbed from his car and raised his fists in the air after 400 miles at Richmond. Never has someone been so excited to finish second (At least, not since Alan Kulwicki in 1992 at Atlanta). Clint Bowyer’s victory was an afterthought and so was the performance of nearly every other driver besides Kyle Busch.
However, Gordon wasn’t the only to driver to exit his car at Richmond after a top-five finish to breathe a sigh of relief. After a four-race slide in which Tony Stewart nearly fell out of the top 10 in points, he finally stopped the bleeding at Richmond.
It’s time for the Chase! Aren’t you thrilled? Oh. Well, actually neither am I. The fact is the haze of summer has given way to …
*Sprint Cup: A Postseason Snapshot* After 26 long weeks, the field for the Chase for the Sprint Cup has been decided. Only one spot actually changed hands in Richmond, as Jeff Gordon passed Kyle Busch for twelfth place on the points chart and the final wild card. (Both Gordon and Busch had one win on the year, making points the deciding factor.) Now, as the series heads toward Chicago, the talk will inevitably turn towards that of title favorites among the twelve who make the final cut.
Those numbers, causing a ho-hum title race in the process were enough for NASCAR to make a change. The season-long process to pick a champion, in place since 1975 was scrapped the following year with the advent of the Chase for the Cup. The title was now to be settled among the top 10 drivers in points after 26 races of the season. But in just three years, after a couple high profile drivers and a defending champion failed to make the Chase the rules were expanded to include the top 12. But the ADD nature of NASCAR fans apparently was still not enraptured by that set of changes; at least, so it seemed because after the 2010 season, the “playoffs” endured a third major change. The point system that had been used for decades was scrapped for the one point per position system, while the Wild Card entries for the Chase were added. The race for the last two spots would certainly now come down to the last race and the uncertain nature of who would make the final 12 would obviously keep every single fan on the edge of their seat.
By Jeff Wolfe The saying goes that a little rain never hurt anybody. But a few drops at around 12:30 a.m. Sunday in Richmond, Va., …
On Tuesday of this week, NASCAR’s Silly Season came to a head with Matt Kenseth’s long-awaited announcement that he would move to the No. 20 at Joe Gibbs Racing. Just a few hours later, the current driver running that Toyota, Joey Logano, announced his move to Penske Racing and the No. 22. On the surface, Kenseth’s and Logano’s choices look similar, basically lateral moves from one high-profile ride to another.
But look underneath, and they couldn’t be more different.
*Regardless of who gets in on the wild card spot, does it really matter?*
Love it or hate it, the wild card race has been the main focus both last year and this year when Richmond rolls around. Introduced to the series at the beginning of 2011, it made wins the most important thing to getting in the Chase for those who otherwise wouldn’t have a chance. Awesome, right?
Sort of. Yes, of course it’s great to have the focus on winning. But have we ever considered there is a reason those drivers aren’t there in the first place?
Ty Dillon’s victory in last Friday night’s Jeff Foxworthy’s Grit Chips 200 at Atlanta Motor Speedway marked the 11th different–and sixth first-time–winner in the Camping World Truck Series this year. The current record for most wins in a single season sits at 14–set in 1998 and 2005–and with eight races left on the schedule, it’s a mark that could be broken.
But the question that remains: who might break through and add their name to the list of victors?
At Talladega anyone could make a trip to victory lane in that race – assuming all 36 trucks aren’t wiped out in a massive wreck. After all, remember what happened at the last superspeedway race the Truck Series had in Daytona this February. John King executed an ill-timed bump on Johnny Sauter, sending him spinning and ended up snagging the victory. But that wild card aside, there are plenty of drivers that have yet to win this year and could easily do so before season’s end.
With Tuesday’s announcement making official what everybody has known for the past two months, 2003 Winston Cup Champion Matt Kenseth has left Roush Fenway Racing, and will be moving to Joe Gibbs Racing. To say that Roush Fenway is a talent vacuum might not be much of an understatement. Over the course of the past five years, consider the drivers that they have lost: Mark Martin, Kurt Busch, and Matt Kenseth in the Cup Series alone. Sponsorship has taken a hit as well, adding to the list of Office Depot, UPS, AAA, DeWalt, Crown Royal, and Carhartt.