“Summer’s Five Things” is a daily column by Summer Bedgood for NASCAR fans to catch up on the most recent, relevant, and need-to-know news and information in the sport! While mostly focused on NASCAR, this column may also feature other interesting and exciting moments from the world of motorsports. Enjoy!
- Brad Keselowski wins back-to-back races in two of NASCAR’s crown jewels
Up until very recently in the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series season, no one other than the “Big Three” of Martin Truex Jr., Kevin Harvick, and Kyle Busch were showing a lot of speed. Sure, Clint Bowyer was the only other driver with multiple wins and Kyle Larson had spent a lot of time up front, but other than that, no one came even close.
So to now look back over the past two weeks and see Team Penske driver Brad Keselowski in Victory Lane is quite a surprise.
Of Team Penske’s three drivers (Keselowski, Joey Logano and Ryan Blaney) and their one satellite team (Paul Menard with Wood Brothers Racing), only one driver had gone to Victory Lane in the first 24 races of the season — Logano at Talladega Superspeedway. Otherwise, the Team Penske drivers have rarely contended for wins and seem to lack the speed they need to go from running in the back half of the top 10 to getting up front and leading laps.
That all seemed to take a turn a couple of weeks ago in the Bojangles’ Southern 500 at Darlington Raceway. While the Team Penske duo of Keselowski and Logano certainly didn’t have the fastest cars, they were absolutely in the top three. Keselowski’s pit crew earned him the lead on what would be the final pitstop of the day, and the driver of the No. 2 took advantage and drove away to win the race.
A little over a week later on Monday in the rain-postponed Big Machine Vodka 400 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, Keselowski again made it to Victory Lane, again despite not being the fastest car. Leading only nine laps en route to the victory, a pit strategy call by crew chief Paul Wolfe for fresher tires allowed Keselowski to power by Denny Hamlin on a late-race restart and never looked back.
Suddenly, Keselowski has gone from a dark horse at best to a driver carrying some serious momentum into the Playoffs, which starts next weekend at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
“…About to enter the playoffs, of course having those few extra playoff bonus points, you never know when you’re going to need those,” said Keselowski post-race. “You just can’t ever predict it. Having five more of those sure does make us feel good about the next 10 weeks ahead.”
Keselowski earned 10 extra Playoff points with his victories the last two weeks, which gave him a higher ranking when the points were reset following the race at IMS.
This was the first victory for team owner Roger Penske in the Brickyard 400. Penske has earned 17 Indianapolis 500 victories in the Verizon IndyCar Series. Team Penske driver Will Power earned the victory in that race back in May.
Keselowski’s teammates weren’t able to keep up with him this time around. Logano’s team had to change a left front shock early in the race and was able to rally for a 13th-place finish on the lead lap. Blaney had a few pit road miscues that cost him some track position, and was able to salvage an 11th-place result. Menard, a former Brickyard 400 winner, finished ninth.
Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Unofficial Race Results
- Justin Allgaier wins first of NASCAR doubleheader on Monday
To say rain impacted the weekend at Indianapolis Motor Speedway would be an understatement. The track was supposed to see on-track action for three days with the traditional Friday-Saturday-Sunday weekend. However, because of persistent rain and mist in the area, the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series and NASCAR XFINITY Series didn’t see a single car on track until Monday…
…when the drivers pulled onto the racetrack for pace laps and to take the green flag.
No practice. No qualifying. Just racing.
Turns out that works just fine for Justin Allgaier.
In the NASCAR XFINITY Series race, Allgaier led a race high 41 laps and went on to win his fifth race of the season and 10th of his career. It was his first victory at IMS.
“This one is for my dad, because at Brickyard Crossing up there, he drove me up here every Wednesday night during the winter, so that I could take classes to be the best that I could be, not only inside the car but outside the car,” said an emotional Allgaier after the race. “It was about three-and-a-half hours, and he drove me here every Wednesday night, so hats off to him.”
The XFINITY Series ran Monday morning ahead of the Cup Series race, with eight drivers competing in both races: Ryan Blaney, Chase Elliott, Ty Dillon, Austin Dillon, Ross Chastain, JJ Yeley, David Starr, and BJ McLeod.
Allgaier currently holds the points lead by 49 points over Cole Custer. If he is able to hang on to the points lead for the regular season finale next week at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, he will earn the regular season championship with 15 extra Playoff points being applied to his points reset following the race.
