Lorenzo Notches First Win of Season at Aragon
Movistar Yamaha MotoGP rider Jorge Lorenzo scored his first victory of the season at Sunday’s Gran Premio Movistar de Aragon. He crossed the finish line 10 seconds ahead of his competition after a chaotic series of events derailed several top competitors’ races.
Lorenzo’s victory was Yamaha’s first ever at the 5.078-mile Motorland Aragon, and it came as Factory Yamaha’s second consecutive win of the season.
The race was characterized by a slow-building onset of rain, which led to the demise of several riders’ efforts. Marc Marquez, Valentino Rossi and Dani Pedrosa, the top three riders in the points standings, all experienced wrecks, which left Lorenzo in front at the finish line.
Lorenzo’s win wasn’t simply handed over to him. Hard racing early and timely rain strategy later proved to be the winning formula.
Pramac Racing’s Andrea Iannone started the race from the front row and took an early lead aboard his new heavily modified, narrower Ducati 14.2, and looked strong battling with Marc Marquez until dropping into second place and running off the track and crashing early on.
Misano’s winner Rossi ran out of track as well on Lap Five, enduring a hard hit and eventually being taken off the course on a stretcher.
Lorenzo pursued Marquez until they exchanged the lead on Lap Nine, and then again on Lap 12. They swapped the lead a few more times on Lap 14, until Marquez waved Lorenzo by to surrender the lead. Two laps later, Marquez and his Repsol Honda teammate Dani Pedrosa overtook Lorenzo for first and second places.
Pedrosa took the lead from Marquez on Lap 17, and they spent the remainder of that lap swapping position and running side-by-side. Meanwhile, the rain had grown much heavier and riders began coming into the pits to switch to wet tires.
Ducati Team’s Andrea Dovizioso crashed the other new Ducati 14.2 bike with five laps to go, shortly before planning on coming into the pits.
Marquez regained the lead with five laps to go, and as he and Pedrosa crossed the finish line with four laps left, Pedrosa lost the front end of his bike and wrecked. At the same time, Lorenzo had elected to swap his bike out for the wet conditions.
Marquez slipped around the track several times until the powers of nature finally won the battle, slipping his Honda out from underneath him with three laps to go. This opened up the lead to Lorenzo, who carefully navigated the track for the final three laps and took the win with a comfortable margin of victory.
The real race was for second, as NGM Forward Racing’s Aleix Espargaro made contact with Ducati Team’s Cal Crutchlow and barely edged him out in a neck-and-neck dash to the line, scoring his first podium finish of his premier class career. Espargaro rebounded from an early race mishap that shuffled him off the track, and Crutchlow received his first podium result with Team Ducati.
In fourth place was Stefan Bradl, whose place Crutchlow will be taking at LCR Honda next year. Rounding out the top five was Tech 3 Yamaha’s Bradley Smith after recovering from 20th place on the opening lap.
Drive M7 Aspar’s Nicky Hayden, the only American premier class rider, returned after a four-race injury hiatus and finished in ninth place.
Marquez and Pedrosa salvaged three and two points, respectively, and maintained their spots as the top two drivers in the standings. Marquez leads Pedrosa by 75 points. Rossi, who had trailed Pedrosa by one point in third heading into Aragon, failed to complete the race, allowing Pedrosa’s 14th place finish to increase the gap between them to three points.
Results:
- Jorge Lorenzo
- Aleix Espargaro
- Cal Crutchlow
- Stefan Bradl
- Bradley Smith
- Pol Espargaro
- Alvaro Bautista
- Hiroshi Aoyoma
- Nicky Hayden
- Scott Redding
- Danilo Petrucci
- Alex de Angelis
- Marc Marquez
- Dani Pedrosa
- Yonny Hernandez
- Michael Laverty
- Mike Di Meglio
- Broc Parkes
- Hector Barbera
NC:
Andrea Dovizioso
Valentino Rossi
Andrea Iannone
Karel Abraham
Surprising and Not Surprising: Dover AAA 400
With advancement into the Contender Round for the NASCAR championship on the line, here is what was surprising and not surprising from the 45th annual AAA 400 at Dover international Speedway.
Surprising: After experiencing a tire valve stem issue early in the race, one driver surprisingly seemed to have turned his attention to the upcoming holidays instead.
