Sprint Cup N's & Q's: Infineon

Notes & Quotes comes flying at you this week from the sandy shores of the Gulf of Mexico. I hope you'll pardon my tardniness.

Infineon Win a Baby Step for Kasey Kahne at RPM

If you got a chance to read Holly Cain's piece on Kasey Kahne this week, you saw how excited the Washington driver was to be finally finding good equipment at Richard Petty Motorsports. According to Kahne, everything from bodies to engines are coming together at the right time for the team.

That's good news for Kahne fans, but it's even better for the folks running the show at RPM.

With Kahne set to renegotiate a contact for his ride following the 2010 season, he's previously said that RPM needs to a healthy dose of improvement before he'll truly consider signing a long-term deal at the company. And with Kahne being the poster child of that merged operation, RPM desperately needs to keep one of NASCAR's highest-profile drivers in the fold.

Green Flag Passing Stats Rise Dramatically

The use of the now much-discussed double-file restart rule at Infineon Raceway created some astronomical gains in the numbers of passes caught by NASCAR's timing and scoring system during Sunday's race.

In 2007, the system caught 2,351 green flag passes during the 110-lap race, with that number falling heavily to 1,263 in 2008.

This season? Sunday's 350k at the 10-turn road course saw 3,099 passes completed under green flag conditions -- a gain of 1,836 from a year ago.

Of course, there's a number of variables that can affect those numbers such as multiple green flag pit stops, but the numbers, and the advance of several drivers in the closing laps, exemplified how much more competitive and on-the-edge the double-file restarts made the competition at the road course.

Kyle Busch Flashes Back to 2008 Chase

After dominating the road course series in 2008 by going two-for-two in the Sprint Cup Series, Kyle Busch figured to be an easy pick for the win after starting second in Sunday's Toyota Save Mart 350k. It wasn't to be, despite leading laps early.

Busch got caught up in mutliple incidents around the 10-turn track, including one with Sam Hornish Jr. and Brian Vickers that left his fellow Toyota driver and former Hendrick Motorsports teammate steamed with his actions.

"I don't know what he was thinking," said Vickers. "That was stupid. He had no reason to be racing the 77 that hard and wreck him and wreck himself and when he wrecked himself, when he took back off, he drilled us in the door and cut a right rear down, closed our pipes off which ended up blowing the motor."

For as many problems and spins as Busch had Sunday, it certainly looked like he was trying to bring back the struggles of last fall's Chase for the Sprint Cup. His 22nd-place finish? His fourth finish outside the Top-10 in the last four races.

Smaller Fuel Tanks Would Work

I talked a little bit about how smaller fuel tanks for the Sprint Cup boys at Infineon Raceway might be a good idea in the Warmup, and I still think it might make sense.

Because of the limited amount of cautions and 35-40 lap fuel window, just two stops is all a team needs to make it to the checkered flag, meaning caution flags after that point just bunch up the field and don't let teams have a good option to make more adjustments under a pit stop because of the lost track position.

Give the crews one or two more cracks at the car during pit stops due to fuel mileage, and you might see a few more cars adjusted to make a better run at the leader.