Despite what Harvick said last week in California, Jimmie Johnson did not need any luck to take the checkered flag this week.  He used blinding speed, pit stragety, and the drive of a champion to take the Shelby American at Las Vegas.  The key to his win was an amazing pit stop on lap 230.  Johnson’s crew cheif Chad Kanaus decided to take four tires, while then leader Jeff Gordon decided to take two tires.  Johnson came out of the pits in fourth place, while Gordon came out second.  Johnson’s fresh four tires proved to be the difference maker, as he took the lead on lap 251. “It was just a matter of time,” said Gordon, who also relinquished second place to Kevin Harvick on lap 264.

Gordon dwelled on the two-tire decision after the race: “Well, you know, if we won the race we’d look like geniuses, Steve would have. The fact that we lost the race, now Chad looks like a genius. That’s how it goes sometimes. When you’re leading, that’s the toughest position to be in, to make that call. “You know, I felt like we needed to come in and get some tires, but I felt like two tires was the right call, too. We just needed the 48 to take two. They did the opposite of us. That won the race for them.” On equal tires, Gordon was nearly untouchable until Letarte decided on that two tire change.

Another great showing from Kevin Harvick has him still holding on to the points lead: “I just have to thank all my guys — they did a great job this weekend after crashing into the wall there at the beginning of practice and putting us behind for the start of the weekend,” said Harvick. “We had a good enough car to come through the field, just came up a little bit short again this week. But just a good day for us. Led a lap and did what we had to do.”

Tensions mounted as well in this race between teammates.  Jamie McMurray lost control of his car causing a wreck that collected not only Kurt Busch, but his EGI teammate Juan Pablo Montoya. “[McMurray] runs straight into my ass,” Montoya said. “He nearly ran me into the fence in [Turn] 2 as well. I don’t know. I’m sure [McMurray] is going to say, ‘Oh, I didn’t mean that.’ “Every time I’m around him, he wants to run the s–t out of me. I don’t know if it’s OK to say that but I just did [laughing]. On the restart I was inside of him, I think he got tight and never lifted. I didn’t hit the [Turn 2] fence because — it was a miracle”.

“Well, you’re really frustrated — I haven’t heard what [Montoya] said but it wouldn’t shock me that you’re upset in a situation like that,” McMurray said. “We both had really good cars [Sunday] and unfortunately we crashed. “He turned-in [to Turn 3] a little earlier than I expected. It’s after a restart and you’re racing hard and when we drove off in there, my car just got really loose-in, [when he turned in] it made it even looser. You’re so close, there’s really not any room for error and once we touched, you’re just kind of along for the ride. “I was just chasing my car up the race track and unfortunately he was the car that was above me.”

Here’s how they finished at the Shelby American at Las Vegas Motor Speedway:

Other notables: Tony Stewart (7th), Clint Bowyer (8th), Kasey Kahne (9th) Greg Biffle (10th), Jeff Burton (11th), Kyle Busch (15th), Dale Earnhardt Jr (16th), Denny Hamlin (19th), Brian Vickers (31st), Kurt Busch (35th), Jamie McMurray (36th), Juan Montoya (37th)

Next week, the Sprint Cup seires head to Atlanta.  Coverage begins at 1pm on Sunday.  Here are the Sprint Cup Standings after three races, still a long way to go:

During the 2002 season, Jimmie Johnson’s first full season in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series, he won his first race at Fontana at the Auto Club Speedway.  Eight years later, he reached another land mark…48 career wins for the 48 team.  It was a familar sight in victory lane yesterday, as Johnson took the checkered flag, once again.

Johnson gained the lead after getting a lucky pit break during the final caution of the race.  Jeff Burton, the race leader at the time, was beat to the line by Johnson for the lead.  The thing is, Burton was out on the track, he just slowed down too much and allowed Johnson to take the lead and never look back. This win ties Johnson with Herb Thomas for 12th on the career wins list.

