Fact of the Track: Qualifying well here can be very beneficial. Over the last three years (six points-paying races), 45% of the drivers that started in the top 10 also finished there. In that same time span, the pole winner has an average finish of 10.3.

During The Last Race At Charlotte: Matt Kenseth started on the outside pole here last fall and didn’t really look back from there. The #17 Ford lead for 46 of the 334 laps and had an average running position of 3rd en route to Kenseth’s second career points-paying victory at this track. Kyle Busch, who led a race-high 111 laps, finished 2nd, followed by Carl Edwards, Kasey Kahne, and Marcos Ambrose, who rounded out the top 5. Pole sitter Tony Stewart led 94 laps but ended up finishing 8th.

Practice Schedule: With this week’s racing being on Sunday night, the practice schedule is a bit different than normal. What’s good is that we get to see the cars on the track after qualifying, although it will be a lot earlier than the scheduled race time, and thus have different track conditions. On Thursday, there is one practice session (at 3:30 pm) before qualifying at 7:00 pm. The cars won’t see the track on Friday, but will have two sessions on Saturday–the first beginning at 10:00 am and Happy Hour starting at 1:00 pm. After that, this year’s Coca-Cola 600 should start around 6:30 pm on Sunday evening. For those that play Yahoo! Auto Racing: rosters are due at 5:00 am on Thursday morning.

Click here to see the entry list for this year’s Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway.

Top Fifteen Ranking Entering The Coca-Cola 600:

1. Jimmie Johnson - I’m going to take a wild guess here and say that Five Time will be on everyone’s radars this weekend, and for good reason. Keep this team on your roster until further notice; it’s crazy how red-hot Johnson and company are right now. Furthermore, the #48 team’s record on the intermediate tracks this season is by far the best. Johnson has finished in the top 3 in four of those five races and has an average driver rating of 124.4 (chart here). As you probably know, Jimmie won the All-Star race last Saturday, and he has six career points-paying victories here. Back when this track was named Lowe’s Motor Speedway, the #48 was dominant to say the least. Another interesting tidbit? The winner of the All Star race in the last two even years (2010 and 2008) has also gone on to win the Coca-Cola 600. I’m already considering him a lock for a top 5.

2. Kasey Kahne - I seriously think Johnson’s hot streak is overshadowing Kasey Kahne’s awesome run over the last two months: since Texas in April, the #5 Chevrolet hasn’t finished worse than 9th. Surprised? Now that Five Time has a victory under his belt, I think he can go on a streak of race wins, but the newest member of Hendrick Motorsports can do the same. Charlotte is Kasey’s best track on the circuit (statistically) and he has posted three victories in sixteen career starts at this track. As I said before, Kahne finished 4th here last fall while driving for Red Bull, and he led 28 laps in the 2011 Coca-Cola 600 despite finishing 22nd. What’s most impressive to me is that Kahne has led 711 total laps here in his sixteen career starts. That’s more than Tony Stewart (695) and Jeff Gordon (672), who have twenty-six and thirty-eight career starts here, respectively. This team is firing on all cylinders and is on the verge of grabbing their first win. Will it be on Sunday night?

3. Matt Kenseth - What’s not to like about Kenseth this weekend? In the last two races at 1.5-mile racetracks, the #17 has ended up in 5th and 4th, and he almost won the joke format of the All-Star race last Saturday. Oh yeah, Matt is the most recent winner at this race track (points-paying events considered) and has been the fifth-best on the intermediate tracks this season in terms of average driver rating (click here for that chart). Kenseth finished 14th in the 2011 Coca-Cola 600, but led 103 laps that night and was a top 10 car for most of the race (Yahoo! chart here). Also, in the last six points-paying races at Charlotte, Matt has recorded five top 10s and his worst finish was that aforementioned 14th. Kenseth should be in contention to win his third career race at this track on Sunday night.

4. Kyle Busch - If I were to tell you that the driver that has led a combined 592 laps in five of the last six events at this track has never won here, would you believe me? Well, you’re looking at him. Kyle Busch has single-digit finishes down the board at Charlotte (see here) but hasn’t been able to close the deal in sixteen career starts at this track. It’s only a matter of time before that happens, and Sunday may be the night, as I also expect the #18 Toyota to be in contention at the end. Kyle has been less-than-stellar on the 1.5-mile racetracks this season (chart here), but I’m not too worried about it. He finished 4th in last weekend’s All-Star race after the team tweaked on the car to make it right. I expect this team to turn around their performance on the 1.5-mile racetracks this weekend, but if this Toyota looks a little off during practice, you may want to keep him on the bench in favor of Johnson or Kenseth. It’s hard to not like Busch’s average running position of 8.8 in the last four races at Charlotte, though.

5. Martin Truex, Jr. - His success during the 2012 season doesn’t warrant Truex, Jr. to be named a dark horse this week, but his record at Charlotte Motor Speedway does: in thirteen career starts here, Martin has finished inside the top 10 just twice and owns a 19.9 average finish. Ouch. I’m not too worried about that, though, and the #56 Toyota is my sleeper of the week. His average finish here is worrisome, no doubt, but let’s look into Truex’s history here a little further. He’s been good on the shorter races (Showdown/All-Star events) but then disappoints in the longer ones. Martin won the Showdown race in 2010 then went on to finish 2nd in the All-Star race later that night. In 2007, he also won the Showdown, and ended up 10th in the All-Star. I think part of the reason for Truex’s lack of success in the larger races–particularly the Coke 600–may be due to Michael Waltrip Racing’s lack of solid equipment. In 2012, though, MWR has taken a huge step forward, and that can be seen on their intermediate track success. Specifically, Truex has the 4th-best average finish (7.6) on them this year with the 3rd-best average driver rating (111.9). I hope Chad Johnston can start making some better calls on the pit box soon, though. Truex should have visited victory lane already in 2012.

6. Greg Biffle - Try to put The Biff’s somewhat-lackluster performance in Darlington out of your mind, because the #16 team should be  on top of their game again this weekend. Roush-Fenway Racing was testing engines during the All-Star Race and the one under Biffle’s hood blew after a little over 2/3rds of the race was complete. Not to worry, though, because they won’t be doing that this weekend. On the intermediate tracks this season, Greg has an average finish of 5.4 (chart here) and has yet to have a race with a driver rating under 100 (chart here). At Charlotte, Biffle hasn’t been great, but he’s led laps, which I like. He finished 13th and 15th here last season, leading 50 and 68 laps in those races, respectively. The Biff has just six top 10s in eighteen career starts at this track, but this team has been fast all year and that shouldn’t change this weekend. Statistically, this is his sixth-worst track on the circuit, but I’m looking past that for now. If this team looks a litle off in practice, though, Biffle will probably tumble in my final rankings, so be sure to check after Happy Hour over on ifantasyrace.com.

