The worst kept secret in NASCAR is now official: Matt Kenseth is headed to Joe Gibbs Racing beginning in 2013. Back in late June, the 2012 Daytona 500 winner announced he would be leaving Roush Fenway Racing, the team he’d raced with since his rookie season back in 2000, at the end of the year. …

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We're getting close! The 10 race stretch to the champinonship known as "the Chase" is now only a week away, and Atlanta still left many more questions raised than answered. Hamlin's back-to-back wins were almost a forethought to the wild card spot that were occupying headlines. However, Hamlin was indeed the driver in Victory Lane …

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*ONE: Pastrana’s Roush Deal the Latest Scramble for Cash* Travis Pastrana is returning to Nationwide Series racing this weekend in one of the most storied rides the series has to offer; the No. 60 of Roush Fenway Racing. Despite having scored no top 10 finishes in his brief NASCAR career, Pastrana is getting the seat that Trevor Bayne was pulled out of earlier this year due to sponsorship woes.

Despite 11 out of the 12 spots in the 2012 Sprint Cup Chase having already been solidified, this weekend’s regular season finale at Richmond International Raceway should prove to be one of the most gripping of the year. That’s because of the lone remaining Chase spot. Though currently held rather handily by Kyle Busch, it’s by no means his to lose. In fact, losing will not be a part of the equation for Busch or four other drivers Saturday night. The objective? Win.

Hello, race fans. Welcome back to Couch Potato Tuesday, where race broadcast criticism is the name of the game. This past week, the Sprint Cup, Nationwide and Camping World Truck Series were each at Atlanta Motor Speedway for 1,000 miles of racing and wearing tires down to the cords. Speaking of wearing down to the cords, I’m pretty sure that Trevor Bayne did quite a bit of that on Sunday night if his practice laps Saturday were any indication. His car seemed to be more at home at Lebanon Valley than Atlanta. Also of note, we’re getting into college football season again. Countdown prior to both the Nationwide and Sprint Cup races was affected by games running long. I have no idea why ESPN thinks that it is a good idea to allot three hours per game. They have to run exceptionally fast in order to finish in that amount of time. At this point, ESPN literally has the power to dictate terms to schools about when they start games (the Tuesday night MAC and Sun Belt Conference events are just one example of this.) I’d suggest moving the start times up, but I guess they’d probably wait until next year to execute any changes.

In his post-race interview after blowing an engine at Atlanta, Carl Edwards said all he could do to get in the Chase was win at Richmond on Saturday and hope for a miracle. The reality is, unless Jeff Gordon and Kyle Busch get involved in a melee from Talladega Nights, Edwards isn’t going to make the playoffs. With three superstar drivers looking at the Chase from outside at the beginning of the summer, it was pretty clear that Kyle Busch, Jeff Gordon and Edwards weren’t all going to claw their way back in. After engine problems at Atlanta, Edwards has one nail left on the claw and is hanging from a ledge.

_The regular season comes to an end this coming weekend at Richmond. Kyle Busch is in the thick of the wild card hunt and is heading to one of his best race tracks on the circuit, while crew chief Dave Rogers has one shot to make or break the title hopes of the No. 18 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota. Rogers is dotting all of his I’s and crossing all of his T’s to make sure the team has every chance to be a part of the 12 teams in the Chase for the title. He talks this week about testing, tire durability, having Busch as his driver and setting up cars to go fast or be comfortable._ Mike Neff: *We’re heading to Richmond this weekend. It is the last race before the Chase and the whole Wild Card scenario is hanging thick in the air. Kyle is very good at Richmond, knowing the circumstances surrounding the weekend and what is at stake, how aggressive can you be with your setup and strategy knowing that if you go too far, you could knock yourself completely out of contention?*

It’s Sunday. You flick on the TV and the NASCAR logo flows across the screen, usually with an aerial shot of this week’s location in the background. The grandstands, shape of the track and familiar buildings rise up out of the trees, desert, hills… whatever the iconic signature of the area might be today. We’ve …

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by Garrett Horton 0 Chase hopeful Joey Logano needs a win at Richmond to make this year’s Chase. It will be tough given Logano’s history at the short track – he hasn’t led a single lap in his seven career starts. 1 Since announcing he would be leaving Roush Fenway Racing at the conclusion of …

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A green-white-checker finish saw Denny Hamlin grab the lead and hold off Jeff Gordon to take his series leading fourth win of the season.

If not for a badly-timed tire problem for Jamie McMurray, Martin Truex Jr. wouldn’t be getting my shoutout — because he’d have won the race. Instead, Truex had to settle for fourth after a wild restart. Adding insult to injury, Truex, who has flown under the media’s radar all year long despite being a fixture in the top 10 in points, garnered relatively little television attention compared with the night’s other race leaders.

Tony Stewart and Matt Kenseth: two racing horses of clearly different colors. One loves Indiana and everything in it; the other is obsessed with the Green Bay Packers. “Smoke” will take his temper to your mouth, then buy you a beer; the “quiet champ” of 2003 has the most sarcastic sense of humor nobody ever hears about. One is a self-described bachelor, winning a title on the heels of dumping his girlfriend last September; Kenseth, in contrast, has had two children within the last three years. Until now, they’ve been tied together by nothing more than a helmet throw, an angry Smoke retaliating for some ill-advised contact that knocked both drivers from a chance of winning Bristol in August. In a few days, perhaps an announcement will leave them loosely connected; Kenseth is poised to take over Stewart’s former No. 20 car, the Home Depot Toyota at Joe Gibbs Racing starting in 2013. But as Atlanta’s competition failed to break the “bad news” cycle, these men dominate the NASCAR headlines for another reason no one wants to talk about.