NASCAR Cup Series

Aric Almirola and the No. 43 team had a strong showing in Chicago before an engine failure resulted in a 41st-place finish. Now 16th in points and 23 points outside of the Top-12, Almirola and the team are focused on winning in the next two races in order to advance to the Contender Round of the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup.

On the strength of back-to-back race victories, Brad Keselowski and the No. 2 Miller Lite Ford team enter this weekend as the leaders in the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series (NSCS) championship. The team is the only one to claim five victories in 2014 NSCS competition. The consecutive victories mark Keselowski’s first ever two in a row and his 15th career win. It also ties his career-best mark of five wins in a season that he notched on the way to claiming the Cup title in 2012.

“We are aware of the completed investigation and the announced next steps. First, our thoughts continue to be with all who have been impacted by this tragedy. We will monitor this process and stay in close contact with Stewart-Haas Racing. It would be inappropriate for NASCAR to comment on this case so we will continue to respect the process and authorities involved.”

NASCAR, Front Row Motorsports, Kyle Busch Motorsports and Martinsville Speedway announced today they will honor 2015 NASCAR Hall of Fame Inductee Wendell Scott, the first African-American driver to win a NASCAR premier series event, with a series of tributes during the Martinsville race weekend from Oct. 24-26.

Brad Keselowski has won the last two NASCAR Sprint Cup Series races, becoming the first Ford driver to do that since 2010 when Carl Edwards won back-to-back at Phoenix and Homestead.

Ragan has 15 Sprint Cup career starts at New Hampshire Motor Speedway ... He has one top-10 and three top-15 finishes at the 1.058-mile oval ... His best finish at Loudon is seventh (2011).

Gilliland has 15 Sprint Cup career starts at New Hampshire Motor Speedway ... His top finish at the 1.058-mile oval is 18th (2013) ... Clean Harbors, a provider of environmental, energy and industrial services, will makes its first appearance as primary sponsor on the No. 38 for Sunday's race.

For the Mayetta, New Jersey Truex family the roots are deeply embedded at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, where three different members of the Truex clan have scored a victory at the 1.058-mile oval.

Within those 40 laps, we saw Brad Keselowski shoot through the middle between the dueling Kyle Larson and Kevin Harvick to take the lead with sixteen to go. It was a great piece of racing, and once he was through he was gone. Two in a row, fifth of the season, and Keselowski earned himself a berth in the next round of the Chase.