7. Denny Hamlin - Denny may finish outside the top 10 more often than he finishes inside it at Charlotte Motor Speedway, but I wouldn’t let that keep you from picking him this weekend. This team now has four top 6 finishes in the last six Sprint Cup series races and this is a track that Hamlin runs well at and, unless he has trouble, comes away with solid points for fantasy owners. He finished 10th in the 2011 Coca-Cola 600 and followed that up with a solid 9th-place effort in the fall race. That makes three straight top 10s for him at Charlotte. I never found out what happened in the All-Star race to give Denny his 20th-place finish, but he did lead 16 laps that night, so that’s promising. This team also hasn’t finished worse than 12th in the last four intermediate track races (chart here). Hamlin has been in the top 15 for 77.1% of the last four points-paying events at this track, which is third-best in the series. Make sure the #11 looks great in practice before taking Denny over the other “big dogs” this weekend.

8. Carl Edwards - The #99 was also one of the Roush-Fenway Fords testing engines so don’t be alarmed about Edwards blowing up during the All-Star race. Statistically, Carl is the third-best driver in the series at this track, with an average finish of 12.6 and eight top 10 finishes in fourteen career starts. What’s even better about Edwards is that he has just two finishes outside of the top 20 in his career here. On the intermediate tracks in 2012, Carl Edwards hasn’t finished outside of the top 10 (chart here) despite having just the 11th-best average driver rating on them (chart here). As I’ve said for a few weeks now, I’m waiting for this team to really break out, but I don’t see this weekend being the time for them to do so. With his seventh top 10 of the season in Darlington, though, I have to ask the question: is Carl Edwards over his “hangover” from the 2011 season? Click here to vote.

9. Dale Earnhardt, Jr. - Junior was incredible during the All-Star weekend, and that is the main reason why he’s getting ranked in the 9th spot going into the Coca-Cola 600. He led every lap in the Showdown race and then came up through the field in the All-Star race, won a segment, and finished 5th. He said they learned a lot and I believe him. In this event last season, Junior and his crew were up and down all night (chart here) and gambled on fuel at the end but came up just a little short, finishing 7th. Before that, Earnhardt had an average finish of 33rd in the five points-paying events at Charlotte from 2008 through 2010. He got back to his abysmal ways in the 2011 fall race here, finishing 19th after starting 15th. This team has posted top 10 finishes in all of the 1.5-mile races this season, though, and I’m expecting another one on Sunday night.

10. Kevin Harvick - Over the last two seasons (four points-paying races), nobody in the series has an average finish better than Kevin Harvick. He also spend the second-most time in the top 15 over those four events. Happy won the 2011 Coke 600 after Dale Junior ran out of fuel and backed that up with a solid 6th-place finish in the fall. This team has also been solid on the intermediate tracks in 2012, posting the seventh-best average finish (chart here) and the eight-best average driver rating (chart here). Harvick was pretty solid in the All-Star race and finished 6th behind the #88. I’m expecting a top 10 finish at the least out of Harvick and the #29 crew on Sunday evening. Let’s just hope he doesn’t ram into his teammate again.

11. Tony Stewart - This team has been so hit or miss this season that it’s hard for me to rank Smoke very high going into the weekend, especially at a track that is his fourth-worst on the circuit (statistically). In twenty-six career starts here, Stewart has notched twelve top 10s and one victory (in 2003). His average finish here is 13.6 and in the All-Star Race, Tony hit the wall early and never really recovered, ending up 17th out of the twenty-three cars. In the last two events at 1.5-mile racetracks (Texas and Kansas), the #14 ended up 24th and 13th, and in the last four Coca-Cola 600s, Stewart hasn’t finished better than 15th. He surprised a bunch of people in Darlington a couple weeks ago, though, so I wouldn’t put it past this team to put up an unsuspecting good run in Charlotte this weekend.

12. Brad Keselowski - I think Brad Keselowski is poised to have a career night at Charlotte on Sunday. His best finish thus far in five career starts has been 12th, and that came while driving for Hendrick Motorsports in 2009. The Blue Deuce has been either real good or real bad on the intermediate tracks in 2012, but the real bad finishes have came from faulty equipment. I personally think that Penske has that problem figured out, though, and I’m not worried about it. BK drove up from near the rear of the field in the All-Star race to win a segment and wound up finishing 2nd. Unlike the other Penske Dodge, Keselowski and crew generally make the right calls and can put the Blue Deuce in contention at the end. Brad sat on the pole for the 2011 Coca-Cola 600 and was a top 10 car all night before finishing a disappointing 19th. He has just one finish outside of the top 20 here in his career.

13. Joey Logano - As I said before, I’m expecting a big night out of Joe Gibbs Racing, and Logano is no exception. His record here at Charlotte is very good: in six career starts, Joey has never ended up worse than 13th and owns an average finish of 8.2. This team hasn’t ran particularly well on the intermediate tracks this season, but they’ve gotten into position to get the finishes. At Las Vegas and Kansas (both 1.5-mile tracks), the #20 finished 16th and 15th, respectively, and Sliced Bread got his third top 10 of the season in Darlington a couple of weeks ago. He has disappointed all season, but if there’s any track that I would trust Logano at, it’d be Charlotte. It’s by far his best track on the circuit.

14. Mark Martin - After this team’s let down in Darlington, many fantasy racers are probably going to be a little cautious with Martin and the #55 team this weekend (myself included). He’s led over 1,000 laps here at Charlotte Motor Speedway but hasn’t led more than nine in a single event here since 2006. Mark started 13th in both races here last season and finished 34th and 37th. I wasn’t too impressed with him in the All-Star race, either. This ranking is banking on this team getting back to their “normal 2012″ form this weekend. However, if he looks bad in practice once again, expect Martin to make his way onto my “Avoid” list.

