My notepad tells you all you need to know about Michigan. Whereas I ordinarily have two to three pages of notes, on this race I had just one.
Just like those fans who leave an NBA game because their team is down by 20 at half time, fans who walked out early on this race missed a dramatic ending.
For most of the race, Jimmie Johnson was setting sail on the field, easily wresting the lead back anytime anyone dared to take it from him. When I watched the “48″ overtake the “16″ as the laps wound down I thought “What on Earth am I going to write about?” I mean, how many team can you say “Jimmie Johnson’s car was good off the hauler and when he’s good off the truck, fuhgeddaboudit?”
That’s why it pays to hang around for the ending, because some funny things happen at the end.
First- Johnson runs out of gas, having used up his fuel supply trying to catch Biffle and then hold him off. Kyle Petty invokes the name of the Silver Fox (David Pearson), but Wally Dallenbach says wait, we’re still done yet.
No sooner that that’s said, Biffle starts to falter and Mark Martin zooms past to pick up his 5th Michigan victory and his 3rd of the season for Hendrick Motorsports. After the race, Martin said he was being conservative right up to the end because he needed a good points day, coming in at one point out of 12th. With the win, Martin ties Kyle Busch for the NASCAR Sprint Cup leads in victories and moves up to 8th in the points.
Credit runner-up Jeff Gordon for a brilliant finish. Gordon started out at the back of the field, but it may be argued that he might have caught Martin with another lap or two.
Denny Hamlin, Carl Edwards, Juan Pablo Montoya, Kurt Busch, Brian Vickers and Clint Bowyer all got the finishes their fortunes needed by making the top 10. Edwards furnishes further evidence he’s back on track with another top 5. Busch’s 8th place finish was a nice bounce back effort. In spite of good cars, bad luck has really had Hamlin in the dumper recently and now he sits in 10th for the season after sitting precariously close to the bubble.
It sure looked like Montoya would get his first top 5 of the year. As it stands now, JPM has a little bit of wind at his back- thanks to a 6th place finish- as the former open wheel stud takes to Sonoma. It will take a monster effort for Bowyer and Vickers to get into the chase picture, but at least they’ve got some forward momentum going for them.
Tony Stewart hangs on to the points lead after finishing 7th, teammate Ryan Newman bobbles a little finishing 23rd. You’d have to go back several races to find one where the SHR crew wasn’t a serious contender for the win. Newman slips back to 5th in the points as Kurt Busch leapfrogs past him.
Unless you’re a Johnson fan, the majority of this race was a real sleeper. However- from this race we once again learn one of the supreme lessons of sports “It ain’t over ’til it’s over.”
PHOTO CREDITS- Mark Martin courtesy of Todd Warshaw/ Getty Images for NASCAR.
{ 1 comment }
I hate to keep beating this horse, but again NA$CAR gives an economy run rather than a race.
We know they have x-ray vision for finding debris when they need it. Sunday, with about 40 to go. They needed it! A quick final stop for fuel, & for that last tweak. Would have given us a race at the finish, rather than another snoozer.
Note to Brian…..This is not the kind of product that built NA$CAR, nor is it the kind that will turn it around. Your restarts are a gimmick. If you don’t put on some real races. Three wide Indy starts aren’t going to help much.
Comments on this entry are closed.