Six favorites crashed out just 26 laps into the race at Bristol Motor Speedway, but after that everybody played nice as Brad Keselowski picked up his second Bristol trophy. Overall, the fourth race of the season gets a 3 Star Rating.
Some people might go off the edge and say Sunday’s race was boring and lacked any kind of excitement, but the race wasn’t horrible. For those who like wrecks, hopefully they tuned in early. For others who like hard, clean racing, the final 450 laps were enjoyable.
Unless track owner Bruton Smith changes his mind and decides he doesn’t like the current style of racing, the old beat-and-bang racing is gone and it’s not coming back. The funny thing is the type of racing we saw Sunday would be considered intense and exciting at almost any other racetrack. People simply have different expectations for Bristol.
However, the race doesn’t get a rating higher than a three for a reason. Keselowski had the best car of the day and drove away for the win. Matt Kenseth tried hard to keep up, but he did not have a car that handled well enough at the end to really challenge for the win. The Keselowski-Kenseth battle was actually fairly similar to the Tony Stewart-Jimmie Johnson battle a week ago at Las Vegas.
Also, many of the promos for this week’s race included old footage of wrecks and overheated drivers getting angry at each other. But the only real angry battle between two drivers at Bristol since the reconfiguration in 2007 was Kyle Busch and Carl Edwards driving into each other after the checkered flag of the 2008 night race.
Other than Busch slamming the roof of his car as he got out after his early wreck, everybody else came back to the garage peaceful and ready to pack up and head home.
That has also been the case for the entire season to date. The drivers have been incredibly level-headed to open the season. Even after questionable incidents on the track such as when Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Mark Martin bumped at Las Vegas, the drivers kind of shrugged their shoulders and moved on. The same could be said after all of the wrecks during Speedweeks, as well.
I’m not saying we need to have drivers angry at each other all the time. This is a sport that doesn’t need sideshow spectacles to be entertaining. The point is this is the quietest start to a season in regards to drivers’ emotions since the famous “Have at it, boys” edict before the start of the 2010 season.
One of the most surprising aspects of the race at Bristol was how well the three Michael Waltrip Racing cars of Clint Bowyer, Martin Truex Jr. and Brian Vickers ran, particularly Vickers.
Vickers hadn’t been in a Sprint Cup Series car since the final race of 2011 at Homestead before his Red Bull Racing team shut down. He ruffled a lot of feathers late in the season with rough driving, but he sure made the most of his opportunity Sunday in the #55 car.
Vickers led 125 laps and dominated the first half of the event. If the race had been 250 laps, he may have shocked the world and ended up in Victory Lane.
It will be interesting to see where his career heads from here on out. He has five more races this season in the #55 car and might drive his way back into a full-time ride again sooner rather than later.
So, next week NASCAR heads out to everybody’s favorite race on the schedule: the Auto Club 400 in Fontana, Calif. Last year was probably the best race at the track when Kevin Harvick passed Jimmie Johnson for the win on the final lap.
However, considering we haven’t had more than a 3 Star race yet this season, the chances of busting out the first 4 or 5 Star race at California aren’t very good.
In any case, have a great week, everybody.
Showing posts with label Food City 500. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Food City 500. Show all posts
Sunday, March 18, 2012
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Rating the Food City 500: 4 Stars ****
After the first off-week of the season, the big boys got back in the saddle again at NASCAR’s coliseum: Bristol Motor Speedway. While the stands were not jam-packed for the first time in 55 races, there was still some pretty good racing on the track itself. The first short track event of the season gets a 4 Star Rating.
Once again, Jimmie Johnson and the #48 team brought home the trophy Sunday afternoon. That lucky horseshoe helped out again as Johnson was able to move past the cars in front of him on the final restart with 10 laps to go. It always seems like the #48 has four tires at the end of the race when many other teams only take two, and Sunday was no exception. Had the final caution not come out, Kurt Busch would likely have been standing in Victory Lane throwing groceries.
Right now every team that challenges the #48 team comes up short. Johnson has already has the best car on the track the majority of the time, and then always has the correct strategy at the end. Rarely does the #48 fall victim to somebody else having a better strategy at the end of the race, as they did when Johnson came up short on fuel at Michigan a year ago.
What’s scary is Johnson and Chad Knaus just seem to keep getting better and better as they go along. With Johnson’s win at Bristol, there are very few, if any, tracks where Johnson is not one of the favorites coming into a race. It is going to take one heck of an effort for a different team to when the championship this season.
