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Author: Ed Coombs

  • Keselowski Guts Out Broken Ankle to Win the Good Sam RV Insurance 500

    Keselowski Guts Out Broken Ankle to Win the Good Sam RV Insurance 500

    Brad Keselwoski gingerly climbed from his car as he celebrated his win at the Pocono Raceway late Sunday evening. Kesleowski held off a hard charging Kyle Busch for his second win of the 2011 season making him the first wild card in the chase. Keselowski had injured himself earlier in the week while testing at the road course in Atlanta. During the red flag Keselowski admitted to being sore but he toughed it out.

    [media-credit name=”Kirk Schroll” align=”alignright” width=”218″][/media-credit]“It’s not me its good people,” Keselowski said in victory lane. “There’s so many people to thank.” But Keselowski also quickly said, “I’m no hero; the heroes are the guys that died in Afghanistan this week. I just drive race cars for a living.”

    When asked about winning the possibility of winning a million dollars he said, “I would throw away the money (for the Sprint challenge) if I could get in the chase”, as Kurt Busch came in to congratulate him.

    All the action occurred after a red flag delay that exceeded an hour and a half that saw Joey Logano leading the race.

    “The 48 was coming,” Joey Logano said in the television booth during the red flag for rain at the Pocono Raceway. Logano had taken the lead from his team mate Denny Hamlin during a pit stop by taking 2 tires.

    Sunday was a busy day at the Pocono Raceway as the Camping World Truck Series completed their race that was postponed due to weather on Saturday. Then the ARCA Series ran their delayed race before the Sprint Cup cars took to the track under the threat of rain.

    Joey Logano led the field to the green after winning the pole award. Kasey Kahne started second but by the time the red flag was displayed on lap 124 Kahne was a lap down in 29th place.

    Up to the red flag it was Joe Gibbs Racing who dominated the race leading 110 of the 124 laps run, 65 of those by Logano’s team mate Denny Hamlin. During the red flag when asked if he wanted the race to be called Logano said, “What do you think?”

    The June Pocono race winner, Jeff Gordon struggled early on from his starting position of 31st hanging in the top 25 but his crew went to work and the car was getting better on each stop. By the time the red flag came out Gordon was in 6th and he said, “I’m kind of hoping we go back racing because I think we can get our car good enough to win”

    Jimmie Johnson was the only fly in the ointment for the Joe Gibbs trio chasing down and passing Kyle Busch and Denny Hamlin as he was bearing down on Logano for the lead when the rains came. Johnson wanted to get back to racing as did Dale Earnhardt Jr. who was in 5th.

    When the race restarted the leaders all went to the pits and Jeff Burton only took two tires coming out first. Kurt and Kyle Busch led them to the green flag and took off. Earnhardt Jr. had slipped to 15th but was working his way forward.

    It went green flag and with 50 laps left pit stops started. Those went without issue and after Landon Cassill made his pit stop Kurt Busch remained in the lead as rain was close by but was forecasted to miss the track. Jimmie Johnson started having issues with his transmission shifter and had to keep it in high gear.

    When Kyle Busch passed his brother Kurt with 38 laps to go for the lead Kurt  said, “Well, at least we won the Pocono 400.” At the same time Jeff Gordon was working on sixth place Joey Logano.

    Things stayed green and they started another round of green flag stops with about 28 laps remaining.

    Then with 21 laps to go Juan Pablo Montoya and the No. 4 of Kasey Kahne got together coming off turn 1 sending Montoya spinning and Kahne to the pits with damage. Kahen lost a lap and was angry with his crew yelling, “It’s like you guys have never been to a race before!” That erased a sizable lead by Kyle Busch over Brad Keselowski.

    Under the caution many cars on the lead lap stopped for tires and fuel as the top 5 stayed out along with a few others who tried to gain track position.

    On the restart Jimmie Johnson made a move for the lead going 3-4 wide into turn 1 and Keselowski ended up with the lead as Busch seemed to focus on Johnson who never made the pass. As the laps wound down Busch was tracking Keselowski down and closing in as Kurt Busch was in third and Jimmie Johnson was in fourth.

    With 12 laps to go Joey Logano was losing a tire and almost crashed as he was in heavy traffic.

    Coming to the checkered flag Kurt Busch and Jimmie Johnson had some high speed antics going on as they slammed doors. Johnson and Busch clearly disagreed as to what happened.

    Kyle Busch said that if he to do it over again he would have done that restart the same way on the bottom even though he got bogged down with Johnson.

