Miles the Monster is hanging out under a blue sky with fluffy white clouds today. Looks to me like those clouds could gather and cause issues later. Kyle Busch will lead the field to green. He’s spent a great deal of the week listening to or talking about his dropping the mic during his media availability last weekend after the race. KyBu finished second and was less than pleased. In the TV and radio interview I heard he was frustrated and disappointed, but not acting in any way unusual. Before the television broadcast ended they showed him very disgruntled in the media center. He didn’t use abusive language, nor shout. He simply spoke in a manner which indicated his unhappiness though his words were benign. It left me wondering what was said to him to put him in that mood – since he hadn’t behaved like that earlier. There’s never been an answer to my question, but Kyle has been lambasted and discussed madly. He had to address it on Friday in his media availability. Poor guy. I couldn’t imagine having a very, very disappointing day at work, then being expected to speak about it – repeatedly – as though it wasn’t a crushing blow. He’s a professional – driver. He’s a practicing human being like the rest of us. A reality check seems to be needed in this situation and I’d still like to know what actually set him off.<\/p>\n
It’s always such a relief on the tv broadcast when Michael Waltrip and Larry McReynolds aren’t seen or heard. The MRN broadcast hadn’t yet started when the TV broadcast opened with Chris Myers & Mikey. My mute button got a workout as it always does when Mikey is doing his schtick. Yesterday Bunny and I were discussing the impending end of the FOX NASCAR season. Because we no longer have to be subjected to Mikey we anticipate the end of the FOX season, but we also recognize the NBC broadcast is awful. Our disgust with Michael and McReynolds causes us to forget how terrible the NBC broadcast is at times. I desperately miss the FOX broadcast – other than Mikey and McReynolds – typically from the first week of the NBC broadcast until the last. I eagerly look forward to the return of Mike Joy and DW. Jeff Gordon is learning and getting better, but not yet at the point where I look forward to him during the off season – he still talks way too much. I so enjoy Mike Joy and DW that I ignore the fact we’ll also be subjected to Mikey and McReynolds (though I also hold out hope that they will disappear soon). One of these days, NASCAR on FOX will hire the best and let the rest go elsewhere. ESPN\/ABC still has some high quality NASCAR talent being wasted.<\/p>\n
The 48 made a gear change so they will start at the back of the field.<\/p>\n
The stages for this race are 120-120-160.<\/p>\n
Gordon Ramsay gave the command to start engines. Okay. Strange. Cross promotion I guess.<\/p>\n
Caution on lap 16 of 400 for a spin by Ryan Sieg. Didn’t he kick off the cautions in the yesterday’s Xfinity series race?<\/p>\n
Drunk Daddy and Stinkhouse stayed out and will lead the field to the green.<\/p>\n
Kyle Busch has lost the left rear tire and its rolling down the track. Similar thing happened to Chase Briscoe in the Truck Series Friday night, except he lost his left front tire. NASCAR was less than pleased Friday night. The replay shows the left rear tire carrier putting the tire on, the guy with the guy starts to hit a lug nut and KyBu drives off. Kyle got damage on the rear of the car as a result of it dragging. The jackman’s job is to look left and right to make sure both of the tire changes are done, then he drops the jack which is KyBu’s signal to go. The jackman did not look to his right, he dropped the jack and Kyle went.<\/p>\n
Restarting on lap 21.<\/p>\n
The MRN guys were saying something before the start of the race that seemed to indicate the ‘orange cone’ rules have changed. A couple weeks ago – or so – they swapped out the orange cone for a box. That caused a bit of confusion the first week it was used. From what I understood the radio guys to say the drivers are required to have all four tires inside (or outside) the commitment box now.<\/p>\n
Caution on lap 48 of 400 for debris. Stinkhouse lost the right front tire, hit the wall and left parts and pieces on the track.<\/p>\n
