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NASCAR Fans–Do You Believe in Miracles

Bobby Labonte holds the only win at Homestead-Miami Speedway in a Chevrolet, while Matt Kenseth is the defending race winner.

The only Dodge win in the short history of the south Florida track come from the unlikely source of Bill Elliott. Elliott only won four races for Evernham Racing after resurrecting the brand in NASCAR.  Tony Stewart picked off the first two wins ever at HMS in Pontiacs.

The majority of wins have come from the Blue Oval Boys.  Fords of Jack Roush have won five of the nine races.  Kurt Busch started the winning in 2002.  Greg Biffle “owns” Homestead with three consecutive wins in ‘04 through ‘06; while Matt Kenseth is the defending race winner.  While Roush drivers have been celebrating race wins over the last three years at the finale; they have had to watch Jimmy Johnson revel in his championships.

Jack Roush would like nothing better than to be able to celebrate a championship and a race win for Carl Edwards. It’s the long shot of all long shots to believe that JJ can’t pull off a 36th place finish.

photo credit: Icon Sports Media

Carl Edwards trying to get Ford back to Winning at Phoenix

Seven of the last eight races at Pheonix International Raceway have seen Chevrolet drivers head to victory lane.

Dale Earnhardt, Jr. started the turn of events in 2003 when he won the first of back to back wins.  Only in 2005 was the recent Chevy dominance interrupted by Kurt Busch in a Roush Ford.  It has been all Chevy power ever since.  Kyle Bush, Kevin Harvick and Jeff Gordon have preceded defending race champ Jimmy Johnson as the most recent GM winners.

Phoenix hasn’t always been so Chevrolet biased.  The early Cup years saw Ford win eleven of the first fifteen races held on the unique mile oval.  Alan Kulwicki, Bill Elliott and Davey Allison all won races in the first few years of the journey out to the Valley of the Sun.

Carl Edwards is hot and a man on a mission while Jimmy Johnson is looking to hang on to win a record tying third straight championship.

This could be the year that Ford begins to re-assert itself as a dominate player at Phoeniz.

photo credit: Icon Sports Media

Phoenix International Raceway: Kasey Kahne Kant

Most weeks, even though 2008 has not been a banner year for Kasey Kahne, his stats make him look like - at least - a dark-horse contender to win. With mile-and-a-half tracks comprising a majority of the Chase races, and Kahne being a relative stud on the intermediates (he swept the two Cup races at Lowes in May) Kasey has been a legit consideration most of the last eight weeks. But not this time.

PIR has not been good to Kahne. Eight races there with three top tens and three finishes of 31st or worse. Zero laps led, a 20th best Loop Driver Rating of 70.9 - compared to stat topper Jimmy Johnson at 118.0 - and an Ave Finish in the last seven races of 23.4. Kahne has run only 39.1 percent of his Laps in the Top 15.

There is no other driver whom I look upon as a consistent contender, that looks as unlikely to win this race, this week. The Dodge teams don’t strike fear into anyone. Budweiser, I would think, must question their selection of the Gillette-Everham/Kasey Kahne choice as the replacement - as if - for Dale Earnhardt Jr and DEI/Chevy. 

The results this weekend from the Desert probably won’t help.

Photo credit: BethAnne Heisler - OnPitRow.com

Finally–Advantage Ford

Yates Racing and Roush-Fenway Racing lead the way in victories at Texas.

Of the fifteen races held at Texas Motor Speedway eight have come with the driver behind the wheel of a Ford.  Elliott Sadler and Dale Jarrett each have a win behind the wheel of a Yates car.  Carl Edwards has two wins for Roush and is the only multiple winner for the Blue Oval Boys.

Texas is the only track in the Chase that has given an advantage to Ford teams.  If Carl Edwards is going to make a run at Jimmy Johnson, he has to make a move at Texas.  He has done what he must do at Atlanta and it do any good because Johnson was able to mount a comeback after early race misfortune.  Cousin Carl needs to replicate his Atlanta finish and hope that Johnson has some real problems at Texas.

Texas has the potential for a big one like crash.  The speeds turned there are close to Atlanta and with a less than perfect track, bad things can happen in a furry.

Look for Edwards to mount a great fight at Texas.  He has history on his side, at least as far as car make is concerned.

photo credit: Icon Sports Media

Dodge Going Away–Say It Ain’t So

Four races to go and driving a Chevy is as important at Atlanta as it has been everywhere else on the Chase circuit.

The strength of the Hendrick cars and Richard Childress Racing along with Joe Gibbs Racing tenure with the GM brand is the reason it is the brand to beat of late at Atlanta.  The question has been; is it the car or does Chevrolet just have the best drivers and teams?  It’s hard to argue that the three teams listed above along with Dale Earnhardt Inc. hasn’t been the best equipped over the past ten to fifteen years.

