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August 06, 2007
Kurt Busch Is King!!
By Mark Young
Well my fellow blog-heads Kurt Busch completely dominated the triangle known as Pocono yesterday. I wondered if the other drivers had restrictor plates on or something he was so fast. The victory puts him in the Chase....for now s he is only 7 points ahead of Dale Junior. I think that Kurt's worst running position, with the exception of cycling through green flag pit stops, was 9th. The Miller Lite Dodge has been running very well of late and I think we should get used to hearing Kurt's name called on Sunday because this team could be peaking at just the right time to help lock them into the Chase.
Pocono was typical in my opinion. I was able to get things done around the house and check it every ten minutes or so and found that very little had happened. I give a good deal of credit to ESPN because I saw improvement over last week's production. They have a long way to go to get back on top of the broadcast world where they were years ago but I am seeing things to give me hope.
On we go to Watkins Glen International and another road course, will Robby Gordon be allowed to drive this week? Will we see fireworks, confusion, and stupidity this week like we did in Canada? Time will tell my friends.
What do you think?
August 6, 2007 | Permalink
Comments
Mark,
Kurt definitely won the day and deserves the crown. Jr should get an honorable mention for the spin and the subsequent pit work that got him up to second.
Wasn't much of a race, but that's Poconap. Only the well spaced cautions, added to the ridiculous, but convenient, "tape in turn 3 caution," kept it from being even more boring.
The coverage was solid. Draft Track, however, get's more and more irritating as they seem to want to use it for every event on the track. DT was displayed more than some of the cars that were running. Candy is good. Eating the whole bag at once is not so good.
Posted by: Keith | Aug 6, 2007 7:47:14 AM
No question about this. The 2 car was clearly the class of the field.
Junior showed what he and his team can do under pressure.
The rest of the finishing grid contained the usual suspects with a few exceptions. Good to see casey Mears continue to rise and be in contention each race.
It ws fun to watch Rudd and Elliott dice with one another late in the race. Even though it was only for position, it still showed that they have that competitive drive.
Keith, I got a nap betweeen lap 40 and 85. At my age, if they don't start earlier (flag at 1pm) and have more action packed races, I'll probably miss the whole thing.
Congratulations to Kurt Bush, King of France Mountain.
Posted by: Fred | Aug 6, 2007 8:40:56 AM
So how long before "conspiracy theorists" start claiming JR created his own "needed" caution? Been known to happen.
Gotta give Kurt and his team credit, they did it all right, and it paid in spades.
Posted by: TLH101 | Aug 6, 2007 8:42:08 AM
TLH101 I thought that very thing about Jr. spinning to get a caution the minute I saw them changing the shock. But wait a minute, those same conspiracy theorists are the same ones that said he doesn't have talent so he couldn't possibly have done that on purpose.
Posted by: Mark | Aug 6, 2007 9:16:47 AM
It was great seeing Kurt win again!!
I like the Draft Track, but wish they would show it when you got say 5 or 6 cars bunched up.
Posted by: Kristy | Aug 6, 2007 9:20:04 AM
Hey Mark,
Great to see that 2 car back on top. Feared that motor wouldn't last.
Please file draft trax with 3D, on sat morning cartoons.
I know there is plenty of room for more Poco-bashing as boring. But, I still love that shot of the cars fanning then funneling into the tunnel turn. Add this track to the chase.
Posted by: Larry | Aug 6, 2007 11:05:53 AM
"Please file draft trax with 3D, on sat morning cartoons."
What is this Larry?
This was a better Pocono race than most have been.
Posted by: Mark | Aug 6, 2007 11:39:13 AM
Typical Pocono? I suppose the spirited shootout between Stewart and Hamlin in June was unusual? Puh-leeze.
Larry, don't add tracks to the Chase - drop the Chase altogether.
Posted by: Mike Daly | Aug 6, 2007 11:47:06 AM
DROP THE CHASE!! I agree with you on that one Daly. I missed the majority of the June Pocono race so that is why I said this one was better than usual.