     

    Unofficial Race Results
    Good Sam RV Insurance 500, Pocono Raceway
    http://www.speedwaymedia.com/Cup/race.php?race=21
    =========================================
    Pos. St. No. Driver Make Points
    =========================================
    1 13 2 Brad Keselowski Dodge 47
    2 11 18 Kyle Busch Toyota 43
    3 5 22 Kurt Busch Dodge 42
    4 18 48 Jimmie Johnson Chevrolet 40
    5 12 39 Ryan Newman Chevrolet 40
    6 31 24 Jeff Gordon Chevrolet 38
    7 4 99 Carl Edwards Ford 38
    8 9 16 Greg Biffle Ford 37
    9 19 88 Dale Earnhardt Jr. Chevrolet 35
    10 7 27 Paul Menard Chevrolet 34
    11 28 14 Tony Stewart Chevrolet 33
    12 3 56 Martin Truex Jr. Toyota 32
    13 25 5 Mark Martin Chevrolet 31
    14 10 29 Kevin Harvick Chevrolet 30
    15 6 11 Denny Hamlin Toyota 31
    16 20 17 Matt Kenseth Ford 28
    17 8 31 Jeff Burton Chevrolet 27
    18 14 33 Clint Bowyer Chevrolet 26
    19 29 43 A.J. Allmendinger Ford 25
    20 27 9 Marcos Ambrose Ford 24
    21 17 78 Regan Smith Chevrolet 23
    22 16 1 Jamie McMurray Chevrolet 22
    23 24 34 David Gilliland Ford 21
    24 33 0 David Reutimann Toyota 20
    25 22 47 Bobby Labonte Toyota 19
    26 1 20 Joey Logano Toyota 19
    27 36 51 Landon Cassill Chevrolet 0
    28 2 4 Kasey Kahne Toyota 16
    29 42 71 Andy Lally * Ford 15
    30 21 36 Dave Blaney Chevrolet 14
    31 39 38 Travis Kvapil Ford 0
    32 23 42 Juan Montoya Chevrolet 12
    33 41 32 Jason White Ford 0
    34 15 6 David Ragan Ford 10
    35 38 7 Robby Gordon Dodge 9
    36 32 13 Casey Mears Toyota 9
    37 30 66 Todd Bodine Toyota 0
    38 37 30 David Stremme Chevrolet 6
    39 26 83 Brian Vickers Toyota 5
    40 40 37 Scott Speed Ford 0
    41 43 87 Joe Nemechek Toyota 0
    42 35 46 Erik Darnell Ford 2
    43 34 55 J.J. Yeley Ford 1
  • Pocono Raceway Friday Update

    Pocono Raceway Friday Update

    Friday at Pocono Raceway saw the announcement from Doc Mattioli that he was resigning from all positions he holds at the Pocono Raceway effective immediately. His grandson Brandon Igdalsky and the rest of Mattioli’s family will take over in various positions of senior management.

    [media-credit id=18 align=”alignright” width=”213″][/media-credit]Mattioli was very emotional when he was speaking saying, “They cant do a damn thing until Rose and I die and my 3 children die.” That was in reference to the family selling the track to the folks looking to take some races away from the track.  There was a lot of reminiscing done by both Mattioli and the media. It was a special moment in the media center. It was also a bit sad.

    Jimmie Johnson and Dale Earnhardt Jr. came in the media center and did a joint press conference as did Jack Roush and Carl Edwards.  Edwards and Roush’s conference was self explanatory as they came to terms on a contract extension.  There was plenty of good feelings from those two as they actually looked at each other and said, “thank you.” Edwards said, “there was a lot of respect during the process. I’m glad its behind us and I’m glad to be going for the championship.

    It was a drawn out process. “I wish I would have never confirmed my term was up. We could have gotten it done a lot quieter. ”  Edwards went on to say that it was never about money which led to more questions.

    For Earnhardt Jr. and Johnson the press conference started discussing Johnson running in Watkins Glen one of JR Motorsports entries. Earnhardt said, “We really didn’t have anything; a driver and a sponsor for the car, and Tony (Eury) Jr. texted me and said that Chad (Knaus) or Jimmie had mentioned to him at one time if there was ever an opportunity or maybe if they were interested in racing at The Glen or driving at The Glen.”

    Johnson, whose sense of humor was quite evident discussed the difficult interviewing process for the job. “I’m excited about the opportunity,” Johnson said. “The interview to drive for him was rather tough. He wanted to see my resume. I think Mike wanted to see my resume in great detail and make sure I was qualified with good references. Once we cleared that hurdle, it was on.”