15. Marcos Ambrose - There are a few things I like about Marcos Ambrose this weekend, and I consider him my number two sleeper right now. First, he’s been pretty consistent on the intermediate tracks this year–just check out this chart. Second, Richard Petty Motorsports has been good at Charlotte recently, including Marcos’ 6th and 5th-place finishes here in 2011. Finally, Ambrose looked pretty solid in the All-Star Race on Saturday night, ending up in 7th after starting 18th. With an average finish of 18.5, this is (statistically) Marcos’ eight-best track on the circuit. I’m expecting at least a teens finish out of the #9 team this Sunday.

Just Missed The Top Fifteen:

Aric Almirola - The Petty Fords were pretty good here last year (as in both Marcos Ambrose and A.J. Allmendinger posted top 10s in each event) and I think we may see a decent run out of the #43 team this weekend (as long as Kurt Busch doesn’t get some kind of pay-back for Darlington). Aric’s best intermediate finish came two weeks ago in Darlington (19th) and he finished 7th in the Showdown race last Saturday. In Yahoo!, Almirola will probably be my backup if I don’t want to start Trevor Bayne.

Trevor Bayne - He’s going to be the most popular pick in the Yahoo! C Group this week with so many people saving starts on drivers that race every weekend. Trevor started 10th and finished 31st in his only Sprint Cup start at Charlotte last season and finished 15th in The Showdown last Saturday (I think I remember him hitting the wall). What’s somewhat re-assuring for those who pick Bayne this weekend is that Ricky Stenhouse, Jr. finished 11th in this car in the 2011 Coke 600.

A.J. Allmendinger - If you’re looking for a long-shot dark horse pick with potential for qualifying bonus points, look no further than the Double Deuce. A.J. has been great at qualifying over the last month and has started in the top 4 in each of the last three points-paying races here at Charlotte. He also won the pole for the Showdown last weekend and finished 2nd after an early pit stop. It would take a lot for me to start Allmendinger this weekend, though (click here to see his average finish on the intermediate tracks in 2012).

Those To Avoid Entering The Coca-Cola 600:

Ryan Newman - There’s still a little animosity with me towards Newman from Darlington, but that’s only a fraction of the reason that I won’t be picking him this weekend. He may make my roster, but that’s only for the possibility of qualifying bonus points. Newman now has three straight finishes of 20th or worse on the intermediate tracks, and his driver ratings on them this season haven’t been too impressive, either (check out this chart here). At Charlotte, The Rocketman owns an average career finish of 20.4 and has recorded only eight top 10s in twenty-two career starts here. Ryan also hasn’t had a triple-digit driver rating in a points-paying race at this track since 2005.

Kurt Busch - We all knew it was only a matter of time before Kurt Busch went off. Yes, he’s had some good runs over the last few weeks, but I ask one simple question: why take the risk in picking him? Also, 600 miles means that there’s more opportunities for equipment to fail, the #51 crew to make a mistake, or even Kurt to go crazy. Landon Cassill finished 28th with this car in the 2011 Coke 600. I’d be surprised if Busch finished on the lead lap on Sunday night.

Jeff Gordon - Well, what’s going to happen to the #24 this weekend? As Gordon said a couple of weeks ago, it’s comical how much bad luck this team has encountered this season. Again, as with Kurt Busch, why take the risk? Gordon is going to turn his season around soon enough, but until then you won’t see him on my rosters. In the last three points-paying races at Charlotte, Jeff hasn’t finished better than 20th, despite starting 1st and 11th in two of them. Gordon finished 13th in the All-Star race last weekend.

One of my heroes passed this past weekend.

I don’t want to recap Shelby’s life in this post. Others have written that story over the past several days. The truth is, I’m a little late to be writing an epitaph on the man. From the moment that I heard the news of his passing though, I’ve known I had to write about my feelings.

I was a kid in the late fifties and sixties. I loved all sports but auto racing was a magnet for my attention. I’ve written before about how tough it was to get timely racing info back then. Especially so for the things that happened mostly in Europe, like Formula One and Sports Car racing. Lucky for me, that my dad subscribed to Sports Car Graphic and Road & Track. There I found coverage of men who became, and remain, my heroes.

F1 and endurance racing was then, as it is again today, dominated by European manufacturers. Ferrari and Porsche in sports cars, Lotus, Cooper, BRM and Brabham in F1. But a handful of Americans - and man, did they ever look the part of All-Americans - went over there and competed. When they had the right ride, guys like Dan Gurney, Roger Penske, Richie Ginther and Carroll Shelby won, against the best in the world.

For a few of them, winning in someone else’s, some other country’s, car wasn’t enough. They must have heard the comments like; “yanks can only build cars that go in circles”. I think they got pissed.

Shelby, Penske, Gurney and Jim Hall are my Avengers.

They built cars here, in the states, and went to Europe and beat the best in the world. I can remember to this day, how proud I was when Shelby’s Cobras won and Hall’s Chaparrals and Dan Gurney’s Eagle Westlake F1 car won at Spa. That Eagle was the first, and only American F1 winner until The Captain, Roger Penske went back to Europe with his own car.

The greatest achievement, most significant anyway, may have been when Shelby lead a team of Ford MK IVs to victory in the 24 hours of Lemans, beating the best of Enzo Ferrari’s 330 P4s. Glorious.

In the Avengers comics, Tony Stark is Ironman. He designed his famous suit of armor to protect a damaged heart. He did more with it than that.

Carroll Shelby was one of the longest lived recipients of a heart transplant. He accomplished much after, and lived an amazing life.

When I heard of Shelby’s death, I texted Steve and asked that he try to get Dave Despain On Pit Row this week to talk about ‘Ol Shell. Here is the highlight of Daves interview. I hope you enjoy it.

Photo credit: Sports Illustrated

I hope you’re ready for Danica-mania again, because it’s going to be in full effect this Saturday night at Darlington

Fact of the Track…In the last five races here, the pole sitter has finished in the top 10 four times. The occurrence that that didn’t happen was in 2008 when Greg Biffle led 95 laps but eventually had engine problems and finished 43rd. Also over that span, nearly half of the top 10 starters (22 out of 50) also finished there.

During The Last Race At Darlington…I’ve been talking about this particular race for the last couple of weeks. You may remember that it was Regan Smith who took the checkered flag and grabbed his first career Sprint Cup series victory over Carl Edwards. I said as soon as that race ended that Carl played the “points” card and let Smith win. Just think, if Edwards would have won, he also would have grabbed the 2011 championship. Anyway, Brad Keselowski, Kasey Kahne, and Ryan Newman rounded out the top 5.