Posted by: Mark | Aug 6, 2007 11:59:32 AM
I can't wait to see them run draft trax at Martinsville. If they try I hope Rusty and Petree speak up or they'll be made fools of trying to tell us about the "strong" 90mph draft. LOL
They did show more of the action yesterday albeit Pocono is fairly light on action at times. I think they'll be ok.
Anybody see Steven Wallace saturday? Poor guy still looks pretty beat up. Couldv'e been far worse but felt for him. What a week!
Posted by: ScottfromWI | Aug 6, 2007 12:53:12 PM
Have we seen a more dominant performance this year than the #2 yesterday? Damn, he had it covered!! And the #12 was doing pretty well too. Has Penske found something that has been missing this year?
SLIGHTLY OFF TOPIC: I am playing with scoring systems from other series. Using the F1 system, Gordon leads Hamlin 92-50! F1 gives points only to the top 8. If NASCAR used such a system, maybe it should expand to the top 20 or 25. As I reflect, I could live with a system that does not give points to every single starter, but the F1 system also doesn't give winning too big a bonus: 10-8-6-5-4-3-2-1. As someone suggested before, double the numbers or something...
Now if I could just find a website that lists how each driver finished in each race this year...I.e., Gordon finished 10th, 2nd, 2nd... without having to look up each race.
Posted by: Doug in CA | Aug 6, 2007 2:19:24 PM
I can't bring myself to give either Busch brother king of anything. At least not right now. Sorry.
But I thought the 8 team did a fabulous job getting the pole and then recovering from an aggressive set up.
They are kings of my Bud Mountain!
Posted by: Shirley | Aug 6, 2007 2:23:23 PM
Ditto, Shirley. I cannot bring myself to cheer for either Busch.
Great hootin' and hollerin' for #8 Team, though.
Posted by: Doris | Aug 6, 2007 3:07:33 PM
Ladies, ladies, ladies. No matter how much you don't like either one of those two guys you have to at least agree that the #2 car was without a doubt the strongest car in Pennsylvania let alone Pocono yesterday.....
Posted by: Mark | Aug 6, 2007 3:15:19 PM
No conspiracy on the spinout. He did it to cause a caution so he could fix his car. No jr fan here, but it was pretty smart. I had not thought about all the time they gave him to fix it until someelse mentioned it. It was a long caution for a simple spinout. At least he agreed he was lucky to finish 2nd. But the most luck of all was friday. The tracker had him qualifying 30th when the rain came as he was almost finished. If he had started that far back with the car as bad as it was Sunday, he would have been lapped very soon.
Posted by: tom | Aug 6, 2007 3:57:49 PM
"Now if I could just find a website that lists how each driver finished in each race this year...I.e., Gordon finished 10th, 2nd, 2nd... without having to look up each race."
Doug, try racingreference.info, or better yet
[url]http://www.jeffgordon.com/racing/default.sps?itype=12251[/url]
For Gordon.
[url]http://www.joegibbsracing.com/current_season/jgr_nc_11/nc_11_results.php[/url]
Hamlin
[url]http://www.roushracing.com/matt_kenseth/default.asp?page=/matt_kenseth/results_bs_2007.htm&menu=busch[/url]
Killer Bee Matt
And so on. Looks like the team pages are the best place to get the info to me.
Posted by: FedEx Guy | Aug 6, 2007 4:01:28 PM
Thanks to all who have directed me to places where drivers' results are listed. I managed to tweak racing-reference.info enough to have it all in one place, but do I really want to do it? The answer is that I do, because this point system argument has me fascinated. I keep imagining that I'm on a committee of 5, along with Mike Daly and some others, and we have been told not to emerge from our meeting room until we have agreed on a scoring system. To do that, I have to give up my 43-42-41 position, and Mike will have to give up his "most wins is the champ" position.
And again, the little I have done so far reinforces the fact that Jeff Gordon is having an absolutely astonishing year. 19 of 21 top tens???