People may not like it, but we are watching possibly the greatest run of success any team in the history of NASCAR has had, with the exception of Richard Petty and his 10 race win streak in 1967. If Johnson continues to add to his early season success this season, he will add that dominant year to his resume that Richard Petty, Dale Earnhardt and Jeff Gordon have. If Johnson is going to win like this, it would be cool to see him make a run at Gordon and Petty’s modern era record of 13 wins in one season.
Other positives from Bristol include it being the last race of the wing. There was only one champion in the wing era: Jimmie Johnson. Glad that’s over. Also, for once the leader of the race didn’t jump out to a huge lead after each restart. Yes it’s a small track at Bristol, but the second-place car was able to hang with the leader side-by-side on several restarts. In the past few races at Bristol, the leader would jump out to a big lead and the field would have to wait until he caught lapped traffic before reeling him back in. That was not the case so much Sunday, The leader only jumped out to a sizeable lead a few times, with most of those being Kurt Busch as, like Gordon at Las Vegas, he had the dominant car throughout the day, only to be nipped by Johnson at the end. If the spoiler fixes that issue, look out folks. This is going to be a fun ride.
Next week the series moves to the grand old track in Martinsville, Va. This track had some of the best racing of the season last year, and with plenty of drivers upset at this point in the season, this race could be a lot of fun. However, don’t bet against Johnson and the #48 team again this week. If he won at Bristol, one of his worst tracks, just think what he will do at Martinsville, one of his best tracks. In any case, it will be great to see the rear spoiler back on the car. Hopefully each team is able to pick up where they have left off and one team doesn’t figure it out long before everyone else, because that would almost certainly be the #48.
Once again, Jimmie Johnson and the #48 team brought home the trophy Sunday afternoon. That lucky horseshoe helped out again as Johnson was able to move past the cars in front of him on the final restart with 10 laps to go. It always seems like the #48 has four tires at the end of the race when many other teams only take two, and Sunday was no exception. Had the final caution not come out, Kurt Busch would likely have been standing in Victory Lane throwing groceries.
Right now every team that challenges the #48 team comes up short. Johnson has already has the best car on the track the majority of the time, and then always has the correct strategy at the end. Rarely does the #48 fall victim to somebody else having a better strategy at the end of the race, as they did when Johnson came up short on fuel at Michigan a year ago.
What’s scary is Johnson and Chad Knaus just seem to keep getting better and better as they go along. With Johnson’s win at Bristol, there are very few, if any, tracks where Johnson is not one of the favorites coming into a race. It is going to take one heck of an effort for a different team to when the championship this season.
People may not like it, but we are watching possibly the greatest run of success any team in the history of NASCAR has had, with the exception of Richard Petty and his 10 race win streak in 1967. If Johnson continues to add to his early season success this season, he will add that dominant year to his resume that Richard Petty, Dale Earnhardt and Jeff Gordon have. If Johnson is going to win like this, it would be cool to see him make a run at Gordon and Petty’s modern era record of 13 wins in one season.
Other positives from Bristol include it being the last race of the wing. There was only one champion in the wing era: Jimmie Johnson. Glad that’s over. Also, for once the leader of the race didn’t jump out to a huge lead after each restart. Yes it’s a small track at Bristol, but the second-place car was able to hang with the leader side-by-side on several restarts. In the past few races at Bristol, the leader would jump out to a big lead and the field would have to wait until he caught lapped traffic before reeling him back in. That was not the case so much Sunday, The leader only jumped out to a sizeable lead a few times, with most of those being Kurt Busch as, like Gordon at Las Vegas, he had the dominant car throughout the day, only to be nipped by Johnson at the end. If the spoiler fixes that issue, look out folks. This is going to be a fun ride.
Next week the series moves to the grand old track in Martinsville, Va. This track had some of the best racing of the season last year, and with plenty of drivers upset at this point in the season, this race could be a lot of fun. However, don’t bet against Johnson and the #48 team again this week. If he won at Bristol, one of his worst tracks, just think what he will do at Martinsville, one of his best tracks. In any case, it will be great to see the rear spoiler back on the car. Hopefully each team is able to pick up where they have left off and one team doesn’t figure it out long before everyone else, because that would almost certainly be the #48.
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