THE FRONTSTRETCH NEWSLETTER
Presented by Frontstretch.com
The Best Seat at the Track, The Best View on the Net!
March 26th, 2012
Volume V, Edition XLVII
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ADVERTISEMENT
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~~~~~~~~~~~
Presented by Frontstretch.com
The Best Seat at the Track, The Best View on the Net!
March 26th, 2012
Volume V, Edition XLVII
~~~~~~~~~~~
ADVERTISEMENT
Are you looking to advertise your website, product or brand? A good way to get your name out there is via direct advertising here in the Frontstretch Newsletter! Interested parties can contact us at frontstretcheditors@googlegroups.com for details.
~~~~~~~~~~~
Sprint Cup Race Recap: Stewart Scores a Rain-Shortened Fontana Victory
by Phil Allaway
NASCAR's made two trips out to the Western United States for intermediate races this season. Tony Stewart is basically perfect so far in those events. Leading 42 laps on Sunday, he cruised to victory in a rain-shortened California event just two weeks after scoring an impressive victory out in Las Vegas.
It was a surprising turnaround, considering the dominance of Stewart's former employer, Joe Gibbs Racing throughout the weekend. Denny Hamlin won the pole and dominated practice. However, once the race started, Kyle Busch came to the forefront. He passed Hamlin on the second lap of the race for the lead and pulled away.
Busch held onto the lead through the first two rounds of pit stops, all the while lapping well up into the midfield. However, on Lap 84, Busch caught Juan Pablo Montoya, who was running in 21st, last driver on the lead lap. Montoya raced Busch to stay on the lead lap quite hard, holding the No. 18 at bay. Eventually, Busch had to back off a little to preserve his tires.
This allowed Stewart to run down Busch from a second and a half behind. At the end of Lap 85, Stewart made his move on the outside of Busch exiting Turn 4. He was able to complete the pass entering Turn 1 and quickly dispatched the pesky Montoya as well. From there, Stewart quickly pulled away and held his advantage through a round of pit stops.
Unfortunately, the big story of Sunday's race wasn't even the action on track. All weekend, meteorologists were forecasting a 100 percent chance of rain for Sunday afternoon. Luckily, the rains held off long enough for NASCAR to start the event a little early. Regardless, racing against the rain set a tone for the race. Drive as fast as you can, but as carefully as you can.
When the rains finally came on Lap 125, bringing out the first and only yellow of the event, Stewart executed a fake out on much of the rest of the drivers on the lead lap when pit road opened. Staying out allowed Stewart to maintain his lead. A couple of laps later, NASCAR "lost the track" and pulled the field onto pit road. After a conference of officials and some cursory attempts to dry the track, it was determined that the rains were likely to stick around for a while, making it impossible to dry the track and restart in a timely manner. With the race already past the halfway point, it was thus declared to be an official race and Stewart was declared the winner.
For Stewart, it is his second victory of 2012 and the seventh since the beginning of the Chase last season. After the race, he was very happy with his day.
"Our car drove really, really well in traffic. Felt like it was real maneuverable as far as being able to move to different spots on the racetrack than other guys were at," he said. "Steve did an awesome job all day of the changes that he made. Every time he changed something, the car really responded well to it. That's when you know you have a real good race car under you, when you make little changes and it makes a big difference. He did an awesome job. Each run we got better and better and better."
Second-place Kyle Busch was happy with his result, but wishing that he had more time.
"We had a great race car there from the beginning of the race," Busch said in the post-race press conference. "Glad we were able to run that way and up front like we're supposed to and to our potential, that we had a day where we didn't have attrition or something else get in our way. I just wish we led 30 more [laps] and we'd be in a different position right now."
Behind Stewart and Kyle Busch was Dale Earnhardt, Jr. in third. Kevin Harvick finished fourth, while Carl Edwards rounded out the top 5. Points leader Greg Biffle was sixth, followed by Ryan Newman. Martin Truex, Jr. was eighth, followed by Kurt Busch in the Phoenix Racing Chevrolet. Jimmie Johnson, who was the first driver off of pit road under the race's only caution, rounded out the top 10.