It is difficult to go too far back to try and gain any perspective on how brands do at particular tracks when everything has been changed by the “New Car”.  The car makes and models are literally just shells of what they once were.  It has been since the mid to late Eighties that definite car makes made a difference in their ability to affect the outcome of a race.

There was a time when car owners would change brands or models of car to gain an advantage over the competition.  Going back to the Sixties the Mercury Cyclones were the car of choice over the Ford Torino, later Talledaga, because its shape was more areodynamic.  The Monte Carlo Aero Coupe was the answer to the teams that found slipperier makes from Olds, Buick or Pontiac in the Ninties.

But, of course, the days of having all those makes of car are long gone.  Granted they were all GM makes, but having the long list of models made for more interesting chatter on Mondays.  It has only been a relative short few years since Dodge has returned to the Cup series.  Now with the talk of mergers on and off the race track, the future of Chrysler in racing is in doubt.  Any time you lose a brand, it isn’t a positive.  Dodge came back into the sport with high hopes and eventually re-introduced one of its most popular models, the Charger, because of it.

The new car has stripped all brand identity except for the decals and engine block.  It is really too bad that with that little difference in cars; more models, even in name only, aren’t represented.  It’s a pipe dream on my part, but since NASCAR didn’t listen to me when I asked for factory roof, hood, deck and glass, what the hell, I can dream can’t I?

photo credit: Icon Sports Media

Martinsville Drivers Win in Many Brands

Nine of the last eleven races at the paperclip shaped track in Martinsville, Virginia have been won by drivers sporting the Chevrolet brand.

Chevy hasn’t always been the dominate nameplate.  Martinsville started holding NASCAR Cup level races in 1949.  In the 119 Cup races held there have been eleven different brands seeing victory circle.  Even the Fabulous Hudson Hornet tasted victory there twice in 1952.  Mercury also got a pair of wins; one in 1968 with Cale Yarborough and the other in 1973 with David Pearson.

Toyota picked up its lone win with Kyle Busch at the Spring race this year.  Chrysler and Buick own three wins each.  Chrysler’s came early on in the Fifties while the Eighties were kind to the Buicks.  The General Motors brands of Pontiac and Oldsmobile were the cars to beat four and eight times respectively,

Dodge and Plymouth have combined for 26 wins over the years with twelve of those at the hands of Richard Petty.  Petty had two wins in a Ford in 1969 while feuding with Chrysler.  The Blue Oval boys have 24 other victories as well.  The first coming with Fast Freddy Lorenzen behind the wheel in 1961 and the most recent by Kurt Busch in 2002.

Once again Chevrolet drivers have had the upper hand at a race track.  Thirty-eight percent of all wins at the half miler have been with Chevy sheet metal.  A total of forty-five wins greatly out numbers its nearest rival.  Buck Baker was the first to taste victory and started a string of four consecutive wins beginning in 1957.  Jimmy Johnson is the most recent winner, capping off seven straight Chevy wins that he began in the Fall of 2004.

So once again the numbers favor a win coming from Jimmy Johnson.  This race and the championship seem to be his to lose.  He has wins at the paperclip and he drives the right car.

photo credit:  Jason Smith/Getty Images

Lowe’s Not a Fan of the Blue Oval

This weekend’s Bank of America 500 at Lowe’s Motor Speedway will be the one-hundredth Cup race held since its inception in June of 1960.

In the first four decades of races at Charlotte, Fords had been a consistant presence.  Twenty-five wins in those first forty years leading to the new millenium ranked the brand among the leaders in manufacturer wins.  Only Chevrolet had more wins in those early years; bringing home the checkers twenty-seven times.

In recent years however it has been a much different story for the boys from Dearborn.  Fords have seen  victory lane only twice in the 21st century.  Matt Kenseth in 2001 and Mark Martin in 2002 brought their Roush Fords home first in that years Coca-Cola 600.  No Ford has come home victorious this century in the Fall race.

Contrast that to the eight wins in seven and a half years for Chevrolet and you can see a definite trend emerging.  Much on the strength of the Hendrick Motorsports teams, the Bowtie Brigade’s owns the mile and a half at Lowe’s.  Five of those wins and four in a row starting in 2004 come at the hands of current points leader Jimmy Johnson.  Johnson has pretty much owned all the success at Lowes since he has entered the sport.

I will go way out on a limb and look for JJ to put up another good run at Lowes Motor Speedway in his Chevrolet.

The only possible chink in the armour could come from the Dodge of Kasey Kahne.  Kahne has won three of the last five races at NASCAR’s home track and all but one of Dodge’s victories in recent times.

photo credit: Icon Sports Media

Chevrolet holds the edge at Talladega

Ken Shrader started the domination of Chevrolet at Talladega in 1988.

But it has been the Chevys of Dale Earnhardt and then his race team that has held a lock on the longest oval on the NASCAR circuit.  Twenty eight wins in the forty races since Shrader started the trend gives the Bowtie Brigade seventy percent of the wins since that July day in 1988.

