Nascar and Racing Chase For The Sprint Cup

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.

It's that time of year again. Sunday's race at New Hampshire Motor Speedway officially kicks off the "Race to the Chase," the 10-race stretch for a shot at the championship.

While there have been several surprises in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series this year, one of the biggest shocks as we close in on the Chase for the Sprint Cup is the absence of a clear-cut favorite for the championship. Last year's dominant teams at this time of the season were the 99 and 18, and the 24 and 48 in 2007, but we really don't have one in 2009, which bodes well for the sport.

Holding off Tony Stewart on multiple late-race, double-file restarts on a road course may turn out to be the easier proposition for Sunday's race winner Kasey Kahne.

Capitalizing on the momentum from the victory and avoiding drama in the final days that set the Chase for the Championship 12-driver field ... that's another story.

Kahne said Tuesday he's up for the challenge.

"That might be one of the reasons I like racing ... all the pressure and the excitement,'' Kahne said. "I don't mind it, I enjoy trying to perform under pressure.''

Good thing.

SONOMA, Calif. (AP) -- Kasey Kahne gave struggling Richard Petty Motorsports a much-needed boost Sunday, holding off Tony Stewart at Infineon Raceway to snap a 37-race winless streak.

Kahne was met in Victory Lane by Richard Petty, who made his first trip as a car owner in more than a decade. A Petty-owned car had not won a race since John Andretti's victory at Martinsville in April, 1999.

"I feel just as good as he does," said The King, clad in his trademark cowboy hat and sunglasses. "It's great, man. It's great."

For those that question NASCAR's race shows -- the people who criticize white-checkered finishes, single file parades and races that are agonizingly too long -- the antidote comes Sunday on the beautiful 1.9-mile road course built into the winding, hills of Northern California wine country.

Road course racing is real racing, the true test of driver talent.

And NASCAR's Sprint Cup Series could stand a few more.

Sunday's NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race at Infineon Raceway could very well make or break the season of two underrated drivers who are teammates by virtually all definitions of the word.

Marcos Ambrose, who drives for JTG-Daugherty Racing, essentially a satellite of Michael Waltrip Racing (MWR), and David Reutimann, who won his first Cup race for MWR last month at Lowe's Motor Speedway, are two humble and subdued drivers making a lot of noise on the track this year. But the road course in Sonoma, Calif., could mean totally different things to the duo.

It's fair to say Mark Martin wasn't always a glass-half-full kinda guy.

Even a decade ago while piling up wins in the midst of four championship runner-up seasons as the lead driver for a more streamlined Jack Roush organization, Martin wasn't exactly effusive or happy-go-lucky. Even in victory circle he tended to analyze what went wrong instead of what went right.

Mr. Sunshine he was not.

The pre-race buzz is understandably high for the double-file re-starts NASCAR is implementing in the Sprint Cup Series Sunday at Pocono, Pa.

But the real story isn't so much the exciting midseason change in format, but NASCAR's willingness to make a midseason change in format.

Say what you want about stock car's benevolent dictatorship, but in the last few years, the hard-line has been replaced with the open-line. And NASCAR's willingness to adapt -- in the name of more exciting competition -- may be the very thing that keeps it relevant and afloat in these tricky economic times.

NASCAR's primary goal each week is putting on a spectacular show for the fans, but Goodyear's practice of utilizing the same tire for its top three series is hurting the show.

The tire problems that surfaced in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series race last weekend at Dover may have been avoided if Goodyear had in place a specific tire for the Truck Series instead of a general design that services Trucks, NASCAR Sprint Cup and NASCAR Nationwide Series cars.

CONCORD, N.C. (AP) -- Tony Stewart won his first race as a team owner Saturday night, breaking through for a $1 million payday with a victory in the annual All-Star race.

Stewart passed Matt Kenseth with two laps to go of a thrilling final 10-lap shootout to win his first All-Star event in 11 previous starts. It was the first victory since he left Joe Gibbs Racing at the end of last year, after two championships and 10 successful seasons, to become co-owner of Stewart-Haas Racing.