    Earnhardt discussed his “chase strategy” and how different choices are made for points. “Yeah, I think the main difference would be you see people making different choices and different strategies at Indy,” he said. “We feel like we weren’t in a position to really take a gamble of trying to make it on fuel. So we played a safer strategy. If we were more in Jimmie’s position, we might have taken the gamble and tried to do what some of those guys did to stretch it. That’s mainly the difference, really. Otherwise you’re all out there running as hard as you can run.”

    Earnhardt was asked on Danica Patrick’s status he simply retorted, “I have nothing new to report on that. I guess I’m really not in the middle of it, but I guess they’re still moving forward. I don’t know nothing that I didn’t know last week.”

    Of course the rumors are that Patrick will be dabbling in cup with Tony Stewart’s team. To that he said with an audible laugh, “I know, I’ve heard all kinds of stuff.” When asked is he could say anything he simply said, Nope, nope, Can’t say anything.”

    David Regan feels pretty strongly that you need to be in the top 12 in points to make the chase, regardless of the wins that drivers have. Regan also said that he was glad that the Edwards ordeal was over they “could put it to rest and move on” and find sponsors for all the teams. Regan also said that Menard winning hurt them even though they’re good friends. He was looking for a top 5 in points to win at Indy. He also discussed his visit to see wounded veterans and that most of the service were familiar with NASCAR and most were Dale Earnhardt Jr. fans.

    Regan also mentioned that his visit to Walter Reed hospital and how most members

    Kurt Busch mentioned that his and Gordon’s birthdays being shared was funny because Gordon was 7 years older than he was and he was 7 years older than younger brother Kyle.

  • WGI’s President Michael Printup Says There’s Lots Going on in 2011

    WGI’s President Michael Printup Says There’s Lots Going on in 2011

    Earlier this spring Watkins Glen International Speedway President Michael Printup fed the rumor mill about things that might happen at the track in 2011. Two of those things were very unique events, a car swap between a Formula One and a NASCAR driver and a concert / festival by a “jam” band with a fanatical following. Printup, a user of social media took to Twitter to announce on March 18th, “I think I am going Phishing this weekend!”, then said shortly afterwards, again via Twitter, “hopefully we will have some big racing news soon coming from The Glen!!! and there is one more surprise out there as well!!! Stayed tuned!!!”

    [media-credit id=18 align=”alignright” width=”197″][/media-credit]Although many don’t remember the track had hosted Summer Jam in 1973 headlined by the Grateful Dead and it drew more people than Woodstock a few years earlier. Subsequent laws were passed restricting this type of event there but those were reversed in the fall of 2010. So the rumors about Phish going there started in the fall and continued into the spring of 2011. The rumors about the car swap also circulated for some time and Printup just fed fans and media little morsels of information about both events. He played it perfectly as both events came to fruition and were successful.

    The track and area has a storied past but there was a time back in the early 1980’s that saw the track fall into disrepair after Formula One stopped racing there. Eventually it was saved by a partnership between Corning Enterprises (a division of Corning Inc.) and International Speedway Corporation (ISC), the company that owns Daytona International Speedway and many other race tracks. A lot has changed at Watkins Glen International Speedway since then and it’s near demise, one change was the addition of the Glen Club, a facility that hosts V.I.P.’s. On March 6, 2007 the club burned down. Since then the track had used temporary facilities to replace the structure that hosted V.I.P. for track events and private parties. For this season that facility has been replaced with a permanent building. It’s just one of the many projects that the track’s president, Printup, has initiated and completed under his short tenure.

    Printup, a native of Hamburg N.Y., was named president of the track in June of 2009. According to his profile available from ISC, Printup has a long history of working in professional sports. From 2005 through mid 2007 Printup was vice president of 380 Development LLC where he was the project manager for the development and implementation of a racetrack in Staten Island, N.Y. The company later abandoned the project after reported difficulties with local government representatives being just one of the problems.

    From there Printup went to the Michigan International Speedway where he was the senior director of facility management. In that position he headed up all business and facility development. He also headed up new business initiatives at the track and managed almost $30 million in projects.

    Speedway Media caught up with Printup on one of the hottest days of 2011 and he spoke about both of those rumored events mentioned earlier. “It’s been a fantastic year,” Printup said. “I know it’s been the busiest our track management has ever been. Between the ‘car swap’, planning for the Phish show, something really outside of the box that we just did, it’s been busy. We have the track rented almost every single day from the middle of April until November 1 so there’s not much peace that can be had up at Watkins Glen. We all love it and we’re having a very busy and now hot summer.” Printup then explained that although it was very hot the elevation of the track still allowed for nice breezes.

