For the ninth time, Jimmie Johnson, driver of the No. 48 Lowe’s/Kobalt Tools Chevrolet stole the show at the Monster Mile, making it two race wins in a row and virtually guaranteeing himself a place in the Chase for the tenth consecutive year.
Jimmie Johnson won last week. The odds are that Johnson will win again this week. Nothing is for sure, but a 33% winning rate anywhere is astronomical and Six Time has done it eight times in 24 attempts in Delaware.
With military tributes abounding and NASCAR patriotism at its best, here is what was surprising and not surprising from the 55th annual running of the sport’s longest race, the Coca Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
Come Sunday, Kurt Busch will join John Andretti, Robby Gordon, and his boss Tony Stewart as the only NASCAR drivers to complete the Indianapolis 500 and the Coca-Cola 600 on the same day. Kurt Busch will start the 98th running of the Indianapolis 500 from the 12th position.
Surprising: Weird and freaky things continue to happen at NASCAR races and the Kansas race was no exception. The lights went dark on the back stretch, the speedy dry truck lost a gear, and the car that was ‘Freaky Fast’, starting from the pole with a new track record, just could not pull off the victory, coming in second instead.
We are only a quarter of the way through the 2014 season and there have already been more memorable finishes than all of last year. At Daytona, Dale Earnhardt, Jr. held off a hard charging Denny Hamlin to win his 2nd Daytona 500. Two weeks later at Las Vegas, Brad Keselowski passed Dale Earnhardt, Jr. on the last lap to score the victory.
Four winners, three of whom sit atop our leader board. As important as victories are this season in determining the Chase contenders, it would be hard to include Kevin Harvick among the best under normal circumstances.
Rain. That was the theme of the cool, overcast, and often wet event at Bristol last Sunday. Rain delayed things, then stopped it all together for two hours as we sat on lap 125 of 500 for a spell. Often in the past, we have seen the guys who are leading near the start of the race just happen to be the same dudes there at the end.
