Too many commercials on FOX Sports One (and Two)! It makes watching difficult. As a viewer I feel I am constantly missing action on track due to the quantity of commercials. It is wonderful to start the day with NASCAR on television, in spite of all of the commercials. It’s even nicer to listen to Rick, Phil and Hammond call it. Happy 50th birthday Kenny Wallace!!Nationwide practice has ended with quite a few scraped/damaged cars. Hornish, Elliott Sadler, Mike Wallace, and Robert Richardson Jr. all visited the wall in one way or another. Wallace and Richardson needed backup cars. Mike Wallace’s sway bar had an issue that caused his wreck.
So now we’re in the good news/bad news place. Sprint Cup practice is on. Great news. Mike Joy is on. Even better news. He’s joined by Larry McRepetitive and Petty Kyle. Awful news. Mike Joy promised to talk about the news out of the morning media sessions, but the volume is on mute unless I see someone talking other than Petty Kyle & Larry. It bums me out, because Mike Joy is great and I enjoy listening to him, but he cannot overcome the aggravation of listening to Petty Kyle and Larry “I’m going to say something obvious, something everyone read in the press during the week, something someone just said, or something totally irrelevant.” McRepetitive.
Greg Zippadelli said that Gene Haas has always liked Kurt Busch and talked about putting Kurt in the 39 last year, but things didn’t work out. He went on to say they’re close to a deal to get him in a fourth car next year. Zippy looks so incredibly uncomfortable with this. He looks like he finds lying and misdirection and omissions problematic. I’m not sure this is the right job for him. Mike Joy perpetuated the story that they(SHR) said they were a three car team and with Kevin Harvick coming there wasn’t a place for Ryan Newman. That statement does not preclude SHR becoming a four car team in the future. I mean, if you watched Newman’s performance over the past three years why wouldn’t you consider a better driver who’s available, looking for a position and willing to consider driving for your organization?
Rain delay in Nationwide qualifying. David Starr was smoking heavily on his lap. Hammond thinks he might have an oil line problem that blew oil across the headers causing all the smoke. We join David’s run at the end and almost immediately go back to commercial – within three minutes. Insane!!! I want another way to see qualifying. Knockout qualifying with 8 people going home is interesting to me. I want to see this. Instead I’m mostly seeing commercials and catching a bit of the action between them. BOOOOOOOOOO!!!! I’ve seen three cars run so far and there’s a top ten in qualifying listing when we come back from commercials! That’s ridiculous, especially considering there was a rain delay. 15 cars have gone out and I’ve seen three…THREE!!! FOX Sports One needs to figure out a better way to do this.
Darn! I’m late to watching qualifying. I couldn’t find it on the schedule. FS1 is really throwing things off for me. Sigh. Anyhoo, I’m watching it and so far I’ve managed to see two whole runs without a commercial, plus two interviews. I don’t think I accomplished that the entire time I was watching Nationwide Qualifying.
That was a rather mad qualifying session. The drivers were having issues with getting up into the marbles, among other things. Now over to ESPN (from ESPN2) for the Nationwide race. Nicole, Ray and Rusty, yaaaaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyyyy!!!! Unfortunately Brad is there too.
Ewwww Marty Reid. Yaaaaaay Dale Jarrett and Andy Petree. DJ got his hair cut. Sharp-dressed men.
Just as I’m ready to watch the race, the ingredients for dinner arrive and I ends up cooking, serving and eating dinner instead of watching the race. Boooo! Congrats to KyBu though on win 2 of the race weekend. He won this one more easily than the Wednesday night Truck Race it appeared. No one was racing him side-by-side to the checkered flag. We were bummed that Drew Herring ended up on the hook after a pretty nice qualifying effort. I hope Drew gets a shot. He seems like a good guy.
The weather is lovely for the night race at Bristol. The drivers look happy and rested. The track has put together a very good pre-race show. The parachuters seem a hit with both the drivers and the fans. Denny Hamlin leads the field to the green flag. This is his first pole at Bristol.
Ryan Truex, in his Sprint Cup debut, brings out the first caution hitting the wall on lap 40 losing the left front tire. Brad Keselowski hit David Reutimann, in the 83, hard on pit lane.
Caution is out on lap 89 as Josh Wise, in the 35, hits the wall courtesy of Kurt Busch. Kurt got a speeding penalty which put him back there with Josh.
Caution is out for debris after Joey Logano and Kyle Busch tangled on lap 106 when KyBu got loose. Danica was behind the clash, but hit the wall trying to check up. KyBu got popped for too many men over the wall and has to go to the back of the field.
Kurt Busch was behind the wall to replace the right rear hub. According to Petree they ran it too long with a loose wheel.
Travis Kvapil in the 93 tapped leader Bowyer in the rear end as Bowyer was trying to navigate through traffic to lap them bringing out the caution on lap 176. While he was sitting sideways on the track then Bobby Labonte plowed into him. Jeff Gordon tapped Labonte when he checked up causing him to slam into Clint sideways. Bobby Labonte is behind the wall while Clint is back on track.
Carl Edwards leads them to the green flag.