Practice Schedule…It’s another night race so it makes sense to practice at close to the same race conditions, but I didn’t make this weekend’s schedule so that’s not happening. There’s a practice session set to start at 11:30 am on Friday followed by Happy Hour at 2:00 pm. Later that night (5:00 pm) the starting lineup will be set. The eleventh race of the season is set to start around 7:00 pm on Saturday evening. For those that play Yahoo! Auto Racing, the deadline to select your drivers is 5:00 on Friday morning. All times are in eastern.

Click here for this week’s entry list to see who is racing.

Top Fifteen Ranking Entering The Bojangles Southern 500:

1. Denny Hamlin - The most recent intermediate track race winner is coming in to his second-best track on the circuit (statistically). In six career starts here, Hamlin owns an average finish of 6.5 and he won here in 2010. Denny has never finished worse than 13th at Darlington and I wouldn’t expect that to change on Saturday. This team has been somewhat inconsistent this season, so make sure the #11 Toyota looks good in practice before going “all in” with Hamlin.

2. Kyle Busch - Rowdy Busch isn’t great here by any means, but with four finishes of 11th or better in a row now, it looks like this team is finally getting back into their “great” role. Oh, yeah, a win and a 2nd-place finish in the last two Sprint Cup races doesn’t hurt momentum, either. Busch has made seven career starts here and owns an average finish of 17.1. When you look at his driver rating for those races, though, you can tell the #18 was pretty good in all of them. Kyle won here in 2008 and has led a total of 278 laps in the last four races at this track. In 2010, Busch started 39th and drove through the field to finish 7th, and last year he finished 11th despite leading 78 laps.

3. Greg Biffle - The Biff hasn’t finished worse than 6th on this intermediate tracks this season, and I wouldn’t expect that to change this weekend. The #16 Ford is just so fast week in and week out that it’s almost impossible to go against it. In eleven career starts at Darlington, Biffle has recorded two victories and averages a finish of 14.2. In 2008, he started on the pole and led 95 laps but an engine problem relegated Biffle to a 43rd-place finish, as I said before. Greg has led 639 laps at the track, which is by far more than anyone with less than twenty starts. In comparison, Jimmie Johnson has led just 409 laps in two more starts than Biffle.

4. Kasey Kahne - Hopefully you’ve gotten over Kasey Kahne being so disappointing earlier this year, because this team is finally looking to fire on all cylinders and look like the pre-2012 expected team. This is Kahne’s second-best track on the circuit, but he’s never won here and has finished in the top 10 in just 33.3% of his starts. What’s good, though, is that Kasey hasn’t ran into major problems at Darlington in his six starts and has never finished worse than 23rd because of. As you read up above, Kahne finished a solid 4th here last season after leading 124 laps. Another good thing about Kasey this weekend? He has won the pole in four of his nine starts here.

5. Jimmie Johnson - Five Time is the one driver in my top 5 this week that I’m not 100% sure about. It’s hard to look past how great this team has been on the intermediate tracks in 2012, though (check out the chart here). In the last four Darlington races, Jimmie has recorded just one top 10 finish, but I’m not too worried about that. In the six races between 2003 and 2007, Johnson finished outside of the top 4 just once, and that was a 7th-place effort. His average finish of 9.7 at Darlngton is third-best among active drivers.

6. Brad Keselowski - You know I don’t like to go against the most recent winner. Even better is Keselowski’s quick ‘understanding’–so to say–of Darlington and how to run the track. He started 31st and finished 7th in his first career start here back in 2009 and hasn’t looked back since. In 2010, BK ended up in 12th, and last year, as I said before, he posted a solid 3rd-place effort (although he wasn’t that good all race–Yahoo! chart here). Still, there’s a lot to like with Keselowski this weekend. This team has been strong on the intermediates in 2012 but has run in to problems (mainly the fuel pump issues). The Blue Deuce has now finished 11th or better for three straight weeks. I like drivers with confidence at this track and Keselowski definitely has that.

7. Ryan Newman - “The Rocketman” has gotten us bonus points just once thus far in 2012, but that very well could change this weekend. In thirteen career starts at Darlington, Newman owns an average starting position of 8.2 and has qualified in the top 3 in more than half of them. He also races well here: there are some slip-ups on his record, but for the most part Newman’s finishes have been single-digits. In the last seven Darlington races, “The Rocketman” has finished 6th or better in five of them and the other two finishes have been 9th and 37th (not sure what happened that race). Hopefully this team can turn around their recent shortcomings on the intermediate tracks (chart here).

8. Carl Edwards - When you look at Cousin Carl’s record at Darlington, it’s pretty impressive but he does have a couple bad runs. In 2006, he finished 39th after starting 7th, but that was due to an engine issue. And then in 2009, Edwards hit the wall while inside the top 10 (Yahoo! race chart here) and ended up finishing 32nd. If you take away those two races from his record, though, Carl has an average finish of 6.7 in his other six starts at this track. As I said before, he let Regan Smith win this race last year finished 2nd in this race last season, but this team isn’t back to 2011 form just yet. They haven’t finished outside of the top 10 on the intermediate tracks in 2012, though (chart here).

9. Matt Kenseth - Kenseth isn’t stellar here by any means, but I like the way he is running right now and I think he should get at least a top 10 finish on Saturday night. In eighteen career starts here, Matt owns an average finish of 18.1 and has never finished better than 6th. He ended up in 25th in this race last season, but before that Kenseth had a streak of five straight Darlington races inside the top 13 at the end.

10. Martin Truex, Jr. - With two bad finishes in a row, I can hear the masses jumping off the Martin Truex, Jr. bandwagon at an alarming rate. I’m not so quick, though, and recommend that you give the #56 at least one more shot this weekend before writing him off as “the usual Martin”. Statistically, this is Truex’s second-best track on the circuit, behind Homestead. He has made six career starts at Darlington and owns an average finish of 12.3 and has completed all but one lap in those races. Truex finished 10th here last season, which was his second career top 10 at this track. When it comes to average finish, Martin Truex, Jr. has been the fourth-best Sprint Cup driver on the intermediate tracks this season (chart here).

11. Dale Earnhardt, Jr. - Junior hasn’t finished outside the top 10 at all in the intermediate races this season and it wouldn’t surprise me one bit if he continued the streak here on Saturday night. His recent history here is a bit concerning (average finish of 19.7 in the last three years) but he wasn’t running at the level he is running at in 2012 during those events. From 2004 to 2008, Earnhardt recorded six straight finishes of 11th or better. Another thing that I like about Junior this weekend is that he has just four finishes outside of the top 20 in seventeen career Darlington starts.