Caution on lap 62 of 400. Looks like another issue for Ricky Stenhouse. Yep, back into the wall. Again the right front tire appears to be down.<\/p>\n
Stenhouse is out. He’s gone to the garage.<\/p>\n
Restarting on lap 65 and Kurt Busch and ‘It’ get together and spin bring the caution back out.<\/p>\n
Kurt got loose on the restart chased it up the track and ‘It’ was there. ‘It’ has headed to the garage.<\/p>\n
Restarting on lap 70 of 400.<\/p>\n
Caution on lap 95 of 400 for KuBu visiting the wall.<\/p>\n
The top 3 – Truex, Harvick and Jimmie Johnson all stayed out for that pit stop.<\/p>\n
Clint Bowyer is leaking oil. ‘Drunk Daddy’ wants to get back out on the track. Sounding positive. Good for him.<\/p>\n
Some other folks from the mid-to-rear pack also stayed out on that stop. Restarting on lap 104 of 400.<\/p>\n
Martin Truex Jr wins stage 1. This is his seventh stage win. The most stage wins in the field.<\/p>\n
Kutey Kyle stayed out for this round of pit stops. The top 11 cars stayed on the track. Martin will start 13th since he came in for a pit stop.<\/p>\n
Restarting on lap 127 of 400.<\/p>\n
Caution for a spin by ‘Lil Dude on lap 145 of 400. At this rate Danica and Ricky will be able to head home early together.<\/p>\n
‘Son’ (Ryan Blaney) ran into the back of Kenseth getting onto pit road. There’s damage on both cars.<\/p>\n
Restarting on lap 150 of 400. The front two didn’t pit – Kutey Kyle and Michael McDowell.<\/p>\n
Caution lap 193 of 400 for Squinty-Douchey visiting the wall.<\/p>\n
Restarting on lap 198 of 400.<\/p>\n
The teams are going through tires quickly resulting in various teams worried about the amount of tires left versus the amount of racing left.<\/p>\n
Most teams have three sets of tires left with 200 laps left in the race and another scheduled caution period (the end of stage two).<\/p>\n
David Ragan hit the wall with a flat tire on lap 206 of 400. He makes it to pit road without bringing out the caution.<\/p>\n
Caution on lap 218 of 400 for Landon Cassill visiting the wall with a flat right front.<\/p>\n
Teams are starting to prepare tires that have already been used. Few takers for pit road amongst the lead lap cars. Kutey Kyle got new tires.<\/p>\n
Restarting on lap 221 of 400.<\/p>\n
The 34 of Landon Cassill heads for pit road with a flat tire on lap 229 of 400 – 11 laps to go in the stage.<\/p>\n
Martin Truex Jr wins his eighth stage of the season.<\/p>\n
‘Son’ may have broken an axle exiting his pit. I notice he was slowly moving forward and seemingly letting folks pass him. He headed back to the pits.<\/p>\n
Blaney has been repaired and is back on track.<\/p>\n
Restarting on lap 246 of 400.<\/p>\n
Landon hits the wall again with 142 to go. Again not bringing out the caution.<\/p>\n
Truex tapped the 48 and barely missed the 42.<\/p>\n
Caution on lap 264 of 400 for debris.<\/p>\n
‘It’ felt the need to mouth off about KyBu’s mic drop. Seriously dude until you can get yourself under control and figure out how to act remotely human and sane you really should keep your mouth shut. He acts as though he’s never been taught right from wrong and\/or respect for anyone or anything. Yet he feels as though he needs to add his 2 cents to every topic and announce his ignorance and hypocrisy? He should keep his mouth shut so people believe him to be wise, instead of opening his mouth – or his tweets – and proving himself a whiner\/hater\/liar\/bad word.<\/p>\n
Restarting on lap 268 of 400.<\/p>\n
Regan Smith is on a race-to-race basis subbing for Aric Almirola. Since he is running full-time in the truck series and they are at Texas next weekend and Gateway the following weekend while the Cup series are in Pocono and Sonoma he likely won’t be back in the 43 for a bit.<\/p>\n
Kenseth is on pit road he thought he had a tire going down. He goes down a lap. He also got popped for a commitment line violation and too fast entering. He had his right side tires on the orange box, instead of below them. So he will have a pass through penalty.<\/p>\n