Finally, can anyone tell me this: a driver runs five races. He wins one, finishes third in one, and finishes seventh in another. He has one win. Does he have one or two top fives? 1 or 3 top tens? I.e., does "top ten" mean a finish between 6th and 10th? Or is it 10th or better?
Posted by: Doug in CA | Aug 6, 2007 4:14:02 PM
"Now if I could just find a website that lists how each driver finished in each race this year...I.e., Gordon finished 10th, 2nd, 2nd... without having to look up each race."
Doug, try racingreference.info, or better yet
[url]http://www.jeffgordon.com/racing/default.sps?itype=12251[/url]
For Gordon.
[url]http://www.joegibbsracing.com/current_season/jgr_nc_11/nc_11_results.php[/url]
Hamlin
[url]http://www.roushracing.com/matt_kenseth/default.asp?page=/matt_kenseth/results_bs_2007.htm&menu=busch[/url]
Killer Bee Matt
And so on. Looks like the team pages are the best place to get the info to me.
Posted by: FedEx Guy | Aug 6, 2007 4:14:57 PM
Doug in CA
The driver would have 1 win,2 top fives and 3 top tens.That is the way the stats have been explained to me.Hope that helps in your "quest".
Posted by: Short Lady | Aug 6, 2007 4:57:48 PM
On my scoring tangent, thanks for the help. I took the top ten drivers after Indianapolis and applied the F1 system to them after Pocono. The results are surprising. Remember that F1 gives points only to the top 8. (Number in parens is NASCAR position.)
1. Gordon (1), 105 pts.
2. Johnson (9), 73 pts.
3. Hamlin (2), 56 pts.
4. Stewart (5), 54 pts.
5. Burton (4), 51 pts.
6. Kenseth (3), 48 pts.
7. Harvick (7), 37 pts.
8. KyBusch (8), 36 pts.
9. Edwards (6), 31 pts.
10. Bowyer (10), 14 pts.
Clearly the wins pay big time. Johnson's 4 wins bring him back to 2nd from 9th (after Indy.) And having a nice top 15 car means zip if you don't get points after 8th place.
F1 scores 8 of about 22 cars. Call it 1/3. I'll try to tweak the F1 system to score the top 14 places, about 1/3.
BTW, Mike D., after 21 races (and 4 wins) last year, Kahne would have had 54 points under this system. He finished out of the top 8 11 times in 21 races.
Comments welcome.
Posted by: Doug in CA | Aug 6, 2007 5:30:17 PM
Kurt Busch is King? King of what? Weird rambling victory lane interviews? What a kook!! He had a great car but why does he look like he's on a double dose of Prozac when they talk to him? That guy is just odd. He really weirds me out when he's on tv. I have always loved Penske teams since I live where they used to be HQ'd but a lot of people around here just can't find any love for KB.
Posted by: Buschiswhacked | Aug 6, 2007 6:44:22 PM
Doug -- The F1 system is better than it seems. There may be only a 2-point difference between first and second, but that amount represents a 20 percent drop. If my math is correct (and y'all remember, I teach English, so it very well may not be), that would be the same as a NASCAR system that awarded 185 points to win and 148 for second. Now, that's incentive!
Posted by: David Green | Aug 6, 2007 7:46:57 PM
Sorry, Mark; as for the topic of your post, yes. Kurt Busch -- weird or not -- is king.
As for the question you posed near the end of the post, RE: Robby Gordon's status for Watkins Glen, I suspect they may let him drive, but they're going to whack him big-time in dinero and "valuable Nextel Cup points" (can't use the word "points" by itself anymore, you know).
Posted by: David Green | Aug 6, 2007 7:51:21 PM
David,
He gets the Super NASCAR whammy...He'll lose owner points also! And, his owner has to pay his fine.
Posted by: Keith | Aug 6, 2007 9:13:02 PM
Doug in CA, recalculate that with the following -
Latford point system but with 300 (instead of 175) points for race winners and 100 bonus points per race for most laps led.
Posted by: Mike Daly | Aug 6, 2007 9:47:40 PM
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