Cloudy at race time and there’s a chance of showers this afternoon. PRN has the radio broadcast for this race so I’ve muted the television and I’m listening to the pre-race show. I just can’t deal with Petty Kyle, Aggravating Adam Alexander and Wacky Wally. I believe this race marks the halfway point in the TNT season. Soon it will be over and we can get back to pros on the desk and no Larry McStats. I have to believe no one has ever explained to Larry McReynolds and Daniellle Trotta that you can use statistics to backup any side of an issue – so they don’t matter and they’re basically irrelevant.
Paulie Harraka hit Alex Kennedy on pit road as they were starting to join the field for the parade laps. Not a good start and he did some damage to that car. The pace car for the group started off, the group started then the first car stopped, Kennedy stopped and Harraka slammed into the back of him. Madness. Bobby Labonte’s car has been pushed to the garage and Jacques Villenueve has made a pit stop before race start. Labonte’s car laid down a lot of fluid and it extends from Harvick’s pit through several other pit stalls so the pit crews are trying to clean up. It was bad enough they sweeper trucks are cleaning up the pits. For the first time in 15 years of the race at Sonoma there are raindrops failling on the track. They’re doing lots of parade laps. Bobby Labonte has a broken oil pump. Kyle Busch and Jimmie Johnson are having radio issues.
Jamie McMurray leads the field to the green flag with Carl Edwards alongside. Marcos Ambrose quickly takes the lead and runs off.
Bobby Labonte has come onto the track and his car appeared to stall, though he’s off the track so the race stays green. David Ragan spins around on turn 3 without damage.
JPM hit KyBu in the rear and spun him around on lap 4.
Rain is still visible on the camera lens and on JPM’s windshield.
They ran about six parade/caution/warmup laps before the race started. Everybody was concerned about fuel mileage and tire fall-off for this race, so all of those laps may be relevant.
Caution is out on lap 6 for a Paulie Harraka crash.
At lap 14 PRN is reporting that the rain has ended for the moment.
Finally on lap 17 Marcos Ambrose has a challenge for the lead from Kurt Busch.
Kurt Busch takes the lead from Marcos Ambrose on lap 19 of 110.
Danica Patrick goes for a spin on lap 20 – no damage. There are raindrops on her windshield. Jacques Villenueve has an issue and is coasting around the track.
Caution is out on lap 25 for sprinkles on the track. Jeff Gordon was committed to pit road when the caution came out so he did his stop. He was penalized for pitting too soon. He hadn’t quite hit the line when the yellow flag came out. So he’s going to restart behind Danica.
Todd Barrier thinks this rain will move out soon and be the last rain for a while.
Looks like we’re going back green on lap 31.
Before the end of lap 3 four cars have spun off the course in turn 11. The caution finally comes out. The 19 of Alex Kennedy is a crunched up as Paulie Harraka’s was and sitting in the dirt trap. Joey Logano tapped David Reutimann in the 83 and sent him spinning. Travis Kvapil in the 93 also has some rear end damage.
Lap 34 Keselowski takes the lead from Kurt Busch who did not pit. Kasey Kahne is closely following Bradley K and Martin Truex Jr is tailing Kasey Kahne. Kasey has gotten around Kurt on lap 35 and is followed by Martin Truex Jr. Kurt Busch hits pit road. This is Kurt’s first pit stop.
Kurt Busch is penalized for speeding on pit road putting him a lap down.
Martin Truex takes over the second position from Kasey Kahne. Kurt is one lap down, but he’s just passed the fifth place car so he might get back on the lead lap the hard way. Martin takes the lead on lap 41. Brian Vickers (55) is working on Kasey Kahne for position. Vickers started at the end of the field because he was at Road America yesterday and didn’t qualify his car.
Vickers passes Bradley K on lap 43 for second position.
Kasey Kahne has just passed Bradley K.
Kurt Busch has driven back onto the lead lap passing leader Martin Truex Jr.
The sun has come out on the track so various drivers are experiencing issues.
Jimmie and Kasey have been told to save fuel.