For Johnson, having the rains force an early end to the proceedings was the only way that he could have legitimately finished well on Sunday. After leaving pit road under caution, Johnson's No. 48 began smoking heavily due to an oil leak. With the rain falling and the radar looking quite ugly, crew chief Chad Knaus chose to leave Johnson out on track. This turned out to be a good decision.
Next weekend, the Sprint Cup Series returns to action at the paper clip, Martinsville Speedway in Ridgeway, Virginia. Coverage starts Sunday afternoon at 12:30pm EDT.
OFFICIAL RESULTS: FOOD CITY 500
Phil Allaway is the Newsletter Manager and a Senior Writer for Frontstretch.com. He can be reached via e-mail at phil.allaway@frontstretch.com.
Tracking the Chase: Biffle's Lead Shrinks Slightly, Large Gains for Stewart
by Phil Allaway
Greg Biffle had a very quiet day on Sunday at Auto Club Speedway. However, this performance, however uneventful turned into a solid top-10 run by the checkers. Biffle's sixth-place result put him in position to potentially expand his point lead; however, Kevin Harvick had an even better day, carrying the Jimmy John's Chevrolet to a fourth-place finish. The result is that Harvick reduced Biffle's lead from nine to seven.
Dale Earnhardt, Jr. ran well Sunday, spending most of the race in the top 10. Choosing not to pit under the race's one and only caution allowed him to finish in third, jumping him three spots to third in the points, 17 out of the lead. Just one point behind Earnhardt, Jr. is race winner Tony Stewart. Stewart flexed his muscle once again. Do not doubt Stewart under any circumstances. Martin Truex, Jr. dropped one place to fifth in the standings, but not because he had a bad run. Truex still earned another top-10 finish on Saturday.
Matt Kenseth dropped three places to sixth in points after choosing to pit under the only yellow of the race. He ended up 16th, the last car on the lead lap. Denny Hamlin moved down two places to seventh after dominating most of the weekend leading up to the race, but only leading two laps all day on Sunday before pitting under caution left him 11th. Clint Bowyer remains in eighth after an anonymous run to 13th.
Jimmie Johnson's victory in last week's final appeal moved him from 17th to 11th in points. Sunday, Johnson got lucky thanks to the rain. He ran well all day, but during the caution, his Lowe's/Jimmie Johnson Foundation Chevrolet started leaking oil and smoking. Had the race been able to restart, Johnson would have been in a heap of trouble. But Mother Nature provided a kicksave, and a beauty: Johnson stayed on track until the field was stopped and kept a tenth-place finish, which moved him up two places to ninth in points. Ryan Newman re-enters the top-10 after a seventh-place result.
Just outside of the top-10 are Paul Menard, Carl Edwards and Joey Logano. Logano, winner of the Royal Purple 300 on Saturday for the Nationwide Series, fell out of the top 10 in points after finishing 24th Sunday.
Standings: 1) Greg Biffle 195, 2) Kevin Harvick -7, 3) Dale Earnhardt, Jr. -17, 4) Tony Stewart -18, 5) Martin Truex, Jr. -20, 6) Matt Kenseth -22, 7) Denny Hamlin -24, 8) Clint Bowyer -38, 9) Jimmie Johnson -39, 10) Ryan Newman -40, 11) Paul Menard -47, t-12) Carl Edwards -49, t-12) Joey Logano -49.
Wild Cards: Brad Keselowski (16th in points, one win), Paul Menard (11th in points)
Race Winners: Matt Kenseth (Daytona), Denny Hamlin (Phoenix), Tony Stewart (Las Vegas, Fontana), Brad Keselowski (Bristol)
Tracking The Top 35: Bringing 2012 Points Into Play Knocks One Team Out
Sunday was the last opportunity for teams to either race their way into the top-35 in owner points, or (at least temporarily) lock down their existing places in the field. Ultimately, only one car (other than FAS Lane Racing's No. 32, since that situation is a special case) that was on the outside looking in back at Daytona was able to lock themselves into Sunday's Goody's Fast Relief 500 in Martinsville.
