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2016 STP 500 Preview

MARTINSVILLE, Va.– NASCAR is back from the left coast and ready to go bumping and banging at the Virginia paperclip.

This week, the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series comes off the Easter holiday and rolls into Ridgeway, Virginia to run the STP 500 at Martinsville Speedway. The 500 lap race on the .526 mile (.847 km) short track will be the sixth race of the 2016 season.

After spending the previous month on the western end of the United States, Martinsville is the first stop of what I like to call the short track gauntlet. Over the course of April, the Sprint Cup Series will also visit Bristol Motor Speedway and Richmond International Raceway with Texas Motor Speedway sandwiched between Martinsville and Bristol.

Opened in 1947, Martinsville Speedway is the last remaining track from the NASCAR’s first season in 1948. It’s a throwback to a bygone era when race tracks were located in the middle of nowhere in the most remote parts of America. During that stretch of 68 years, many tracks have come and many more have gone. The only two constants in NASCAR are change and Martinsville. In a way, Martinsville serves as a bridge that connects the past to the present.

When people say Martinsville never changes, they’re right to a very large degree. Nine-time Martinsville winner Jeff Gordon once said that of all the tracks he’s raced at in his entire 23-year Sprint Cup Series career, Martinsville was the one track that changed the least. He said the way you drove the track in 1993 was virtually the same as the way he drove the track in his last start at the Virginia paperclip in 2015.

At Martinsville, the outside line is the kiss of death. Photo: Jeff Zelevansky/NASCAR via Getty Images

Martinsville is a rhythm-heavy race track. Once you figure out the rhythm, you can conquer all who race on it. You run against the wall on the straights and hug the yellow curb in the turns. Protecting the inside line is vital at Martinsville. You pass someone by diving underneath them going into turn 1 or turn 3 or you use your chrome bumper to gently nudge them out of the way. If you’re caught on the outside line, you’d better fall behind another car and get to the bottom or you’ll drift towards the back.

While you could run a 500 lap event on just three or four pit stops with a fuel window of 130 laps, you’ll be stopping for tires at least double-digit times. If you’re the race leader when the caution flies and forces overtime, you’re pretty much a sitting duck. If you pit, everybody behind you stays out. If you stay out, everybody behind you pits. To put it shortly, you have to pick your poison.

Carnage lurks around every turn at Martinsville. Photo: Rob Carr/Getty Images

Like most short tracks, the tight confines and low banking means passing is at a premium at Martinsville. As I mentioned earlier, there are two primary ways to pass someone at Martinsville; dive underneath someone going into turn 1 and/or turn 3 or use the chrome bumper to nudge someone out of the way.

Many times in a race, one driver will nudge another out of the way, collect another driver and cause a multi-car pileup. Other times, one car will dive too deep into turns 1 or 3, hop the curb, slam into another car and cause a chain-reaction crash that way. This type of accordion-effect wrecking will happen multiple times in a 500 lap race at Martinsville.

Controlling your temper is vital at Martinsville. Photo: Jeff Zelevansky/2015 Getty Images

With all the bumping and banging, it’s very easy to lose your composure. Keeping your temper in check is important to success at Martinsville.

Most of the time, it leads to a lead lap car forcibly nudging a lapped car out of his or her way. Sometimes, it can give us classic Martinsville moments like Brad Keselowski rubbing up against Kurt Busch for about five laps.

Other times, though, it can lead one driver who’s running nine laps down losing focus of reality, intentionally taking the race leader and getting that driver parked for two races.

I believe we’re going to see our first real test of the updated NASCAR behavioral policy this weekend in Martinsville. While I doubt we’ll see a repeat of what happened last November, I don’t think we’ve seen the last of drivers taking out one another at Martinsville.

Now let’s talk about drivers to watch this weekend.

Few drivers have mastered the Virginia paperclip like Jimmie Johnson. Photo: Sal Sigala Jr.

The odds-on favorite at 9/2 is Jimmie Kenneth Johnson (Vegas Insider).

In his 28 career starts at Martinsville, the driver of the No. 48 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet has eight wins, 18 top fives (64.29 percent) and 22 top-10s (78.57 percent). He’s led nearly 3,000 laps (2746) and has a 7.5 average finish.

However, he hasn’t led a single lap at the Virginia paperclip since 2014 and has finished second, 32nd, 35th and 12th. That’s a 20.3 finishing average in the last four races.