12. Jeff Gordon - Oh, how the mighty have fallen. Gordon hit the nail on the head when he said that this season has been comedic. His bad luck thus far is almost unbelievable. Jeff’s record at Darlington is great (thirty-one starts, twenty-one top 10s, and SEVEN victories), but how confident do you think he is right now? And how confident are you going to be if you pick him on Saturday? There’s no doubt in my mind that Gordon can run top 5 here this weekend–he does have seven in the last eight events–but why take the risk right now? I’m going to let him get a few good races going before I consider taking the #24. If this was my Predictions article, Gordon would be labeled “High Risk”.

13. Mark Martin - He’s got a week off and this car has been fast on the intermediate tracks all season, so what’s not to like about Mark Martin? His average finish on these tracks in 2012 would be much better (chart here) if he didn’t blow up in Kansas. He was running top 10 in that race. At Darlington, Mark owns an average finish of 12.2 in a whopping forty-five career starts. He has visited victory lane twice (most recently in 2009) and has recorded twenty-six top 10s here. A mid-teens finish is a little bit of a low estimate in my mind, but in four of the last five events here he has finished between 14th and 19th. That was when he was with Hendrick, though, who has just one top 10 as an organization here over the last two seasons.

14. Jeff Burton - In case you don’t read my articles often, let me make this clear: Jeff Burton is very rarely on my radar. I think he’s past his prime and will be done in a year or two. I don’t know what it is, but I’ve had him on my many rosters over the last three years or so a maximum of two times. That being said, I’m expecting a top 15 out of the #31 this weekend (although his performance on the intermediates this year has been sad). He just knows how to race at Darlington. In the last six events here, Jeff has posted finishes of 12th or better in all or one of them, with the lone exception being last season. However, he was running top 15 that race (Yahoo! chart here) before having engine problems. RCR doesn’t have problems like that too often so I’m not really worried.

15. Jamie McMurray - Here’s my sleeper of the week. Statistically, this is Jamie Mac’s second-best track on the circuit (behind Indianapolis) and he has just one finish worse than 22nd in eleven career starts here. His average finish of 14.5 is respectable and I like the fact that McMurray has led 84 laps combined in his last two starts at this place. Believe it or not, Jamie hasn’t finished worse than 14th in the last month of Sprint Cup Series racing.

Honorable Mentions: A.J. Allmendinger. This guy has been a qualifying machine as of late and could net you a few extra bonus points if you want to waste the roster spot. I wouldn’t recommend starting him, though (average finish of 27.4 here). Tony Stewart will probably move up in my rankings when I post my Predictions on Friday.

Those To Avoid Entering The Bojangles Southern 500:

Clint Bowyer - If any driver on this Avoid list is going to go against their past record at this track, it’s going to be Clint Bowyer. His history at Darlington should be simply called bad luck. He was running in the top 10 last year before getting caught up in the Kyle Busch and Kevin Harvick wreck. In 2010, Bowyer drove up from his mid-twenties starting position to the mid-teens before having brake issues. And in 2009, Clint drove up to the top 5 before getting caught up in a wreck with A.J. Allmendinger. The #15 has the potential to run top 15 this week but you wouldn’t know it by looking at Bowyer’s average finish here (24.5).

Joey Logano -At most of the intermediate track events this year I have went into them with high hopes for Sliced Bread, but that’s not happening this weekend. He’s been disappointing at every intermediate track thus far in 2012 and that trend won’t stop in Darlington. In each of his three starts here, Logano has finished worse than he has started (sound familiar?) and his best finish in the last two years here has been 27th.

Paul Menard - He finished 15th here in 2009 but do you really think Paul Menard was that good all race? Check out his Yahoo! race chart (click here) and you tell me. As the saying goes, even a blind squirrel finds a nut at one point or another. In Menard’s four other starts at Darlington, he owns an average finish of 29.8 and hasn’t finish on the lead lap once. Next!

Danica Patrick - Must I explain?

During The Last Race At Talladega…It was Clint Bowyer grabbing the win (his second at the track) and his third top 2 finish in as many races at Talladega. He passed his team mate, Jeff Burton, coming off of turn four and beat him to the line (video here–you should probably mute it). Dave Blaney, Brad Keselowski, and Kasey Kahne rounded out the top 5.

Practice Schedule…First off, practice and qualifying mean absolutely nothing at these tracks. For the drivers, it’s all about avoiding problems and, in the end, timing to determine whether or not you will be in position to win. There are two practice sessions on Friday (2:00 pm and 3:30 pm) followed by qualifying on Saturday, which is set to start around noon. The green flag on this year’s Aaron’s 499 is set to wave around noon on Sunday. All times are in EST.

Note: Looking for another fantasy racing game to play? My website just added a new $500 prize that you are eligible to win by signing up mid-season! Click here for more information.

Yahoo! A Group:

Who To Consider Picking:

Brad Keselowski - The Blue Deuce is a near lock for my roster this weekend. He’s pretty much the only A-list driver that I know for a fact I won’t need to use 9 times this season, and to add to that he’s pretty good here. In six starts, BK has recorded four top 10 finishes and won this race in 2009 while driving for Phoenix Racing.

Kevin Harvick - There is one number that I love about Happy Harvick at Talladega: zero. That’s how many DNFs he has here in twenty-two career starts. I also like his three top 5s in the last four races here. I have the full nine starts left with Harvick so chances are he will make my roster this weekend.

Matt Kenseth and Carl Edwards - We’re looking at qualifying bonus points with the Fords this week, as it was Edwards and The Biff who took the front row in this year’s Daytona 500. I wouldn’t suggest starting either of them, but as you probably remember Kenseth won in Daytona and Carl finished 8th.

Not Worth Wasting A Start:

Basically the normal guys that there is a possibly that you may start them the full nine times this season: Jimmie Johnson, Denny Hamlin, and Tony Stewart. You could also throw in the two Roushkateers I mentioned above.

Yahoo! B Group:

Who To Consider Picking:

Kurt Busch - As I mentioned before, Brad Keselowski won with Phoenix Racing in 2009 and now that Kurt and his team have gelled a little bit this season, I think he could actually challenge for the win if he stays out of trouble. Whenever James Finch puts a car in a super speedway event, it’s going to be fast no matter who’s behind the wheel. With Busch–who is a very good plate track driver–it is just an added bonus. Landon Cassill finished 16th in this car last season at Talladega.