“The inner valve stem got knocked out just like the first race here, except this time it was on the left-front,” the driver of the No. 4 Budweiser Chevrolet said after finishing 13th from the pole. “A lug nut got in between the wheel and the brake rotor and knocked the valve stem out.”
“So unfortunate, but probably our own fault for not finding a solution for it the first race,” Harvick continued. “Just handing out early Christmas presents to people for winning races that we should be winning.”
“It’s just unbelievable that it can happen.”
Not Surprising: As has played out for much for the season to date, the Monster Mile was also two-team dominated. Hendrick Motorsports driver Jeff Gordon won the race, while his usually strong at Dover teammate Jimmie Johnson finished third.
Team Penske also had a great day at Dover, with Brad Keselowski and Joey Logano finished second and fourth respectively.
“I knew we could compete with the No. 2 (Brad Keselowski) car,” Jeff Gordon said in Victory Lane. “The No. 2 was really good on short runs, but we could run him down. Of course he made us work for it there at the end.”
“Certainly wish we were in Victory Lane, but good solid third-place run,” Hendrick teammate Johnson said. “We had a solid car.”
“All I could think about was how I wanted to win all three races,” Brad Keselowski said after his runner-up finish. “Three more races and we’ve got to keep our head on straight t and push forward these next three like we have these last three.”
“It was a hard-fought day, which is pretty normal for here at Dover,” Logano said of his fourth place finish. We got something good out of it and now we’ll start the next round and try to move on to the next one.”
“We’ve got to focus on what we do to go fast and not what other people are doing or who our competition is,” Logano said about the Team Penske vs. Hendrick battle. “There are 11 other guys right now who are our main competition, so we’ve got to look at them all just like we did going into this round. We look at every one as a contender, no pun intended, and we’ll be able to focus on what we’ve been doing with our race cars and go from there.”
Surprising: It was surprising to see just how disappointed so many drivers were who actually advanced to the next round of competition after the race at the Monster Mile.
“It was off a little bit,” Matt Kenseth said, after taking the checkered flag in fifth as the highest finishing Toyota. “I couldn’t do very good on restarts and that really hurt us bad. I’d lose so many spots over the restart and just too hard to get them back.”
“There were times when the car was better than where we finished and other times when it was worse.”
“We did what we had to do today with our Interstate Batteries Camry, but I’m not sure what the problem was on the last couple funs of the race,” Kyle Busch said after finishing tenth. “We were tight all day, but it just got worse at the end.”
“We didn’t run good obviously,” Dale Earnhardt Jr. said after finishing 17th. “We struggled with our car all day long. We never had a moment during the race where the car was very good and competitive.”
Not Surprising: Although he did not make it into the Chase race, this rookie driver has big plans for his participation during the remainder of the competition rounds.
“It was a really good finish for us,” Kyle Larson said after taking the checkered flag in the sixth spot. “Hopefully I can be the guy that wins Kansas and Charlotte so all the Chase guys can be nervous going into Talladega.”
Surprising: While everyone else who made it to the Contender Round of the Chase had Talladega on their minds, one driver surprisingly indicated that he could not wait to get to the superspeedway.
“This is built for us,” Carl Edwards, driver of the No. 99 Fastenal Ford said. “We’ve got to capitalize on it and go run well at Kansas and Charlotte.”
“We know we can win Talladega, so I look forward to that race,” Edwards continued. “That’s the first time I’ve ever looked forward to Talladega in the Chase, but I’m looking forward to it.”
Not Surprising: At a track that he claims as one of his own close to home, it was not surprising that Martin Truex Jr. had a good run, finishing seventh after starting 26th. Truex scored the second best finish among non-Chase drivers and this was also his second best finish of the season.
“Dover has always been a special place for me,” Truex said. “I don’t know what it is about this track – maybe it’s just home field advantage for me because it seems like the longer the race goes here the better we get.”
“Just like last week (New Hampshire) I wish the race was longer. I never thought I would say that.”
Surprising: While many, including Mr. Hendrick have stated that they are witnessing the rebirth of race winner Jeff Gordon as he drives for his fifth championship, another driver felt surprisingly renewed after squeaking into the next round of competition.