That team was the No. 36 for Tommy Baldwin Racing and driver Dave Blaney. Blaney has finishes of 15th, 23rd, 29th, 34th and 33rd in the first five races of the season. That was ultimately enough to lock the No. 36 into the top-35 in 28th position.
The only reason why Blaney had to qualify on speed is that the team switched their owners points from last year in order to lock in the new No. 10 that the team is splitting between David Reutimann (for normal weekends) and Danica Patrick (for those weekends in which Stewart-Haas Racing is operating the car). After Patrick was involved in a Lap 2 crash in Daytona and Reutimann blew an engine in Phoenix, it was an uphill battle to keep the No. 10 locked into the field. However, Reutimann has kept the car clean the last three weeks and shown improved form. That was enough to lock the No. 10 into the top 35, but only tenuously. They are only five points ahead of 36th.
The only team locked in at the beginning of the season that will have to qualify on speed this weekend in Martinsville is BK Racing's No. 83 and driver Landon Cassill. Generally, Cassill's No. 83 has been the faster of the two Burger King Toyotas this season. However, mechanical problems have hampered Cassill's efforts. A blown engine in Las Vegas resulted in a 36th-place finish; then, Fontana saw Cassill record another 36th-place result due to the car having issues under the hood right before the rains came.
Here's your owners point standings near the all-important cutoff.
29) Germain Racing (No. 13 - Casey Mears), 19 points ahead of 36th.
t-30) BK Racing (No. 93 - Travis Kvapil), 18 points ahead of 36th.
t-30) FAS Lane Racing (No. 32 - Ken Schrader), 18 points ahead of 36th.
t-30) Front Row Motorsports (No. 38 - David Gilliland), 18 points ahead of 36th.
33) Front Row Motorsports (No. 34 - David Ragan), 17 points ahead of 36th.
t-34) Tommy Baldwin Racing/Stewart-Haas Racing (No. 10 - David Reutimann), 5 points ahead of 36th.
t-34) Richard Childress Racing (No. 33 - Brendan Gaughan), 5 points ahead of 36th.
36) BK Racing (No. 83 - Landon Cassill), 5 points behind 35th.
37) Inception Motorsports (No. 30 - David Stremme), 18 points behind 35th.
38) Wood Brothers Racing (No. 21 - Trevor Bayne), 23 points behind 35th.
39) Front Row Motorsports (No. 26 - Josh Wise), 24 points behind 35th.
Phil Allaway is the Newsletter Manager and a Senior Writer for Frontstretch.com. He can be reached via e-mail at phil.allaway@frontstretch.com.
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Got NASCAR-related questions or comments?
Send them John Potts' way at john.potts@frontstretch.com; and if you're lucky, you'll get your name in print when he does his weekly column answering back to you – the fans that keep Frontstretch afloat. Potts' Shots will run on Thursdays with a whole new set of Fan Questions and Answers!
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Quotes To Remember From Fontana
"When you're the leader, those guys, they're not very courteous. They don't give you much room. They try to take away your air." - Kyle Busch, on dealing with lapped traffic. These comments came as a result of a question about Juan Pablo Montoya holding him up.
"The track kind of lends itself to that, but nobody wanted to see the caution come out either because we knew it was gonna be tight (reaching the halfway point). If we would have had a 15-minute caution, we may not have made it." - Greg Biffle, on Auto Club Speedway lending itself to having fewer cautions.
"Our car with Medallion Financial on board looked cool, I just wish it was as fast as it looked." - Aric Almirola, on his tough run to 25th.
"We would lose a lot of time somewhere. Between coming in and leaving, we'd lose three or four seconds and have to [use] the whole run to try to get that back together." - Denny Hamlin, on his race on Sunday.
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Secret Star Of The Race: The Best Run You Never Saw
After the events of last season, Kurt Busch could use a nice, quiet day. Essentially, 2011 was filled with wins, an amicable divorce, and multiple confrontations. 2012 has been quieter, but not in a good way on-track. Kurt has had significant trouble with the No. 51 thus far, failing to record a decent finish in the first four weeks of the season while suffering from wrecks and mechanical failure.
