On Sunday, Smoke made his way back into Chase contention by scoring a key win at the Price Chopper 400 in Kansas. Stewart recently had gone through a terrible streak of six straight races without finishing better than ninth. Stewart beat out Jeff Gordon by a very slim margin at the start-finish line (.894 seconds) to cut his defecate from 39 points to Chase leader Mark Martin.
Thanks to a two tire stop on the final pit stop of the race, Smoke was able to restart in the lead and never gave it up. ”Darian [crew chief of the 14 car] – you don’t question him when he makes a call,” Stewart said. “You know it’s the right thing to do, and then you go from there. The big thing was just not driving the tires off the thing, in case we got a [late] caution and a green-white-checker. We had a little bit left, but we didn’t leave too much out there.”We got two tires earlier and were able to go really quick on ‘em, so it was pretty much, I think in our opinion, a no-brainer what to do there. The guys who took four never could gain the track position back. We had a really good car on two tires, and Darian and the guys on the pit crew are the ones that got us the win. They got us track position, and I was able to pick which line I wanted on the restart, and that won us the race.”
Three time defending series champion Jimmie Johnson made the same call in the pits, coming out third for the final restart. However, he was shuffled back and finished ninth. He is now 18 points behind Martin in second place.
Greg Biffle, who had a dominate race car all day, opened his lead to about 9 seconds all day and was poised for the win. However, a four tire stop may have cost Biffle the win, as he was shuffled back to fourth in the final restart. He finished third.
Here is how they finished on Sunday:
| Pos. | Driver | Make |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | Tony Stewart | Chevrolet |
| 2. | Jeff Gordon | Chevrolet |
| 3. | Greg Biffle | Ford |
| 4. | Juan Montoya | Chevrolet |
| 5. | Denny Hamlin | Toyota |
| 6. | Kasey Kahne | Dodge |
| 7. | Mark Martin | Chevrolet |
| 8. | David Reutimann | Toyota |
| 9. | Jimmie Johnson | Chevrolet |
| 10. | Carl Edwards | Ford |
Other notables: Kurt Busch (11), Kyle Busch (12), Ryan Newman (22), Kevin Harvick (24), Joey Logano (28), Dale Earnhardt Jr (36), Brian Vickers (37), Matt Kenseth (39)
No time to rest, as the Sprint Cup series heads to Fontana, CA for the Pepsi 500 at the Auto Club Speedway. Matt Kenseth, who had a dominate race car there in the spring race, will look to take the checkered flag. Despite his recent trend of terrible finishes, I am looking at my boy as the favorite to win this race. As always, we leave you with the Chase standings as of last Sunday:
| Pos. | +/- | Driver | Points | Behind |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | – | Mark Martin | 5,551 | – |
| 2. | – | Jimmie Johnson | 5,533 | -18 |
| 3. | – | Juan Montoya | 5,500 | -51 |
| 4. | +1 | Tony Stewart | 5,484 | -67 |
| 5. | -1 | Kurt Busch | 5,460 | -91 |
| 6. | – | Denny Hamlin | 5,452 | -99 |
| 7. | +1 | Jeff Gordon | 5,448 | -103 |
| 8. | +1 | Greg Biffle | 5,437 | -114 |
| 9. | -2 | Ryan Newman | 5,387 | -164 |
| 10. | +1 | Carl Edwards | 5,386 | -165 |
| 11. | +1 | Kasey Kahne | 5,361 | -190 |
| 12. | -2 | Brian Vickers | 5,301 | -250 |