Jamie McMurray - As of now, the only shot Jamie Mac has at making my roster this season is at Talladega and Daytona. I thought we were going to see a bounce back out of this team in 2012, but it’s just not happening. The 2010 Daytona 500 winner has five top 5s to his name here at Talladega and won the fall event in 2009. He had a top 10-top 15 car for more than a third of this year’s Daytona 500.

Clint Bowyer - If you’re down to five or six starts with Bowyer, you may want to leave him off this weekend, but I’m sitting with eight more so I’m good to go. History means nothing at this track but you can’t look past a guy that has finished 1st or 2nd in each of the last three events here. Bowyer has finished worse than 12th just once in the past nine races here which tells me one thing: he knows how to avoid wrecks.

Dale Earnhardt, Jr. - This is one major dilemma that I will personally go through this weekend: should I put Junior on my roster? The guy is red hot and we all know what he can do on the plate tracks. I only have five starts left with him, though. If you have seven or more go ahead and put him on there.

Joey Logano - He’s disappointing pretty much everywhere else, but Logano could be a nice pick this weekend. He finished 9th at Daytona in February and finished in the top 10 at Talladega more often than not (four times in six races).

Not Worth Wasting A Start:

With Greg Biffle, I would like to hear any argument as to why you would have him on your roster this weekend except for possible qualifying points. If you start him, I’m sorry but that’s just not smart. I have eight starts left with Ryan Newman but I’m not using him simply because he hates this track and hasn’t finished better than 23rd in the last five events at Talladega. Kasey Kahne is starting to get things turned around so you will probably want to save the rest of his starts for sometime later in the year. I’m sitting at eight with him, though, so he might make my team.

Yahoo! C Group:

Note: I’m generally not real big on “start saving,” but I think in this year’s C group it is essential, and the people on the “avoid list” below really shouldn’t be on anyone’s rosters.

Who To Consider Picking:

Michael Waltrip - Heck, why not? He may have wrecked himself out of the Daytona 500, but Mikey’s taking over Mark Martin’s #55 Toyota this weekend. This car has been speedy all season and finished 10th in the season-opening race in Florida. Waltrip finished 9th in the fall race at Talladega last season and has finished in the top 20 in over half of his fifty-one career starts here.

Trevor Bayne - I can’t find a schedule for him that says exactly how many Sprint Cup races he’s running this season, so I’m going to use Trevor when I can. We all know that the #21 Ford has some power under the hood so you may be able to grab some qualifying bonus points out of him. He started 4th here last fall en route to a solid 15th-place finish.

Dave Blaney - If he can avoid trouble, Blaney could be a real good pick for Sunday. Not only did he finish 3rd here last fall, but he wound up 15th in this year’s season-opening Daytona 500.

Not Worth Wasting A Start:

The two obvious names here are Aric Almirola and Bobby Labonte. I’m sure everyone plans on using both of them the full 9 times this season, so there’s no point in wasting a start on a wildcard race like this. I’d also like to throw into the mix Casey Mears. We’re going to need another starter on intermediate tracks later in the season and that is where this #13 team has been at their best this year.

As I write this, the Denny Hamlin Short Track Showdown is on the Speed Channel, and through 25 of 75 laps, Greg Edwards is leading the late model race. Right now, the Langley (GA) Speedway legend is doing a good job of holding the lead, though he’s got another car filling his mirrors.

Did I mention that that car is being driven by Tony Stewart?

Sprint Cup stars dabbling in late model racing has become a hot, and very entertaining, trend in the past few years, as many drivers look to run as many races as they can. The Prelude to the Dream, held at Stewart’s own Eldora Speedway, has become a major pay-per-view event. The Hamlin event also gathers some attention as local drivers get the opportunity to prove themselves against stock car racing’s best. But these races mean just as much to the Sprint Cup drivers as they do to the locals with something to prove.

Some drivers even go all out to build their own cars. Kyle Busch, of course, fields his late model out of his own shop. Guys like Kenny Wallace, Ken Schrader, and Bobby Labonte have been doing it for years. Jeff Burton spent his own money to build a brand new late model out of his own shop just for Hamlin’s event, with the goal of handing it over to his son in due time.

That got me thinking - with so many great opportunities for late model races, why isn’t there a de facto late model championship for top NASCAR drivers?

Hear me out. For one, these races aren’t about winning money, they’re about winning over competitors, making them a perfect candidate for charity benefit. Plenty of people will be willing to show up for a bunch of exhibition races between top NASCAR drivers, especially for a good cause.

Second, there are plenty of tracks on the NASCAR schedule that either already hold late model races, or could easily establish one. Hamlin’s race is at Richmond in April, while Bristol used to hold late model races for old-timers in March and New Hampshire has an ACT late model invitational in September. Rockingham could serve to add a race as a warm-up for its Truck event in April, while Lucas Oil Raceway Park could use an event in July to replace the Nationwide and Truck events. Throw in affiliations with Eldora for the Prelude to the Dream, Oxford Plains for its annual 250-lap event, and Five Flags Speedway for the Snowball Derby in December, and you have a 10-race schedule.

Lastly, there’s the hope - maybe a small hope, but still a hope - that a series like this would get some of the Cup drivers out of the feeder series and into their own exhibition races. Most of the reason they run those races is for the sake of racing, anyway. Plenty of stars have said that they want to contest the Truck race at Rockingham after watching Kasey Kahne win it this year. But if they choose to return to their late model roots rather than race in the bigger events, maybe it cracks the door open a little wider for some development driver to run once or twice more and impress somebody.

I’m sure a bunch of drivers would sign on, especially with charity involved. Stewart, Busch, and Hamlin would undoubtedly headline it, while Wallace and Schrader might even make it their primary goal to win the title in any given year. The races would make for great television, which the sponsors love, and running for points that determine how much each charity benefits adds an extra layer of motivation beyond bragging rights.

You’d watch it. I’d watch it. A lot of folks would.

Hamlin’s race is now in its intermission, setting up a 25-lap dash for the checkers. Edwards has fallen to third place, with Stewart now in the lead. For Smoke, this could be just another victory won for the love of racing. But for some other driver, a win could be the realization of a dream - beating what may be the sport’s best driver.

Some things may just be pipe dreams, but someone ought to make this dream come true.

Fact Of The Track: In the last five years at Richmond–ten total races–the pole winner has gone on to win the race 20% of the time. The average starting position of the race winners during that span has been 9.8, and the average finish of the pole winners has been 12.9.

