HOMESTEAD-MIAMI SPEEDWAY (1.5-MILE OVAL)
LOCATION: HOMESTEAD, FLORIDA
EVENT: NASCAR SPRINT CUP SERIES (RACE 36 OF 36)
TUNE IN: 3 P.M. ET, SUNDAY, NOV. 22 (NBC/MRN/SIRIUSXM)
No. 5 Great Clips Chevrolet SS / Kasey Kahne
Driver Kasey Kahne Hometown Enumclaw, Washington
Age 35 Resides Mooresville, North Carolina
2015 Season
18th in standings
35 starts
0 wins
1 pole position
3 top-five finishes
10 top-10 finishes
66 laps led
Career
431 starts
17 wins
27 pole positions
86 top-five finishes
156 top-10 finishes
4,607 laps led
Track Career
11 starts
0 wins
2 pole positions
1 top-five finishes
4 top-10 finishes
107 laps led
GREAT CLIPS ON THE NO. 5 CHEVROLET SS: Great Clips will adorn the hood of Kasey Kahne’s No. 5 Chevrolet SS this weekend at Homestead-Miami Speedway for the 12th time this season. Great Clips will be returning as a primary partner on the No. 5 car next year for 10 races.
HOMESTEAD-MIAMI LOOP DATA: According to NASCAR loop data, in the last 10 years at Homestead-Miami Speedway, Kahne ranks second in green-flag passes (855 passes), sixth in average speed late in a run (160.398 miles per hour), sixth in quality passes (44.5 percent, 445 passes), eighth in average running position (12.692 average), eighth in fastest laps run (4.0 percent, 108 laps), ninth in laps in the top 15 (64.4 percent, 1,720 laps) and ninth in laps led (4.0 percent, 107 laps).
2015 – A YEAR IN REVIEW: Kahne experienced a roller-coaster 2015 season. He began the year near the top of the charts, ranking eighth in the standings after the first 13 races. The 11 races from June to August proved to be more difficult for the 35-year-old driver. However, the No. 5 team found its groove again in the 11 races leading up to Sunday’s finale, as Kahne ran 1,795 laps in the top 15, leading 20 laps and improving his average finishing position by six spots compared to the summer months.
END OF AN ERA: Kahne and teammate Jeff Gordon will race for the final time as shop teammates this weekend at Homestead-Miami Speedway. The duo has shared Hendrick Motorsports’ Nos. 5 and 24 race shop since 2012 and earned a combined 13 victories, 67 top-five finishes and 131 top-10 finishes in that time.
CARRYING MOMENTUM INTO THE NEW YEAR: Kahne, crew chief Keith Rodden and the No. 5 team are looking to carry their end-of-the-year momentum into the 2016 season. Kahne has run 213 of the fastest laps run in Sprint Cup competition throughout the 2015 season thus far and has capitalized on opportunities that allowed him to make 3,137 green-flag passes, improving from his starting position in 14 of the 35 regular-season races, six of those races being in the last 11 events of the season. He is looking to continue that upward streak in the 2016 season as he vies for his first Sprint Cup Series championship title.
No. 24 Axalta Chevrolet SS / Jeff Gordon
Driver Jeff Gordon Hometown Pittsboro, Indiana
Age 44 Resides Charlotte, North Carolina
2015 Season
2nd in standings
35 starts
1 win
4 pole positions
5 top-five finishes
20 top-10 finishes
256 laps led
Career
796 starts
93 wins
81 pole positions
325 top-five finishes
474 top-10 finishes
24,920 laps led
Track Career
16 starts
1 win
1 pole position
7 top-five finishes
12 top-10 finishes
244 laps led
Jeff Gordon, driver of the No. 24 Axalta Chevrolet SS, will be available to members of the media at NASCAR’s “Championship 4” media day, scheduled from 2-5 p.m. ET Thursday at The Diplomat Resort & Spa in Hollywood, Florida.
Gordon is also scheduled to visit the Homestead-Miami Speedway media center following qualifying on Friday.
DRIVE FOR FIVE IS ALIVE: On Nov. 1, Gordon led the final 22 laps at Martinsville Speedway en route to his ninth win at the Virginia short track. Gordon’s first win of 2015 – and 93rd career victory – means the four-time NASCAR Cup Series champion will battle Martin Truex, Jr., Kevin Harvick and Kyle Busch for the title in the season finale this Sunday at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
FINAL LAP: Sunday’s race in Miami is scheduled to be Gordon’s final start as a full-time Sprint Cup driver. His career began on Nov. 15, 1992, at Atlanta Motor Speedway in Richard Petty’s final start. This will mark Gordon’s 797th consecutive start – extending his NASCAR record.
AT HOMESTEAD-MIAMI: On Nov. 18, 2012, Gordon led the final 13 laps on the way to his only Sprint Cup victory at the South Florida track. His seven top-five finishes and 16 starts are the most at the 1.5-mile track while the driver of the No. 24 Axalta Chevrolet SS is tied with Harvick for most top-10s.
NEW CHAPTER: In 2016, Gordon will join Mike Joy and Darrell Waltrip as an analyst for the FOX Sports broadcasts of the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series.
ANOTHER TITLE FOR GORDON: Axalta Coating Systems (NYSE: AXTA), a leading global manufacturer of liquid and powder coatings, and Gordon announced a new multi-year partnership in February. Gordon was named Axalta’s Global Business Advisor and will serve as special advisor to Charlie Shaver, Axalta Chairman and CEO, bringing his winning skills and innovative thinking to Axalta, its leadership team and its customers worldwide.
CREW CHIEF AVAILABILITY: No. 24 team crew chief Alan Gustafson will be available to the media Wednesday, Nov. 18, at 2:30 p.m. EST. Please visit www.nascarmedia.com for teleconference details.
No. 48 Lowe’s Chevrolet SS / Jimmie Johnson
Driver Jimmie Johnson Hometown El Cajon, California
Age 40 Resides Charlotte, North Carolina
2015 Season
12th in standings
35 starts
5 wins
1 pole position
14 top-five finishes
21 top-10 finishes
558 laps led
Career
506 starts
75 wins
34 pole positions
207 top-five finishes
313 top-10 finishes
17,709 laps led
Track Career
14 starts
0 wins
2 pole positions
4 top-five finishes
9 top-10 finishes
99 laps led
SEEKING VICTORY: Even though Jimmie Johnson and the No. 48 Lowe’s team have earned two poles, four top-five finishes and nine top-10s at Homestead-Miami Speedway, the South Florida track remains one of the four venues on the current Sprint Cup schedule where Johnson has yet to score a win. The others are Chicago, Kentucky and Watkins Glen.
SUCCESSFUL SEASON: While Johnson won’t be contending for his seventh championship this weekend, 2015 has been a very successful season for the driver of the No. 48. In Johnson’s 14 years competing in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series, 2015 marks the ninth in which he has scored five or more victories in a single season. Additionally, with his pole position last week at Phoenix, Johnson has earned at least one pole each year of his career with the exception of 2011.
RECORD YEAR: This season, Johnson became the winningest driver at Dover with 10 career victories and at Texas with six career wins. Heading into Sunday’s race, the driver of the No. 48 Lowe’s Chevrolet SS has earned 14 top-five finishes. It is also his 14th straight season with 20 or more top-10 finishes.
MIAMI DRIVER RATING: According to NASCAR’s loop data statistics, Johnson has the sixth-best driver rating at Homestead-Miami with a score of 97.5 during the past 10 years at the track. The driver rating is a formula that combines wins, top-15 finishes, average running position while on the lead lap, average speed under green, fastest lap, most laps led and lead-lap finishes. The maximum a driver can earn in each race is 150 points. The driver rating number is used pre-race as a prediction tool and post-race as a performance evaluator.
ONE AWAY FROM THE TIE: The win at Texas Motor Speedway put Johnson within one race of tying Dale Earnhardt Sr.’s 76 career wins. Johnson’s 75 are currently eighth all-time. One more win would tie him with Earnhardt for seventh, behind Cale Yarborough’s 83 wins in sixth place. The all-time wins leader is Richard Petty with 200.
No. 88 Nationwide Chevrolet SS / Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Driver Dale Earnhardt Jr. Hometown Kannapolis, North Carolina
Age 41 Resides Mooresville, North Carolina
2015 Season
7th in standings
35 starts
3 wins
0 pole positions
16 top-five finishes
22 top-10 finishes
287 laps led
Career
576 starts
26 wins
13 pole positions
143 top-five finishes
246 top-10 finishes
8,134 laps led
Track Career
15 starts
0 wins
0 pole positions
1 top-five finishes
2 top-10 finishes
121 laps led
STANDINGS UPDATE: With his victory in last Sunday’s rain-shortened event at Phoenix International Raceway, Dale Earnhardt Jr. moved up two spots to seventh in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series standings. The win was his 26th career NASCAR Sprint Cup victory and marked his third of the 2015 season and his third at Phoenix. The triumph also allowed Chevrolet to clinch its 13th consecutive NASCAR Sprint Cup Series manufacturer’s championship.
NATIONWIDE AND THE BETTY JANE FRANCE AWARD: Vote today for The NASCAR Foundation’s Betty Jane France Award presented by Nationwide Insurance: http://www.NASCAR.com/Award. The NASCAR Foundation’s Betty Jane France Humanitarian Award, presented by Nationwide, honors one dedicated NASCAR fan who has made a profound impact on children by volunteering in his or her local community. Voting is open through Dec. 3 and the winner will be named at the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Awards Banquet on Dec. 4 and presented with a $100,000 donation to his or her charity.
