"When I hit the wall,” Keselowski said, “I thought the worst. But the Chase is long and grueling, and won’t be won in a day. You’ve got to keep your eyes on the prize. For me personally, I’m able to see the ‘Lite’ at the end of the tunnel.”
“I automatically advanced to the next round of the Chase,” Keselowski said. “So you can pencil my name on the bracket to the ‘Contender’ round. And speaking of things written in pencil, the Chase format has seen more alterations than Bruton Smith’s pants.”
Many fans seem to be disappointed in what they saw at Richmond over the weekend. Yes, we had two runaway races—Kyle Busch in the Nationwide race and Brad Keselowski in the Cup race, but there is a reason for that and it is something that many fail to understand. There are the haves and the have nots. The haves always win unless you’re at a road course or Daytona.
1. Jeff Gordon: Gordon was running second early at Atlanta when he blew a tire, sending him into the wall. He fell two laps down, but battled back to regain the lead lap and finished 17th.
With an intense heat radiating from the track and an even more intense return to the track for Tony Stewart, here is what was surprising and not surprising from the 55th annual Oral-B USA 500 at Atlanta Motor Speedway.
1. Jeff Gordon: Gordon started second at Bristol but encountered handling issues that left him mid-pack for much of the race. He finished 16th, one lap down, and leads the Sprint Cup points standings by 27 over Dale Earnhardt, Jr.
1. Dale Earnhardt Jr.: Earnhardt finished 11th at Watkins Glen after an untimely late caution cost him any chance of winning. He passed Jeff Gordon to take over the lead in the Sprint Cup points standings, and now leads Gordon by four.
Things are not rosy at Roush Fenway Racing. Lately, they’ve lost their top driver to apparently Joe Gibbs Racing, and today they lost 3M as a primary sponsor on the No. 16 Ford of Greg Biffle. The performance has been putrid at best all year even though Carl Edwards has two wins, but Biffle and Ricky Stenhouse, Jr. have not had the performance that a top team should have.