“[Sunday], fortune came our way,” Johnson said. “We hit pit road, and the caution came out and gave us track position. We lost the handle in the second half of the race. We were making gains coming back, but a lot of other guys were ahead of us, and I knew it would be tough to pass them. “I’m not going to lie — the fact that we were on pit road gave us track position, and I drove my butt off. We finally got the car turning — it was just a little too loose. The 29 [Harvick] was coming, but then he hit the wall and let us get it.”

Kevin Harvick, who finished 2nd in the race, had some choice words for the 48 team and the way they won. “They’re really good, but they’re also really, really lucky,” Harvick said. “They have a golden horseshoe stuck up their a** — there’s no getting around that. “Johnson responded “Yes, we were lucky, but you don’t get lucky and win four championships and 48 races.” Sour grapes for Happy Harvick?

Despite the whining from Harvick, this race marked the return of Richard Childress Racing, as all three of their drivers finished in the top 10. Here is the way they finished for the Auto Club 500.

Other notable finishes: Brian Vickers (12), Carl Edwards (13), Kyle Busch (14), Jamie McMurrary (17), Jeff Gordon (20), Denny Hamlin (29), Dale Earnhardt Jr (32), Kasey Kahne (34), Juan Pablo Montoya (37), Martin Truex Jr (39)

Next Sunday, the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series will travel to Sin City at the Las Vegas Motorspeedway. Coverage begins at 2:30pm and we will have a full race preview for you prior to the race on Sunday. Here are your updated Sprint Cup Points series standings:

Pos.	+/-	Driver	Points	Behind
1.	+4	Kevin Harvick	331	Leader
2.	+2	Clint Bowyer	312	-19
3.	–	Greg Biffle	304	-27
4.	-3	Jamie McMurray	302	-29
5.	+7	Jeff Burton	300	-31
6.	+5	Mark Martin	297	-34
7.	+1	Matt Kenseth	288	-43
8.	-2	David Reutimann	273	-58
9.	+11	Joey Logano	263	-68
10.	–	Carl Edwards	262	-69
11.	+11	Kurt Busch	254	-77
12.	+23	Jimmie Johnson	253	-78

]]> http://tailgate365.com/nascar/2010/02/jimmie-johnson-wins-the-auto-club-500/feed/ 1 http://tailgate365.com/nascar/2010/02/mcmurrays-amazing-start-continues-at-the-auto-club-speedway/ http://tailgate365.com/nascar/2010/02/mcmurrays-amazing-start-continues-at-the-auto-club-speedway/#comments Sat, 20 Feb 2010 15:41:44 +0000 Steve McNelly http://tailgate365.com/nascar/?p=150 Jamie McMurray continues to turn heads in the NASCAR world.  After winning an exciting Daytona 500 last week, he followed that up by capturing the pole at the Auto Club Speedway for the Auto Club 500 on Sunday. Thanks to a blazing lap of 39.185 seconds, he edged out his Earnhardt-Ganassi Racing teammate Juan Pablo [...]]]>

Jamie McMurray continues to turn heads in the NASCAR world.  After winning an exciting Daytona 500 last week, he followed that up by capturing the pole at the Auto Club Speedway for the Auto Club 500 on Sunday. Thanks to a blazing lap of 39.185 seconds, he edged out his Earnhardt-Ganassi Racing teammate Juan Pablo Montoya.  After a crazy week of making apperances and talk shows in New York and California, he returned to the track focused and determined.

“I ran my first two laps of practice, and the car has really good speed in it,” McMurray said, who now has four career poles, the last coming on the road course at Sonoma in 2007. “The car feels really solid, so that was refreshing to go through everything this week and get here and have a fast car again.”I think this weekend is what really sets the standard for the rest of these races. It should be a really good weekend.”

McMurray’s crew chief, Kevin Manion, mirrored the set up of Montoya and the 42 team, a car that McMurray used to drive during his first few full seasons in the Sprint Cup Series: “The good thing is that, everywhere we’ve been, I’ve really liked the 42 car setup, what Juan and Brian have developed,” said McMurray who drove a Ford for Roush Fenway Racing last year. “So we just unloaded here very similar to what they had — and a couple of small things different — and we just adjusted our car from there”

Here is the starting line-up for the Auto Club 500:

POS	CAR	DRIVER	MAKE	SPONSOR	SPEED	TIME	BEHIND
1	1	Jamie McMurray	Chevrolet	Bass Pro Shops / Tracker	183.744	39.185	Leader
2	42	Juan Montoya	Chevrolet	Target	183.477	39.242	-0.057
3	33	Clint Bowyer	Chevrolet	Cheerios / Hamburger Helper	183.127	39.317	-0.132
4	9	Kasey Kahne	Ford	Budweiser / Team USA	182.913	39.363	-0.178
5	66	Dave Blaney	Toyota	Prism Motorsports	182.908	39.364	-0.179
6	29	Kevin Harvick	Chevrolet	Shell / Pennzoil	182.899	39.366	-0.181
7	48	Jimmie Johnson	Chevrolet	Lowe’s / Kobalt Tools	182.890	39.368	-0.183
8	77	Sam Hornish Jr.	Dodge	Auto Club	182.811	39.385	-0.200
9	18	Kyle Busch	Toyota	Interstate Batteries	182.788	39.390	-0.205
10	5	Mark Martin	Chevrolet	GoDaddy.com	182.741	39.400	-0.215
11	00	David Reutimann	Toyota	Aaron’s Dream Machine	182.597	39.431	-0.246
12	2	Kurt Busch	Dodge	Miller Lite	182.292	39.497	-0.312
13	82	Scott Speed	Toyota	Red Bull	182.195	39.518	-0.333
14	31	Jeff Burton	Chevrolet	Caterpillar	182.085	39.542	-0.357
15	6	David Ragan	Ford	UPS	181.974	39.566	-0.381
16	14	Tony Stewart	Chevrolet	Old Spice / Office Depot	181.883	39.586	-0.401
17	36	Mike Bliss	Chevrolet	Wave Energy Drink	181.749	39.615	-0.430
18	39	Ryan Newman	Chevrolet	Haas Automation	181.726	39.620	-0.435
19	20	Joey Logano	Toyota	The Home Depot	181.671	39.632	-0.447
20	17	Matt Kenseth	Ford	Crown Royal	181.502	39.669	-0.484
21	12	Brad Keselowski	Dodge	AAA Insurance	181.333	39.706	-0.521
22	78	Regan Smith	Chevrolet	Furniture Row Companies	181.324	39.708	-0.523
23	83	Brian Vickers	Toyota	Red Bull	181.314	39.710	-0.525
24	09	Aric Almirola	Chevrolet	Phoenix Racing	181.314	39.710	-0.525
25	11	Denny Hamlin	Toyota	FedEx Freight	181.301	39.713	-0.528
26	47	Marcos Ambrose	Toyota	Armor All	181.228	39.729	-0.544
27	88	Dale Earnhardt Jr.	Chevrolet	Amp Energy Juice / National Guard	181.109	39.755	-0.570
28	24	Jeff Gordon	Chevrolet	DuPont	181.055	39.767	-0.582
29	43	A.J. Allmendinger	Ford	Best Buy	181.041	39.770	-0.585
30	55	Michael McDowell	Toyota	Prism Motorsports	180.895	39.802	-0.617
31	99	Carl Edwards	Ford	Aflac “You don’t know quack”	180.768	39.830	-0.645
32	87	Joe Nemechek	Toyota	FrontRowJoe.com	180.755	39.833	-0.648
33	71	Bobby Labonte	Chevrolet	TaxSlayer.com	180.587	39.870	-0.685
34	56	Martin Truex Jr.	Toyota	NAPA Auto Parts	180.523	39.884	-0.699
35	16	Greg Biffle	Ford	3M	180.325	39.928	-0.743
36	98	Paul Menard	Ford	Energizer / Menards	180.081	39.982	-0.797
37	19	Elliott Sadler	Ford	Stanley	179.919	40.018	-0.833
38	37	Kevin Conway*	Ford	Extenze	179.292	40.158	-0.973
39	34	Travis Kvapil	Ford	Long John Silver’s	178.975	40.229	-1.044
40	7	Robby Gordon+	Toyota	Warner Music Nashville / Whitney Duncan	176.302	40.839	-1.654
41	38	David Gilliland+	Ford	Taco Bell	176.207	40.861	-1.676
42	26	Boris Said+	Ford	Sacred Power / Southern Pride Trucking	-	-	-
43	13	Max Papis	Toyota	GEICO	180.501	39.889	-0.704

The favorite coming into this race is the defending race champion, Matt Kenseth.  Kenseth has dominated this race track during the past few races, winning two Auto Club 500 races in a row, three in total, and averaging a finish of 9.2 at the Auto Club Speedway. In the Nationwide series, he is even more dominate, winning four times and averaging a 7th place finish per race.  He set a record for Nationwide Series drivers in 2007, leading the most laps in at the Auto Club Speedway in Nationwide Series history. While you can look at Jimmie Johnson and Carl Edwards as favorites as well, who both average 8.2 at California, I have to go with Kenseth to win his third Auto Club 500 in a row.  The change at crew cheif is a welcome change, and Todd Parrott will guide Matt Kenseth to victory tomorrow afternoon in California.

After the 2009 season, when Kenseth failed to make the Chase for the first time in his career, car owner Jack Roush asked if he needed to make a change or if he was comfortable with his team. He responded yes and that crew chief Drew Blickensderfer needed a full season and full off-season to cement his mark with the 17 team.  After Daytona, Kenseth realized he was wrong.

His run at the Daytona 500 prompted a change at the crew cheif position, as Todd Parrott will now be swaped out as Kenseth’s new crew chief. “It doesn’t make any sense. It’s not really good for anybody. It’s just kind of the way it went down,” Kenseth said. “I thought it was just something that needed to be done. We’re just one race in, we’ve got a lot of racing to go this year, and we wanted to get Todd in there with the guys and get him acclimated and get a head start on this thing instead of waiting halfway into the season, and it’s too late to dig ourselves out.”

Roush and Kenseth both realized that the chemistry just wasn’t there with the 17 team and Blickensderefer, despite winning the Daytona 500 and the Auto Club 500 last season.  Parrott was an overseer of the Roush Fenway cars, and now returns to the crew chief position.  His track record is outstanding, as he helped lead Dale Jarrett to the Sprint Cup Champion in 1999 and several wins for the former powerhouse race team of Robert Yates Racing.  Hopefully, this change will return the 17 team to glory and the Chase this season.  Personally, as a Kenseth fan, I’m psyched about the move and can’t wait for Sunday as Kenseth goes for three Auto Club 500 wins in a row.

After avoiding pot holes and each other all day, Jamie McMurray emerged the winner of the 52nd Daytona 500. McMurrary held off a hard charging Dale Earnhardt Jr to capture his first Daytona 500 victory. This is his second win at the famed Daytona International Speedway.  An emotional drained McMurrary let it all out in victory lane: It’s a dream — it really is,” he said. “To be where I was last year, and for Johnny Morris [owner of sponsor Bass Pro Shops], Chip (Ganassi) and [co-owner] Felix (Sabates) to take a chance on me and let me come back — what a way to pay them back.” McMurray led two laps the entire race, the lowest for any winner of the Daytona 500.  However, they were the two laps that counted.

