Category: Race Central

[media-credit name=”Credit: Tom Pennington/Getty Images” align=”alignright” width=”225″][/media-credit]Kasey Kahne scored the pole today during qualifying for the Kobalt Tools 400 earlier today.

Kahne was one of fifteen other drivers to break the track record as well. Kahne is looking for a boost to his 2012 season. Kahne suffered accidents in both the season-opening Daytona 500 and the Subway Fresh Fit 500 last weekend in Phoenix. Kahne got caught up in one of many big wrecks at Daytona and wrecked on his own at Phoenix early in the race after getting loose off Turn 4. This is Kahne’s third career pole here at Las Vegas.

Kahne ran his first race here in 2004 where he started from the pole. Kahne led 43 laps and finished second to eventual winner Matt Kenseth. He last won the pole in 2007, but suffered a crash late in the race when the 38 car of then driver David Gilliland sucked him around on the outside, putting the then #9 car in the wall. He has one other Top 5 finish at the track and that happened in 2006 when he finished in fifth. How will Kahne do on Sunday?

Hometown favorite Kyle Busch (sort of) will start on the outside of the front row. The reason why I put “sort of” is that I remember last year when his motor exploded, I heard very loud cheers. I felt kinda bad for Kyle that day. He has one victory here which he got in 2009.

Kevin Harvick qualified his #29 Budweiser Chevrolet in third. I’m seeing a new Harvick this year. He is qualifying a lot better here early in the season and he’s running up front. Harvick has never won here at Vegas, but came close in 2004 before running out of fuel, and finished second to Jimmie Johnson in 2010.

Rounding out the rest of the Top 10 included: Earnhardt Jr., Bowyer, Johnson, Stewart, Logano, Biffle, and Martin Truex Jr.

Is it just me or is Joey Logano on fire? Logano has a new crew chief this year in Jason Radcliff, who spent a long period of time serving as the crew chief for Kyle Busch during his Nationwide Series runs. Logano is running better than ever! I see Logano finally making the Chase this season. It is now his time after three seasons under Greg Zipadelli. Zipadelli now is Competition Director at Stewart-Haas Racing.

Defending winner of this race, Carl Edwards, qualified his #99 in the 21st position as his Daytona 500 winning teammate, Matt Kenseth, qualified his #17 Best Buy Ford in 11th.

Edwards is my pick to win this race, but you never know. My dark horse pick for this weekend is going to be Joey Logano. He has really showed me that he is ready to be a threat for the title.

What do you guys think? Follow me on Twitter. http://www.twitter.com/SirRyanTheOHara or email me rosharppromotions@gmail.com. Enjoy the race!

[media-credit name=”David Yeazell” align=”alignright” width=”208″][/media-credit]Kasey Kahne captured the pole for Sunday’s Kobalt Tools 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway with a track record lap of 190.456 MPH (28.353 secs). This was Kahne’s 23rd career cup pole and his first since joining Hendrick Motorsports.

“It was a good lap. We carried a lot of speed to the line in the Farmers Insurance Chevy. I got through (Turns) 1 and 2 really well. When I got to (Turn) 3, I was a little bit tight and just had a little more wheel than what I would have liked coming off of (Turn) 4 and back to the line. So I knew I was a little on the tight side. But I still felt like it was a good run and the Hendrick engine runs so well it pulls you there. That was a good lap. It was faster in practice today. We did a lot of race trim stuff and then we made a couple of runs right at the end.” Kahne said.

Overall, 15 drivers broke Matt Kenseth’s record lap of 188.884 mph set in 2011.

Kyle Busch qualified second. “The M&M’s Camry drove great. Dave(crew chief) and the guys did a nice job so hoping that second place starting spot is good for Sunday and keeps us up front with our track position.” Busch said.

Kevin Harvick third. “Yeah, these guys on this Budweiser Chevy are making me look good on qualifying days.” Harvick said.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. fourth and Clint Bowyer qualified fifth.

“I’m pretty happy with how we ended up. We struggled in qualifying last year and wanted to work on that this year and this is a good result, so hopefully we’re making some gains there.” Earnhardt Jr. said.

[media-credit name=”Simon Scoggins” align=”alignright” width=”238″][/media-credit]Denny Hamlin avenged his 2010 hiccup during the 2010 Chase for the Sprint Cup and used good pit strategy to win the Subway Fresh Fit 500 at the Phoenix International Raceway.

“If you would’ve asked me at the beginning of the day, I would’ve taken a top-15 finish.” Hamlin said in victory lane. “Just an amazing job by this FedEx Office team. Just kept working on it. Every time we worked on it, it got better. Can’t thank them enough.”

The race came down to fuel mileage as Hamlin had the 29 of Kevin Harvick breathing down his neck down the stretch, but the 29 was short on fuel by just one lap, but still managed to finish in Second.

“You cut the fuel mileage that close, you’re figuring it right. So I’m proud of all my guys. When they come to a place like this where we struggled so much, and then race for a win, is hopefully what sets the tone for the year.” Harvick said.

Greg Biffle, who was one of the favorites for the race today based off his performance during the first practice session struggled for the first half of the race before finally picking up the pace.

“The guys did a great job with the 3M Ford Fusion. I wish I wouldn’t have tried to save so much gas. I probably would have caught the 29, but you just never know how much gas you’ve got.” Biffle said.

Jimmie Johnson rebounded from last week’s disastrous Daytona 500 to finish in fourth position, but because of the penalty handed out by NASCAR at the beginning of the week, Johnson only has 18 points coming out of Phoenix.