    When asked about new things for 2011 at the track he said, “It’s been another busy year on our capital improvement program. I got here in 2009 and we took a totally different review of what we were doing from a capital improvement project list. We’re fortunate because the company has really been supportive of the changes that we made and of our strategic plan and our master plan.” For this year he said, “We have put in camping amenities, about $500,000 worth. We added a bunch of stuff over at Gate 1 (camping area), new lights, additional water, and better parking. We added showers. The Crown Royal Club is now a permanent structure. We put up 4 new grandstands in areas that we used to rent grandstands. So it’s providing a much, much, better experience. In the last 7 or 8 years we’ve put almost $28 million into the place. This year alone we’ve put in about $3.3 million. And I’m very proud to say all with New York State construction companies and vendors as well.”

    Printup’s position is that the fans need to be catered to and notice how hard the track works to get things right for them, “The whole goal is to take care of the fans. I wish I could fix everything in a year. I lobby and we end up with a strong strategic plan. The goal for me and my team is for the fans to recognize a change every single time they come back to the track.” One thing he mentioned was making it better all around the track. “We bought $100,000 worth of picnic tables alone just to spread throughout the grandstands instead of people camping on the grass and laying there,” he said. He also wants to finish adding more permanent grandstand seats a project that fans will see is half-way completed when they get there.

    Obviously the premier NASCAR series stop at the track is a highlight of the year but 2011 saw a really special event when NASCAR’s Tony Stewart and F-1’s Lewis Hamilton swapped their rides at the track. “My short term dream event was that car swap,” Printup said of the event in early June. “That was literally one of the first phone calls I made when I became track president. The vice president of Mobil is a very good friend of mine and I’ve known him for over a decade. I said, ‘you know where I’m at?’ He said, ‘Yes’ and I said ‘first I need Mobil 1 as the official oil’, he told me to ‘go to hell’. He said, ‘not a chance; I’m not spending money at race tracks.’ Number two I said, ‘let’s copy what Indianapolis did with Jeff Gordon and Juan Pablo Montoya and let’s do a car swap.’ He said, ‘That we might be able to do.’ I did that in July of 2009. It took two years to get done. In the last year we worked really, really hard on it.”

    One thing that did come from that swap was the idea of racing the “boot” section of the track during the NASCAR race. Tony Stewart and according to Printup, Juan Pablo Montoya are on board with NASCAR racing on that section of the track.

    “I would like to see it and I will lobby, heck I already have lobbied, with NASCAR but we’re going to take it one step at a time,” he said about seeking permission to use the infamous boot section. “I met with a few of the NASCAR executives the week after the car swap. I sat down with them and said, ‘I know it’s premature to be barking up a storm about racing the boot but let me take a look at a few capital things first.’ Then he explained why he couldn’t do it right away. “You don’t want to just open up the boot and not have a plan. I would have to pave the sand trap in turn 8. I wouldn’t want to do it before then. I would want to consider, do we want to add any seats? Even if it’s limited bleachers. Camping. There are just so many things to go through. So I told NASCAR, ‘give me at least a year to think about this and maybe in 2012 I’ll come back and lobby you and maybe we run Nationwide on the boot.’ We could start there and just how it goes.”

    Printup has great plans for the infamous track in the finger lakes of central N.Y. and wants to makes fans want to come back. But one thing he did say was that the possibility of a Formula One race at Watkins Glen was remote. “You’re picking my dream event,” he said when asked about F-1 racing there. “To have a NASCAR and Formula One facility would be unbelievable. But Bernie Ecclestone (Formula One Management CEO and President) is a tough cracker. I’ve been involved in this for a long time. I am a Formula One and NASCAR freak and fan. I just know of anyone that is paying Bernie, $25 million a year in a sanctioning fee here. We couldn’t sustain that business. We would be selling tickets at 1,000 bucks apiece. Then you’d just out price all the fans that truly, truly love the Glen for its road course, technical abilities, it’s a drivers course. It just wouldn’t make sense.” He said, “They want to be in New York City, Chicago, L.A., now they’re going to be in Austin Tx. Which is fantastic. That would be my dream event. That’s a long way away.”