During The Last Race At Richmond…Kevin Harvick and Carl Edwards had the best cars all race and led a combined 315 laps out of the 400 ran that night. They finished 1st and 2nd, respectively. Jeff Gordon ended up 3rd with David Ragan and Kurt Busch rounding out the top 5.

Practice Schedule…I really don’t understand how the practice sessions are going to help the drivers this week, but I don’t own the track so I didn’t make the schedule. There are two practices on Friday at noon and 2:30 pm. Qualifying will then be held at 5:30 that night, and then the race is set to begin around 7:15 pm on Saturday, meaning the cars really won’t be on the track during race conditions in practice. All times are in Eastern Time. Note to those who play Yahoo! Auto Racing: rosters lock early Friday morning, meaning we have to set them before seeing the cars on the track.

Click here for the entry list for this week’s race at Richmond.

Top Fifteen Ranking Entering The Sprint Cup Series 400:

1. Kevin Harvick - When you look at the stat sheet, Harvick isn’t the flat-out, number one pick in most people’s minds, but he is in mine. When you combine history at Richmond along with how each driver is running this year, I believe Harvick is the safest bet, and for that reason he gets my vote. Also, as I said before, “Happy” is the most recent winner here, and he led the most laps at Phoenix earlier this year (which, if you pay attention to ifantasyrace.com, Ryan Rantz thinks is a reversed Richmond). In the last fourteen races here, Harvick has finished inside the top 10 on ten seperate occasions, and that includes five top 5s. Statistically, this is the fourth-best track on the circuit for Kevin, and his average driver rating of 110.1 in the last two years here is third-best in the series.

2. Jimmie Johnson - When you look at average finish, Jimmie Johnson probably wouldn’t be on the top of your fantasy lists this week. However, you have to look at more than just that. Yes, in twenty career starts at Richmond Five Time has averaged a finish of 17.2, but he has also had three visits to victory lane and led 414 laps. Last fall, Jimmie finished 31st, but he led 38 laps that day and was a top 5 car until Kurt Busch put him into the wall. Furthermore, in the last five Richmond races, that is the only event that he hasn’t finished inside the top 11. Also, let’s not forget that the #48 team has had great cars week in and week out and Jimmie hasn’t finished worse than 12th since Daytona. Go against him if you want, but I know I won’t.

3. Denny Hamlin - What’s not to like about Hamlin this weekend? He’s coming off his second win of the season and heading to one of the best tracks on the circuit for him. In twelve career starts at Richmond, Denny has finished inside the top 5 in half of them and notched two victories along the way. His worst finish here is 24th–although he led 93% of the laps ran in that race (flat tire)–and he has completed 4,806 of the 4,810 laps ran in his twelve starts here. Hamlin has also led 1,188 laps in his career here, which is better than everyone not named Jeff Gordon. The #11 should be a force once again on Saturday.

4. Kyle Busch - I actually found it very difficult ranking these next two drivers like I did. However, it’s hard going against numbers like these two have. We’ll start with Rowdy Busch. Richmond is Kyle track, plain and simple. His average finish of 5th here is, by far, the best in the series, and he’s tied with just a handful of others with the most wins at this track (3). In fourteen starts here, he’s never finished worse than 20th, and Busch has eleven top 5s to his name. He has led 859 laps in his career here and has completed 100% of the laps ran (how impressive is that?). Unless a freak situation happens like in Bristol, I fully expect Kyle to be a top 5 car on Saturday night.

5. Jeff Gordon - Gordon’s record isn’t as stout as Kyle’s at Richmond, but it’s still good nonetheless. In thirty-eight career starts at this track, Jeff has visited victory lane twice and amassed twenty-four top 10s (fifteen of them being top 5s). Gordon has led a series-best 1,413 laps here and has the fifth-best average driver rating (104.8) in the last two years at this track. He’s going to stop having bad luck sooner or later, and the last time we were at a short track, Gordon absolutely dominated (Martinsville). He also finished 8th at Bristol despite starting 30th. Also, nine of the last ten Richmond races have ended with Gordon in the top 12.

6. Tony Stewart - Here’s a real wildcard for the weekend. Smoke is pretty good here (three career victories) and owns the fourth-best average finish in the series on this track, with a 10.9 in twenty-six career starts. Statistically, this is Stewart’s fourth-best track on the circuit, behind Watkins Glen, Indianapolis, and Chicago. He finished 9th and 7th here last season but has led just two total laps in the last six Richmond events. Despite struggling here in 2010, Smoke still has seven top 10s in the last ten races here, and has completed all but two laps during that span. His 817 laps led here is sixth-best among active drivers.

7. Carl Edwards - This team is making strides, they just need to finally break through. The good news is that Edwards led his first lap of the season last weekend in Kansas, and he’s been pretty good here at Richmond lately. Carl is one of only two drivers (the other being the man ranked #3) to post top 10 finishes in each of the last four races here. Edwards also has led a total of 221 laps during that span and has averaged a driver rating of 108.1 (fourth-best in the series). Carl hasn’t finished worse than 11th in the last month and I wouldn’t expect that to change on Saturday night.

8. Martin Truex, Jr. - I think this week is going to be a real test for this team because Truex hasn’t been good at all in his career at this track. In twelve career starts here, Martin owns an average finish of 24.3 and just four finishes inside the top 20. As I said last week, though, Truex is sort of like the 2011 Brad Keselowski–you just throw out past history for now. He has top 5s in both short track races thus far in 2012, so that’s a little re-assuring. Truex has also qualified in the top 10 in 42% of his starts at Richmond.

9. Clint Bowyer - One of the most surprising things to me this season has been that Clint Bowyer has consistently had the worse car in the Michael Waltrip Racing stable week in and week out. There are a couple things that I like about Clint this week, though. First, he has top 10s in both short track events in 2012 (10th at Martinsville and 4th at Bristol). Also, he has the third-best average finish (10.5) of anyone in the series at this race track, despite only having only one top 5 finish, which was his win in 2008. However, Clint has three 6th-place finishes to his name in his last five starts here, and he has qualified in the top 5 in each of the last three Richmond races. His average driver rating of 104.3 in the last two years here is sixth-best in the series.