On Sunday, Kurt managed to have a very quiet run in Fontana. Despite the 250 consecutive miles of green-flag racing, Kurt managed to keep the Phoenix Construction Chevrolet on the lead lap and in reasonable contention for a good finish all day. When some of the drivers in front of him pitted under the caution, it moved Kurt up to a ninth-place finish. That may not sound like much for a driver that's won in Fontana in the past, but it's quite the milestone for Phoenix Racing. It is only the 12th top-10 finish overall for the organization, and the very first one on an intermediate track. – Phil Allaway
STAT OF THE WEEK: 3. This number represents Dale Earnhardt, Jr.'s current points position. It is his best start to a Cup season since 2004, when he was second in points after the fifth race of the year. That season, his last with Tony Eury, Sr. as crew chief, was a career year for "Driver No. 8" with six wins and a fifth-place finish in the inaugural Chase for the Nextel Cup. Will the same thing happen in 2012? – Phil Allaway
by Phil Allaway
NASCAR's made two trips out to the Western United States for intermediate races this season. Tony Stewart is basically perfect so far in those events. Leading 42 laps on Sunday, he cruised to victory in a rain-shortened California event just two weeks after scoring an impressive victory out in Las Vegas.
It was a surprising turnaround, considering the dominance of Stewart's former employer, Joe Gibbs Racing throughout the weekend. Denny Hamlin won the pole and dominated practice. However, once the race started, Kyle Busch came to the forefront. He passed Hamlin on the second lap of the race for the lead and pulled away.
Busch held onto the lead through the first two rounds of pit stops, all the while lapping well up into the midfield. However, on Lap 84, Busch caught Juan Pablo Montoya, who was running in 21st, last driver on the lead lap. Montoya raced Busch to stay on the lead lap quite hard, holding the No. 18 at bay. Eventually, Busch had to back off a little to preserve his tires.
This allowed Stewart to run down Busch from a second and a half behind. At the end of Lap 85, Stewart made his move on the outside of Busch exiting Turn 4. He was able to complete the pass entering Turn 1 and quickly dispatched the pesky Montoya as well. From there, Stewart quickly pulled away and held his advantage through a round of pit stops.
Unfortunately, the big story of Sunday's race wasn't even the action on track. All weekend, meteorologists were forecasting a 100 percent chance of rain for Sunday afternoon. Luckily, the rains held off long enough for NASCAR to start the event a little early. Regardless, racing against the rain set a tone for the race. Drive as fast as you can, but as carefully as you can.
When the rains finally came on Lap 125, bringing out the first and only yellow of the event, Stewart executed a fake out on much of the rest of the drivers on the lead lap when pit road opened. Staying out allowed Stewart to maintain his lead. A couple of laps later, NASCAR "lost the track" and pulled the field onto pit road. After a conference of officials and some cursory attempts to dry the track, it was determined that the rains were likely to stick around for a while, making it impossible to dry the track and restart in a timely manner. With the race already past the halfway point, it was thus declared to be an official race and Stewart was declared the winner.
For Stewart, it is his second victory of 2012 and the seventh since the beginning of the Chase last season. After the race, he was very happy with his day.
"Our car drove really, really well in traffic. Felt like it was real maneuverable as far as being able to move to different spots on the racetrack than other guys were at," he said. "Steve did an awesome job all day of the changes that he made. Every time he changed something, the car really responded well to it. That's when you know you have a real good race car under you, when you make little changes and it makes a big difference. He did an awesome job. Each run we got better and better and better."
Second-place Kyle Busch was happy with his result, but wishing that he had more time.
"We had a great race car there from the beginning of the race," Busch said in the post-race press conference. "Glad we were able to run that way and up front like we're supposed to and to our potential, that we had a day where we didn't have attrition or something else get in our way. I just wish we led 30 more [laps] and we'd be in a different position right now."
Behind Stewart and Kyle Busch was Dale Earnhardt, Jr. in third. Kevin Harvick finished fourth, while Carl Edwards rounded out the top 5. Points leader Greg Biffle was sixth, followed by Ryan Newman. Martin Truex, Jr. was eighth, followed by Kurt Busch in the Phoenix Racing Chevrolet. Jimmie Johnson, who was the first driver off of pit road under the race's only caution, rounded out the top 10.