  • The Inaugural Debacle at Kentucky

    The Inaugural Debacle at Kentucky

    At one point early in the Quaker State 400 at the Kentucky Speedway Kyle Busch has a lead of over 8 seconds. Busch, who started on the pole by being the fastest in happy hour practice after the qualifying session was cancelled due to rain, gave up the lead for a while to Brad Keselowski held off David Reutimann in a 3 lap shoot out at the end.

    [media-credit name=”Brian Douglas” align=”alignright” width=”273″][/media-credit]The majority of the race was uneventful as the leaders enjoyed the clean air while others struggled mightily with the track. Unfortunately, most of the action was reportedly outside the track as race fans struggled with gridlocked traffic trying to get to the racetrack. There were reports of fans being turned away when they finally made it to the track.  Jeff Gordon said after the race, “I think the only thing that made this a great race today was the green-white-checkered and the excitement and energy of the fans. I think when Bruton (Smith) is looking at how to get the traffic in here he’s going to have to look at the race track as well. It’s rough. It’s really hard to pass. The layout needs a little help; but the surface most importantly, to give these fans what they really deserve. You never know how it’s going to go. It was certainly exciting there at the finish, so that’s cool.”

    Busch had regained the lead late in the race during green flag pit stops but shortly after Dale Earnhardt Jr., who took fuel only blew a left front tire shredding his fender all over the back stretch. On the subsequent restart Jimmie Johnson was chasing down Busch but Clint Bowyer also appeared to have lost a tire and that brought out the final caution.

    Jimmie Johnson finished third , Ryan Newman fourth and Carl Edwards rounded out the top five. Johnson said, “The No. 00 was coming and got by me so i was hoping I had a shot just to fight for second. I felt like the win was kind of gone at that point. But I didn’t see the white and I came around and everybody let off and I was still on the gas and going and I was like wow I guess its over. Great night for the Lowe’s Chevrolet. We had a a very solid race car. Drove up through the field a few times and raced for the win. The No. 18 was a little better than us and we were on equal tires there at the end. We had a shot at him on new tires. That restart went good for me. If I could have stayed along side of him going into turn three and been side-by-side off of four I could have a shot at it but just didn’t work out that way. If there was another lap I think that No. 00 was going to go right by that No. 18, he was coming awfully fast.”

    Johnson also made comments about the issues of getting to the track. People who follow NASCAR on twitter (@coombsegater_sm) would have seen that even the drivers and crews were not immune to the traffic issues as they all struggled getting to the track even hours before the green flag flew.  Johnson said when informed of Hamlin’s issues, I went home to Charlotte. It was my daughter’s birthday yesterday. I went home. I was going to drive in. I had heard there were some issues with the Nationwide race. So I made different arrangements and helicoptered in. I fortunately didn’t have any issues.

    The stories I heard sounds like there’s some upset fans, people that were turned away and weren’t able to get into the event today.

    It’s disappointing. I mean, the SMI group knows racetracks and does a very good job at all the racetracks they own. It’s unfortunate we were unable to look ahead and see where these potential problems were.

    This is such a great market, so many fans are enthused to come and want to be here. To not get them all in the door is kind of a bummer. Knowing Bruton (Smith), he’ll get it fixed for next year and unfortunately it happened this year.”

    During the race the track sent out this statement, “We’ve had an overwhelming response to our inaugural NASCAR Sprint Cup Series “Quaker State 400.” We know we had challenges related to traffic. We’re already planning improvements and looking forward to a much better situation for next year’s event

  • Keselowski’s Fuel Outlasts Harvick’s

    Keselowski’s Fuel Outlasts Harvick’s

    Brad Keselowski dominated the Feed the Children 300 at the Kentucky Motor Speedway leading 132 of 200 laps. His closest challenger, Kevin Harvick had an apparent miscue from his crew chief that cost him valuable time as there was some confusion as to whether Harvick was stopping for fuel in the final 10 laps. As Harvick slowed, Keselowski pulled away further even though Harvick’s crew chief called off the stop. That allowed Keselowski to conserve fuel more. The final 61 laps were run under green flag conditions.

    Harvick finished second was said he thought that his car was great but there needed to be better communication from on top of the box. Kyle Busch finished in third after starting the field in 43rd as a result of him crashing during his qualifying effort.  Busch was followed by Kasey Kahne who drove the JR Motorsport No. 7 Go Daddy car, his first time in that Chevrolet. Pole-sitter Elliot Sadler finished 5th and left Kentucky with the points lead even though he struggled at times during the race to get into the top 10.

