Nascar and Racing David Ragan

Tony Stewart may be working spots for Burger King at the moment, but at the end of Sunday's race, he was making chicken salad.

"It was making chicken salad out of chicken you know what," said Stewart after finishing 5th. "We were pretty fortunate to get a couple of breaks there when we needed them."

The 'breaks' Stewart was talking about including getting back on the lead lap after falling behind thanks to a miscue on pit road. You could also toss in the fact that he kept his Chase hopes alive by not taking a finish deep in the field.

Casey Mears has had a downright awful season in 2009, but it got a little bit better on Sunday.

BRISTOL, Tenn. (AP) -- David Ragan held off teammate Carl Edwards on a two-lap sprint to the finish Friday night to win the Nationwide Series race at Bristol Motor Speedway.

Edwards settled for second, but shaved 91 points off the commanding lead Kyle Busch brought into the race. Busch, who started the night with a 339-point lead over Edwards, was wrecked by Chase Austin while leading early in the race and finished 28th.

Edwards now trails him by 248 points, and wasn't disappointed to lose to his Roush Fenway Racing teammate.

TALLADEGA, Ala. -- After competing in nearly 200 races in NASCAR's three marquee series, David Ragan picked up his first victory in Saturday's Nationwide Series race at Talladega Superspeedway besting, among others, restrictor plate expert Dale Earnhardt Jr.

Ragan positioned his No. 6 Discount Tire Ford just behind the lead pack cars of Ryan Newman, Earnhardt and veteran Tony Raines in the final laps. And when the typical Talladega last lap scramble broke out, Ragan slipped by for the checkered flag about six feet in front of Newman. Joey Logano, Raines and Earnhardt rounded out the top 5.

As Ragan made his maiden trip to Victory Lane, most drivers -- including Earnhardt and Newman -- stepped out onto pit to congratulate the 23-year-old.

Warning: Objects in this post may be the only way to successfully live through the NASCAR off-season. For best results, read rearview mirror early and often.

Driver: David Ragan
Team: No. 6 Roush Fenway Racing Ford
'08 Final Standing: 13th (-2385)
Best Race: New Hampshire (4th-place)
Worst Race: Kansas & Phoenix (43rd-place)

Season in a box: Ragan's biggest impact on the Sprint Cup Series came after his first race at Martinsville when Tony Stewart deemed the then-rookie a "dart without feathers." After 2008, though, Ragan has gained quite a bit more respect from the entire series.

Matt Kenseth's contract at Roush Fenway Racing got extended Thursday afternoon and that was seemingly bad news for his teammate Jamie McMurray.

Kenseth got a new "multi-year dear" from RFR to keep him as the driver of the No. 17 Ford for well past 2010, when his current contract was set to expire. Terms weren't disclosed by the team, but I'd imagine the contract puts Kenseth in a position to make RFR his final place of stock car employment with either a heavily extended contract from his current one or one loaded with options.

Kenseth, a native of Cambridge, Wisc., turns 37 in March.

For teammate McMurray -- who's been nothing short of a disappointment during his time at RFR but showed some flashes of brilliance towards the end of the 2008 -- Kenseth's re-signing might be a nail in the coffin for his future at RFR.

David Ragan is ready to drive the truck.

Or, he's at least ready to drive the colors of the truck.

Roush Fenway Racing & UPS announced on Friday at New Hampshire Motor Speedway that Ragan would sport the brown and white colors of UPS on his No. 6 Ford starting in 2009 as the sponsor makes it's second high-profile move in three years.

David Ragan is 46 points away from making the Chase for the Sprint Cup.

Let me say that again: David Ragan is 46 points away from the making the Chase for the Sprint Cup!

Yes, the driver with one of the coolest hometowns (Unadilla, Georgia -- it just rolls off the tongue) in all the NASCAR racing that got less than a ringing endorsement from Tony Stewart when he entered the Sprint Cup Series in 2006 ("a dart without feathers" according to Smoke) is very quietly making a name for himself in the Sprint Cup garage.

In the past four races, the driver of the Roush Fenway Racing No. 6 Ford has a worst finish of 14th at Indianapolis with three Top-10s, including two 5th-place finishes at Daytona and at Pocono last Sunday.

A finish of 40th at New Hampshire wasn't indicative of how well he ran there, as it was instead the result of teammate Jamie McMurray failing to see Dale Earnhardt Jr. which lead to a chain reaction crash that took out Ragan.

Most importantly, though, is that Ragan has established himself as a major player for one of the final Chase spots with just a handful of races left until the cutoff at Richmond. Ragan, as stated above, is just 46 points away from the cutoff spot of 12th, and just 35 points behind teammate Matt Kenseth in 13th.

Miss the race? Wanna re-live the green-white-checkered finish? Here's your chance, thanks to Youtube.

Watch below for the Jeff Gordon-spinning, David Ragan-near-wrecking, Michael Waltrip-wall-banging, Carl Edwards and Kyle Busch side-by-side finishing awesomeness that was the end of the Coke Zero 400 at Daytona in all of its glory from the live TNT broadcast.

The fun starts below as the field takes the final green flag of the race:



Gordon gets the on-track fireworks show started by getting turned around by Carl Edwards while riding in second place after the leaders exited the tri-oval under the green flag. Gordon took blame for the incident, though it left him with a disappointing 30th-place finish.

With 10 races now left to go until the Chase for the Championship begins at New Hampshire Motor Speedway in September, FanHouse is looking at who's riding the bubble of making into the 10-race championship playoff run.

13th - Kevin Harvick (-2 points): Harvick fell out of the Top-12 in points after dive-bombing Tony Stewart last Sunday at Infineon Raceway during the closing laps of the Toyota/Save Mart 350. The move sent Stewart, Harvick, and two others spinning and relished Harvick to a 30th-place finish.

The finish knocked Harvick down three spots in the Chase ladder while putting Matt Kenseth in to the Top-12. Harvick is in great position to still get back into the Chase in the next ten races though its not a guarantee.

14th - David Ragan (-47 points): The Roush-Fenway Racing driver is in the midst of his second season in the Sprint Cup Series and has truly amassed a season that is much improved from his finishes in 2007.

Ragan could very easily be the one driver who is a big shock in the Chase if a driver in the lower half of the Top-12 puts a string of mediocre finishes together. A big help to Ragan will be second visits to Daytona, Michigan, Pocono, and Richmond between now and the cut off after Richmond in September.

Clint Bowyer took home his first Nationwide Series victory of the 2008 season Saturday afternoon at Bristol Motor Speedway thanks to a persistent rain shower.

Saturday's 300-lapper started nearly two hours later after thunderstorms rumbled through the Tri-Cities of northeastern Tennessee just following Sprint Cup Series final practice. The race finally got underway just past 4:30pm/ET.

171 laps -- 21 past halfway -- were completed before more rain drenched the track. NASCAR wanted to restart the event, but the rain showers wouldn't stop.

The victory was Bowyer's sixth-career Nationwide Series win.

Kasey Kahne was visibly upset when the rain brought the cars to pit road on lap 171 saying that he "pretty much blew that." Kahne had been all over the rear bumper of Bowyer's No. 2 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet for many laps, but wanted to make the pass clean.

Denny Hamlin led early until a flat-tire forced him to pit road on lap 37 and Martin Truex Jr. got tapped by David Ragan off of turn 2, spun into turn 3, and was clipped by Kyle Busch very early in the event. Both Truex and Busch were knocked out of the race.

And yes, there apparently were some Nationwide Series regulars in the event, with Brad Keselowski finishing 4th.

Thankfully, NASCAR was able to get a majority of its schedule completed Saturday afternoon despite the heavy threat of rain. The forecast for Sunday's Food City 500 looks sunny and clear.