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Author: Tucker White

  • Johnson makes NASCAR history with victory in Miami

    Johnson makes NASCAR history with victory in Miami

    Jimmie Johnson etched his name into the history books of NASCAR with a race victory and title victory in South Florida.

    The driver of the No. 48 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet took the lead from Kyle Larson on the final restart of the race in overtime to win the Ford EcoBoost 400 and his record-tying seventh Sprint Cup Series championship.

    “Oh my gosh, there is no, no way on earth. Just beyond words,” Johnson said. “Just didn’t think the race was unfolding for us like we needed to do to be the champs, but we just kept our heads in the game. Chad called a great strategy, made some great adjustments for the short runs.  Luck came our way and we were able to win the race and win the championship. I wouldn’t be here without so many people believing in me and giving me this chance; from my dirt days – my parents first and foremost, my brothers, my wife and family today.  Car owners, sponsors, Chevrolet, Lowe’s, so many amazing people along the way that believed in me to give me this chance.  Jeff Gordon, Rick Hendrick, all the men and women at Hendrick Motorsports for working so hard to get these cars fast and giving me an awesome 15 years with the company. Just thank you. From the bottom of my heart, thank you.  So thrilled to be in this moment and so grateful for the opportunity and so thankful and blessed. I am at a loss for words.”

    It’s his 80th win in 543 career Sprint Cup Series starts, fifth of 2016 and first at Homestead-Miami Speedway.

    He joins Richard Petty and Dale Earnhardt in a tie for first in most championships in NASCAR history. He and Chad Knaus also join Petty and Dale Inman as the only driver/crew chief duo’s to win seven championships.

    Larson, who led a race-high of 132 laps, finished runner-up. It’s his 15th top-10 finish on the season.

    The run to the finish was setup by a caution with 15 laps to go related to Dylan Lupton.

    On the restart with 10 to go, Joey Logano tried to go inside of Carl Edwards, Edwards went down to block him, but got himself hooked into the inside wall. This led to a multi-car wreck that took out a number of cars, notably Martin Truex Jr., whose car went up in flames.

    Logano brought his car home fourth.

    “It was eventful to say the least,” Logano said of his race. “I hate being that close to a championship and not getting it. The team did a great job all day. We had a good race car and we put ourselves in position to win. No one made any mistakes or anything like that on our pit crew. That last restart, I was hoping to get Jimmie there and trying to get either to the inside or outside of him. I just timed it a little bit wrong to get underneath him. I just didn’t have enough time to get under him. We lost some time there and unfortunately we finish second. The championship means so much and everyone forgets about second place. That is what stinks. But overall I am proud of this team. This will be motivation for next year. This hurts.”

    It required the race to be red-flagged for 31 minutes and nine seconds.

    On the following restart with five to go, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. got loose exiting turn 2, slid down the track and slammed into the inside wall.

    “I was just trying to get all I could get there,” Stenhouse said. “It looked like the 3 got underneath the 20 and I tried to get underneath the 3 and when I did he was really close to my door and it just kind of sucked me around and we got loose. It’s a bummer way to end. We were just kind of average all night. It’s a tough way to end the season, but we’ll build it and get back ready for next year.”

    Kyle Busch made the decision to pit under the caution and wound up finishing sixth, clinching the 2016 manufacturer’s championship for Toyota and snapping a 13-year win streak by Chevrolet.

    Edwards finished 34th retired from the race in that accident with 10 to go.

    Notables include a third-place finish by Kevin Harvick, who led 79 laps, and Michael McDowell finishing 10th.

    “We had a great car,” McDowell said. “We made up a lot of spots in the beginning and we just sort of maintained that all day. We were running right there 16th – 20th most of the day and the strategy worked out, everything played out. Got back on the lead lap which obviously was a game changer. There at the end we got a couple of good restarts and we had a good car. We were able to close off a good season.”

    Sixteen cars finished the race on the lead lap and 32 cars were running at the finish.

    The race lasted three hours, seven minutes and 10 seconds at an average speed of 128.869 mph. There were 20 lead changes among six different drivers and seven cautions for 33 laps.