     

    Busch said about his night, ” I screwed up qualifying today and ‘fenced’ the NOS Energy Drink Camry.  But, we had another one in the truck.  The guys did a great job putting it together and getting it ready and just in time.  Probably didn’t have as much time as they would have liked to have spent on it, but all in all we gave it the best we had.  Probably was going to be about a fifth or sixth before all the fuel exchanges and everything going on there at the end.  Thank all the guys.  They did a great one for me tonight. ”

    The win was Keselowski’s 13th in the series. One thing that was overheard in the media center was Keselowski explaining that his beer was better than Harvick’s. Both run in Saturday’s 400 mile race .

    “This car was awesome. The boys at Penske Racing spent some extra hours on it and it feels good. I think we got more in the hopper. To see this team start coming along feels great.

     

    “The guys at Discount Tire have been behind me, supporting me. They made this program possible so we could win the championship last year. (We) got banned from it this year, so now we’re just out here having fun.

     

    “If you keep doing the right things long enough, you will be rewarded and today was a day of reward. I can’t wait to see a bunch of the Discount Tire guys this week bring them home a trophy,” Keselowski said.

    [media-credit id=12 align=”alignright” width=”240″][/media-credit]

  • Stewart Drives Formula 1 Car in the Mobil 1 Swap at Watkins Glen

    Stewart Drives Formula 1 Car in the Mobil 1 Swap at Watkins Glen

    See our Special Gallery HERE : http://www.speedwaymediaphoto.com/photos/azcms/gallery.php?gazgroup=1gazpart=show&gazgal=305

    On a dark and dreary day at the picturesque Watkins Glen International Speedway Mobil 1 racers swapped cars. At the end of it all they were nothing but smiles as each driver took their own car around the track for 3 or 4 laps and then they drove each others cars. The drivers were NASCAR’s Tony Stewart and F-1’s Lewis Hamilton.

    [media-credit id=18 align=”alignright” width=”199″][/media-credit]This event marked the first time an active F-1 team has been at Watkins Glen since 1980 and comes on the 50th anniversary of F-1 first appearance here.   The race track that they would drive on would be the full course that includes the infamous “boot” section that is not used during a NASCAR race. After everything was done Stewart said, “I wish we did run the boot, there’s a lot of opportunity to pass there. It’s different but I think we should race there.” It also marked the first time Stewart had run on rain tires.

    Before they swapped cars the drivers came in the media center and seemed very relaxed as they explained how excited they were to do this. Hamilton was asked if he had a nickname, like Stewart did what would it be? He responded, “Bump, probably,” since he ran into so many cars lately. When Hamilton was asked what advice Stewart had given him about driving the road course he laughed and said, “Just go flat out, everywhere” to the laughter of the media center. But Hamilton did admit to being somewhat nervous about driving a stock car.

    Then the drivers hit the track and each did a slow lap and then picked it up to speed. Hamilton went first and it appeared he hit the rev limiter and had some issues shifting. Compared to his own car it looked like the car was very slow. The F-1 car when Stewart was driving was much faster on the track than he was driving his own stock car.

    In the media center afterwards the drivers, the crew, their staff, the track staff and even the media were all smiles. Hamilton was asked if he’d ever consider driving in NASCAR and he responded that his “goal was to be Formula 1 world champion and he had not met that goal.”  Hamilton in the media center said, “I just feel like a kid today.” Stewart said that if he ever wanted to drive in NASCAR he wanted to get first crack at signing him.

    There were about 10,000 fans in the grandstands on a dreary day. Track President Michael Printup said that he was very excited about how everything went and when asked about Stewart’s comments about driving the boot he said, “I am getting a message into Mr. Helton about this very topic tomorrow. We wouldn’t increase the length of the race we would decrease the laps. It would open up a huge area of the track. The fans would love it. It’s just a mile more.”

    So all in all it seemed like a successful event. For more photos of this historic event see our special gallery here:

    http://www.speedwaymediaphoto.com/photos/azcms/gallery.php?gazgroup=1gazpart=show&gazgal=305

  • Pocono Raceway – Saturday update

    Pocono Raceway – Saturday update

    [media-credit name=”Ed Coombs” align=”alignright” width=”230″][/media-credit]Saturday at the Pocono Raceway we got off to a very wet start to the day as heavy storms pounded us early Saturday morning. Things cleared up long enough to get Coors Light qualifying completed for the Sprint Cup Series but a persistent fog plagued the ARCA series race and it was called shortly after the halfway mark due to the misty weather and the fact the spotters could not even see turn 1 from the tower!

