Family Feud
Speaking of playing the string out, RCR lost their final appeal this week. NASCAR's Chief Appellate Officer (what's that pay?) upheld the penalty against RCR's #33 Chevy. Richard Childress accepted the ruling, but had to take a shot at the three person panel from his first appeal. Childress is now ready to put this all behind him. Are you listening, Jeremy?
Joker's Wild
After a few days to mull over the Kyle Busch vs David Reutimann on-track shenanigans at Kansas I finally realized where I saw this happen before. Go all the way back to Kyle's trifecta at Bristol. In the Nationwide race Busch got loose in front of Brad Keselowski. BK hit Busch causing him to scrape the wall. In no way was it intentional, but Kyle ran him down and dumped him that same lap. Maybe Mr Busch can tell us how that incident was different than the one with the Beak at Kansas?
Jeopardy
NASCAR is this close to signing a new marketing partner (cha ching), Growth Energy, an ethanol lobbyist. As of now, there's not a lot of energy saving, but there are plenty of Federal dollars in the Green business. NASCAR may be using a 15% ethanol blend next year. The Indy Car Series (original name, huh) has been using 100% ethanol for the past six years. Ethanol can't be transported via pipeline, as it picks up moisture that way, so it is transported by truck. Ethanol fueled trucks, I suppose?
Wheel of Fortune
Tissot Watches has jumped on the Danica freight train. Tissot will be the primary sponsor on her JRM #7 vroom-vroom car this week in Cali. They will also be an associate sponsor on her other five races this year, and for however many she decides to drive next year. In semi-related news, Justin Allgaier, Brian Scott, and Eric Darnell are still looking for sponsors so they can actually run in the top-5 in the series.
Cali Chatter
Kevin Harvick's entry is the same car that he won with at Michigan in August. He also drove it to 2nd place at Indy and Fontana's first race this year.
Jimmie Johnson has won the past two events here, and he has five here overall. Ruh roh.
Jamie McMurray backed up his Daytona 500 win by winning the pole here the next week, back in February.
Kyle Busch holds the track qualifying record, and won his first pole, and race, here.
Kurt Busch leads the way with three poles at Fontana.
Matt Kenseth has three wins here, and averages a 9.1 finish.
Get Footloose with Kenny Loggins at his pre-race concert here on Sunday.
Nice Gene!
ReplyDeleteThe difference between Kansas and Bristol? Bristol wasn't a Chase race. I'm wondering how far the "Have At It Boys" will go before NASCAR finally backs 'em off. Maybe it will take putting JJ or Gordon upside down... But since it was Kyle, NASCAR didn't do anything...
If Reutimann was a chaser then maybe, but what he did was BS... His crew chief was heard on the radio urging him to do it... What kind of crap is that?
Spontaneous Combustion, Spontaneous Combustion, Spontaneous Combustion... LOL
Tissot used to sponsor Sauber when they first came into F1 back in 1993 I believe....made sense; a Swiss team on time, lol
ReplyDeleteDwindy... I'm a huge Kyle fan, but he brought this on himself. I was pissed when it happened, but after reflecting on it, it was just a racing deal. And, it may have cost him his shot this year. Lesson learned by Kyle, hopefully.
ReplyDeleteKyle had no problem retaliating when it wasn't called for. Live by the bumper, die by the bumper. I would seriously question if JJ would have done to Rooty what Kyle did... at that point in the race. You have to think, not just drive, like a champion to be a champion.
The Chase is boring enough as it is. In past years when there was a strict "don't touch the Chasers" policy it was even worse.
CR... does Tissot make calendars? You know, to "time" Danica's laps...
ReplyDeleteGene, I think you meant to direct that comment to tez?
ReplyDeleteThe main difference in Kyle's mind, ...I know, I'm projecting myself... is that the Kansas thing happened between the leaders, at crunch time. It wasn't retaliation, it was a tactical move for the win.
Cr...I knew it was one of you F-1 guys! LOL
ReplyDeleteDo you mean Bristol instead of Kansas? My point is that Kyle never looks at the other side of the coin. So focused on winning, I reckon.
Gene...I knew it was one of those roundy, left turn tracks! LOL
ReplyDeletea Tissot calendar...I think the closest would be some of their watches having the date on them, Gene :)
ReplyDeleteHey- Danica EARNED that 2nd place finish at Homestead. She and Kanaan fought tooth and nail for the position right down to the checkers.
ReplyDeleteSB... she earned that. She also earned a 10th place points finish this year... out of about 18 full time teams. She has not EARNED a top ride in any NASCAR series. She needed thousands of laps of testing, on a closed track, before she competed in an actual stock car race. But JRM saw dollar signs instead. Anyone who has heard a peep of her radio conversations, in a stock car, can tell she doesn't have a clue.
ReplyDeleteThis has nothing to do with her being a woman. If anything she's holding back women with real talent. Anyone think that Chrissy Wallace doesn't have more talent in a stock car? And, where is she?
I had issues with Sam, Juan and AJ jumping straight into Cup. IMO, every driver who wants to jump ship needs to do what Ambrose and Speed did with going Trucks to NW to Cup...doesn't matter if you've won the F1, V8 supercar, WRC and Race of Champions all in the same year, you're racing the Truck Series first.
ReplyDelete