For Johnson, having the rains force an early end to the proceedings was the only way that he could have legitimately finished well on Sunday. After leaving pit road under caution, Johnson's No. 48 began smoking heavily due to an oil leak. With the rain falling and the radar looking quite ugly, crew chief Chad Knaus chose to leave Johnson out on track. This turned out to be a good decision.
Next weekend, the Sprint Cup Series returns to action at the paper clip, Martinsville Speedway in Ridgeway, Virginia. Coverage starts Sunday afternoon at 12:30pm EDT.
OFFICIAL RESULTS: FOOD CITY 500
Phil Allaway is the Newsletter Manager and a Senior Writer for Frontstretch.com. He can be reached via e-mail at phil.allaway@frontstretch.com.
Tracking the Chase: Biffle's Lead Shrinks Slightly, Large Gains for Stewart
by Phil Allaway
Greg Biffle had a very quiet day on Sunday at Auto Club Speedway. However, this performance, however uneventful turned into a solid top-10 run by the checkers. Biffle's sixth-place result put him in position to potentially expand his point lead; however, Kevin Harvick had an even better day, carrying the Jimmy John's Chevrolet to a fourth-place finish. The result is that Harvick reduced Biffle's lead from nine to seven.
Dale Earnhardt, Jr. ran well Sunday, spending most of the race in the top 10. Choosing not to pit under the race's one and only caution allowed him to finish in third, jumping him three spots to third in the points, 17 out of the lead. Just one point behind Earnhardt, Jr. is race winner Tony Stewart. Stewart flexed his muscle once again. Do not doubt Stewart under any circumstances. Martin Truex, Jr. dropped one place to fifth in the standings, but not because he had a bad run. Truex still earned another top-10 finish on Saturday.
Matt Kenseth dropped three places to sixth in points after choosing to pit under the only yellow of the race. He ended up 16th, the last car on the lead lap. Denny Hamlin moved down two places to seventh after dominating most of the weekend leading up to the race, but only leading two laps all day on Sunday before pitting under caution left him 11th. Clint Bowyer remains in eighth after an anonymous run to 13th.
Jimmie Johnson's victory in last week's final appeal moved him from 17th to 11th in points. Sunday, Johnson got lucky thanks to the rain. He ran well all day, but during the caution, his Lowe's/Jimmie Johnson Foundation Chevrolet started leaking oil and smoking. Had the race been able to restart, Johnson would have been in a heap of trouble. But Mother Nature provided a kicksave, and a beauty: Johnson stayed on track until the field was stopped and kept a tenth-place finish, which moved him up two places to ninth in points. Ryan Newman re-enters the top-10 after a seventh-place result.
Just outside of the top-10 are Paul Menard, Carl Edwards and Joey Logano. Logano, winner of the Royal Purple 300 on Saturday for the Nationwide Series, fell out of the top 10 in points after finishing 24th Sunday.
Standings: 1) Greg Biffle 195, 2) Kevin Harvick -7, 3) Dale Earnhardt, Jr. -17, 4) Tony Stewart -18, 5) Martin Truex, Jr. -20, 6) Matt Kenseth -22, 7) Denny Hamlin -24, 8) Clint Bowyer -38, 9) Jimmie Johnson -39, 10) Ryan Newman -40, 11) Paul Menard -47, t-12) Carl Edwards -49, t-12) Joey Logano -49.
Wild Cards: Brad Keselowski (16th in points, one win), Paul Menard (11th in points)
Race Winners: Matt Kenseth (Daytona), Denny Hamlin (Phoenix), Tony Stewart (Las Vegas, Fontana), Brad Keselowski (Bristol)
Tracking The Top 35: Bringing 2012 Points Into Play Knocks One Team Out
Sunday was the last opportunity for teams to either race their way into the top-35 in owner points, or (at least temporarily) lock down their existing places in the field. Ultimately, only one car (other than FAS Lane Racing's No. 32, since that situation is a special case) that was on the outside looking in back at Daytona was able to lock themselves into Sunday's Goody's Fast Relief 500 in Martinsville.