“I feel great,” Denny Hamlin said after finishing 12th in his No. 11 FedEx Freight Toyota. “We’ve got another life.”
“This is going to be a great comeback story if we can keep going,” Hamlin continued. “This is a new life.”
Not Surprising: There was no fairy tale ending for the two small Cinderella teams battling for their place in the Chase, as both Aric Almirola and AJ Allmendinger were eliminated.
“It just didn’t work out for us,” Aric Almirola said after his 28th place finish. “I hate it. We picked a bad day to run the way we did and we can’t blame anybody but ourselves. I’m sure we’ll be able to look past this another day, but right now it’s pretty disappointing.”
“It was an awful day,” Allmendinger said after finishing 23rd. “We didn’t give up. We just missed it all weekend.”
“It’s disappointing to miss it by two points, but we didn’t deserve to be in it with the run that we had,” Dinger continued. “We have to look at it – I’m not going to take a moral victory out of it to miss it by two points, it’s disappointing, but we know we are making steps in the right direction.”
“We have seven races to go. I will be disappointed tonight, but be ready to go tomorrow morning.”
Surprising: One driver was surprisingly gracious in defeat, just missing the next round in competition.
“I felt like we were in good position to advance, but you just can’t expect to advance by running 15th,” Kurt Busch, driver of the No. 41 HAAS Automation Chevrolet said. “You have to be more competitive. We gave it a good run, you know?”
“We put this team together pretty late,” Busch continued. “Gene Haas believed in me to come in here and do this and thanks to Haas Automation and Chevrolet and great associate sponsors like Mobil 1 and State Water Heaters and Monster Energy.”
“We don’t get to advance to the championship, but we can still run for pride and run for wins.”
Not Surprising: Perhaps with a small nod to fellow racer Michael Waltrip’s stint on Dancing With the Stars, Kasey Kahne, who just squeaked into the next round of competition, told his pit crew that they would have to step it up after some struggles during the Dover race.
“Well, these guys work hard,” Kahne said. “And we’ve struggled all season with that. But they work hard and I know they’ll keep working hard.”
“I just told them if you guys want to go further, it’s time to step-up,” Kahne continued. “It’s time to put our best stuff out there. I know they want to. They’ll work hard this week.”
“I’m going to work hard and we’re going to be prepared when we get to Kansas and hopefully we can keep moving on.”
The Final Word – Kahne Provides Some Drama at Dover
Thank God for Kasey Kahne. With no Kahne, the broadcast of the Dover race would have been about as exciting as watching a Soap Box Derby contest in Saskatchewan, or a downhill ski event in Saskatchewan, or an outdoor performance of the Sound of Music…in Saskatchewan. The hills might be alive, but they are nowhere to be found. Sort of like waiting for drama at Dover, except for the performance of Kasey Kahne. He came in six points in the Chase. It almost proved to be not enough.
When Kasey’s crew left him with a loose wheel after a pit stop, he needed to come in. In doing so, he went two laps down. When he needed a green lap stop later, he went down four. He just did not stay there. Pit strategy and cautions fell at the right time, his car was just that good, and in the end Kahne finished Dover in 20th. Not great, but it was enough, by two points, to continue in the Chase.
Aric Almirola was buried in 41st after Chicago, and 28th in Delaware kept him buried. A.J. Allmendinger was six to the good on Saturday, but Dover is a track he historically does not do well at. History won, as he finished 23rd, and it was Kahne who advanced.
I had thought Greg Biffle might be the man. He was, but the car was not. Usually good on this track, he was 21st when he needed a top fifteen. Kurt Busch was 18th, but after the disaster at Loudon only a top ten would have saved him. As for Denny Hamlin, he was six points out of it coming in, but a 12th place finish cured his ills and all is forgiven up to and including Talladega.
Now, the top dozen are even, 3000 points for everyone in a 12 driver tie. Jimmie Johnson has 14 Top Tens, along with a couple of wins, in sixteen tries at Kansas. That bodes well for him. Jeff Gordon, who won at Dover has three on the plains, so he should do well. Other Chasers with strong Kansas resumes include Carl Edwards, Brad Keselowski, and Kevin Harvick. Oh, Kyle Larson seems to like the place, too. I am starting to think the kid is on a scouting mission for next year.
