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Welcome to the Cup Scene Daily for
Vol. III,No.VIXII RACE DAY EDITION
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Quote Of The day: 7 DAY ARCHIVE SundayMonday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday INSIDE TODAY'S ISSUE: Green looks to "disturb the peace" Kahne will keep fighting CJ.Gordon wins third-quarter SPEED Driver of the Year voting Nextel Cup elite leave also-rans in dust Mark Martin is jazzed up about MTV appearance Earnhardt's loving the pressure Kvapil beats the rain to win truck series race Evernham's to Mayfield: Let's enjoy it while we can Cravens's swan song today Earnhardt steers a humble course Drivers to watch at New Hampshire Cup Scene readers speak out
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Happy Birthday: Keith Barnwell Ten drivers. Ten races. Ten tracks. Let the Chase begin.
"A lot of drivers are now going to be excited about going to New Hampshire," former Cup champion and current NBC and TNT NASCAR analyst Benny Parsons said. New Hampshire is a good place to start for the Hendrick Motorsports teammates who start the Chase 1-2. Jeff Gordon has won a contender-best three races at the track, and Jimmie Johnson swept the summer and fall races in 2003. And if experience counted for everything, Jeff Gordon would be a lock to win NASCAR's first 10-man, 10-race championship playoff. The four-time series champion goes into today's Sylvania 300, the first event of what NASCAR has dubbed the "Chase for the Nextel Cup," as the points leader and the odds-on favorite to still be on top after the season finale Nov. 21 in Homestead, Fla. Among the other title contenders, only Matt Kenseth (2003) and Tony Stewart (2002) have won Cup championships, and Gordon's 69 race wins are far and away the most of the group, with the 34 by four-time series runner-up Mark Martin the closest among the other nine. Winning another title to go with the championships he won in 1995, 1997, 1998 and 2001, would mean a great deal to the 33-year-old Gordon, who has finished fourth in the standings each of the past two years. "The last couple of years have been decent for us, but we've been missing the boat and not been in that championship battle," Gordon said. "This is very exciting and certainly an opportunity we want to take advantage of."
Under the new format, once the 10 contenders were locked in, the points were reset, with the contenders separated in increments of five points heading into Sunday's race. Gordon leads teammate Jimmie Johnson by five points and 10th-place Ryan Newman by 45. In between are Dale Earnhardt Jr., Stewart, Kenseth, Elliott Sadler, Kurt Busch, Martin and Jeremy Mayfield. Thanks to the rain that washed out Friday's qualifying, the lineup was set by car owner points and that means the contenders will line up for the start of today's race at the front of the 43-car grid. "In a way it's kind of neat that the 10 guys in the championship will start out this thing all together," Martin said. "We've just got to hope that nobody gets too crazy out there, but I don't think that will happen. At least, not yet." Johnson is very happy to be starting out front on the tight 1.058-mile oval. "Track position is real important here," Johnson said. "It's a tough place to pass. Anything that can help in these last 10 races to keep your frustration level lower is a bonus. "This track is about a groove and a half where you can really race side-by-side. If you force the issue, you've got two grooves. That raises the frustration level for your team and for the other guys. And you've got to be very clean these final 10 (races) to not get anybody mad at you to where they want to pay you back or dump you." Johnson said he expects some of the contending teams to take a conservative strategy and others to go out aggressively - at least for a few races. "But I would think that regardless of wherever you are after five or six (races), it will look like a typical championship," Johnson said. "Once you get up there and you're down to the final three or four races and you're looking for points, you're going to switch to conservative mode." Unlike some of the drivers in the top 10, Johnson and Gordon have been at or near the top of the points most of the season and have felt little pressure. That could change starting today. "Fortunately for us, we really haven't had to be very conservative to this point, so I think we'll be aggressive, and the No. 24 (Gordon) will be aggressive," Johnson said. "And I definitely think that Mark, Jeremy and Elliott have been set on kill for a few months and it's been working for them." With rain also wiping out Saturday's scheduled Cup practice, all the teams will start the important race with a lot of question marks. "With the rain washing the rubber off (the track) and only Friday's practice to go by, there's going to be a lot of guessing and a lot of adjusting going on early in the race," said Busch, who won the July race here despite starting 32nd. The fourth-year Cup driver can hardly wait to get the 10-race championship started, though. "At this time of year, you usually have two or