Caution is out on lap 201 for Tony Raines, in the 33, hitting the wall. He came up in front of Jimmy who got into Raines’ back end. Jeff Gordon’s oil temperature and water temperature was over 290 so he had to come in for a pit stop and loses position. Tony Raines got popped with a two lap penalty for slowing to bring out the caution.
Caution is out on lap 256 for debris. Kenseth was penalized for speeding on pit road. Water temp on the 24 is still above 265. Gustafson worries that they might have lost some ductwork.
Kenseth tried to put a slide job on Jimmie and ended up putting Jimmie into the wall.
Caution is out on lap 333 for debris after Bobby Labonte tangled with the 38 of David Gilliland. Montoya popped for speeding on pit road.
Caution is out on lap 358 for David Reutimann (83) spinning after Brian Vickers (55) turned him. He spun around and ended up in front of Jimmie who plowed into the back of Reuti-tooty. Jimmie headed to the garage. Kurt Busch and David Reutimann were both hit for speeding on pit road. Kurt is 24 laps down after the hub issue.
Caution is out for Burton spinning into the inside wall on lap 374. JPM clipped the left rear corner for the 30 of Stremme knocking him into the 31 of Jeff Burton causing him to hit the walls.
Carl Edwards has switched ignition boxes. His car has been stumbling under caution so he stayed low and out of the way on the restart. Carl says its letting go and he wants to know if he should keep going or bring it in. Fennig told him to keep going. Carl thinks its a valve spring or a valve. Carl is seeing smoke now. Fennig just called him in. Carl is now behind the wall on lap 390. Carl and Biffle were the only two cars that had finished every race so far this season. The engine is done, so the 99 is done for the rest of the night.
The crew chiefs are telling the drivers to save fuel with over 75 laps to go.
Caution is out on lap 438 for debris from JPM’s car. He had rear end damage from the issue with Stremme and it had been flapping for quite a few laps and finally came off.
Caution is out on lap 446 for a big wreck involving Harvick, Truex, Schrader, Newman, Hamlin, Keselowski, Casey Mears, and Stremme. Harvick is having a few words with Denny on pit road during the caution. He’s out of his car and gone over the Denny’s car and in the window to talk to him. Harvick said the 11 shot up – he thought he was trying to get back at someone but the 11 said the 56 got into him and caused him to go up.
Looks like the 11 had contact with the 55 then bounced into the 39 who spun, the 29, 2, 56, spun into it. When they got onto pit road KHarv parked in Hamlin’s pit stall and Hamlin pushed the 29 out of the stall. The contact with the 55 cut down the tire of the 11. Keselowski is headed behind the wall.
Kenseth held Kasey Kahne off to win the race.
In NASCAR news this week:
- Kevin Harvick’s 2014 Crew Chief Named. Rodney Childers is leaving the MWR 55 and going to SHR to call the shots on Kevin Harvick’s car.
- Now that the follow-up visit is complete it is official Tony Stewart will not be back in the 14 car for the rest of the season. Oddly, Mark Martin will fill in. It’s strange because Mark has been associated with Toyota for the past few years. He is a former Hendricks driver, so he has Chevrolet ties, but not as recent. I wonder if the diagnosis was a surprise to Smoke and Zippy. So Vickers gets in the 55 a bit earlier.
- MWR has fired another employee. A tire changer ran afoul of the substance abuse policy and was immediately dumped by MWR. NASCAR has made a point of saying that a person who fails a drug test can complete the road to recovery and retain their livelihood. That’s not the case at Michael Waltrip Racing. When you fail a test you’re unemployed. I wonder if the test reflects alcohol consumption in the past week? In other words, can you be a drunk throughout the week, but not drink on the day of the test and still keep your job at MWR? The difference in the treatment of alcohol, marijuana, and caffeine is ridiculous. Red Bull and Monster can sponsor teams, but you can be fired for using marijuana while not at the racetrack.
- Stewart Haas Racing Offer Kurt Busch a ride. There’s a report out that SHR has offered Kurt Busch a ride and people are up in arms on behalf of Ryan Newman. They’re under the impression that Newman was told they couldn’t fund a fourth car for him and now this. Now Gene Haas reportedly said he would fund the car out of his pocket if necessary. I think people are missing the point. I would imagine Newman was told SHR couldn’t fund a fourth car for him – not in general, but specifically for him. Newman has not performed. Overall the limited success he has had has come as a result of a lot of luck and a lot of bad/dangerous driving. If I had a race team I would fire him. The performance wasn’t there and he doesn’t bring anything else to the table (like Danica who has a high profile in spite of her lack of results). I think its unreasonable for people to be outraged that the performance business called SHR would not continue to provide Ryan Newman with a paycheck without a return on investment.
- Darlington Raceway has a new president. Darlington Raceway President Chris Browning has resigned and International Speedway Corporation named Chip Wile as replacement, effective immediately, at NASCAR’s oldest superspeedway.
Nationwide Series Headlines:
- Acute Renal Failure Sidelines McClure
- AdvoCare to Sponsor Bayne in 2014
- Tryson Named No. 30 Crew Chief at TSM
- Ty Dillon to Run Nationwide in 2014