Ron Thornton

Despite placing fourth on Sunday, no Ricky Stenhouse Jr. No Dale Earnhardt Jr. Neither Austin Dillon or Ty Dillon. No Danica Patrick. A.J. Allmendinger was third at Daytona, outside the Top Twenty ever since. One can have the name, the equipment, the marketing, but results are what matters and for some those results just have not been there just yet.

You had better luck finding Nemo than Ryan Newman in Victory Lane in recent years. He was there for the first time since July 28, 2013 in Indianapolis. That was surprising enough.

Wins mean everything, but doing well in the stages and coming home close to the front seems pretty important also this season. Last week, Matt Kenseth finished ninth, yet lost ground by 30 points to race winner Martin Truex Jr. in Las Vegas alone.

I wonder what the highlight was from Las Vegas? Just maybe it was the passing opportunity to see Joey Logano get his ass kicked on pit road. However, before that could happen, a lot of dudes on Logano’s race team quickly took Kyle Busch out of the mix as their driver literally got carried off to safety.

One thing that pops out at you are some of the unfamiliar names among our Hot 20 after a couple of races. Even more so, all the familiar names not there.

Brad Keselowski won. 22 victories. This time, if he has any self respect, he needs to send out a few lines of thanks to a pair of drivers. Kyle Larson would be one of them. Larson ran low, did well, but for some reason he thought Keselowski would pass him on high, so he stayed high. Brad passed him down low, and drove away. Larson has one win, and seven runner-up finishes. I am starting to see why.

It is expected. The standings look weird. With bonus points from the Duels and the demo derby that was the Daytona 500, some wound up with more points than anticipated, and some got far less.

So, you want a car just like the one that won the Daytona 500, eh? Well, you get yourself a sparkling new Ford Fusion. Splash it up with some red on the hood, and basic black the rest of the way around. Polish it up so it is real shiny and pretty. Then take a Louisville Slugger and beat on that beauty from stem to stern.

Sorry, but this column is arriving a day later than my usual Thursday date. Of course, it has something to do with the race that gives me the data to mess around with did not take place until Thursday. It is not my fault.

The sun was shining, at least on Sunday, the birds were singing, and joy was back in our hearts. A new NASCAR season is now upon us, and we could not be happier. We learned over the offseason that if a car gets too torn up that it can not be fixed in five minutes on pit road using original pieces, other than tons of tape, its gets parked.