Danica Patrick brings out the caution on lap 63. She spun out and hit the tire barrier.
Jamie McMurray will lead them to the green flag for the restart. Martin Truex Jr starts alongside with 45 laps to go.
Lap 68 Denny Hamlin spins around into the dirt then gets headed back in the right direction and underway. Caution is now out on lap 68. Denny suddenly checked up and got popped in the rear by Tony Stewart. It appears a fire started in the grass/dirt on the side of the track. There’s a large black circle and its smoking. Martin Truex Jr stalled on pit road and got a push out of his pit stall.
Joey Logano is going to lead the field to the green flag on this restart.
Caution is out on the restart Victor Gonzalez Jr (36) and Aric Almirola (43) got damage. The field stacked up on the restart causing cars to dodge and get into each other.
Can I just put it out there than I HATE the Twisted Tea commercial with the woman who sounds like she’s laughing, a lot, at the guy who’s packing his car for fishing and she sees Twisted Tea. I have no idea why she sounds like she’s grinning like an idiot, but it drives me insane! It makes me turn down the volume and unfortunately they are apparently sponsoring this race on the PRN broadcast, so they keep airing, making me struggle for the mute button!
The caution light is turned off at turn 7 making it tough for the wave-around cars to catch up to the field. Danica had not caught up at the time of the last restart, but since the caution came out quickly she caught up.
Restart on lap 74. Joey Logano takes the lead over Dale Jr who is followed by Jeff Gordon. Jamie McMurray is driving through the dirt right now. No caution.
Jeff Gordon has taken the second spot from Dale Earnhardt Jr. He takes the lead from Joey Logano on lap 80. Martin Truex Jr is battling Dale Jr for third.
Caution is out on lap 82 for Kyle Busch. Carl Edwards got into his rear end sending Kyle spinning into the tire barrier.
Martin Truex Jr leads the field on the restart on lap 85. He and Kenseth stayed out during the caution.
Stremme spins around on lap 87, but gets it pointed in the right direction. No caution.
Kyle Busch has spun around again on lap 88.
Marcos Ambrose is working Matt Kenseth hard for third. With 19 laps to go Smoke has spun around, but gets it back going. Smoke ran into Jeff Burton.
They asked Kyle Busch if he had the car to win. Kyle said no. It appears he was correct.
Jeff Gordon is now working on Kenseth for fourth with 13 laps to go. Marcos Ambrose also passes Kenseth. Now Happy Harvick and Kurt Busch are working on Matt Kenseth.
Jeff Gordon is working on Carl Edwards, he just took third from him with nine laps to go. Carl harrassed him for a while, but Jeff eventually drove away from Carl.
With seven to go Kurt Busch gets past Marcos Ambrose for fifth.
With four laps to go Kenseth and Harvick both passed Kenseth. Jimmie locked up the brakes and Logano pushed him past Kenseth and through the turn. Dale Jr and Vickers pass Kenseth. Menard is working on Kenseth and he passes Kenseth with three laps to go. Newman is now behind Kenseth.
With two to go Jimmie has passed Happy.
JPM runs out of gas on the white flag lap. Martin Truex has taken the white flag in the lead.
MARTIN TRUEX JR WINS!!!!
In NASCAR news this week:
- Jason Leffler was buried this week. Over 800 people attended his funeral. R.I.P. Jason you are missed.
- James Finch is at it again. He makes almost as many doomsday pronouncements as Bruton Smith. He says Indy will be his last race. I wonder if he would really try to build a team rather than to get headlines he might have a chance. He seems to hire expensive drivers who grab headlines instead of results. Hiring a young driver who can take care of the equipment and learn to win seems like a better answer, but won’t get as much attention (unless they get a surprise win like Brad Keselowski. We’ll see, after Indy, if the reportedly very rich James Finch really leaves NASCAR because of money.
- New Jersey state police have released initial findings from a report on the June 12 crash at Bridgeport Speedway in Logan Township which claimed the life of NASCAR driver Jason Leffler. They say a mechanical problem caused the accident.