I don’t see this trend continuing for a few reasons. First, the 48 team is on a roll right now having won 40 percent of the races so far this season. Second, Johnson is historically no slouch when it comes to Martinsville. Finally, his mentor was Jeff Gordon who made Martinsville his playground through his 23-year career.

I expect Johnson to be up front and contending for the win on Sunday.

Denny Hamlin has also found success at Martinsville. Photo: Nick Laham/NASCAR via Getty Images

Next, at 6/1 is James Dennis Alan “Denny” Hamlin.

In 20 career starts at Martinsville, the driver of the No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota has five wins, 11 top fives (55 percent) and 16 top-10s (80 percent). He’s led over 1,000 laps (1315) and has an average finish of eighth.

Unlike Johnson, the last four races have been kind to the Virginia native with finishes of 19th, eighth, first and third. That’s a 7.8 finishing average.

He’s also the defending race winner having led 91 laps on his way to scoring his first checkered flag of the 2015 season. He enters Martinsville with a win in the Daytona 500 and three top-10s. He’s finished on the podium in the last two races and looks to continue that run this weekend.

I expect Hamlin to contend for the win on Sunday.

Joey Logano looks to continue his strong runs this weekend at Martinsville. Photo: Todd Warshaw/NASCAR via Getty Images

Next, at 6/1 is one Joseph Thomas Logano.

Since 2014, the driver of the No. 22 Team Penske Ford has been arguably the best at the Virginia paperclip with finishes of fourth, fifth, third and 37th. In those four races, he led 39, 60, 108 and 207 laps.

In the last visit to Martinsville, he and teammate Brad Keselowski had the field in check the entire afternoon before Keselowski suffered a suspension failure and crashed out of the race. Logano was in total control with 47 laps remaining, but then he was eliminated from the race after being intentionally wrecked by Matt Kenseth.

Both drivers are smart enough to know that it wouldn’t be in the best interest of either of them to re-light that fire and force NASCAR to step in again, so I don’t expect anything to come about from it this time around.

I see no reason as to why he won’t be a force on Sunday.

Kevin Harvick should be a threat to win at Martinsville. Photo: Robert Laberge/NASCAR via Getty Images

The final driver to keep your eye on this weekend at 7/1 is Kevin Michael Harvick.

In 29 career starts at Martinsville, the driver of the No. 4 Stewart-Haas Racing Chevrolet has amassed one win, three top fives (10.35 percent) and 14 top-10s (48.28 percent).

That might not seem like much, especially compared to the success of Johnson, but in his last four starts, he’s finished seventh, 33rd, eighth and eighth. That’s an average finish of 14th. In the last two trips to the Virginia paperclip, he’s led 154 and 38 laps.

At any other track, Harvick would be my outright pick to win. I’m not as willing to go out on that limb at Martinsville. He’s only finished in the top-five three times and those were during his time at Richard Childress Racing. While I do expect him to be leading at some point Sunday, I wouldn’t pick him over someone like Johnson to win.

Tune into the STP 500 on Sunday to see who takes home the grandfather clock. You can watch the race beginning at 12:30 p.m. on FOX Sports 1 or at noon on the Motor Racing Network and Sirius XM (subscription required for the latter). If you’re within a few hours of Ridgeway, Virginia, hop in your car, drive to the track and watch the action in person. I’m on assignment at Martinsville this weekend, so I’ll be bringing you all the happenings from the media center.

March 31, 2016
Surprising and Not Surprising: Martinsville STP 500

From the first short track of the season with the grandfather clock as the trophy, here is what was surprising and not surprising from Martinsville Speedway’s STP 500.

Surprising: Denny Hamlin embarked on his own version of the ‘Drive for Five’ while the driver trying for his fifth championship doomed his own chances of winning with a pit road speeding penalty late in the race.

“Well, by no means did we have a smooth race at all, and we still won,” the driver of the No. 11 FedEx Express Toyota said after his fifth win at Martinsville. “So that to me shows what we’re capable of, and once we get everything worked out the way it needs to be and we’re back to our normal selves on pit road and we don’t have any penalties and everything just runs a smooth race, we can win a lot of these things.”