maybe four guys running for the Cup," Busch said. "This time around, we've got 10 and we're one of them. That was the objective from the get-go and now we've got tests saved up and we've got a whole new outlook on things. "Who knows, we could be the points leader come the end of Sunday." Newman is only 45 points behind Gordon, but the 10th-place driver knows he has an uphill battle – though that hill isn't nearly as steep as it would have been had the points not been reset under the new Chase format. Further, he's been one of the most dominant drivers in the last few years at NHIS. In five previous starts at the 1.058-mile New England oval, Newman has one win (his first career Cup triumph), three poles, four top-five and five overall top-10 finishes. Needing to get off to a good start in the Chase, he couldn't pick a better place to do just that. "Winning races and leading laps will be the important things in these last 10 races," Newman said Friday. "I think whoever does well here and at Dover [next week] will be in the driver's seat for the championship." Newman will start 10th in Sunday's race, though he had the fastest car in practice Friday morning and was considered a favorite to win the pole after covering the 1.058-mile New England oval in 28.538 seconds (133.464 mph). That was a significant advantage over the next quickest and fastest driver, Kasey Kahne (28.819 seconds, 132.163 mph). "Track position is always important, but it's more important at this track and Martinsville than it is anywhere else," Newman said. "It's all about being flat, and the flatter [the track] is, the more important track position becomes. "Winning races and leading laps will be the important things in these last 10 races." Those drivers not in the chase for the title will be trying to win races abd lead laps as well and they say they'll give no quarter to the title contenders today. Last weekend at Richmond, it didn't matter to Mike Wallace who it was trying to race his way into NASCAR's championship chase, Wallace was not going to pull over so they could gain another position and more points. No matter how much pleading. "Any driver that lays over and just lets somebody drive by, they should be fired," Wallace said. Overlooked by NASCAR's new points system is that it has created two classes of Nextel Cup competitors - those 10 drivers racing for the title and the other 33 who are not. Although most of the field has no title hopes, it doesn't mean they're second-class citizens merely in the race to be passed - something a title-contending team might think. "It's important for us to race to win," says Robby Gordon, not eligible for the title. "We'll do what it takes. If these guys [in the top 10] don't think that, they've got another surprise coming." Gordon's not talking cheap shots, just racing hard. That's what Wallace says he was doing when he kept Mayfield out of the lead for more than 40 laps last week. Some might say that Wallace should have allowed Mayfield by to earn the five bonus points for leading. Mayfield, they'd say, was trying to race his way into the title chase and a chance at the $5.2 million prize; Wallace was not in title contention and had nothing to gain. Not exactly. "Jeremy Mayfield has a full-time Cup ride," Wallace says. "I don't have one." So, Wallace kept his lead. Mayfield says he didn't mind since the third-place car was not close. Had others closed on them, Mayfield says he would not have been as patient. Eventually, Wallace motioned for Mayfield to pass low. After Mayfield led the lap, Wallace says he tried to get back by but couldn't. Later, Wallace said McMurray's team asked him to stay behind McMurray so they wouldn't lose any more points. Wallace didn't. McMurray failed to make the title race by 15 points, but one position would not have mattered. Jeff Gordon says that drivers not racing for the championship, such as Wallace, could factor in who wins this year's title. "You don't want to tick any of those guys off because they don't have near as much to lose as you do," says Jeff Gordon, who enters Sunday's race at New Hampshire International Speedway atop the points standings and on the pole after rain canceled qualifying. "If you go out there and mess with somebody and make an enemy, that enemy could cost you the championship, not necessarily because they might wreck but just because they might race you different and race you extremely hard and not do anything to help you." In what is now a 10-race season, one mistake or crash could be too much to overcome and cost a driver a title. So, drivers will live by the Golden Rule in how they treat their competitors. Only thing is, everyone's interpretation is different on what's allowed and what isn't. Earnhardt Jr. has a simple explanation on how contenders should race those outside the top 10. "If you're a jerk to Kenny Schrader, you're going to get treated like a jerk back no matter whether you're in the chase or not," says Earnhardt. "You try to treat everybody with respect all year long and maybe they'll cut you a break when it comes down to it and when you need it." |
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