Not everyone likes Kansas, though after Dover I can not imagine it being a worse televised experience than that. Hamlin and Dale Earnhardt Jr. do not exactly burn up this venue. Same goes for Ryan Newman. However, there are two gents who have a tough time just cracking the top twenty there. It could be an interesting day for Joey Logano and Kyle Busch.
In case you missed it, Kyle Busch won another Nationwide race last weekend. I went to the bathroom last weekend, and so did you. Look at that, an entire paragraph totally unnewsworthy.
There is no question that the stats that spit out after Kansas should be interesting. We have great story lines, strong characters, but sadly I believe the NASCAR movie just does not measure up to the book.
Advancing…
1 – Brad Keselowski – 1 Win – 2140 Points – *
2 – Joey Logano – 1 – 2136 – *
3 – Jeff Gordon – 1 – 2117 – *
4 – Kevin Harvick – 0 – 2123 – 46 Points In
5 – Jimmie Johnson – 0 – 2121 – 44
6 – Kyle Busch – 0 – 2111 – 34
7 – Dale Earnhardt, Jr. – 0 – 2104 – 27
8 – Matt Kenseth – 0 – 2097 – 20
9 – Ryan Newman – 0 – 2091 – 14
10 – Carl Edwards – 0 – 2091 – 14
11 – Denny Hamlin – 0 – 2081 – 4
12 – Kasey Kahne – 0 – 2079 – 2
Eliminated…
13 – A.J. Allmendinger – 0 – 2077 – 2 Points Out
14 – Kurt Busch – 0 – 2073 – -6
15 – Greg Biffle – 0 – 2072 – -7
16 – Aric Almirola – 0 – 2061 – 18
Dale Earnhardt Jr. ‘Concerned’ Going into the Next Round of the Chase
Dale Earnhardt Jr. finished the Challenger Round at Dover with a lackluster 17th place finish. Although he began the year with a win at the season-opener Daytona 500 followed by two more wins, both at Pocono, the team has taken a wrong turn in the last several weeks. Since his last win in August, his best finish and only top-five, was a fifth place at Michigan.
After Sunday’s AAA 400 at Dover International Speedway, Earnhardt spoke to the media about the challenges his team encountered during the race.
“We didn’t run good obviously,” he said. “We struggled with our car all day long. I thought we had a lot better car in practice, but we made some changes. I guess they didn’t really work out for us. We were real loose on entry and real tight in the center. The balance was bad at the start of the run and the end of the run. So we never had a moment during the race where the car was very good and competitive. We just missed the set-up pretty bad. We just need to start from scratch when we come back here next year.”
Earnhardt called it a “frustrating day” and expressed his thoughts on the urgency of turning things around as they go into the next round of the Chase.
“Seventeenth was as good as we could run. That’s not good enough to win a championship. But we get to move forward and start from scratch on the next weekend. Trust me,” he continued, “we’re going to go to work and try to find everything we can to get better. But we’re concerned. It’s not been a good couple of weeks. We need to find something quick.”
Earnhardt is right to be concerned. Only eight of the 12 drivers will make it to the Eliminator Round and he is currently in seventh place on the Chase grid. However, it’s important to remember that all 12 drivers will have their points reset to 3000 entering the next round.
But don’t count the No. 88 team out of the running. Earnhardt took to Twitter to reassure his fans that they are in it to the end.
“This one’s over. It’s all back to zero. Can’t quit. Won’t. This team ain’t done yet. Gotta keep working hard. Smart. All the way to Homestead.”
The action returns Sunday, October 5 at Kansas as the top 12 contend for one of those eight coveted positions that will take them to the Eliminator Round and one step closer to the winner-take-all Championship Round.
Jeff Gordon Scores Career Win 92 in AAA 400 at Monster Mile
While his teammate Jimmie Johnson has traditionally dominated at the Dover Monster Mile, it was Jeff Gordon scoring his 92nd win, his fifth win at Dover, and his fourth win of the season. Gordon also punched his ticket to the next round in NASCAR’s Chase for the Championship.
“It was a really solid race all day long,” Gordon said. “Our strength was definitely the stronger runs. My car really came to life then and we could start reeling them in. I was pretty happy from the start.”
“We’re a team that is good enough to win and to ultimately be consistent.”