Conversely, Jeff Gordon, with an eye on a fifth championship in his last full-time season, doomed his victory chances with a pit road speeding penalty on Lap 462, finishing in the ninth position in his No. 24 Axalta Chevrolet.

“Oh my gosh, I’m so disappointed in myself,” Gordon said. “I felt like we finally got the car, got ourselves in a position to win the race. I knew I was pushing the limit but I didn’t think I had done anything different than I had all day. I’m very, very disappointed.”

Not Surprising: Although Chase Elliott made his first Cup debut, qualifying his way into the show, he joined his Hendrick teammates in having unusual struggles at Martinsville.

Elliott finished 38^th after some damage sustained early in the race, while teammates Jimmie Johnson and Dale Earnhardt, Jr. suffered not only damage from incidents on the track. but also mechanical problems to finish 35th and 36th respectively.

“A lot of guys I think were having some transmission or gear problems,” Junior said. “We got some real bad vibration in the car 30 laps into the race and it just kept breaking the shifter. It was just swinging up there like a tuning fork.”

“It was a tough race.”

Surprising: While Team Penske seemed to experience some moral dilemmas about wrecking, they still managed to finish in the second and third positions respectively.

Brad Keselowski, on one hand, wrestled with his conscience as to whether or not he should wreck Denny Hamlin for the win, while his teammate Joey Logano was hoping beyond hope that Keselowski and Hamlin would wreck each other so that he could have the win and the weekend of his life.

“I did everything I could other than wreck him,” the driver of the No. 2 Miller Lite Ford said after the race. “Morals and racing are pretty subjective, but I just felt like I raced him the way I wanted to be raced and I guess that is what it is.”

“I was hoping so,” the driver of the No. 22 Shell/Pennzoil Ford said when asked if he thought Keselowski and Hamlin might wreck each other. “That was my only shot at it once they got pretty far away.”

“That was the only shot I had for the win.”

Not Surprising: In NASCAR, records are made to be surpassed and broken and both happened at Martinsville. Martin Truex Jr. continued his streak of consecutive top-10 finishes for the sixth race in a row, while Kevin Harvick’s streak of top-2 finishes came to an end with his eighth place run.

“It is awesome,” Truex Jr. said of his top-10 streak. “I can’t say enough about the team. Again to battle like we did today. We showed we never give up. We haven’t all year long. We haven’t given up on each other since I started here.”

“It feels good to have another good run at one of my worst race tracks,” Truex continued. “Just can’t believe we were able to stay on the lead lap, fix the power steering and all that and drive back through there. It was a hell of an effort.”

Although Harvick led the most laps, 154 of 500, the driver of the No. 4 Budweiser/Jimmy John’s Chevrolet lost track position on a late-race restart and simply could not recover.

“I just got hung on the outside and couldn’t get back down,” Harvick said. “By the time I got down, I was 10th or 11^th.”

“Everybody did a good job, just lost track position at the wrong time.”

Surprising: NASCAR seems to be in significant need of recovery, with the announcement of J. D. Gibbs facing a significant health issue and Kyle Larson fainting during an autograph session.

“We’ve been dealing with this for about six months and basically what the doctor’s say is that they really don’t know,” Coach Joe Gibbs said of his son’s situation. “J.D. has lived a very active lifestyle. All the things that he’s done in his life physically he’s loved all sporting events and it’s everything from football to snowboarding, racing cars, racing motor bikes – he’s lived in a lot of ways for him, he loved all those things.”

“We can’t point to any one serious thing that happened to him, certainly any injury is a possibility that led us into some of the symptoms that he’s experiencing now.”

In addition to Gibbs, Kyle Larson suffered his own surprising health symptoms after passing out prior to the Martinsville race.

After fainting at an autograph session in Martinsville, VA, Kyle Larson was first evaluated at a local hospital in Martinsville and ultimately evaluated at a Charlotte hospital,” Chip Ganassi Racing said in a prepared statement prior to the race. “Although all tests came back negative and Larson feels completely fine, the doctors felt he should be held for more testing.”

Regan Smith, sub extraordinaire, filled Larson’s seat and after starting from the back of the field in the No. 42 Target Chevrolet, managed a respectable 16th place finish.

Not Surprising: In spite of scoring his first ever top-five at Martinsville, David Ragan had nothing but thoughts of Kyle Busch, for whom he continues to substitute in the No. 18 M&M’s Crispy Toyota, and his recovery from injuries sustained at Daytona.