Only eight Fords, one Pontiac and one Toyota have won in the same twenty years time span.  Kyle Busch holds the lone Toyota victory from earlier this year.  Only two of the Fords have come from a team that has cars in the Chase.  Mark Martin owns the two wins for Roush-Fenway Racing. The most Ford wins com from Yates Racing cars that are not involved in the post-season.  The remaining two came from the Blue Ovals fielded by Junior Johnson.

Those Ford numbers don’t bode well for the Roush-Fenway entries of Greg Biffle, Carl Edwards or Matt Kenseth.

The late Dale Earnhardt owns eight of the 28 wins, or 28 percent, but a full 100% of the wins from Richard Childress Racing .  Rick Hendrick owned cars have won ten races mostly with Jeff Gordon behind the wheel.

No Chrysler product has seen victory lane since Dave Marcis did it in a Dodge in August of 1976.

When looking for a favorite at the unpredictable superspeedway, look no further that Chevy drivers, especially Jeff Gordon and Dale Earnhardt, Jr. Both drivers are in desperate need of a win to get their Chse hopes back.

photo credit: Todd Warshaw/Getty Images for NASCAR

History on Bowtie’s Side in Land of Oz

Kansas Speedway has been kind to the drivers of the General Motors brand.

When a track has had as little history as Kansas, its hard to try to make any conclusions from the limited data.  But one thing is clear; especially if you figure in the Nationwide Series numbers, Chevrolets have won half of the races since Kansas opened in 2001.  Jeff Gordon won the first two Cup races at Kansas in 2001 and 2002.

Joe Nemecheck swept the Busch and Cup races in 2004, driving his own Chevy to the win in the Busch race and taking the Nelson Bowers owned #01 to the Cup win.  Tony Stewart holds the most recent win in a Joe Gibbs owned ride from 2007.

Kevin Harvick and Kyle Busch round out the Chevy wins in the Nationwide Series coming in 2006 and 2007 respectively.  The remaining fifty percent of the wins are divided amongst Ford and Dodge on the Cup side along with a lone Pontiac win in the Nationwide Series.

While Rick Hendrick owned cars lay claim to the majority of the Chevy wins, all but one of the combined Ford wins have come from Jack Roush owned vehicles.  It’s tough to bet against Chase drivers from either Hendrick or Roush.  Jimmy Johnson and Dale Earnhardt, Jr. can be looked on as favorites at Kansas.  With Johnson being given the pole for Sundays race following the disallowing of Juan Pablo Montoya’s time, JJ would have to be the favorite to pick up his first win at Kansas.

Greg Biffle continues to impress also as his two Ford wins to start the Chase put him in the cat-bird seat.

photo credit: Icon Sports Media

Ford and Chevy Wins Evenly Split at Dover

Over the last eleven races, Ford leads in manufacturer wins at Dover.

Dating back through the 2003 season, the Fords out of the Jack Roush stable have won four times.  One win each for Mark Martin (2004), Greg Biffle (2005), Matt Kenseth (2006) and Carl Edwards (2007) would lead one to believe that a win in 2008 must loom on the horizon.  Carl Edward’s season to this point would lead you to believe that he is the most likely to gain a win at the Monster Mile.

However, last week’s win at New Hampshire by Biffle, could make him the favorite to pull off back to back wins.  Biffle’s strong outing came at the amazment of many who never saw his strong performance as possible.

Over the same four and a half year period both Dodge and Chevrolet account for three wins each.  Martin Truex Jr. was the most recent winner at Dover in a Chevy for Dale Earnhardt Inc., doing so in the Spring of 2007.  Richard Childress Racing’s Jeff Burton took home the victory in the Fall of 2006 and Hendrick Motorsports’ Jimmy Johnson was the winner in the Fall of 2005.

Ryan Newman holds all the wins for Dodge; sweeping the races there in 2003 and getting a third win at the fall race in 2004.  The Penske Dodges were strong early in this six year sampling, but have shown nothing of late.

Looking further back into the manufacturers history at Dover, Ford and Chevrolet have won 21 and 27 times respectively.  If you add in seven Mercury wins for Ford Motor Company, the two manufacturers are on an even standing.  Several years in the early seventies Ford only raced under the Mercury banner, so its not too far fetched to combine the two makes.  Whereas General Motors has run cars under several banners for most of their racing careers.

Pontiac has accounted for six wins,  Oldsmobile two and Buick brought home three in addition to the twenty-seven for Chevrolet.  Add four Richard petty wins in Plymouths and Dodges from the early seventies to the three Newman wins and you can see that Mopars haven’t been much of a factor in the history of The Monster Mile.

This years saw the first victory for Toyota at Dover with non other than Kyle Busch behind the wheel.  While Busch and his Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Chasers of Tony Stewart and Denny Hamlin could be a factor on Sunday, look for Jimmy Johnson’s Chevy or Carl Edwards’ Ford to come home first.

photo credit: Icon Sports Media

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