September 17, 2008
By Chuck Abrams
The rain stayed away at Loudon on Sunday and let us finish one race there this year. Back in the spring, the rains fell and Kurt Busch won the event.
Fast forward to September.
Kurt has another good race and Greg Biffle wins after Dale Jr. and Jimmie Johnson appear to be the class of the field at different times during the race.
But Biffle led the most important lap of the race – the last one, The one that leads to the checkered flag. His first win of the year could not come at a better time for him. Biffle has had an average season so far and leap-frogging into third place in the Chase is not a bad way to start. Now he just needs to carry that momentum into Dover where he tends to do rather well. Of course, so does Carl Edwards.
Kurt’s sixth place finish was great but yielded him only one spot in the standings. He is still mired 200 points out of the top fifteen.
So you ask yourself just how important a sway bar is? Just ask Kyle Busch. Kind of ruins your day when you are making left hand turns all day. It doesn’t help that Jamie McMurray did not see Kyle or did not think he was going to come back up onto the track after spinning out. Either way, it ruined Jamie’s day and made Kyle go from bad to more bad.
Speaking of bad days, I had picked Matt Kenseth to pull my fantasy team out of the doldrums. Unfortunately for Matt, Loudon was not the place to do that. He had just an average car and then got caught up in a stupid accident. And I say stupid by the way guys were driving at the time.
Once again, Dale Jr. leads the race only to falter halfway through.
I have no idea what is going on with the 88 team but they have been leaving wins on the table all year. Either Earnhardt lacks the concentration or Eury Jr. cannot keep up with the changing track and car. This week it was blamed on a bad set of tires although some blame Michael Waltrip for racing Earnhardt to hard. But is that not what drivers are supposed to do -– race each other hard?
And speaking of hard racing, Jeff Burton and Earnhardt raced hard with each other and it was great. Neither was spun out or wrecked. Shows you what class and respect can do.
Wunderkid Joey Lagano started his first race in Hall of Fame’s 96 car. JJ Yeley has to be saying “See, I told you, their cars bite!” This is not what Logano was hoping for in his Cup debut (32nd). But he stayed with it and we can now put the question of -- “is it the car or the driver” -- to rest for now. The car was sub-standard and hence was the drivers’ performance. Sliced Bread looked more like milk toast.
David Reutimann was again the best of the non-JGR Toyotas with his top fifteen run. Maybe he is better than his equipment right now.
Now it is on to Dover and the Monster Mile. Another track that could shake up the Chase standings…at least let’s hope so.
Drive fast, turn left and keep the shiny side up.
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