“I just hope I helped the 18 team for the Chase race later in the year,” Ragan said. “We’ll enjoy Easter and I cannot wait to get to Texas.”

Surprising: Smoke surprisingly got in the eyes of both Austin Dillon and AJ Allmendinger. The two Chevrolet drivers both had motor issues that determined their 41st and 43rd place finishes.

“I’m not sure what the exact problem was with the motor,” Allmendinger, driver of the No. 47 Bush’s Beans Chevrolet said. “I noticed some smoke start rolling in the car and I could see it start out of the back of the car.”

“I was smoking so bad they black flagged me.”

“Yeah it was a motor issue,” Dillon, driver of the No. 3 Cheerios Chevrolet, said. “I think the same things as the No. 47. We just have to do a better job of going through our procedures at ECR right now. We have some power but we are not finishing races.”

Not Surprising: It was a weekend of celebration for the Gilliland family, with dad David, in his 300th Cup start, having his best run ever at Martinsville with a 25th place finish and 14 year-old-son son Todd winning his first Late Model Stock Car race at Southern National Motorsports Park.

“I’m proud of the guys,” Gilliland, driver of the No. 38 Love’s Travel Stops Ford, said. “The pit stops were good and this was the best I’ve personally ever run here, so we’ll build from it.”

“And I couldn’t be prouder of my son,” Gilliland continued. “He’s a great young man and a great race car driver. I think he proved a lot with his win.”

“I’m so glad I was racing in Martinsville this weekend so I could drive down to see this race.”

Surprising: The penalty of uncontrolled tires in the pits continued to dominate. There were five such penalties in the Martinsville race, adding to the total of 21 of these out-of-control tires for the season.

Not Surprising: Danica Patrick about summed it all up at Martinsville. When asked, how she avoided the wrecking on the track, she asked “Well, which one are you talking about?”

“That’s kind of the way it goes at Martinsville,” the driver of the No. 10 TaxAct Chevrolet said. “I think all four corners were banged up.”

“It’s all a matter of luck, too,” Patrick continued. “I could have got drilled from the back and hit into the car. I could have swerved to the right and had somebody clip my right rear and spun, somebody could have been out there.”

“Crashes are about observing where you’re at and making a good decision about where to go, but they’re also about luck. I got lucky that there was nothing in my way to get around that one. That would have probably wrecked my day.”

Patrick finished seventh at the track known as the ‘Paper Clip’, tying her second-best career finish in the Cup Series.

March 29, 2015
Surprising and Not Surprising: Martinsville STP 500

With no practice due to a rainy weekend, the Cup drivers unleashed their pent up aggression on the short track of Martinsville. Here is what was surprising and not surprising from the 65^th running of the STP 500.

Surprising: The closest that Hendrick Motorsports got to Victory Lane at Martinsville was the motor and chassis as Kurt Busch surprisingly took his No. 41 Haas Automation Chevrolet to the checkered flag.

The win also marked significant milestones for driver and crew chief as this was Busch’s 25^th Cup win and his crew chief Daniel Knost’s first win as a crew chief.

Busch’s 83 start winless drought finally came to a close, with his last victory prior to this at the Monster Mile in the fall race of 2011.

“Every time you come to Martinsville you draw a line through it; like there’s no way I’ll be able to challenge those Hendrick guys,” Busch said. “The Stewart-Haas team gave me a team to do it.”

“It’s an unbelievable feeling to deliver.”

Not Surprising: While Brad Keselowski had some harsh words to say about the race winner, sarcastically ‘thanking Kurt’ after tangling with him early in the race and finishing 38^th, he kept his sense of humor when he took to Twitter after the race.

“I’m here,” Keselowski tweeted when a follower said that he would probably not be on social media for a while. “Laughing at all the hate tweets. #freeEntertainment.”

With that difficult finish, the driver of the No. 2 Miller Lite Ford dropped three spots to seventh in the point standings.

Surprising: Dale Earnhardt Jr. was surprisingly disappointed with not getting a clock, even though he finished third in his No. 88 Diet Mountain Dew Chevrolet and took the points lead away from Carl Edwards.

“Well, it was up and down,” Junior said of his race. “We ran out of tire there just trying to get by those lap guys that were giving me the top in the corner and I don’t need to be up there running.”