That team was the No. 36 for Tommy Baldwin Racing and driver Dave Blaney. Blaney has finishes of 15th, 23rd, 29th, 34th and 33rd in the first five races of the season. That was ultimately enough to lock the No. 36 into the top-35 in 28th position.
The only reason why Blaney had to qualify on speed is that the team switched their owners points from last year in order to lock in the new No. 10 that the team is splitting between David Reutimann (for normal weekends) and Danica Patrick (for those weekends in which Stewart-Haas Racing is operating the car). After Patrick was involved in a Lap 2 crash in Daytona and Reutimann blew an engine in Phoenix, it was an uphill battle to keep the No. 10 locked into the field. However, Reutimann has kept the car clean the last three weeks and shown improved form. That was enough to lock the No. 10 into the top 35, but only tenuously. They are only five points ahead of 36th.
The only team locked in at the beginning of the season that will have to qualify on speed this weekend in Martinsville is BK Racing's No. 83 and driver Landon Cassill. Generally, Cassill's No. 83 has been the faster of the two Burger King Toyotas this season. However, mechanical problems have hampered Cassill's efforts. A blown engine in Las Vegas resulted in a 36th-place finish; then, Fontana saw Cassill record another 36th-place result due to the car having issues under the hood right before the rains came.
Here's your owners point standings near the all-important cutoff.
29) Germain Racing (No. 13 - Casey Mears), 19 points ahead of 36th.
t-30) BK Racing (No. 93 - Travis Kvapil), 18 points ahead of 36th.
t-30) FAS Lane Racing (No. 32 - Ken Schrader), 18 points ahead of 36th.
t-30) Front Row Motorsports (No. 38 - David Gilliland), 18 points ahead of 36th.
33) Front Row Motorsports (No. 34 - David Ragan), 17 points ahead of 36th.
t-34) Tommy Baldwin Racing/Stewart-Haas Racing (No. 10 - David Reutimann), 5 points ahead of 36th.
t-34) Richard Childress Racing (No. 33 - Brendan Gaughan), 5 points ahead of 36th.
36) BK Racing (No. 83 - Landon Cassill), 5 points behind 35th.
37) Inception Motorsports (No. 30 - David Stremme), 18 points behind 35th.
38) Wood Brothers Racing (No. 21 - Trevor Bayne), 23 points behind 35th.
39) Front Row Motorsports (No. 26 - Josh Wise), 24 points behind 35th.
Phil Allaway is the Newsletter Manager and a Senior Writer for Frontstretch.com. He can be reached via e-mail at phil.allaway@frontstretch.com.
~~~~~~~~~~
Got NASCAR-related questions or comments?
Send them John Potts' way at john.potts@frontstretch.com; and if you're lucky, you'll get your name in print when he does his weekly column answering back to you – the fans that keep Frontstretch afloat. Potts' Shots will run on Thursdays with a whole new set of Fan Questions and Answers!
~~~~~~~~~~
Quotes To Remember From Fontana
"When you're the leader, those guys, they're not very courteous. They don't give you much room. They try to take away your air." - Kyle Busch, on dealing with lapped traffic. These comments came as a result of a question about Juan Pablo Montoya holding him up.
"The track kind of lends itself to that, but nobody wanted to see the caution come out either because we knew it was gonna be tight (reaching the halfway point). If we would have had a 15-minute caution, we may not have made it." - Greg Biffle, on Auto Club Speedway lending itself to having fewer cautions.
"Our car with Medallion Financial on board looked cool, I just wish it was as fast as it looked." - Aric Almirola, on his tough run to 25th.
"We would lose a lot of time somewhere. Between coming in and leaving, we'd lose three or four seconds and have to [use] the whole run to try to get that back together." - Denny Hamlin, on his race on Sunday.