“We were concerned because I rarely get good fuel mileage. We were definitely concerned and once we cleared the No. 2 (Brad Keselowski) we just kind of fell into a rhythm at that point and tried to make sure that we got home and made some points. Leaving Daytona in 42nd on the board wasn’t a good way to start the season. But I’m very proud of the effort. We had a very fast Kobalt Tools Chevrolet.” Johnson said.

Brad Keselowski, Kyle Busch, Martin Truex Jr., Jeff Gordon, Mark Martin, and Joey Logano rounded out the rest of the top-10.

Kasey Kahne ran into trouble during the very early stages of the race. Kahne got loose and hit the wall coming off turn 4 and didn’t finish better than 34th. It has not been a season to cheer about so far for Kahne and Hendrick Motorsports.

Another driver involved in the silly season was Clint Bowyer. He simply had no luck. The caution flew for him the first time for a cut tire which caused some damage to the right-front fender, but that wasn’t the end of the disaster. Bowyer cut another tire about nine laps later and hit the wall, but no caution was thrown. Bowyer finished in 30th.

Tony Stewart, who started on the outside of the front row, led early on in the race after passing Mark Martin, but fell victim to the new fueling system which was very similar to what Greg Biffle went through at Las Vegas almost a year ago. Stewart turned off his engine during the yellow, but the engine did not come back when he tried re-firing. Stewart ended up losing laps and wound up a disappointing 22nd.

“I just shut the car off like we did at Daytona and turned it back on and it never re-fired. That’s all I can tell you. I don’t know why it didn’t re-fire. I honestly don’t know. It’s not really my department. I just turned the switch back on and it never re-fired. I don’t know why that was; but it definitely cost us a good day.” Stewart said.

I personally witnessed the fate of Marcos Ambrose. Ambrose was inching his way into the top-5, but ran into a problem with his engine. He came down into Turn 1 and it sounded like the engine had farted. I tweeted “Ambrose is in trouble!”. He came around again and his car had begun to smoke and he pulled down off the track. It was sad to see because it looked like he was on his way to a great finish for a lower-funded Richard Petty Motorsports.

“We blew up. We are here trying to run for wins and run for championships and to trip over ourselves like that, it just isn’t going to get it done.” Ambrose said.

The only other incident of the day happened when A.J. Allmendinger got loose and made contact with Paul Menard on the front stretch. Menard was sent to the inside wall while Jamie McMurray, an innocent man with no where to go, suffered damage to the front-end. McMurray tried staying out and lead some laps before developing an engine problem and later went to the garage and was done for the day.

Hamlin, like many drivers, had made a two tire stop to acquire track position and eventually the lead. Harvick led the most laps today, but as stated above, ran out of fuel and finished second. Hamlin now has the point lead as we head into Las Vegas where last year Carl Edwards edged Tony Stewart for his only win of 2010 minus the Sprint All-Star Race. My pick for the race will be Carl Edwards. Last year, the event was plagued with a series of tire failures, including Jeff Gordon and David Gilliland.

What did you guys think of the race today? Let me know! Follow me on Twitter! http://www.twitter.com/SirRyanTheOHara

On the possibility of a championship: Absolutely. I think we can do it if we continue to run well, but you never know what’s going to happen. Next week we’re going to an entirely different race track and that is what makes the first half of the season difficult. We get a lot of tracks that all have different dimensions for about five weeks during the year. -Hamlin

[media-credit name=”CIA Stock Photography, Inc.” align=”alignright” width=”247″][/media-credit]53 year old Mark Martin took the pole for Sunday’s Subway Fresh Fit 500 away from Regan Smith with just one driver remaining to the applause of the fans at Phoenix International Raceway. This is Martin’s third career pole in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series here in Phoenix. His last pole in Phoenix came back in 2009. He ended up winning that event which turned out to be his first career win with Hendrick Motorsports.

“I can’t say enough for MWR (Michael Waltrip Racing), Aaron’s and my team giving me such great Toyotas. I want to make sure that everybody knows that having an owner for a driver is really, really special. I got this pole because of Michael Waltrip and something that he said to me right before I went to qualify and of course a great race car and a great team and everything else. Thank all the fans for cheering, that’s such a privilege to be still racing — thank you all.” Martin said.

Tony Stewart will start alongside Martin on the front row. We mentioned earlier that Stewart has one career win here which he won during his rookie season back in 1999. Martin also has only one victory here.

Rounding out the top-10 were Regan Smith, Jimmie Johnson, Juan Montoya, Ryan Newman, Greg Biffle, Kevin Harvick, Joey Logano, and Kasey Kahne.

Other notables include: Kyle Busch (12th), Hamlin (13th), Bowyer (16th), Kurt Busch (19th), Edwards (24th), Truex (25th), Kenseth (26th), Keselowski 28th), Jr. (29th), Gordon (30th).

“It was just awful. We have been way too free since we have been here and the track seems a lot more free than last time. We didn’t get much practice in the backup car with me wrecking the other one and having to put the motor in and all that stuff. That got us behind and we just missed it by a lot there in qualifying.” Kenseth said.

Hendrick Motorsports looks to rebound after losing 3 of their 4 race cars during the big crashes at Daytona. It looked like Jr. and Jeff Gordon are more focused on their race setups than Jimmie Johnson and Kasey Kahne. Kahne looked like he had a pole winning time, but his car bottomed out a lot especially in Turns 3 and 4.

The Nationwide Series race begins shortly and the Sprint Cup race will take place tomorrow. Hope to see all of the fans there! Follow me on Twitter for updates! http://www.twitter.com/SirRyanTheOHara