Race Weekend Central

Who’s Hot/Who’s Not in Sprint Cup: 2009 Crown Royal 400 at Richmond Edition

Watching the running order during Saturday’s Richmond race was similar to watching a yoyo go up and down. Pit strategy, brake wear, copious amounts of cautions, timely adjustments and good ol’ fashioned hard-nosed racing worked in harmony to jostle both the running positions and the points standings all throughout Saturday night’s event. In comparison to …

Read more

The Big 6: Questions Answered After the 2009 Crown Royal presents the Russ Friedman 400 at Richmond

Who… gets my shout-out of the race? The shout out of the week goes to Sam Hornish Jr. in the No. 77 Mobil 1 Dodge. After his rookie year in the Cup Series, many people had all but written off the former Indy Racing League champion. However, this season, the team has improved by leaps …

Read more

Fanning the Flames: When the Story About the Story Becomes THE Story

Q: Why did NASCAR penalize Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Casey Mears for their actions at Phoenix? I thought NASCAR wanted emotion… isn’t that what Brian said last year? I could maybe understand a penalty if Junior spun Mears during green and caused a big wreck, but on the cool-down lap?

Crew Swaps Treat Symptoms, Not Disease, for Nos. 07, 29 Teams

After a thoroughly disappointing start to 2009 for the No. 07 and No. 29 teams, two operations that secured Chase berths in 2008, news broke today that owner Richard Childress has swapped the crew chiefs and crews of both teams in an effort to improve chemistry and performance on the racetrack. On paper, changing things …

Read more

Did You Notice? Restrictor Plate 1-Hit Wonders & the New Precedent of “Probation”

Did You Notice? Just probation for Casey Mears and Dale Earnhardt Jr.? Did you really expect the sanctioning body to do anything more after their little post-race altercation at Phoenix? We already have the U.S. Army spread out in Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere across the globe… there’s no need to dispatch an additional battalion to …

Read more

Who’s Hot/Who’s Not in Sprint Cup: 2009 Subway Fresh 500 at Phoenix Edition

Another one bit the dust in the sands out west at Phoenix Saturday night. But as the smoke cleared from the Cup Series’ eighth race of the season, we’re left with plenty of storylines from a weekend’s worth of action at PIR. Mark Martin became one of the oldest drivers ever to win a NASCAR …

Read more

Frontstretch Fantasy Insider: Keeping Your Team Hot in Phoenix’s Dry Heat

After a week off to regenerate the batteries and fatten up on Peeps and chocolate, the series is heading to the desert Southwest. The quirky 1-mile oval outside of Phoenix tests the drivers and the teams to come up with a setup that can handle the tight turns 1 and 2 as well as the …

Read more

Top 10 Places NASCAR Personalities May Have Found Their Easter Eggs

Author’s Note: It has become sort of a tradition (looking back) that around Easter, this list has usually done something about Easter eggs and the creative places certain NASCAR personalities may stick them – excuse me – perhaps “find them” might be a better phrase. With the ever changing world of sponsorship, we should have …

Read more

Who’s Hot/Who’s Not in NASCAR’s Other Top Series

The NASCAR Sprint Cup and Camping World Truck series each took a breather this Easter Weekend while the Nationwide Series fired its engines (and Gibson guitar amps) in Nashville. Since this column already detailed the HOTNESS and NOTNESS of the Cup Series following last week’s events in Texas, we find it only fair to take …

Read more

Did You Notice? Keselowski Kicking Logano’s Butt, Harvick Unhappy at Intermediates & Nationwide’s No-No?

Did You Notice? What keeps Kevin Harvick from being labeled a serious championship contender? It’s his lifetime performance on 1.5-mile ovals. Those tracks used to be easy pickins’ for Harvick – his first two Cup victories came at Atlanta and Chicagoland in 2001 – but over the last few seasons, his fortitude has faded at …

Read more

Frontstretch NASCAR Power Rankings: Top 15 After the 2009 Samsung 500 at Texas

Things at Texas happen fast these days, leaving the margin of error slim to none on what’s become the sport’s speediest track. From Kyle Busch cutting a tire to Carl Edwards having trouble on pit road, too many of the sport’s biggest superstars discovered that answer too little, too late. The end result was a …

Read more

Talking NASCAR TV: Digger Returns… But That’s Not the Only Problem with Texas Coverage

Hello, race fans. Texas provided us with long green-flag runs on both Saturday and Sunday’s races. Usually, this means that the field gets extensively stretched out, and Texas was no exception to the norm. So, how did this weekend’s television coverage add up? Let’s take a look. On Saturday, the Nationwide Series, back from a …

Read more