“That cost us a little bit.”

Junior and girlfriend Amy Reimann did, however, console themselves with a Martinsville hot dog as his “reward” for finishing third, tweeting a picture of the celebration from the plane.

This was Earnhardt Jr.’s 16th top-10 finish in 29 races at the track known as the ‘Paper Clip.’

Not Surprising: Martinsville made for some interesting milestones, including another new winner for the season and a record number of lead changes.

Kurt Busch became the sixth different winner in six races to date and there were a record 33 lead changes among 12 drivers, the most ever at Martinsville. The previous record for lead changes was 31, set in April of 2011.

Surprising: They may have been driving with heavy hearts due to the death of Miss Lynda Petty, the King’s late wife, but the two Richard Petty Motorsports drivers pulled off great finishes, with Marcos Ambrose in fifth and Aric Almirola in eighth.

In fact, this was only the fourth time that the two RPM teammates have finished in the top-10 together, but the second time in six races this season.

““We’ve had a really tough week. We lost Miss Lynda.” Ambrose, driver of the No. 9 DeWalt Ford said. “We really wanted to win for them bad out there, but we’ll take a top five.”

“I’m really proud of all the guys at Richard Petty Motorsports,” Almirola, driver of the No. 43 STP Ford, said. “If we keep running like this, we’ll get to Victory Lane.”

Not Surprising: The highest finishing Ford was Joey Logano, who deemed his drive in the No. 22 Shell/Pennzoil Ford “a battle.”

“This race is really hard, but we finished where we deserved to finish,” Logano said after finishing fourth. “That’s where we ran and that’s about all we had.”

“I wish we had a little more.”

Surprising: “That’s all I had,” are words that are eerily similar to Logano’s but are not typically heard from six-time champion Jimmie Johnson. But that was his summary of the race as well at one of his strongest tracks.

“I’d been loose in the final third of the race and was hanging on there,” Johnson, who finished runner up in his No. 48 Lowe’s Chevrolet, said. “When (Kurt Busch) got back by me, I was hopefully that he’d wear his stuff out and I could get back by him. He did but I couldn’t hold him off.”

“I started to get looser and looser,” Johnson continued. “I ran the rear tires off the car.”

“That’s all I had.”

This was Johnson’s 22^nd top-10 finish in 25 races at Martinsville Speedway and his fourth top-10 finish in the 2014 season.

Not Surprising: While most drivers are focused on the wins, Jamie McMurray was thinking about points and shaking his head.

McMurray, behind the wheel of the No. 1 McDonald’s Chevrolet, was involved in an on-track incident with Dale Earnhardt Jr. on Lap 199 that caused him to finish 42^nd and falling eleven spots in the point standings to 23^rd.

“I thought the No. 88 would be a little more patient with me. I had gotten by him in lap traffic. Then he got on my inside. When he got into me it was like it couldn’t get off and spun me around and just got into the wall there,” Jamie Mac said. “Really unfortunate had a good car, every race we’ve had good cars.”

“You just wish you weren’t racing for points because that is the hardest part to swallow is the point’s loss,” McMurray continued. “It’s fun to run well but that is what you will think about for the next five days.”

Surprising: After missing the previous race week due to metal in his eye and after vowing to make a comeback and win at a track where he has the third-best driver rating, it was most surprising to see Denny Hamlin finish a disappointing 19^th.

The driver of the No. 11 FedEx Freight Toyota had ignition issues and then was just plain slow during the race.

“Just a frustrating day, especially when you know that this is a race track that I feel like I can make up a difference here and there,” Hamlin said. “We were a football field and then some away from the right set up today.”

Not Surprising: Austin Dillon, behind the wheel of the No. 3 Dow Chevrolet was the highest finishing rookie, finishing 15^th at the very demanding short track.

“I had some good runs there in my truck but it was totally different in a NASCAR Sprint Cup Series car,” Dillon said. “It’s one of those races where you have to fight to stay in it.”

“Things were definitely wild there.”

The Cup Series will move from the short track of Martinsville to the track in Texas where everything is big for the Duck Commander 500.

March 30, 2014
Allmendinger’s solid performance continues at JTG-Daugherty

Just past halfway in the 2013 season, the JTG Daugherty team made a very un-popular decision. They decided to sit Bobby Labonte out of the car for a few races and place a different driver in the car to help assess why the team was struggling to finish in the top-20.