ON THE UPSWING: Earnhardt, who has yet to earn his first win at Homestead, has been on the upswing in his most recent visits to the 1.5-mile oval. While he has a total of one top-five finish and two top-10s in his 15 starts at the facility, the Kannapolis, North Carolina, native has finished inside of the top 15 in his last four trips to Homestead-Miami Speedway, including a career-best third-place finish in the 2013 event.
CHANCE AT CAREER HIGH: At Homestead, the 41-year-old driver could surpass his career record for top-five finishes in a single season. In 2004, he earned 16 top-five results and his victory last week at Phoenix allowed him to tie that record this season. Before this year, his next highest number of top-five finishes recorded in a single season was 12 in 2014.
GREEN-FLAG PASSES: Earnhardt leads all active drivers in the last 10 years at Homestead-Miami Speedway in the green-flag passes category. He has a total of 915 green-flag passes, which is 60 passes more than the next closest driver, his Hendrick Motorsports teammate Kahne.
HOMESTEAD LOOP DATA: According to NASCAR’s loop data statistics, Earnhardt also ranks near the top of the fastest laps run category. The driver of the No. 88 Nationwide Chevy is fourth among active drivers at Homestead during the last 10 years with 149 fastest laps run, some of which have been during the 121 laps he’s led in his 15 starts at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
Hendrick Motorsports
Hendrick Motorsports owner Rick Hendrick will be available to members of the media at NASCAR’s “Championship 4” media day, scheduled from 2-5 p.m. ET Thursday at The Diplomat Resort & Spa in Hollywood, Florida.
HENDRICK MOTORSPORTS AT HOMESTEAD: Hendrick Motorsports drivers have earned one win, three pole positions, 13 top-five finishes and 26 top-10s at Homestead-Miami Speedway. The win came courtesy of Gordon in 2012, when he led the final 13 laps of the race en route to Victory Lane.
YELLOW NUMBERS: Gordon’s three Hendrick Motorsports teammates will sport “Jeff Gordon yellow” numbers on the Nos. 5, 48 and 88 Chevrolets this weekend at Homestead as a tribute to the four-time champion’s final race behind the wheel of the No. 24.
SEASON IN REVIEW: With one Sprint Cup race remaining in 2015, Hendrick Motorsports has amassed nine wins, six pole positions, 38 top-five finishes, 73 top-10s and 1,167 laps led. The nine wins came at eight different tracks — Atlanta, Talladega, Kansas, Dover, Daytona, Martinsville, Phoenix and Texas (2). The win at Martinsville propelled Gordon to the Championship 4 at Homestead-Miami Speedway, where he will race for Hendrick Motorsports’ 12th Sprint Cup Series championship.
MANUFACTURERS’ CHAMPIONSHIP FOR CHEVY: Earnhardt’s victory last weekend at Phoenix International Raceway clinched the 2015 Sprint Cup Series manufacturers’ championship for Chevrolet. It marks the 13th consecutive year — and 39th time overall — that the brand has won the title in NASCAR’s premier division. Hendrick Motorsports teams provided nine of Chevrolet’s 15 wins in 2015 and powered 14 of the 15 with its engines.
ORGANIZATION STATS: To date, Hendrick Motorsports has totals of 240 victories, 206 pole positions, 980 top-five finishes and 1,635 top-10 finishes in Sprint Cup competition. Its teams have led 65,008 laps since 1984.
QUOTABLE /
“The approach of Homestead has so much to do with where you are in the points – can you pass a couple cars, can you win a championship? It’s timing for everyone and it’s a lot different for each individual team and driver. We’re going for a win. If we can get a win at Homestead and carry that momentum through the off season it would be a great feeling. It would definitely motivate me, Keith and our team to come back next year as hungry as we’ve been.”
Kasey Kahne on Homestead-Miami Speedway.
“Jeff Gordon was my favorite driver growing up. In my bedroom growing up, I had pictures of sprint cars and Cup cars on my wall. And Jeff Gordon, he was in a lot of those pictures. It’s been an honor to be his teammate at Hendrick Motorsports. He’s just been one of those guys that I’ve always really admired, looked up to. What he’s done for open-wheel racers, what he’s done for any racer, NASCAR, people, the fans – he’s just an unbelievable guy. I’m going to miss him as a teammate. I know running his iconic yellow numbers at Homestead will be a great way to honor him and show him my respect as he makes his last start. He will always be one of the greatest drivers. He’s as good as it gets.”