“Yeah, we knew this was going to be a pressure-packed race and a really tough track,” Alan Gustafson, crew chief said. “We knew we had to be on our game and we had to come together as a team.”
“I think all that kind of came to fruition here and we were able to win the race.”
Brad Keselowski, behind the wheel of the No. 2 Wurth Ford, did not need a Monster Mile win as he had already advanced to the next round of the championship Chase with his prior win. He did however finish second, notching another great run for Team Penske.
“Yeah, we’ve had a really good start, so we can’t really complain that much having won a race, and a second and a seventh. But it’s hard to look at that. All I can think about is how I wanted to win all three races.”
“And now it’s time to move forward,” Keselowski continued. “Three more races, a new start. We’ve got to keep our head on straight and push forward these next three like we have these last three.”
“All in all, it’s going to be a real challenge and if you can survive all three of these brackets and go to Homestead and win this thing, you’ve certainly earned it.”
Jimmie Johnson, behind the wheel of the No. 48 Lowe’s/Kobalt Tools Chevrolet, finished third and shared his excitement to be able to advance to the next round.
“These first three races went pretty well,” Johnson said. “I think Chicago was probably the track where we left the most points on the table.”
“Today we kind of ran, finished where we ran, but we had a decent car,” Johnson continued. “Really strong on the long runs but just would lose too much time to make up the deficit that I had there.”
“Good solid day, happy to advance.”
There was no doubt that Joey Logano was going to advance to the next round of the championship Chase, but he still sealed the deal with a fourth place run at the Monster Mile.
“It was a hard-fought day, which is pretty normal for here at Dover,” the driver of the No. 22 Shell/Pennzoil Ford said. “It was a little bit of a tougher week for us. We didn’t have a very fast car off the truck, but Todd Gordon (crew chief) and all those guys did a great job giving me a car that was pretty racy.”
“We got something good out of it and now we’ll start the next round and try to move on to the next one.”
For Kevin Harvick, Kyle Busch, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Matt Kenseth, Ryan Newman, Carl Edwards, Denny Hamlin and Kasey Kahne, who finished 13th, 10th, 17th, 5th, 8th, 11th, 12th and 20th respectively, it was a good day as they all advanced to the next race for the championship.
“It was pretty solid,” Matt Kenseth said after finishing fifth. “We had good pit stops down here. We just lacked a little bit. Just couldn’t quite get it, but overall it was a good day for us.”
“It was just a solid day,” Carl Edwards, driver of the No. 99 Fastenal Ford, said. “The car was actually pretty decent and everybody did a really good job. The pit crew did great and Jimmy did a great job with the car and that’s what we needed. We had a top-10 car and finished 11th, but I think if I would have done a little better job on the restarts we would have been better.”
“Yeah, there were a lot of anxious moments,” Edwards continued. “We were running 21st at one point and that’s tough.” We keep making small gains and getting the opportunity to be put back in the same position as the guys in front of us is a huge opportunity for us.”
“I just want to make the most of it.”
But for AJ Allmendinger, Kurt Busch, Greg Biffle, and Aric Almirola, however, it was the end of the line as they were eliminated from Chase contention.
“This is the way it’s gone all season,” Greg Biffle, driver of the No. 16 3M/Post-It Ford, said after the race. “We’re just searching for speed and struggled all day today. We’ve worked hard trying to fix our problems, but it just hasn’t come together yet.”
“It’s frustrating because part of you wants to just pull it and put it in the garage and the other half is racing as hard as you can to get in the Chase,” Biffle continued. “It’s pretty frustrating. I’ve won races my whole career, but to be struggling like this all year is disappointing at best.”
“It just didn’t work out for us,” Aric Almirola, behind the wheel of the No. 43 Nathan’s Famous Ford Fusion, said. “I hate it. We picked a bad day to run the way we did and we can’t blame anybody but ourselves. My car didn’t have any grip. You can’t go fast without grip.”
“Right now it’s pretty disappointing.”
Kyle Larson was the highest finishing rookie again, finishing sixth in his No. 42 Target Chevrolet.
“Yeah, I’d be really happy about my three races in this round if I was in the Chase,” Larson said. “But yeah, it was a really good finish for us.”
