Twenty-three-year-old Dylan Lupton made it in the field and will make his first Sprint Cup start on Sunday.
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Should Allmendinger win on his home track Sunday, he would become the 11th different victor in the past 12 Sonoma races and also would make the Chase. He started first in back-to-back races at Bristol and Richmond in April, and won the race at Bristol.
Even if he wins one of the remaining 11 races, Stewart must finish in the Top 30 to qualify for the Chase. He has four victories this year and leads the season standings. They make it look easy, but trust me, it is not! “I feel pretty silly for doing it, but that happens sometimes”, Newgarden said after qualifying. “In this day of social media where everybody is a cricket… on social media, they sit there and chirp, chirp, chirp, chirp until they are in front of you and then they don’t say a damned word”.
“It’s unfortunate that we lost a little bit from the first round to the second round (three positions), but we’re still in good shape”. “I think it shows the versatility we have as drivers and the teams as well, that set up the auto and make the vehicle get around here”.
Stewart said NASCAR’s intensive schedule means it takes over a driver’s entire life.
Well, he sure had fun Sunday. Then comes Daytona next week, for his final appearance as a driver at that vaunted track.
Part of Stewart’s comments Friday reflected his frustration with practice, which ended in an incident with Jamie McMurray.
Stewart got past Hamlin and charged to the checkered flag with the entire side of his vehicle crumpled and his tires slightly smoking from the contact with Hamlin.
“I’m gonna call that luck”, Edwards said. Driving for a midsized team lacking the resources to sustain competitiveness on ovals, he fully recognizes that Sonoma and Watkins Glen represent his best and likeliest chance to score a victory.
Now, he’s eager to move on from NASCAR after this year.
There was a twinge of nostalgia in Tony Stewart’s voice as he was inducted into the Sonoma Raceway Wall of Fame. After chugging a Coca-Cola, he slumped to the ground and sat alongside his auto. “We have been close a couple of times this year now”. I thought I had a shot after the first round but lost some grip the second round and tried harder at the same time, and all of that just didn’t work out. “I know there is. All is fair in love and war”.
Martin Truex Jr. (95.672 mph) qualified third, followed by Kurt Busch (95.654 mph) and Kyle Larson (95.362 mph).
“I think the combination of the corners, the undulation in the grounds, the fact that there’s a lot of fast corners”, said retired driver Dario Franchitti, who won at Elkhart Lake in 1998.
But Larson is quite comfortable on the picturesque 10-turn, 1.99-mile course in California wine country. “You’re going to overstep sometimes, and that’s what I did right there”. “He deserves this now”.
(48) Jimmie Johnson, Chevrolet, 95.027 miles per hour. He is a great friend and has been through so much.
Kurt Busch was one of the most consistent road course racers last season finishing second in this race and fifth at Watkins Glen.
There remains a disconnect between fans who think the Chase is the worst thing ever – too cheesy, too gimmicky – and those who have embraced it wholeheartedly as something NASCAR needed to do to award victories and consistency in the championship equation.
Matt Kenseth, from the powerful Joe Gibbs Racing organization, is usually around 8-1, but this week, because of no top-fives in 16 Sonoma starts, his odds are 50-1. “We got something out of the night”, Edwards was quoted as saying by Fox Sports.
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“With the way the five races had gone before, coming here previous year, the time I had just got back in the vehicle, we weren’t running and finishing the way we needed to”.