Many fans voiced their dis-pleasure at the removal of the former series champion. Social media lit up with complaints that the team was not being loyal to their driver. One major factor in that dis-pleasure, was that it would end Labonte’s start streak which stood at 704, only one behind the series record held by Jeff Gordon.

Team owner, Brad Daugherty, stood by his decision. He explained that the move was for only a handful of races and that other than those races, Labonte would still be in the car at least until the end of the year. He made it very clear that his goal was to finish in the top-20 on a consistent basis and they would make whatever changes were needed to accomplish that goal.

Allmendinger instantly improved the team’s stats. He finished 19^th in his first start with the team at Michigan. He followed that up with a 22^nd place finish two weeks later at Kentucky. His success with the team did not stop there. He ended the season scoring five top-20 finishes in nine starts. A results that impressed, not only the team, but the fans and media as well. During the off season, it came as no surprise that Allmendinger was named as the full time driver for the No. 47 in 2014.

Allmendinger has continued the solid runs with the team this season. In the first six races, Allmendinger has scored four top-20 starts and four top-20 finishes, including an impressive run in the STP 500 at Martinsville Speedway this weekend where he finished eleventh, just shy of his season best eighth place finish last week in Fontana. Allmendinger commented about the team’s improvement after his run at Martinsville saying, “We’re getting there. You know, I feel like we’ve been decent all year, we’ve had fast cars. But overall, you know we’re getting there, I felt really good there were times today I thought we could go take the lead, we just had some struggles, it wasn’t on pit road so much but the bucking down pit road, I would lose a couple of spots each time, but we’re fighting hard, eleventh is actually a little disappointing, so if you can say that at Martinsville, that’s a good day.”

Brad Daugherty stood his ground against the outcry of fans because he knew he needed to make changes to improve his race team. It seems those changes have paid off.

March 30, 2014
Kligerman’s struggles continue at Martinsville

Parker Kligerman joined the Swan Racing team during the off-season to drive the No. 30 Toyota and compete for the rookie of the year honors in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series.

Kligerman competed full time in the NASCAR Nationwide Series last year driving for Kyle Busch Motorsports, compiling 18 top-10 finishes in 33 races. That team was forced to end operations due to the lack of sponsorship for 2014.

Under new ownership, the team began to make several positive moves during the off-season signing several advertising partners to help fund the season. The team also signed, Cole Whitt, to drive a second car full time.

Though expectations were realistic, they were expecting to have better results than they have seen thus far this season. Kligerman opened the season with a respectable 29^th place finish. Kligerman’s teammate, Whitt, finished 28^th, giving the team high hopes for the season.

After Daytona, however, Kligerman has had little to be happy about. The team has struggled in every event since the season opener with a best finish of 34^th at Bristol. He also finished 42^nd twice at Phoenix and Fontana. At Bristol, Klgerman commented about his season saying they have the same equipment as his teammate, they have just had bad luck. Whitt’s results have been moderately better. He followed up his 28^th place finish at Daytona with a 27^th at Phoenix. He also scored the team’s first top-20 of the season at Fontana finishing 18^th.

Kligerman’s struggles continued at Martinsville on the third lap of the race when he got involved in a crash. The damage sent him to the garage area for more than 80 laps to make repairs. There seems to be an increase in tension among the team. While making repairs there was a heated exchange between Kligerman and a crew member.

Hopefully, the tension was due to the current situation and not based on the season as a whole. Kligerman is a very talented driver and once he can shake off the bout of bad luck, we will see him in the top-25 consistently.

March 30, 2014
Earnhardt Jr. seeking his first clock

Martinsville Speedway is known as one of the toughest places to win. The .526 mile, paperclip shaped track with long straightaways coupled with tight, almost flat corners create a recipe for hard-nosed, fender-banging action.

It is rare for a racecar to leave Martinsville without some damage. More often than not, the damage is significant. Fortunately, for drivers, aerodynamics are not nearly as important here as it is at larger tracks. That fact allows drivers to beat and bang, knock competition out of the way, and still maintain a high possibility of winning.