    Sprint Cup qualifying was somewhat surprising to me as Kurt Busch won the pole with Paul Menard rounding out the front row. Jeff Gordon will start third.

    Busch, who wrecked his primary car during practice Friday said, “Quite a bit of emotions today, especially after having to burst out the backup car after yesterday’s mishap. To go out there today, if it was raining, we would be starting last. And now, luckily the weather held out and we’re on the pole. An amazing swing of events. An honest thank you to my guys, especially the ones back at the shop preparing the cars. To pull a backup out that’s a pole-winning car, that’s something you really wouldn’t hear about back in the day. It would be all-right, we’re going to have to struggle through the weekend; it’s not the best piece (car). It’s great that we have that quality control in our system.”

    Busch also made comments about how the Penske organization has changed since his tirades in Richmond and other tracks over the radio. “We haven’t changed a lot of things since Richmond,” Busch said. “It’s just been some procedures, some processes and maybe just looking at the data a little bit differently. It’s great to come back out and be on the pole again.”

    Carl Edwards, who was fastest in happy hour qualified sixth. He said, “It was an okay run but I was just telling Bob and the guys that that is the fastest our car has been through three and four. I knew we got through one and two really well. The timing was a little shaky and we got a little loose. All I could think was, ‘man, this is a screaming lap and don’t overdrive three.’ I drove in there a little bit soft and this thing stuck. It had so much grip and I knew right then that I gave something up. I tried to get into third gear and get on the gas as early as I could. That is a pole winning car right there. I just needed to drive a pole winning three and four. I am excited about the race. It is nice to be disappointed about a sixth place qualifying position. It should be a really good run for us.”

    One driver who was real happy was one of my dark horse picks for the weekend Marcos Ambrose. The affable Australian said, ““That was huge pickup for us. You think that one lap won’t make or break your season but Pocono is really tough. We had a tough Kansas and a tough practice yesterday and our team just dug deep. The car was fantastic. I guessed the shift points correctly and here we are. I am really proud of my guys. I have to thank Stanley and DeWalt and everybody for believing in me. Richard Petty too. He is my boss and I have to make him happy.”

    Mike Skinner had a vicious wreck off turn 1 in qualifying slamming into the second generation SAFER barrier wall. Skinner was OK after the wreck but the clean up some time and it looked like the weather could close in on qualifying session but instead it impacted the ARCA race.

  • Pocono Raceway Update – Friday

    Pocono Raceway Update – Friday

    A lot went on at Pocono on Friday as the Sprint Cup cars took to the track for both of their only practice sessions. With NASCAR allowing for different gear ratios that would allow for shifting again at the uniquely shaped race track everyone would expect that to be  a hot topic, but it wasn’t the only hot topic.

    [media-credit id=18 align=”alignright” width=”240″][/media-credit]First, it was not surprising that the fastest car in happy hour was Denny Hamlin followed by Brian Vickers, Carl Edwards, Brad Keselowski and Jimmie Johnson.

    One hot topic that came up was the “secret fining” of Ryan Newman for reportedly hitting Juan Pablo Montoya in the NASCAR trailer during a meeting. There are denials from NASCAR and of course this leads to credibility issues when they’re not transparent. I’ll leave this to others to work on. I was not the person that was apparently lied to when NASCAR spokesperson’s were asked about fines for incidents the weekend of Darlington.

    The day started out with a brief statement by Richard Childress regarding his altercation with Kyle Busch in Kansas and the subsequent heavy fine levied by NASCAR. Childress only made a statement and allowed for no questions. I hurried off to the media center because Kyle Busch was in there and frankly he was getting grilled.

    Kyle was asked if he had a “respect issue” in the garage and if it has an effect on him. In part he said, “ It makes your day a little bit easier.  Makes your job a little bit easier.  I’ve been able to have good conversations and talk to people outside the race car or at driver intros or stuff  like that.  Whether it’s the case that they’re not being true to my face — I don’t know, I can’t read that.  I’m not in people’s minds.  If you’re mad at me, you’ll have to tell me.”  I thought that was a bit interesting.

    When asked if he felt he was wearing the “black hat” he responded, “I’m not sure that there’s really any hats to be worn here.  The black hat deal…the villain type thing, I’m not sure that I really did a whole lot to bring that back upon myself.  I feel like I’ve acted in the utmost respect to every case that’s come up my way and has been thrown in front of me.  I’ve tried to do it with dignity and class and I feel like that comes from people wearing white hats… not black.”

    So Busch feels it was a total misunderstanding and mentioned that he gave Childress’ driver a “congratulatory tap”. He went on to say,  “There was no malicious intent to be involved in hurting or damaging a RCR (Richard Childress Racing) vehicle.”

    I was able to ask a few drivers about fuel mileage and whether it was as difficult as managing your tires. The answers differed somewhat and look for  a further story on that topic soon on www.speedwaymedia.com

    What I really found interesting was how satisfied Dale Earnhardt Jr. is with just about everything. When he was in his press conference he was very relaxed and was even more so during the practice sessions where he was doing pretty well. I was impressed with his candor regarding being a car owner and what happened when Denny Hamlin and Brad Keselwoski had a run in at Charlotte when Keselwoski drove for Earnhardt’s JR Motorsports. Earnhardt said, “When Denny and Brad were being idiots at Charlotte that one race and banging into each other’s fenders and stuff it really upset me. I was in another car and I went up there and ran into Denny.” The good thing about that entire thing was that he had a very big smile on his face.

    The weather forecast has changed a bit so hopefully we’ll get qualifying and racing in tomorrow and Sunday

     

  • Childress Pleads the Fifth at Pocono

    Childress Pleads the Fifth at Pocono

    Richard Childress made a brief statement but would not take questions at the Pocono Raceway Friday morning. A press release had indicated that Childress would take “Q&A” at 10 AM at the hauler of his No. 31 team. However, shortly after Childress arrived at the hauler the public relations staff came and asked what we were doing there to a bevy of laughter. He said, “Richard will make a brief statement but will not take any questions.

    [media-credit id=18 align=”alignright” width=”202″][/media-credit]Childress appeared a few moments later and was very candid but the one thing that was missing was an apology. Childress basically said he was very passionate about his race teams. Childress said, “Here is the deal. I am going to make one statement on this deal. I appreciate everyone’s patience during the last week when I couldn’t talk to everyone. The main thing is I take all the responsibility for my actions last week. I am very passionate about this sport. I am passionate about my race teams, our fans and I let my emotions get…come in front of my passion. But that is behind us.”

    Busch said in the media center that it was a “congratulatory bump”. He also said he’s an owner and he understands how passionate it can be. He also said that he was “racing for fifth, in the truck series.”  Busch’s conference was very interesting, if you get a chance review the entire thing here on Speedway Media.

    Childress said about the fine, “We had a lot of fans to send in donations last week toward our fine, I am going to pay it personally. All that money that has been sent in, that is still coming in, we’re going to take and donate to the Childress Institute for Pediatric Trauma.  At least in every bad situation, something good will come out of it.”

    I think its over, but it has certainly been entertaining.

  • Walking to Victory Lane- Allgaier Wins STP 300 at Chicagoland Speedway !

    Walking to Victory Lane- Allgaier Wins STP 300 at Chicagoland Speedway !

    Justin Allgaier walked to victory lane at the Chicagoland Speedway after winning the STP 300 by having just enough fuel to pass the slowing car of leader Carl Edwards who had run out of fuel heading into the final turns. Allgaier’s car rested on the front stretch empty of fuel but Allgaier had the checkered flag in his hand for the walk to victory lane.

    As Allgaier sped past Edwards his own car also sputtered and ran out of gas so he pulled down to the apron of the track with Edwards following. They both crossed the finish line before Trevor Bayne, making his first start since being hospitalized with a mystery illness in April, did under his own power at full speed. There was a lapped car in front of Bayne and initially Allgaier thought he was the winner. “I thought it was Trevor,” he said.

    Allgaier said, “Jimmy Elledge has made great calls all year long. I’m having a blast. To get a win in Illinois is just great. It doesn’t get much better than this. It’s a pretty awesome day.”

    Bayne said afterwards, “I could have won this thing. I should have stopped conserving fuel a little earlier. But we’ll take this third place. I feel good.”

    Aric Almirola and Jason Leffler rounded out the top 5.

    Carl Edwards dominated the race for the for 2/3 of the race but battled with the Kevin Harvick Inc cars driven by Elliott Sadler and owner Harvick. Sadler had a great run but elected to get fuel and tires as the laps were winding down. Reed Sorenson’s sixth place finished allowed him to take the lead in the series points from Sadler by 2 points.

    Danica Patrick ran in the race and finished 10th, on the lead lap after getting a “lucky dog” lap back earlier in the race after going  a lap down to the leader.