Kyle Busch charged through the second half of the racing schedule a year ago, and claimed his first ever Sprint Cup championship with JGR.
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The Federated Auto Parts 400 certainly didn’t provide a brilliant showcase for the upcoming NASCAR Chase for the Sprint Cup.
When Martin Truex, Jr. spun his tires on that final restart, Denny Hamlin sprinted away from the pack, and drove to the victory in the Federated Auto Parts 400 at Richmond International Raceway. David Ragan, Carl Edwards, Brian Scott and AJ Allmendinger also were involved, along with Dylan Lupton, whose No. 83 Toyota ended up on top of the roof of Newman’s No. 31 Chevrolet.
“It’s a stressful night for him; he’s trying to make the Chase”, Stewart said when asked about Newman’s outburst.
“He’s right, that was the third time he had driven into me”. How many times does a guy get a free pass before you’ve had enough of it?
The wreckage caused a stoppage of just more than 20 minutes and sent Newman’s temperature soaring.
But Newman’s sole focus was on Stewart, whom the Richard Childress Racing driver lambasted in a televised interview on NBC Sports Network after being released from the infield care center.
It’s just disappointing that you’ve got somebody old like that retired the way he drives. He corrected a reporter who said that Newman had been penalized – it was RCR that was flagged, and the punishment was a loss of points – and wasn’t up for discussing how he felt. “So I feel like what we tried to do this year – I watch the crew chiefs, drivers and everybody – we just try to go every week and be as good as we can be and race as hard as we can”. Google Tony Stewart, you’ll see all kinds of things he’s done. Look it up on YouTube.
Tony Stewart smirked, “Newman will get his wish in 10 weeks”.
Stewart didn’t get too spicy in his responses. He began the night 22 points out of the final Chase spot and the crash eliminated any chance of him making it.
Chase Elliott, Austin Dillon and Jamie McMurray held on to their slots, holding off challengers Newman and Kasey Kahne. It’s been a very nice regular season for the unheralded driver and his under-funded race team. Hamlin and Truex restarted on the front row, ahead of Kasey Kahne, who was looking for a win in his final chance to get into the Chase for the Sprint Cup, which starts September 18 at Chicagoland Speedway. Hamlin has been a top-10 machine through the late-summer stretch and a win at Watkins Glen International plus Saturday night’s Richmond victory has this team thinking title run. That’s how Buescher got to victory lane at Pocono, where he didn’t pit as weather closed in on the race track and inherited the lead in time for the race to be called.
A dozen drivers already qualified for the Chase and two others, Chase Elliott and Austin Dillon, were in virtually invulnerable positions to qualify at the drop of the green flag. This isn’t the first time that Gibbs has enjoyed a run of dominance but they were usually beat out by the Jimmie Johnson championship buzzsaw of the 2000s. If Power starts from the pole, wins the race, and leads the most laps, Pagenaud will have to finish no lower than fourth to win the championship.
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BUSTED BLANEY: It was a short night for Ryan Blaney, who guessed stubbornness was to blame for an accident just 11 laps into the race.
