Nascar and Racing Jimmie Johnson

Perhaps, you could say, Saturday's practice sessions had more twists and turns than the 10-turn road course they happened on.

An favorite, an underdog and a three-time champion were all involved in incidents that should have a good bit of effect on Sunday's 110-lapper at Infineon Raceway, and a rookie even got punted in the support race to accentuate a wild day.

All in a day's work, one would suppose.

The wide racing surface with multiple grooves at Michigan International Speedway often leads to a clean, green race and Sunday's LifeLock 400 was no different with fuel mileage spelling the final name of the game.

Greg Biffle and Jimmie Johnson both eliminated themselves by driving too hard and burning too much fuel in the final laps, and Mark Martin wisely conserved just enough fuel to dramatically win the race after running out of gas himself in the final corner.

And despite the back-to-back fuel mileage finishes in the Sprint Cup Series, the finish of Sunday's race certainly added a little bit of spice to an otherwise vanilla day.

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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.

Since we're a little late on this week's edition of Sprint Cup Notes & Quotes, we're gonna do both a rewind of last weekend's festivities at Dover and a bit on Wednesday night's Prelude to the Dream. Capisce? Capisce.

Prelude to the Twitter - Can't be in or around the booming metropolis that is Rossburg, Oh., (Pop: 224) for Wednesday night's Prelude to the Dream at Eldora Speedway? No problem, FH has you covered with live twittering from the fourth row up behind the start/finish line just for you! Follow us here: www.twitter.com/FanHouseRacing

Rain, for the love of Pete, go away - What happens when you invite 20-plus NASCAR drivers to compete in a charity race at a half-mile dirt oval? Well, they bring rain -- just as they have for three of the past four NASCAR event weekends.

You'd think Ron Capps' day job driving a nitro-powered Funny Car 300 miles per hour in National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) competition would be enough to satisfy his need for challenge and excitement.

"There's not a whole lot that can compare to that but when you go through Turn One at Eldora and Jeff Gordon's on your wheel or you're trading paint with Jimmie Johnson and Tony Stewart, it pretty much rivals what we do in a Funny Car,'' said Capps, who leads the NHRA's Funny Car championship standings and is coming off his fourth win of the season Sunday in his NAPA-sponsored Dodge Charger Funny Car.

As far as Capps is concerned, Wednesday night's HBO pay-per-view all-star race, the Prelude to the Dream on the dirt high-banks of Eldora Speedway, is just as much fun for the racers as it is the fans cheering them on -- all in the name of big buck charity donations which will go to U.S. military themed charities this year.

And Capps wouldn't dream of missing out.

DOVER, Del. (AP) -- Jimmie Johnson went from running away from the field to running down Tony Stewart.

Johnson nipped at Stewart's bumper, went nose-to-nose, then soared past him on an outside pass on the concrete track.

One Cup champion outdueling another in the battle for the checkered flag.

Johnson thrashed the field, then rebounded from a late pit stop that dropped him back into traffic to catch Stewart with two laps left in a thrilling finish in the Sprint Cup series race Sunday at Dover International Speedway.

"We just couldn't hold off Jimmie," Stewart said. "He was like a freight train coming."

Where: Lowe's Motor Speedway
Time: Saturday 7:00 p.m./EDT
TV/Radio: SPEED, MRN Radio
Twitter: Updates at FanHouseRacing
Forecast: 63 degrees, 80% chance of rain
Distance: 4 segments, 100 laps (150 miles)
Pole Winner: Jimmie Johnson
2008 Winner: Kasey Kahne
The last time rain affected the All-Star event at Lowe's Motor Speedway, Jeff Gordon walled his primary No. 24 in a 2001 first-turn crash thanks to rain on the track and later won the event in his backup. While that's a legendary story, the rain isn't -- and it might take center stage tonight.

If NASCAR's looking for a good way to spice up qualifying, they've already got the format ready to roll.

But before we tackle that issue, Jimmie Johnson will lead off Saturday night's NASCAR Sprint All-Star Challenge at Lowe's Motor Speedway after he and his team dropped a fast time of 121.416 seconds in the three lap and four-tire pit stop qualifying process.

Johnson will lead Kurt Busch and Matt Kenseth to the green flag for the first segment after one of the most-enjoyable ways to qualifying for a race the sport has come up with.

As comforting as it is to see NASCAR's new drug policy work, it makes you wonder what was going on before the stricter enforcement.

This weekend Jeremy Mayfield became the first Sprint Cup Series driver suspended indefinitely under the tougher random drug testing policy instituted this year. Two other crew members from other teams also tested positive, bringing the total to five suspensions in the first four months of the season.

Unlike the "wink-wink" slaps on the wrist NASCAR gives its drivers for in-race offenses, stock car's sanctioning body is proving itself serious about its new drug testing policy.

And it should be.

Let's take a quick glance at some of the Richmond post-race storylines:

"We lost the brakes."

Jimmie Johnson, as Saturday night at Richmond International Raceway proved, isn't the racing robot with a switch stuck on "Dominate" we've come to think he is after three-straight Sprint Cup titles. Nope, not even at a track where he's won three of the last four events before Saturday night's race.

In fact, it was an all-around miserable night for the No. 48 after brake problems caused him to spin once, get caught up in another crash and then race the rest of the way with a damaged race car. Unfortunately for the rest of the competition, his 36th-place finish won't be a barometer of his 2009 season.