For Dale Earnhardt Jr., he has yet to find victory lane at the Southern Virginia track, though he has long desired to. Earnhardt Jr., son of the legendary seven time series champion, Dale Earnhardt, talked about his desire to win at Martinsville on Friday saying, “Yeah, this is a track I have been trying to get a win at for a long time. I grew up in a house full of clocks (referring to his father’s six win at the track) so it’s been pretty elusive.” The Grandfather Clock trophy the track is famous for, has become a symbol of accomplishment for drivers.

Earnhardt Jr. has performed well at Martinsville, but has never had every ingredient at the right time to score the victory. Earnhardt commented, “We have had some good cars in the past here that I‘ve felt like could have won races and we just weren’t able to get the job done for whatever reason, somebody was faster or whatever.”

Earnhardt Jr. has 28 starts at Martinsville, and coming into this weekend, has accumulated 15 top-10 finishes, ten top-five finishes and has led 868 laps.

Earnhardt Jr.’s Hendrick Motorsports teammates, Jeff Gordon and Jimmie Johnson, have been very successful at Martinsville. Gordon has eight wins and 34 top-10’s in 42 starts. Johnson also has eight wins and has scored 21 top-10’s in just 24 starts, including a win in the spring race last year. When asked what he takes from them to apply to his set-up at Martinsville, Earnhardt Jr. responded, “We use a program called dart fish where basically it overlaps my lap with another car. Maybe we look at the guys who sat on the pole or qualified in the top three and then look at my qualifying lap. I can do that for last year, the year before, we can go as far back pretty much as we want and see what the guys are doing differently.” He continued, “As far as my teammates go I’m out on the track with them. I know their tendencies and it depends on how their car is driving and how their car is handling as to how they are going to run, drive the corner and approach each corner.”

Earnhardt has come close to winning several times at Martinsville. He talked about the one that “got away,” saying, “I think you look at all of them and see how close you came. We flat got out ran by Kevin (Harvick) that one year in ’11. I thought we had it. I thought we were going to be fine once we got out front , but he was just so fast. I tried to get under him in three and four but he didn’t have a bumper left to move. I went in there to shove him a little bit and everything on that corner of his car was gone.”

Shoving and moving are many times a necessity at the famed half-mile. Given the new rules implemented for this season, aggression may be more prevalent than ever. Earnhardt has always been a smooth and consistent driver. He is not known for being aggressive. He has already visited victory lane this season and almost found it a second time with an aggressive strategy call. The renewed vigor that Earnhardt is showing, coupled with NASCAR’s new rules that reward winning, may be the final pieces of the puzzle that he needs to begin filling his home with clocks… just like his dad.

March 28, 2014
Surprising and Not Surprising: Fontana Auto Club 400

From the unique race command from Muppet star Gonzo to Denny Hamlin’s pre-race trip to the hospital for a sinus infection and vision problems, here is what else was surprising and not surprising from the Auto Club 400 in Fontana, California.

Surprising: There are not many drivers who, after winning a thrilling race in green-white-checkered fashion, can combine ‘Days of Thunder’ with faith-filled references right out of ‘Talladega Nights’. But Kyle Busch surprisingly managed to pull it all together in his Victory Lane remarks.

“Man oh man. The first thing that comes to mind when the caution came out with just a few laps to go — that was total Rowdy Burns ‘Days of Thunder’ right there,” the driver of the No. 18 No. 18 Interstate Batteries Toyota Camry said. “There’s a couple laps to go — I’m not pitting.”

“Everybody has to pit, Cole (Trickle), we’re coming down for four tires because there’s a green-white-checkered coming,” Busch continued. “I knew four tires was going to win the race, so I’m glad Dave (Rogers, crew chief) called that.”

“I was able to keep Kyle Larson behind me. Man, what a shoe that boy is,” Busch continued. “If he drove it in further than I did, Jesus must have told him to stop.”

“I just can’t believe it. I thank the Lord for putting ourselves here and getting us locked in the Chase.”

This was Busch’s 29^th win in 334 Cup races but his first victory of the 2014 season. This was his third victory and 12^th top-10 finish at Auto Club Speedway.

Not Surprising: What double file restarts and shortening up the length of the race has done for Pocono Raceway, the rough, aged racing surface with multiple grooves and huge bumps has done the same, if not more, for Auto Club Speedway.

In fact, it seemed like just a few years ago when the track was criticized for boring racing and the grandstands were empty. This Cup race yielded some of the most exciting racing to date, with six and seven cars abreast, in front of a packed house, most of whom barely sat down for the entirety of the show.