“We were terrible the first two runs. It was all I could do to not crash the case, I was so loose,” Larson continued. “I was really hanging on and Shine (crew chief) and everybody did a really good job to make huge adjustments to get the Target Chevy fast. Once we did, we were a top-10 car immediately and just kept working on it and got better and better.”
“Hopefully we can keep these top-10s rolling.”
| The full race results are as follows: | ||||||||||
| POS | DRIVER | CAR | MANUFACTURER | LAPS | MONEY | START | LED | PTS | BONUS | PENALTY |
| 1 | Jeff Gordon | Chevrolet | 400 | 6 | 94 | 47 | 4 | 0 | ||
| 2 | Brad Keselowski | Ford | 400 | 4 | 78 | 43 | 1 | 0 | ||
| 3 | Jimmie Johnson | Chevrolet | 400 | 8 | 0 | 41 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 4 | Joey Logano | Ford | 400 | 16 | 0 | 40 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 5 | Matt Kenseth | Toyota | 400 | 14 | 2 | 40 | 1 | 0 | ||
| 6 | Kyle Larson | Chevrolet | 400 | 7 | 0 | 38 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 7 | Martin Truex Jr. | Chevrolet | 400 | 26 | 0 | 37 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 8 | Ryan Newman | Chevrolet | 400 | 20 | 0 | 36 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 9 | Clint Bowyer | Toyota | 400 | 9 | 1 | 36 | 1 | 0 | ||
| 10 | Kyle Busch | Toyota | 400 | 2 | 0 | 34 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 11 | Carl Edwards | Ford | 400 | 18 | 1 | 34 | 1 | 0 | ||
| 12 | Denny Hamlin | Toyota | 400 | 3 | 0 | 32 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 13 | Kevin Harvick | Chevrolet | 399 | 1 | 223 | 33 | 2 | 0 | ||
| 14 | Tony Stewart | Chevrolet | 399 | 15 | 0 | 30 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 15 | Brian Vickers | Toyota | 399 | 11 | 0 | 29 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 16 | Paul Menard | Chevrolet | 399 | 19 | 0 | 28 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 17 | Dale Earnhardt Jr. | Chevrolet | 399 | 25 | 0 | 27 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 18 | Kurt Busch | Chevrolet | 399 | 22 | 0 | 26 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 19 | Ricky Stenhouse Jr. | Ford | 399 | 24 | 0 | 25 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 20 | Kasey Kahne | Chevrolet | 399 | 12 | 0 | 24 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 21 | Greg Biffle | Ford | 399 | 27 | 0 | 23 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 22 | Jamie McMurray | Chevrolet | 398 | 5 | 1 | 23 | 1 | 0 | ||
| 23 | AJ Allmendinger | Chevrolet | 398 | 28 | 0 | 21 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 24 | Austin Dillon | Chevrolet | 398 | 10 | 0 | 20 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 25 | Danica Patrick | Chevrolet | 398 | 13 | 0 | 19 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 26 | Marcos Ambrose | Ford | 398 | 17 | 0 | 18 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 27 | Casey Mears | Chevrolet | 397 | 30 | 0 | 17 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 28 | Aric Almirola | Ford | 397 | 21 | 0 | 16 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 29 | Justin Allgaier | Chevrolet | 395 | 23 | 0 | 15 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 30 | Cole Whitt | Toyota | 395 | 29 | 0 | 14 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 31 | David Ragan | Ford | 395 | 37 | 0 | 13 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 32 | Reed Sorenson | Chevrolet | 394 | 33 | 0 | 12 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 33 | David Gilliland | Ford | 393 | 31 | 0 | 11 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 34 | Alex Bowman | Toyota | 391 | 34 | 0 | 10 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 35 | Landon Cassill | Chevrolet | 391 | 36 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 36 | Mike Bliss | 37 | Chevrolet | 391 | 40 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| 37 | David Stremme | Chevrolet | 389 | 38 | 0 | 7 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 38 | Travis Kvapil | Toyota | 389 | 42 | 0 | 6 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 39 | J.J. Yeley | Ford | 387 | 39 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 40 | Mike Wallace | Toyota | 384 | 41 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 41 | Michael Annett | Chevrolet | 361 | 35 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 42 | Josh Wise | Chevrolet | 197 | 32 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | ||
| 43 | Timmy Hill | 44 | Chevrolet | 11 | 43 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | |