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  • Brian France responds to decline in ratings and attendance

    Brian France responds to decline in ratings and attendance

    Brian France responded to concerns regarding continual declines in ratings and attendance saying they “could always be better,” but NASCAR is “pleased with where we’re at.”

    Speaking to the media in the deadline room at Homestead-Miami Speedway, the chairman and CEO of NASCAR was asked, given the decline in ratings for most of the Chase races and few races being sellouts, if he believed this Chase format was resonating with fans.

    “Yeah, you’re seeing TV ratings slide all over the place in sports, right? You’re seeing all kinds of things happen in TV ratings,” France said. “The big events, they go one way, the digital audience is consuming things different. We’re no different from that. It’s not a surprise on that.

    “Attendance has been fine. We’ve come off weather issues like we did in Phoenix a year ago. We don’t have Jeff Gordon and Dale Earnhardt. Needless to say, there’s going to be a little impact there.

    “(Indiscernible) huge crowd. It could always be better, but we’re pleased with where we’re at.”

    NASCAR television ratings have declined dramatically from their peak in 2005. This season alone, ratings are down six percent from last season (Forbes).

    According to Sports Media Watch, 21 of 30 (six races affected by rain weren’t included) races have hit multi-year lows. That includes seven of the nine Chase races run so far (the rain affected races at Charlotte and Texas weren’t included).

    Attendance also appears shaky, but it’s hard to measure since NASCAR stopped releasing official attendance figures for races since the conclusion of the 2012 season.

    The declines in viewership, be it attendance or television, isn’t exclusively a NASCAR problem. It’s plagued all professional sports in the United States. The NFL most notably, which for the longest time has withstood any damage of the 2008 economic recession, has seen significant declines in television viewership this season.

    But it’s one that’s hit NASCAR the hardest of any sport.

    Ratings and attendance is important to teams when looking for sponsorship. When Bob Pockrass asked about this, however, France seemed rather annoyed by it and actually interrupted his question.

    “Let me stop you,” he said. “Maybe what you don’t realize, or maybe you to realize, we report our attendance, right? We have publicly traded companies. We don’t have publicly financed facilities for the most part. All the other leagues have that benefit, so they can discount tickets, give them away. That’s not reported. So we’re in a little bit of a double standard on that, number one.

    “Number two, we are still very pleased with our position in sports. The audience isn’t going away at all. It’s sliding to different places, consuming in different ways.

    “I would tell you some other leagues that have 30% drop‑offs, they didn’t lose 30% of their audience from one moment to the next, that audience is just sliding and consuming in some different ways. Our digital consumption is off the charts.

    “I want to tell you a little something. I watched the other day, as an example, I’m a sportsfan, so I watched a Duke Blue Devils game, after they had played, in like a six‑ or seven‑minute recap of the game. It was pretty good. Maybe it was a little longer than that. I didn’t watch the game on TV, but I watched it fairly intense with my laptop.

    “So things are happening and sliding and moving around. It will all work out. Sports, in the end, us included, will always have a huge, big audience. So whether ratings are sliding over here, spiking at times over here, that will all work out.”

  • The White Zone: The Chase has run its course

    The White Zone: The Chase has run its course

    “The white zone is for immediate loading and unloading…” and I’m here to say that the Chase has run it’s course and it’s time NASCAR do away with it.

    Now right off the bat, I know this might be a tad hypocritical of me to say given I once wrote an article admonishing fans for still hating the Chase. I’ve abandonded that point of view and now don’t look upon the Chase as favorably.

    There is probably nothing more polarizing in the world of NASCAR today than the Chase. Since it’s inception in the 2004 Nextel Cup season, it’s been a source of constant angst that’s divided the fanbase of the sport for a number of reasons.

    The original Chase was less of a “playoff” like in stick and ball sports and more of a 10-race “miniseason.” In it’s first season, Kurt Busch recovered from literally losing a wheel to win the championship by a margin of eight points over Jimmie Johnson, then a record for the closest points finish in NASCAR history.

    As time went on, more and more changes made it more and more artificial and conveluted.

    In 2014, NASCAR implemented the elimination format style of the Chase. This was more like a “playoff” with eliminations and rounds, rather than it being a miniseason.

    This was the format that took the cake in artificiallity. It ensures that no matter what happens, four drivers will always vie for the title at Homestead-Miami Speedway.

    They went a step further this year and added the same format to the XFINITY Series and Camping World Truck Series.

    For me, it came to a head today.

    On the final restart of the Ford EcoBoost 300, Cole Whitt, who opted not to pit and assumed the lead on 30-lap old tires, spun his tires and cost Erik Jones and Justin Allgaier a chance at winning the XFINITY Championship.

    While it was a dumb move on his part, it was the reaction that I don’t agree with and what led to this column.

    There was a lot of people chastizing him for determining the outcome of the championship the way it occured.

    My take on that is this: Whitt has every right to be there. This is racing! Just because Jones was competing for the title didn’t mean Whitt was obligated to move out of the way for him.

    Just because he had no chance of winning the race – by the way, would you tell me if my Tennessee Volunteers will play in the Sugar Bowl this season while you’re looking in your crystal ball – doesn’t mean he doesn’t get to be there. We harp on other drivers when they decide to lay back and not go for the win, yet criticize Whitt for doing exactly that.

    MAKE UP YOUR MINDS!!!

    But it was this one tweet in particular from Jeff Gluck of USA Today that led to this column.

    The part that caught my eye, and led to this column, was suggesting that maybe NASCAR should’ve stepped in and told Cole Whitt he couldn’t restart up front so he wouldn’t interfere with the championship fight. (I’ll come back to this in a moment)

    Now to be fair, he did issue a retraction of that statement in a later tweet.

    So Jeff, if you’re reading this, I’m not directing my ire at you. I just used your earlier tweet for reference.

    I hate to play the hypothetical game, but let’s say hypothetically NASCAR did step in and tell Whitt, who, even on worn out tires, was leading the race, to take a hike and let championship contender Sadler, Jones or Allgaier in first. If that happened, well, let’s just say I hope Mike Bagley, Pete Pistone, Jim Noble, Chocolate Myers, Dave Moody and anyone else at SiriusXM NASCAR Radio would still has vacation days to burn, because they would not want to be present when those people call in on Monday.

    Fans would be irate, and rightly so, at NASCAR explicitly manipulating the outcome of a race. It would instantly validate every last claim of manipulating the outcome of races that has ever been levied against the people that run NASCAR.

    So what does this have to do with my original thesis? It’s my proof that the Chase has done more harm to the sport than its done good and it’s time we put it in the vault labelled “Good on paper, but poorly executed idea” along with the Car of Tomorrow.

    My plane is about to take off so I must get going.

  • Suarez makes history with title victory in Miami

    Suarez makes history with title victory in Miami

    Daniel Suarez made history in South Florida as a victory in Miami made him the champion of the XFINITY Series.

    Starting on the pole, he dominated the race, leading 133 of the 200 laps. However, the championship the whole race was never a lock for the native of Mexico, as each of the Championship 4 drivers spent time at the head of the field.

    It started to intensify with 57 laps to go when all four of the title contenders held the top four spots in the running order for around 10 laps. It peaked with Erik Jones taking the lead with 43 to go before debris slowed the race.

    Suarez worked his way back to the lead on the restart with 37 to go. From there, it was game on to the finish. Justin Allgaier made contact with the wall running in second with 20 to go and Jones made contact with the wall running down his teammate for the lead with 15 and 13 to go.

    Ray Black Jr. spun exiting Turn 4 and brought out the caution with 10 to go. Elliott Sadler exited pit road first but restarted second because, Cole Whitt, on much older tires, opted not to pit.

    Mike Bumgarner, Sadler’s interim crew chief, pleaded with the 14 team to take the bottom lane on the restart, but they wouldn’t. Sadler restarted as the lead bottom car.

    On the restart with three to go, Whitt spun his tires and backed up Jones and Allgaier, costing them a chance at a championship.

    Sadler gunned ahead, but Suarez jumped to the outside, took the lead and scored the victory and the championship.

    It’s his third victory in 68 career XFINITY Series starts, third of 2016 and first at Homestead-Miami Speedway.

    He’s also the first foreign-born champion in any NASCAR national series.

    Sadler came home third.

    “It’s heartbreaking to be that close and to kind of be in position there in the end,” Sadler said. “The guys made a great call to put me in that spot. Yeah, I’m sad for myself, but I’m more sad for my sponsors, my team my guys in the shop. I love them to death. All the hard work they put in these cars. I wanted to win this championship for them really bad.”

    He also addressed his team pleading with the 14 team to let them have the top lane on the final restart.

    “I just wanted to see if they would let us have the top and just let us four race for it because he was on such old tires,” he added. “He decided to stay up there.”

    “I made a mistake on the restart,” Sadler continued. “He didn’t go and I was a little intimidated and I let Daniel get a good run on me. Congratulations to him and his team. He did a really good job on that restart. I messed up a little bit.”

    Allgaier came home fourth. Jones finished ninth and secured Sunoco Rookie of The Year honors.

    A major incident of note took place on lap 137 Jordan Anderson slammed into the back of Jeremy Clements on the backstretch, who was slowing down to avoid hitting the 16 of Ryan Reed in the middle of a lazy spin.

    The race lasted two hours, 34 minutes and 34 seconds at an average speed of 116.455 mph. There were 21 lead changes among 11 different drivers and seven cautions for 39 laps.

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  • Truex fastest in final practice at Homestead

    Truex fastest in final practice at Homestead

    Martin Truex Jr. topped the chart in final Sprint Cup Series practice at Homestead-Miami Speedway.

    The driver of the No. 78 Furniture Row Racing Toyota was the fastest in the final practice session with a time of 30.983 and a speed of 174.289 mph. Carl Edwards was second in his No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota with a time of 31.029 and a speed of 174.031 mph. Ryan Newman was third in his No. 31 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet with a time of 31.264 and a speed of 172.723 mph. AJ Allmendinger was fourth in his No. 47 JTG Daugherty Racing Chevrolet with a time of 31.304 and a speed of 172.502 mph. Chase Elliott rounded out the top-five in his No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet with a time of 31.321 and a speed of 172.408 mph.

    Matt Kenseth was sixth in his No. 20 JGR Toyota. Denny Hamlin was seventh in his No. 11 JGR Toyota. Joey Logano was eighth in his No. 22 Team Penske Ford. Tony Stewart was ninth in his No. 14 Stewart-Haas Racing Chevrolet. Jimmie Johnson rounded out the top-10 in his No. 48 HMS Chevrolet.

    Kyle Busch rounded out the Championship 4 drivers in 14th.

    Kevin Harvick, who had the 11th fastest single lap, posted the fastest 10 consecutive lap average at a speed of 168.286 mph.

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  • Johnson fastest in second practice at Homestead

    Johnson fastest in second practice at Homestead

    Jimmie Johnson topped the chart in second Sprint Cup Series practice at Homestead-Miami Speedway.

    The driver of the No. 48 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet was the fastest in the second practice session with a time of 30.973 and a speed of 174.345 mph. Chase Elliott was second in his No. 24 HMS Chevrolet with a time of 31.154 and a speed of 173.332 mph. Carl Edwards was third in his No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota with a time of 31.223 and a speed of 172.949 mph. Trevor Bayne was fourth in his No. 6 Roush Fenway Racing Ford with a time of 31.261 and a speed of 172.739 mph. Ryan Blaney rounded out the top-five in his No. 21 Wood Brothers Racing Ford with a time of 31.263 and a speed of 172.728 mph.

    Joey Logano was sixth in his No. 22 Team Penske Ford. Martin Truex Jr. was seventh in his No. 78 Furniture Row Racing Toyota. Jamie McMurray was eighth in his No. 1 Chip Ganassi Racing Chevrolet. Ryan Newman was ninth in his No. 31 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet. AJ Allmendinger rounded out the top-10 in his No. 47 JTG Daugherty Racing Chevrolet.

    Kyle Busch rounded out the Championship 4 drivers in 28th.

    Edwards posted the fastest 10 consecutive lap average at a speed of 169.062 mph.

    The Sprint Cup Series is back on track for final practice at 1:00 p.m.

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  • Hendrick pondered separating Johnson and Knaus during summer slump

    Hendrick pondered separating Johnson and Knaus during summer slump

    During the midst of a summer downturn, Rick Hendrick considered making a change that included severing Jimmie Johnson from Chad Knaus.

    Speaking to the media at Homestead-Miami Speedway, the owner of Hendrick Motorsports was reminded of how Johnson and Knaus nearly split apart 11 years ago following Homestead in 2005, that Johnson said that he (Hendrick) had recently asked him (Johnson) and Chad if the relationship is still working, why he would do that and how much he was considering changes in that time.

    “You know, every — I think it’s the toughest question when you have a relationship. It can be in a dealership, it can be in a race team, when you have two guys that have been so good and you try to decide is it time, and this year we started off really well, and then we hit a lull in the summer, and it was — we asked ourselves then, is this time, do we need to make a change,” Hendrick said.

    In the end, he opted to keep the two together.

    “But when you see things that are so close, I think that’s when they work harder, and we really just sit down and work hard together and try to identify weaknesses, and I think they have both made a commitment, they want to retire together,” he added. “They want to finish their careers together.”

    Knaus has sat on top of the 48 war wagon since Johnson’s rookie season in 2002. He’s been apart of all six of Johnson’s championship seasons and all but two of his 79 Sprint Cup Series victories. The enduring partnership these two share is rarely seen in NASCAR today.

    “Jimmie personally, obviously, he is by far one of my best friends, and to be able to have seen him grow and mature into the driver and the family man that he is has been awesome,” Knaus said Wednesday during a media teleconference. “It’s been a great ride.”

    But their relationship hasn’t always been rock solid. It almost came unraveled at the seems following the 2005 Ford 400. Hendrick brought Johnson and Knaus into his office for what was supposed to be a meeting on how they would split up, and ended up mending their relationship over a plate of milk and cookies on a Mickey Mouse plate.

    The two are on the verge of history where they could join Richard Petty and Dale Inman as the only driver/crew chief duo to have won seven titles together.

  • Byron wins the race, Sauter takes the title in Miami

    Byron wins the race, Sauter takes the title in Miami

    William Byron took the lead in the closing laps to close out the season with a victory, but it was Johnny Sauter, one of the elder statesman of the series, who beat the competition to finally add a championship to his resume.

    Byron scored the pole for the race and led the 20 laps before ceding the lead to Matt Crafton. He didn’t make much noise for most of the race until the final caution flew with 24 laps to go. He came out second behind Tyler Reddick, who exited pit road with the race lead.

    He stayed hot on Reddick right from the final restart with 20 to go and took the lead exiting Turn 2 with 10 to go to drive on to victory.

    “It feels awesome,” Byron said. “It’s just – it’s incredible. I mean this team has worked so hard all year. We just had an unfortunate situation last week that we couldn’t control, but, man, they brought a good truck. Qualified on the pole.”

    It was the seventh victory in 24 career starts in the Camping World Truck Series for the driver of the No. 9 Kyle Busch Motorsports Toyota.

    “These guys just are awesome,” he added. “God, I hate leaving this – I just hate this team not being together next year. It’s just insane how good they are and so many talented people on this race team. Can’t thank KBM enough, Toyota, Kyle and Samantha (Busch, Kyle Busch’s wife), everyone at KBM, (sponsor) Liberty University – it’s just amazing.”

    He also secured Sunoco Rookie of The Year honors.

    Sauter brought his No. 21 GMS Racing Chevrolet home third, which was enough to secure him his first series championship.

    “You know, not just me, it’s the whole team, everybody at GMS Racing,” Sauter said in victory lane. “We qualified bad today. Really, we were kind of worried about it. Felt pretty good in race trim.

    “Just proud of these guys for their flawless execution tonight. Joe (Shear) made great adjustments to where I could just kind of hang on. I’m not a high line guy. So I elected to keep doing my deal and they actually found some pretty good grip on the bottom of the race track.

    “Proud to be a champion. I’m gonna do everything in our power to represent NASCAR as best we can.”

    He was asked what point he realized he had a truck that could win the title.

    “I was pretty conservative at the beginning of the race just trying to take care of it and not make any stupid mistakes,” he added. “Then there was about probably 85 laps to go, I was like ‘Okay, we’ll start picking them off here,’ and just had a solid day in the pits.

    “With about 50 to 60 to go, I was like ‘Okay, we’ve got something here,’ and we were really catching the 88. It looked like he was pushing real bad.”

    Kyle Larson, who led a race high of 76 laps, finished fourth.

    Matt Crafton, Christopher Bell and Timothy Peters finished seventh, eighth and ninth.

    Three of the four cautions were brought out by Patrick Staropoli. The other was for a spin by Stewart Friesen.

    Twenty-four trucks finished the race on the lead lap and only Ryan Truex failed to finish the race.

    The race lasted one hour, 32 minutes and 57 seconds at an average speed of 129.747 mph. There were 15 lead changes among five different drivers and four cautions for 18 laps.

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  • Harvick takes pole position in Homestead finale

    Harvick takes pole position in Homestead finale

    Kevin Harvick will lead the field to the green flag on Sunday after posting the fastest time in the final round of qualifying in South Florida.

    The driver of the No. 4 Stewart-Haas Racing Chevrolet scored the pole for the Ford EcoBoost 400 after posting a time of 30.399 and a speed of 177.637 mph.

    It’s his 17th career pole in 574 Sprint Cup Series starts, second of 2016 and first at Homestead-Miami Speedway.

    Brad Keselowski will start second in his No. 2 Team Penske Ford after posting a time of 30.416 and a speed of 177.538 mph. Ryan Newman will start third in his No. 31 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet after posting a time of 30.442 and a speed of 177.387 mph. Denny Hamlin will start fourth in his No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota after posting a time of 30.475 and a speed of 177.194 mph. Chase Elliott will round out the top-five starters in his No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet after posting a time of 30.492 and a speec of 177.096 mph.

    Martin Truex Jr. will start sixth in his No. 78 Furniture Row Racing Toyota. Matt Kenseth will start seventh in his No. 20 JGR Toyota. Ryan Blaney will start eighth in his No. 21 Wood Brothers Racing Ford. Kyle Busch will start ninth in his No. 18 JGR Toyota. Carl Edwards will round out the top-10 in his No. 19 JGR Toyota.

    Tony Stewart will start 11th and AJ Allmendinger will round out the drivers that made the final round of qualifying in 12th.

    Joey Logano will start 13th and Jimmie Johnson will round out the Chase drivers in 14th.

    Gray Gaulding failed to make the race.

    The 40-car field will be comprised of 20 Chevrolet’s, 11 Ford’s and nine Toyota’s.

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  • Newman fastest in first Homestead Cup practice

    Newman fastest in first Homestead Cup practice

    Ryan Newman topped the chart in first Sprint Cup Series practice at Homestead-Miami Speedway.

    The driver of the No. 31 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet was the fastest in the first practice session with a time of 30.789 and a speed of 175.387 mph. Martin Truex Jr. was second in his No. 78 Furniture Row Racing Toyota with a time of 30.795 and a speed of 175.353 mph. Kyle Larson was third in his No. 42 Chip Ganassi Racing Chevrolet with a time of 30.812 and a speed of 175.256 mph. Joey Logano was fourth in his No. 22 Team Penske Ford with a time of 30.828 and a speed of 175.165 mph. Jimmie Johnson rounded out the top-five in his No. 48 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet with a time of 30.867 and a speed of 174.944 mph.

    Brad Keselowski was sixth in his No. 2 Penske Ford. AJ Allmendinger was seventh in his No. 47 JTG Daugherty Racing Chevrolet. Kyle Busch was eighth in his No. 18 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota. Carl Edwards was ninth in his No. 19 JGR Toyota. Chase Elliott rounded out the top-10 in his No. 24 HMS Chevrolet.

    Kevin Harvick, who posted the 15th fastest single lap, posted the fastest 10 consecutive lap average at a speed of 168.283 mph.

    The Sprint Cup Series cars are back on track this evening at 6:00 for qualifying.

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