Kahne on Jeff Gordon
“Jeff is a big part of our shop. He’s a big motivating factor for everyone in the shop. I just think it’s really cool, the opportunity that we have in the Nos. 5 and 24 shop to send him out a champion in his last race. It would definitely be a fairytale ending to earn that fifth championship in his last season. It’s kind of sad that this will be our last race weekend sharing a shop with Jeff, but luckily he will still be around a lot. It’s not like he’s going away forever. He’s still going to be around – (Hendrick Motorsports owner) Mr. (Rick) Hendrick is going to make him work really hard.”
No. 5 team crew chief Keith Rodden on Gordon
“It’s going to be my final race and I know it will be emotional. We’ve clawed and scratched our way into the championship and it’s all a bonus – icing on the cake, if you will – for us this weekend. It’s amazing to think I have an opportunity to go out on top.”
Jeff Gordon on his opportunity to race for a championship.
“I don’t know if it’s going to hit me prior to the race or if it’s going to hit me after the race, but it’s going to hit me. It’s definitely going to hit me. We’re focused on battling for the title, so it hasn’t hit me yet.”
Gordon on making his final start in the No. 24 Chevrolet SS.
“Homestead is a tough track. It seems like there are segments of the race you have to run right on the wall to be fast and once the sun sets, you have to run the bottom. You are always searching because in practice you work so hard to get your car to work in one lane and then for the race you are all over the track. It’s a tough track to figure out – we’ve gotten better there as of late, but still have yet to figure it out to be good enough to win.”
Jimmie Johnson on Homestead-Miami Speedway.
“Jeff Gordon is a hero, friend and mentor. I don’t know how I am going to feel when he is no longer in the car. I owe it all to him – whatever the heck he saw in me way back when – he got me here. Without Jeff Gordon, this sport will be changed forever.”
Johnson on Jeff Gordon
“Not having Jeff Gordon in the No. 24 is going to be a huge pill to swallow for everyone but definitely for me personally. I was fortunate enough to be one of the original members of the ‘Rainbow Warriors’ when I first moved to North Carolina and got into racing. I’m a huge Jeff Gordon fan – always have been. I started changing tires for him back in 1994 and we accomplished a lot together – got our first wins and championships together, too. When the checkered flag falls at Homestead it’s going to be emotional for all of us. It’s the end of an era.”
No. 48 team crew chief Chad Knaus on Gordon.
“If my car drives like it did at Texas, I’m going to win (at Homestead). I told (No. 88 team crew chief) Greg (Ives) to just make it drive just like that; I won’t hit the wall with it and we’ll win the race. We should have won Texas. But that track is really similar to Texas, so I feel confident that we can go there and run well, and we’ve run better there in the past. It’s been a really difficult track for me for a really, really long time but we had an awesome run there a couple years ago, and I think that the track suits me – how we have to run the high line there – I really love racing that track up against the wall. Testing is really boring, but when I get nominated to test at Homestead, it’s not such a bad thing because it’s pretty fun. So that says how much I really like that place if I don’t mind going there to test at it.”
Dale Earnhardt Jr. on racing at Homestead
“Jeff’s done so much for this sport over the years that I like to see, personally, the respect and appreciation that he’s been shown throughout the season and especially as it has ramped up toward the end of the year. He deserves every bit of it. I think everybody genuinely has appreciated what he’s lent to the sport as a driver, but also at Hendrick Motorsports and what he’s made of the company.
“I think that when you raced against Jeff you knew you were racing against one of the best. He is one of the top drivers in NASCAR, ever, and what he’s done for Hendrick Motorsports – he’s been with the same team his entire career, and he’s always put the company first and he always tried to do the right thing and help the company grow. When you look at Hendrick Motorsports and what it has become, Jeff’s influence was there and I think that I’ll always remember that too and appreciate that because I’m a driver and I work there and I, along with all the employees, have to appreciate what he’s done and how he’s affected that company. Selfishly, I’ll miss that part because I think that having him as a teammate helps me on the racetrack. I hope that he continues to have an influence on Hendrick Motorsports because I think that his influence there is a big benefit for the company.”
Earnhardt on Jeff Gordon
“He was always one of my favorite drivers. It was probably ’94 when I was starting my own racing and driving, and trying to emulate someone who I wanted to be like. When I was a rookie driver, I said in 10 years I was going to work for Hendrick Motorsports and that was because of Jeff Gordon and what he was able to bring to the table at Hendrick Motorsports. It’s kind of weird because 10 years later I was setting up his race cars, and now 10 to 12 years later, here I am going down to help him win his fifth championship.
“Homestead and the high line there favors Dale’s driving style, so whatever feedback he can give Jeff to help him out or setup-wise that I can help out (No. 24 team crew chief) Alan (Gustafson), we’ll do. I think you can see our trend of performance here lately – we’ve been running better and that’s because the crew chiefs and drivers have been working well together.”
No. 88 team crew chief Greg Ives on Gordon