The rush came with just two laps to go and whipped away the frustration of two hours of delay from fixing a pot hole (no joke) in the track. McMurray spun the tires on the restart on lap 207, but got a push from former teammate Greg Biffle.  Dale Jr, on the final lap, almost pulled off an amazing victory from shooting all the way 10th to second on the final lap. “It was all a blur — I was just going wherever they weren’t,” Earnhardt said of the closing laps. “I really don’t enjoy being that aggressive. But if there was enough room for the radiator to fit, you just kind of held the gas down and prayed for the best.”

Defending series champion, Jimmie Johnson, had to take his car to the garage after encountering a flat tire that ruined his chance at a Daytona 500 win.  Defending champion Matt Kenseth was riding in the back for most of the race, but charged his way up to the front of the pack to finish an impressive 8th place.

Here is the finishing order for the Daytona 500:

Other notable finishes: Jeff Burton (11), Mark Martin (12), Kyle Busch (14), Brian Vickers (15), Denny Hamlin (17), Tony Stewart (22), Kurt Busch (23), Jeff Gordon (26), Kasey Kahne (30), Ryan Newman (34), Brad Keselowski (36)

Next Sunday, the Sprint Cup Series travels to the Auto Club Speedway for the Auto Club 500, where Matt Kenseth will look to win the Auto Club 500 for the third straight year.

Two great finishes for two great races! The Daytona International Speedway never disappoints, as Jimmie Johnson and Kasey Kahne won two extremely close races. Kasey Kahne won a drag race, beating Tony Stewart by .014 seconds while Jimmie Johnson edged Kevin Harvick by .005 seconds.  Johnson, by virtue of winning Duel 1, will start from the third position in the Daytona 500, with Kahne starting along side him in fourth.

“Really didn’t know how many laps we had left,” Johnson said. “I was hopeful it was going to be done soon. My spotter wasn’t really sure. As I went by the start/finish line sideways, I looked up and hoped that it was the checkered, because I felt like I was going to spin out. I stayed on the gas, saved it. Everybody else let off around me. I knew the race was over.”  Johnson had to hold the lead on old tires, while the rest of the field was on fresh tires.

Kahne led only three laps in the second duel, and held off a hard charging Tony Stewart.  Stewart was give a huge push by Juan Pablo Montoya with just two laps to go, but Kahne managed to edge Stewart on the last lap.

Thanks to their 13th and 14th place finishes, Max Papis and Michael McDowell qualified for the Daytona 500.  Michael Waltrip was on pins and needles watching the second Duel after wrecking in the first Duel.  His prays were answered, as the two time Daytona 500 Champion qualified for one more day in the sun.

Here is the complete running order for the Duels. Enjoy the Daytona 500 everyone!!

Gatorade Duel 1

Gatorade Duel 2

With the luck of the draw last night on SPEED, Carl Edwards drew the pole position for the running of the Budweiser Shootout this Saturday night.  The race will run 75 laps, the first segment will run 25 laps and the second will run 50 laps. “From what I’ve seen so far, there might not be many cars left after the first 25,” said Edwards. “This race is going to be very interesting. It’s going to spread out a little bit. It’s going to become a handling race. It doesn’t matter where you start unless if somebody misses a gear, we’ll be in front of it.”

Five drivers (Greg Biffle, Jamie McMurrary, Kurt Busch, Mark Martin, and Denny Hamlin) will have to go to back-up cars for the Budweiser Shootout after crashing in practice. “None of us have been in a race car very much lately, and we all kind of jump in there and it’s a little bit slippery,” Edwards said. “If we can make it through the first 10 laps of a run all weekend on tires, it’s going to string out, it’s going to be a really good race, it’s going to be little packs of cars that have to handle.” Fortunately, they will not have to go the rear of the field due to the fact his is an exhibition.

Here is the starting lineup for the Budweiser Shootout, enjoy the race and make sure to tune in at 1pm tomarrow for Daytona 500 qualifying!