Nascar and Racing Carl Edwards

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- Catching up on the news and notes trackside at Daytona International Speedway.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. met with reporters briefly Friday and seemed pretty much resigned to the fact that he won't be making the 12-driver Chase for the Championship this season. He's currently ranked 19th, 285 points behind 12th place Juan Pablo Montoya with nine races remaining before the Chase field is set Sept. 12.

"It's going to be a real challenge for us to make the Chase,'' Earnhardt said. "We're still mathematically in it but we're not trying to catch just one guy. .. we're trying to catch four or five guys. And it's unrealistic to expect all them guys to have enough trouble.

WEST ALLIS, Wis. (AP) -- Carl Edwards made the most of his one-day Wisconsin getaway, winning Saturday's Nationwide series race at the Milwaukee Mile after taking a brief break from his Sprint Cup duties in California.

It's a repeat victory at Milwaukee and the first Nationwide win of this season for Edwards, who took the lead from fellow Cup commuter Kyle Busch with 44 laps left in the race and wasn't significantly challenged the rest of the way.

What with Tony Stewart going it on his own just fine, thank you; Kyle Busch smashing trophies in victory lane; Dale Earnhardt Jr. struggling to live up to his hype; 50-year old Mark Martin winning races; and Hendrick Motorsports being, well ... Hendrick Motorsports, the once dominant Roush Fenway Ford team finds itself on NASCAR's attention periphery here at the midseason point.

Saying they were "glad all the safety devices worked properly,'' NASCAR officials addressed the national media Monday to answer questions in the wake of Sunday's frightening final-lap crash at Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway that injured seven fans.

NASCAR Vice President Jim Hunter reiterated the sanctioning body's "number one priority" is the safety of its participants and spectators. And he sent the organization's thoughts to the fans who suffered minor injuries from debris when Carl Edwards' car went airborne and crashed into a fence along the front-stretch grandstands.

Hunter said the sanctioning body would take any steps necessary to ensure safe events. But at this point, there aren't any additional steps to take.

TALLEDEGA, Ala. -- Brad Keselowski did what any driver would do.

It was the last lap, and he had a shot to win his first NASCAR Sprint Cup race. So he held his line and powered forward.

That the ensuing collision between his Chevy and Carl Edwards's Ford as they approached the finish line resulted in Edwards taking a frightening airborne ride into grandstands fencing and injuring seven fans had less to do with Keselowski than the innate dangers of restrictor plate racing.

In fact, NASCAR started putting restrictor plates on the cars at its two super speedways in Talladega and Daytona because of a similar airborne accident at Talladega in 1987. The idea was to control speeds. Roof flaps developed in the 1990s were supposed to keep the cars on the ground.

And so the 25-year-old Keselowski, whose win came in only his fifth Cup start, didn't make apologies for the racing.

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TALLADEGA, Ala. -- It wasn't Junior but his junior, Brad Keselowski, who seemingly came out of no where to survive a wreck-filled, spectacular last-lap crash and win his first ever NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race at Talladega Superspeedway on Sunday.

Keselowski, who drives full time for Dale Earnhardt Jr. in the triple-A Nationwide Series, was behind Carl Edwards about 100 yards from the checkered flag. As Edwards tried to block Keselowski's final push to win, the cars collided, launching Edwards' Ford airborne, which flipped wildly in the air. His car bounced off the hood of Ryan Newman's car and then rolled, roof up, hard into the catch fence along the front grandstand.

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Where: Phoenix Int'l Raceway
Time: Saturday 8:46 p.m./EDT
TV/Radio: FOX Sports, MRN Radio
Forecast: Clear, Lows in the 50s
Distance: 312 laps (312 miles, 500k)
Pole Winner: Mark Martin
2008 Winner: Jimmie Johnson


Mark Martin has gotten awful good at starting Sprint Cup races from the front in 2009 in his new Hendrick Motorsports ride, but its the whole finishing part that hasn't gone as planned.

Where: Texas Motor Speedway
Time: Sunday 2 p.m./EDT
TV/Radio: FOX Sports, PRN Radio
Forecast: Sunny, 62 degrees
Distance: 334 laps (501 miles)
Pole Winner: David Reutimann
2008 Winner: Carl Edwards


For the sake of racing in general let's hope that Saturday's Nationwide Series race at TMS will have been nothing like Sunday's Samsung 500. Missed that race? Well, here's all you need to know: Kyle Busch, Kyle Busch and, yep, more Kyle freakin' Busch.

Where: Las Vegas Motor Speedway
Time: Sunday 4:30 p.m./EDT
TV/Radio: FOX Sports, MRN Radio
Forecast: Partly Sunny, 75
Distance: 285 laps (427.5 miles)
Pole Winner: Kyle Busch
2008 Winner: Carl Edwards



Vegas pole winner Kyle Busch was one of five Toyota drivers to suffer engine problems during Friday's first practice, and Toyota Racing Development boss Lee White wasn't pleased.

Did you get a chance to catch that Nationwide Series race from Las Vegas on Saturday afternoon?

When the checkers fell, Greg Biffle was left out front -- literally, as just 10 cars finished on the lead lap -- to snap his 76-race drought of winning in the series.

But in between, the 209 laps that made up the Sam's Town 300 turned out to be quite hairy for a number of drivers.