Ross Chastain is in his first Cup race and the only time we’ve heard his name is when the TV crew gave him a a shoutout for doing a nice job. Unfortunately Cole Whitt and Ross were racing each other hard and held up Jimmie Johnson who was a tenth behind Kyle Larson before all of that – a car-length or two. Now they’re separated by about 25 car-lengths, about three seconds. Those two are racing for the Lucky Dog – but they need to pay attention to the lead lap cars. Ross gets a pass since its his first Cup race, but Cole Whit should know better.<\/p>\n
Kenseth did have a right front tire down.<\/p>\n
Jimmie says it feels like something is wrong as the car has suddenly swung tight.<\/p>\n
The 78 has passed Jimmie and Chase Elliott has also passed him.<\/p>\n
Kutey Kyle ran the 48 into the wall at one point during their battle and he got some right side damage.<\/p>\n
Erik ‘Da Brat’ Jones is on pit road with a flat right front tire on lap 312 of 400.<\/p>\n
Kasey Kahne is doing a green flag pit stop on lap 318 of 400.<\/p>\n
Jamie McMurray just passed Jimmie for sixth place with 80 laps to go.<\/p>\n
Travor Bayne heads to pit road with 75 to go, as well as Truex, Harvick, Suarez and others.<\/p>\n
Kyle Larson, Chase Elliott and Kyle Busch come with with 73 to go.<\/p>\n
Hamlin and McMurray is in with 72 to go.<\/p>\n
Caution is out with 71 to go. Jimmie inherited the lead from Jamie McMurray and is the leader as the caution comes out. Regan Smith brings out the caution with a flat right front tire sending him into the wall.<\/p>\n
Kyle Larson is the free pass car.<\/p>\n
Newman and Frankenstein are stretching fuel.<\/p>\n
Ty Dillon and Newman beat Jimmie off pit road.<\/p>\n
Truex, Kahne, and Jamie Mc as well as thirteen others took the wave-around.<\/p>\n
Restarting with 62 laps to go. The 6 is stopped on the track. The Matt DiBenedetto car is being chased down pit road by the wrecker – so he might’ve gotten a push.<\/p>\n
With 57 to go Menard hit the wall bringing out the caution. Chris Buescher has damage. He apparently got into Paul Menard. Chris got off the bottom and drifted into Paul Menard.<\/p>\n
Truex is pitting during this caution.<\/p>\n
Restarting with 52 to go.<\/p>\n
KyBu as come to pit road with 41 laps to go. He felt a vibration. He had a loose left rear.<\/p>\n
Caution with four to go for David Ragan getting into the wall after losing a tire. David Ragan’s car is on fire.<\/p>\n
From sixth on back are coming int to get tires.<\/p>\n
Dale Jr too fast exiting in section 9.<\/p>\n
Overtime….<\/p>\n
Kutey Kyle and Jimmie lead them to the green flag followed by Truex and Ty Dillon followed by Newman and Da Brat.<\/p>\n
The pace car and Kutey Kyle hit a pile of speedy dry so they’re adding an additional pace lap.<\/p>\n
Caution is out for a big wreck going into three. Erik Jones, A.J. Allmendinger, Austin ‘Frankenstein’ Dillon, Ty Dillon, Kasey Kahne, Cole Whitt, Trevor Bayne were involved in the big pile-up.<\/p>\n
Jimmie was in the lead and had crossed the overtime line before the caution came out.<\/p>\n
Jimmie wins!!! The field comes around under caution. Career win number 83 tied for sixth on the all time list.<\/p>\n
Congrats to Chase Elliott on a fifth place finish.<\/p>\n
Congrats to rookie Daniel Suarez on a sixth place finish.<\/p>\n
‘Lil Dude finished tenth. Congrats to Danica Patrick on a great comeback.<\/p>\n
Martin Truex Jr finished third and he’s bummed because he led a lot of laps through the race and got caught by a caution.<\/p>\n
Jimmie ties Cale Yarbrough’s record for wins while wearing a Cale Yarborough tribute helmet.<\/p>\n
Jimmie put on one of Cale’s old hats and held up the Cale helmet in victory lane.<\/p>\n
Ross Chastain finishes 20th. Michael McDowell finishes 19th after leading some laps in the race.<\/p>\n
Jimmie becomes one of three drivers with 11 or more wins at a single track. The other two drivers are Richard Petty and Darrell Waltrip.<\/p>\n
Autosports News:<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n Miles the Monster is hanging out under a blue sky with fluffy white clouds today. Looks to me like those clouds could gather and cause issues later. Kyle Busch will lead the field to green. He’s spent a great deal of the week listening to or talking about his dropping the mic during his media … <\/p>\n\n
Next Race: Pocono<\/h3>\n
GO 48!!!!<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"