NASCAR XFINITY Series Unofficial Race Results
NASCAR XFINITY Series Unofficial Driver Points
- Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Playoff Field is Set
With Monday at Indianapolis Motor Speedway serving as the final race of the regular season for the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series, the 16-driver field has been set for the 10-race Playoffs that will determine the 2018 champion.
Kyle Busch was declared the regular season champion after finishing eighth in the Brickyard 400. Busch has won six races, earned 17 top fives, 21 top 10s, and led 1,116 laps over the first 26 races of the season. Busch would lead all of those categories if it weren’t for his closest competitor this year, Kevin Harvick.
Following the points reset, Busch and Harvick are tied for the top of the standings. All drivers are reset to 2,000 points at the beginning of the Playoffs, then allotted the Playoff points they earned throughout the season by virtue of race wins and stage wins. Busch got an additional 15 Playoff points for being the regular season champion.
14 of the 16 drivers were already locked into the Playoffs either on wins or points heading into Monday’s race, with Jimmie Johnson and Alex Bowman still in question. However, as long as someone below them in points did not win the race on Sunday, they were both in.
With Keselowski serving as a repeat winner and having already been locked into the Playoffs on points, both drivers were safe and would move on to the postseason.
Seven-time champion Johnson seemed to still have confidence in his team’s ability to go out and contend for the championship, despite the fact that they have not gone to Victory Lane yet this season and have only led 29 laps all year.
“Well, we have a lot of experience,” said Johnson. “I think our experience in pressure-packed situations will help us and hopefully help us get where we need to. But, we do need speed. I’m looking at experience and I’m also looking at time. We still have ten weeks left to find some speed. If we can win at some key races and transfer; we have the ROVAL in the first round, we have short tracks, we have my best track at Dover. If we can stay alive and get to Homestead, who knows what can happen down there.”
For Bowman, while he acknowledged that, yes, Hendrick Motorsports as a whole is still lacking in speed in comparison to the rest of the field, he is grateful for and wants to make the most of this opportunity.
“Just being a part of it is really cool,” said Bowman. “To come from where I was at in my career is so unobtainable. Just driving for Hendrick Motorsports seemed unobtainable, but to make the Playoffs in my first year back is really cool. It’s a special thing to be a part of. It’s frustrating after a day like today, but it’s just cool to be a part of it.”
The first round of the Playoffs is the Round of 16, where the four drivers at the bottom of standings at the end of three races — Las Vegas, Richmond, and Charlotte (ROVAL) — will be eliminated from Playoff contention. A win in one of those three races by a Playoff-eligible driver will automatically advance them to the Round of 12.
- Chip Ganassi confirms Jamie McMurray will not drive the No. 1 in 2019
Lots of rumors have been floating around this season when it comes to Jamie McMurray and the No. 1 team of Chip Ganassi Racing. The most prevalent rumor has been that Kurt Busch will leave the No. 41 of Stewart-Haas Racing for McMurray’s current ride in 2019, though Busch has stated he has not yet made a decision on where he will go next season.
However, on Sunday, Chip Ganassi told The Associated Press that McMurray will not drive the No. 1 car next season, and instead has offered the 42-year-old driver a leadership position with the team and a contract for the 2019 Daytona 500.
Ganassi stated that McMurray has neither accepted nor declined the offer as of yet.
McMurray entered Monday’s rain-delayed race at Indianapolis Motor Speedway needing a win to make it into the postseason. Instead, he finished seventh and is currently 21st in points. He has not gone to Victory Lane since the 2013 fall race at Talladega Superspeedway.
The driver from Joplin, Missouri, is in his 16th season of full-time Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series competition. He has seven career victories and has never finished inside the top 10 in points.
- The plight of a young cancer patient touched the hearts of the NASCAR community
The NASCAR community sure knows how to rally for a cause.
11-year-old Iowa native Caleb Hammond passed away on Monday morning after a two-year battle with B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia.
His story captured the heart of NASCAR and the motorsports community when, after stopping treatment for his leukemia because it was no longer helping, Caleb asked for his casket to be covered with racing stickers.
The family very quickly became overwhelmed with the amount of stickers they received and so the NASCAR community, led by Shawn Magee of Shawn Magee Design and NASCAR Team Social Coordinator Shane Smith, decided to run a “#TeamCaleb” decal on some of the cars during the Brickyard 400 in support of Caleb.
The race was supposed to run on Sunday, September 9th, but was postponed to Monday, September 10th because of rain in the area.