~~~~~~~~~~
Secret Star Of The Race: The Best Run You Never Saw
After the events of last season, Kurt Busch could use a nice, quiet day. Essentially, 2011 was filled with wins, an amicable divorce, and multiple confrontations. 2012 has been quieter, but not in a good way on-track. Kurt has had significant trouble with the No. 51 thus far, failing to record a decent finish in the first four weeks of the season while suffering from wrecks and mechanical failure.
On Sunday, Kurt managed to have a very quiet run in Fontana. Despite the 250 consecutive miles of green-flag racing, Kurt managed to keep the Phoenix Construction Chevrolet on the lead lap and in reasonable contention for a good finish all day. When some of the drivers in front of him pitted under the caution, it moved Kurt up to a ninth-place finish. That may not sound like much for a driver that's won in Fontana in the past, but it's quite the milestone for Phoenix Racing. It is only the 12th top-10 finish overall for the organization, and the very first one on an intermediate track. – Phil Allaway
STAT OF THE WEEK: 3. This number represents Dale Earnhardt, Jr.'s current points position. It is his best start to a Cup season since 2004, when he was second in points after the fifth race of the year. That season, his last with Tony Eury, Sr. as crew chief, was a career year for "Driver No. 8" with six wins and a fifth-place finish in the inaugural Chase for the Nextel Cup. Will the same thing happen in 2012? – Phil Allaway
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TODAY ON THE FRONTSTRETCH:
Matt McLaughlin's Thinkin' Out Loud: Fontana Race Recap
by Matt McLaughlin
The Big Six: Questions Answered After The Auto Club 400
by Amy Henderson
IndyCar Race Recap: Honda Grand Prix Of St. Petersburg
by Toni Montgomery
Pace Laps: NASCAR's Rivalry Week, Nationwide Vacation And A "Favorite" Triumph
by the Frontstretch Staff
FRONTSTRETCH TRIVIA:
Q: The Spring race at Martinsville was the last Cup event to receive a live, flag-to-flag telecast from television (the first of these actually occurred in 1996). Why?
Q: The Spring race at Martinsville was the last Cup event to receive a live, flag-to-flag telecast from television (the first of these actually occurred in 1996). Why?
Check back Tuesday for the answer, here in the Frontstretch Newsletter!
Friday's Answer:
Q: In 2003, CART was scheduled to hold their season finale, the King Taco 500, at California Speedway. However, that race never happened. Why?
A: The race was originally postponed, and later cancelled due to wildfires that were affecting Southern California at the time. Its an unfortunate reality that comes with living in a very dry region that is susceptible to high winds. That same weekend, the San Diego Chargers were forced to move a home game to Tempe, Arizona's Sun Devil Stadium not because of the fires themselves, but so that the stadium could be used as a command center for first responders.
Coming Tomorrow in the Frontstretch Newsletter:
-- Top News from Kevin Rutherford
-- Sitting In the Stands: A Fan's View by S.D. Grady
This week's topic: The Making of an American Hero
-- Links to your favorite Frontstretch articles, and more!
Coming Tomorrow On The Frontstretch:
Who's Hot / Who's Not in Sprint Cup by StarCoach Race Tours: Fontana-Martinsville Edition by Brett Poirier
With five races in the books, Brett looks at what trends are developing in NASCAR's two top series and which drivers are sizzling hot to start the season... while others are still stuck as if it never began.
Five Points To Ponder by Bryan Davis Keith
Bryan is back with his weekly edition of talking points to tie up the Fontana weekend and get us set for Martinsville.
Couch Potato Tuesday by Phil Allaway
This past weekend, the Sprint Cup and Nationwide Series traveled out to the West Coast for their one and only visit to Auto Club Speedway. Meanwhile, the Izod IndyCar Series began a new era in St. Petersburg, Florida. Were the race telecasts for these events up to snuff? Find out in this week's edition of the TV Critique.
This year, we have an interesting new weekly feature for our readers where we'll have a special guest stop by on a weekly basis to discuss the technical aspects of our sport. Paul Menard's crew chief stops by this week to get us set for brakes, brakes, brakes at Martinsville.
The Yellow Stripe by Danny Peters
Danny returns with another thoughtful commentary looking ahead to Martinsville.
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