Surprising: Kyle Larson went from thinking he was pretty much going to have a tough day to finishing as the highest running rookie, in P2 no less. This stellar finish came on the heels of his Nationwide victory over none other than Cup race winner Kyle Busch.

“I thought we were in trouble or not be able to get to the front,” the driver of the No. 42 said after the race. “I don’t know where everybody went on that last restart.”

“It went through my mind then that I might sweep the weekend,” Larson continued. “That last run, we got good enough to charge to the front. What a weekend.”

Not Surprising: Sam Hornish’s new mantra should be ‘have helmet, will drive.’ Originally, the currently unspoken for driver was on standby to drive for Matt Kenseth in the event that his wife Katie went into labor with their third child.

In the end, however, Hornish ended up substitute driving for Denny Hamlin, finishing a respectable 17th in the No. 11 FedEx Express Toyota. This was his best finish since his 13^th place run in 2012 at Martinsville.

Surprising: The normally cool, calm and collected Aric Almirola, driver of the No. 43 Farmland Ford Fusion, had some surprisingly harsh words for competitor No 33 car driver Brian Scott after their accident brought out the fourth caution of the race.

“The 33 was obviously a dart without feathers and coming across the race track,” Almirola said. “Man, he came from all the way at the bottom of the race track and ran into me.”

“He’s not even racing this series for points,” Almirola continued. “He’s out there having fun because his daddy gets to pay for it and he wrecked us.”

Not Surprising: After tires blew out in practice as well as the race, the debate not surprisingly was on as far as what exactly led to so many tire issues, especially in the left rear.

Brad Keselowski, a driver that suffered particular tire problems in practice and the race, weighed in after the race to share his perspective.

“There were a lot of reasons why we blew a tire today or two or five over the weekend and the field did,’’ Keselowski said after finishing 26th. “I don’t know what to really say about it. As a driver you are left between the choice of driving your car to the limit and blowing a tire out or being a wuss and saving it.”

NASCAR’s most popular driver weighed in with a whole different take on the tire situation.

“I don’t think there is anything wrong with the tire OR the way we choose 2 use them,” Dale Earnhardt Jr. tweeted after the race. “My bet is it’s the bumps on the backstretch.”

“Those are more like jumps and ramps.”

NASCAR representative Vice President for Competition Robin Pemberton shared the more official perspective, saying that some teams were running tires with air pressures as low as 14 pounds, whereas Goodyear had commended tire pressures at 22 pounds for the race weekend.

And finally, Goodyear, echoing Pemberton’s assessment, advised that the problems were not tire-related but more team-related due to the very aggressive set ups.

“Every left-side tire that we’ve seen gone down or had issues with is kind of the same characteristics as (Saturday),’’ Greg Stucker, Director of Race Tire Sales for Goodyear, said. “The common denominator being aggressive on air pressure.”

“You’re in race conditions, so everybody is running a little bit harder.”

Surprising: For the second straight race, NASCAR official human error came into play. This weekend, a NASCAR official actually got his uniform stuck in the fence and he literally could not move to flip the pit road light switch to green.

Because of this error, Brad Keselowski, Jeff Gordon and Clint Bowyer did not pit because there was a red light instead of a green light.

All three drivers went on to suffer less than ideal finishes, with Jeff Gordon finishing the best of the bunch in 13^th, Bowyer in 16^th and Keselowski in 26^th.

“We can’t seem to catch a break,” Bowyer said. “We lead for a while, we came back after confusion with the lights on pit road and were in contention to win at the end.”

“However, we started feeling a vibration with about four to go and it just didn’t make it,” Bowyer continued. “It just stinks for this team.”

Not Surprising: Bosses sometimes do influence the workplace even at the track. One of NASCAR’s most notable bosses, team owner Rick Hendrick, played the encourager role with driver Jeff Gordon, who started from the back not once but twice, passing at least 70 plus cars.

Kurt Busch, who finished third, was also quite emotional about racing with his boss Tony Stewart. “The amount of emotions running well today and we were face and then to race your boss for the win,” Busch said. “Neither one of us got the win but it was a genuine moment for us to race.”

The Cup Series heads next to Martinsville Speedway for the STP 500.

March 24, 2014