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If you would like to receive “Five Things” in your inbox, or just connect with me, you may send me an e-mail at [email protected].
You can also follow me on Twitter and Instagram.
Summer’s Five Things: What You Need to Know For September 11, 2018
“Summer’s Five Things” is a daily column by Summer Bedgood for NASCAR fans to catch up on the most recent, relevant, and need-to-know news and information in the sport! While mostly focused on NASCAR, this column may also feature other interesting and exciting moments from the world of motorsports. Enjoy!
Up until very recently in the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series season, no one other than the “Big Three” of Martin Truex Jr., Kevin Harvick, and Kyle Busch were showing a lot of speed. Sure, Clint Bowyer was the only other driver with multiple wins and Kyle Larson had spent a lot of time up front, but other than that, no one came even close.
So to now look back over the past two weeks and see Team Penske driver Brad Keselowski in Victory Lane is quite a surprise.
Of Team Penske’s three drivers (Keselowski, Joey Logano and Ryan Blaney) and their one satellite team (Paul Menard with Wood Brothers Racing), only one driver had gone to Victory Lane in the first 24 races of the season — Logano at Talladega Superspeedway. Otherwise, the Team Penske drivers have rarely contended for wins and seem to lack the speed they need to go from running in the back half of the top 10 to getting up front and leading laps.
That all seemed to take a turn a couple of weeks ago in the Bojangles’ Southern 500 at Darlington Raceway. While the Team Penske duo of Keselowski and Logano certainly didn’t have the fastest cars, they were absolutely in the top three. Keselowski’s pit crew earned him the lead on what would be the final pitstop of the day, and the driver of the No. 2 took advantage and drove away to win the race.
A little over a week later on Monday in the rain-postponed Big Machine Vodka 400 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, Keselowski again made it to Victory Lane, again despite not being the fastest car. Leading only nine laps en route to the victory, a pit strategy call by crew chief Paul Wolfe for fresher tires allowed Keselowski to power by Denny Hamlin on a late-race restart and never looked back.
Suddenly, Keselowski has gone from a dark horse at best to a driver carrying some serious momentum into the Playoffs, which starts next weekend at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
“…About to enter the playoffs, of course having those few extra playoff bonus points, you never know when you’re going to need those,” said Keselowski post-race. “You just can’t ever predict it. Having five more of those sure does make us feel good about the next 10 weeks ahead.”
Keselowski earned 10 extra Playoff points with his victories the last two weeks, which gave him a higher ranking when the points were reset following the race at IMS.
This was the first victory for team owner Roger Penske in the Brickyard 400. Penske has earned 17 Indianapolis 500 victories in the Verizon IndyCar Series. Team Penske driver Will Power earned the victory in that race back in May.
Keselowski’s teammates weren’t able to keep up with him this time around. Logano’s team had to change a left front shock early in the race and was able to rally for a 13th-place finish on the lead lap. Blaney had a few pit road miscues that cost him some track position, and was able to salvage an 11th-place result. Menard, a former Brickyard 400 winner, finished ninth.
Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Unofficial Race Results
To say rain impacted the weekend at Indianapolis Motor Speedway would be an understatement. The track was supposed to see on-track action for three days with the traditional Friday-Saturday-Sunday weekend. However, because of persistent rain and mist in the area, the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series and NASCAR XFINITY Series didn’t see a single car on track until Monday…
…when the drivers pulled onto the racetrack for pace laps and to take the green flag.
No practice. No qualifying. Just racing.
Turns out that works just fine for Justin Allgaier.
In the NASCAR XFINITY Series race, Allgaier led a race high 41 laps and went on to win his fifth race of the season and 10th of his career. It was his first victory at IMS.
“This one is for my dad, because at Brickyard Crossing up there, he drove me up here every Wednesday night during the winter, so that I could take classes to be the best that I could be, not only inside the car but outside the car,” said an emotional Allgaier after the race. “It was about three-and-a-half hours, and he drove me here every Wednesday night, so hats off to him.”
The XFINITY Series ran Monday morning ahead of the Cup Series race, with eight drivers competing in both races: Ryan Blaney, Chase Elliott, Ty Dillon, Austin Dillon, Ross Chastain, JJ Yeley, David Starr, and BJ McLeod.
Allgaier currently holds the points lead by 49 points over Cole Custer. If he is able to hang on to the points lead for the regular season finale next week at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, he will earn the regular season championship with 15 extra Playoff points being applied to his points reset following the race.
