Rating the AAA Texas 500: 5 Stars *****

A terrific race at Talladega is followed up with possibly an even more exciting race at Texas. The final 500-mile race of the season included a record amount of lead changes, a new championship leader and there was a fight. Texas gets a very well-deserved 5 Star Rating.

What more can this sport offer right now? We have an incredibly close championship battle between Denny Hamlin, Jimmie Johnson and Kevin Harvick, 5 Star excitement in back-to-back races and the emotion is back. Football is great, but right now every week is hold-your-breath excitement at the race track.

As he said earlier in the season, all Hamlin does is win. He brought home trophy #8 and now leads the points standings by 33 points with two races to go. For the first time since 2005, somebody other than Johnson leads as the series heads to its penultimate race.

Along with the Chase excitement, plenty of action took place on the track, not the least of which was the backstretch throwdown between Jeff Gordon and Jeff Burton. After an altercation coming out of turn 4 before the caution flew, Gordon drove up alongside Burton to express his displeasure (he wasn’t the only one Sunday who exercised his freedom of expression) for what had happened. Burton then turned Gordon straight into the wall and both cars came to a rest on the backstretch. What happened next was a scene straight out of a movie.

Gordon walked down the backstretch to meet Burton where the two dropped the gloves and had at it. There have been several feuds between drivers this season, but this one takes the cake. There have even been drivers get out of their cars on the track and yell and push each other, but this fight brought back images to the finish of the 1979 Daytona 500 between Cale Yarborough and the Allison brothers.

The other driver who had issues expressing his displeasure Sunday was Kyle Busch. First, he gets spun out and, while trying to stay on the lead lap, speeds on pit road. Then as he sits in the pits for his penalty, not-so-subtly tells the NASCAR official he or she is #1. That cost him two more laps in the pits and took him completely out of contention.

Finally, the other unusual occurrence during the race happened when Chad Knaus replaced his own pit crew with the #24 team after Gordon wrecked. Now, this is a team that has won the past four season championships, and their crew chief decided to replace them in one of the most important races of the season. It’s incredible. Granted, the #48 crew struggled early in the race and the #24 group was flawless on the final three stops. Still, it added another dramatic element to the race and now the rest of the season, as the #24 guys will pit the #48 car the rest of the season.

So now the stage moves out west where the wild show goes to a one-mile track that acts like a short track. There’s nothing better to follow up a highly emotional race such as what took place at Texas. If people aren’t tuning in now, it’s not NASCAR’s fault. This sport is on top of its game right now.

For everybody who loves this sport, congratulations. These are the moments that make us remember why this sport is so great. The competition is as tight as can be, and the tension will only climb now that Johnson is behind. These next two weeks should be fascinating. Enjoy.