June 3, 2010
By Doug Demmons
Those who complain about the presence of Cup drivers in Nationwide Series races ought to be in heaven this week.
This is the week that the three national series race in three different locations -- Cup in Pocono, Nationwide in Nashville and the trucks in Texas. And that means Cup drivers won’t be doing what Kyle Busch did in 2008 -- race in all three.
They won’t even be trying to race in two. There are only three Cup drivers entered in Saturday’s Federated Auto Parts 300 at Nashville -- Carl Edwards, Paul Menard and Brad Keselowski.
Kyle Busch won’t be there and neither will Kevin Harvick.
That’s welcome news to those who are sick of seeing the same Cup drivers win every week. Busch has five wins so far this year and Harvick has two. Combined, they have won almost 60 percent of the Nationwide Series races.
Only one win has gone to a Nationwide regular -- Justin Allgaier, who won at Bristol.
So the odds are good -- or at least better -- that someone like Allgaier can score a win. Or maybe Steve Wallace will have a chance for a career-first Nationwide win.
Wallace started out quite well this season with thee straight top 10s. It’s been downhill from there. He hasn’t finished on the lead lap in six of the last nine races and has three DNFs in that stretch.
He could sorely use a win. So could a lot of drivers. Brendan Gaughan hasn’t won a race since 2003 when he won in the Truck Series. Jason Leffler hasn’t won since taking the trophy at IRP in 2007.
The Truck Series race this week at Texas Motor Speedway will definitely go to a non-Cup driver because there are no Cup drivers entered. Busch and Harvick are skipping this one also.
That’s the up side.
The down side is that the Nationwide championship has probably just been decided. Go ahead and give it to Brad Keselowski.
Keselowski has just a one-point lead over Busch in the standings but that lead is about to become insurmountable -- by default.
And that’s hardly fair to Keselowski. He’ll probably be at the banquet at the end of the year getting the trophy -- although Edwards could still challenge him -- but there will be those who will say he only won because Busch and Harvick didn’t run the entire schedule.
It’s like winning the heavyweight boxing championship because your opponent didn’t show up. You get the belt, but not the glory.
You can hardly blame Busch and Harvick for concentrating their efforts on winning a Cup championship, but it still devalues the Nationwide championship.
But there is a way to fix it -- bring the Chase to the Nationwide Series.
If there were a Nationwide Chase, Busch and Harvick could qualify for it even after missing a few races. And then there would be a straight-up fight for the title in the last eight or 10 races.
The Nationwide Series doesn’t have a Chase now because NASCAR wants it to be something that sets the Cup Series apart. So it would have to be distinctive from the Cup Chase.
There are ways to do that -- awarding twice as many points for the last 10 races, for instance.
However it’s done, the championship won’t come with an asterisk.
Doug Demmons is a writer and editor for the Birmingham News ~ he writes daily and weekly auto racing columns ranging from NASCAR to open wheel to Formula One, local tracks and more... you can read Doug's columns online at Blog of Tommorow
Follow Doug on Twitter: @dougdemmons
The thoughts and ideas expressed by this writer or any other writer on Insider Racing News, are not necessarily the views of the staff and/or management of IRN.
You can contact Doug Demmons at ....