NASCAR XFINITY Series Unofficial Race Results
NASCAR XFINITY Series Unofficial Driver Points
With Monday at Indianapolis Motor Speedway serving as the final race of the regular season for the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series, the 16-driver field has been set for the 10-race Playoffs that will determine the 2018 champion.
Kyle Busch was declared the regular season champion after finishing eighth in the Brickyard 400. Busch has won six races, earned 17 top fives, 21 top 10s, and led 1,116 laps over the first 26 races of the season. Busch would lead all of those categories if it weren’t for his closest competitor this year, Kevin Harvick.
Following the points reset, Busch and Harvick are tied for the top of the standings. All drivers are reset to 2,000 points at the beginning of the Playoffs, then allotted the Playoff points they earned throughout the season by virtue of race wins and stage wins. Busch got an additional 15 Playoff points for being the regular season champion.
14 of the 16 drivers were already locked into the Playoffs either on wins or points heading into Monday’s race, with Jimmie Johnson and Alex Bowman still in question. However, as long as someone below them in points did not win the race on Sunday, they were both in.
With Keselowski serving as a repeat winner and having already been locked into the Playoffs on points, both drivers were safe and would move on to the postseason.
Seven-time champion Johnson seemed to still have confidence in his team’s ability to go out and contend for the championship, despite the fact that they have not gone to Victory Lane yet this season and have only led 29 laps all year.
“Well, we have a lot of experience,” said Johnson. “I think our experience in pressure-packed situations will help us and hopefully help us get where we need to. But, we do need speed. I’m looking at experience and I’m also looking at time. We still have ten weeks left to find some speed. If we can win at some key races and transfer; we have the ROVAL in the first round, we have short tracks, we have my best track at Dover. If we can stay alive and get to Homestead, who knows what can happen down there.”
For Bowman, while he acknowledged that, yes, Hendrick Motorsports as a whole is still lacking in speed in comparison to the rest of the field, he is grateful for and wants to make the most of this opportunity.
“Just being a part of it is really cool,” said Bowman. “To come from where I was at in my career is so unobtainable. Just driving for Hendrick Motorsports seemed unobtainable, but to make the Playoffs in my first year back is really cool. It’s a special thing to be a part of. It’s frustrating after a day like today, but it’s just cool to be a part of it.”
The first round of the Playoffs is the Round of 16, where the four drivers at the bottom of standings at the end of three races — Las Vegas, Richmond, and Charlotte (ROVAL) — will be eliminated from Playoff contention. A win in one of those three races by a Playoff-eligible driver will automatically advance them to the Round of 12.
Lots of rumors have been floating around this season when it comes to Jamie McMurray and the No. 1 team of Chip Ganassi Racing. The most prevalent rumor has been that Kurt Busch will leave the No. 41 of Stewart-Haas Racing for McMurray’s current ride in 2019, though Busch has stated he has not yet made a decision on where he will go next season.
However, on Sunday, Chip Ganassi told The Associated Press that McMurray will not drive the No. 1 car next season, and instead has offered the 42-year-old driver a leadership position with the team and a contract for the 2019 Daytona 500.
Ganassi stated that McMurray has neither accepted nor declined the offer as of yet.
McMurray entered Monday’s rain-delayed race at Indianapolis Motor Speedway needing a win to make it into the postseason. Instead, he finished seventh and is currently 21st in points. He has not gone to Victory Lane since the 2013 fall race at Talladega Superspeedway.
The driver from Joplin, Missouri, is in his 16th season of full-time Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series competition. He has seven career victories and has never finished inside the top 10 in points.
The NASCAR community sure knows how to rally for a cause.
11-year-old Iowa native Caleb Hammond passed away on Monday morning after a two-year battle with B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia.
His story captured the heart of NASCAR and the motorsports community when, after stopping treatment for his leukemia because it was no longer helping, Caleb asked for his casket to be covered with racing stickers.
The family very quickly became overwhelmed with the amount of stickers they received and so the NASCAR community, led by Shawn Magee of Shawn Magee Design and NASCAR Team Social Coordinator Shane Smith, decided to run a “#TeamCaleb” decal on some of the cars during the Brickyard 400 in support of Caleb.
The race was supposed to run on Sunday, September 9th, but was postponed to Monday, September 10th because of rain in the area.
~~
If you would like to receive “Five Things” in your inbox, or just connect with me, you may send me an e-mail at [email protected].
You can also follow me on Twitter and Instagram.