10. Ryan Newman - The Rocketman should be one person that is real happy to get away from the intermediate tracks for a week. His success at Richmond is pretty consistent, although, like many people, he has had a few bumps along the way. In twenty career starts at this track, Ryan has compiled twelve top 10s and an average finish of 11.7. He also has just two finishes outside of the top 20. Want to know what I really like about Newman this week, though? His last eight finishes in the spring race here: 20th, 8th, 4th, 6th, 6th, 8th, 3rd, 9th.

11. Greg Biffle - If there’s any track type that you can say Greg Biffle has struggled at this season (I use that term loosely, by the way), it’s the short tracks. In case you forgot, The Biff won the pole in Bristol and ended up finishing 13th, and at Martinsville he wound up 13th as well after starting 26th. On Saturday night, I think Greg could easily challenge for a top 10, but I’m thinking he gets a top 15 finish. In nineteen career starts here, Biffle owns an average finish of 16.6, and he hasn’t finished better than 13th at Richmond since 2006. It’s hard to against a guy when he’s this hot, but you probably should stay away from the #16 this weekend.

12. Mark Martin - Martin hasn’t really ran a short track this season for Michael Waltrip Racing, unless, of course, if you count Phoenix, where he put the #55 Toyota on the pole and finished 9th. However, with Brian Vickers behind the wheel, this car has looked very impressive on the short tracks, especially at Bristol where “The Sheriff” brought it home in 5th. Mark has made a whopping 52 career starts at this 0.75-mile race track and has recorded twenty-eight top 10s and grabbed four poles.He struggled here in 2010, but during the 2011 season, Mark finished 14th and 10th at Richmond and qualified in the top 5 in both races.

13. Dale Earnhardt, Jr. - This ranking will probably end up being too low for Junior, but I can’t stop looking past the fact that in the last six races here, NASCAR’s golden boy hasn’t finished better than 16th and has an average driver rating of 63.4. The good news is that Earnhard finished 15th at Bristol and 3rd at Martinsville earlier this year, and I think he should, at least, finish top 15 on Saturday. Junior has three victories at Richmond (in 2000, 2004, and 2006), and actually had more consistent success here before joining Hendrick Motorsports (data here).

14. Matt Kenseth - Like his team mate, I think you would be better off leaving Kenseth on the bench this weekend. Once again, it’s not a firm avoid, but I just think there are too many other options that are better than wasting your time and taking a risk with Kenseth. He was pretty good here from 2002 to 2004, but since then the single-digit finishes are few and far between. In the last nine Richmond events, Matt’s best finish has been just 13th, and he has finished on the lead lap in just 56% of those starts. One thing to take note of, though, is Kenseth has top 5s in both short track races thus far in 2012 (Bristol and Martinsville).

15. Juan Montoya - I don’t know about you, but I was very impressed–and surprised–with Montoya’s 12th-place finish in Kansas last weekend. He started in the back and was on my Avoid list for the race but that #42 Chevrolet was actually pretty good. Hopefully that will give JPM some momentum, which he obviously needs, as he has just one top 10 finish on the season. I think the problem with this team is that they are absolutely horrible at qualifying. Anyway, at Richmond, Montoya has had some good runs and some bad runs as well. In ten starts, he has four finishes of 15th or better along with four finishes of 29th or worse. He sat on the pole for this event last season and Juan is going to be my dark horse of the week for Richmond.

Just Missed The Top 15…Brad Keselowski, A.J. Allmendinger, Marcos Ambrose

Those To Avoid Entering The Sprint Cup Series 400:

Greg Biffle - This isn’t an “avoid like the plague” title for the Biff this week–obviously, as I have him ranked above–but if you’re in an allocation league, I wouldn’t start him unless he looks absolutely unstoppable in practice (which is a possibility with how they have been running). There are too many intermediate tracks the rest of the way for you to use the #16 this weekend.

Paul Menard - You don’t have to look at the stat sheet too long to realize that Paul Menard simply is not good here. He finished 16th here in his first start, but in the nine events since, Paul hasn’t ended up on the lead lap once and also hasn’t notched a finish better than 26th. In the last three races here, Menard has qualified 15th, 10th, and 7th, but finished those events in 34th, 37th, and 26th, respectively.

Kurt Busch - I’m starting to trust this team a little more on the intermediate tracks, but the short tracks are a different story for Kurt Busch. He may have finished 5th here last fall, but let’s remember that was when he was still with Penske. In the three races before that at Richmond, the elder Busch brother never finished better than 18th. At the two short track races ran so far in 2012 (Bristol and Martinsville), Kurt has finished 18th and 33rd, respectively.

Fact of the track: in the 12 total Sprint Cup races ran here, the pole winner averages a finish of 12.1 and 42.5% of the top 10 qualifiers in those races also finished there.

During The Last Race At Kansas…The race here last October was the fourth race in the Chase and Jimmie Johnson pretty much dominated the whole thing. Of the 272 laps, Five Time led 197 en route to his second victory at the track. He had a near-perfect driver rating of 149.2. Kasey Kahne and Brad Keselowski finished 2nd and 3rd, respectively, despite each never leading a lap, while Roush-Fenway Racing team mates Matt Kenseth and Carl Edwards rounded out the top 5.

Practice Schedule…There are two practice sessions scheduled for Friday (at 1:30 pm and 4:30 pm ET) followed by qualifying on Saturday, which is set to start around noon. There will be no practice once the starting lineup is set. For those that play Yahoo! Auto Racing: rosters don’t lock until Saturday morning, so we get to see the cars on the track before deciding our drivers.

Click here for the entry list for the STP 400.

Top Fifteen Ranking Entering The STP 400:

1. Jimmie Johnson - With Five Time and Jeff Gordon dominating but not winning the last two Sprint Cup races, it’s time to ask: what’s wrong with Hendrick Motorsports? This makes just two wins in the last 29 points-paying races for the organization. Let me know what you think by voting on my poll about this issue (click here). With that being said, I personally think it will only be a matter of time before we see a Hendrick driver back in victory lane, and–right now–I think Johnson will be the guy to do it, and it will happen on Sunday in Kansas. The #48 Chevrolet has been great at the intermediate tracks thus far in 2012 (chart here), and Johnson’s record at Kansas is bested only by Greg Biffle. Along with three pole wins, Jimmie has recorded two wins and nine top 10s in eleven career starts with an average finish of 8.4.

2. Greg Biffle - No surprise here. Over the last two years, the Roush-Fenway Fords own the best average finish at Kansas of any organization, and all three should be a force this Sunday (yes, I’m including Carl Edwards for the first time this year). As I said before, The Biff has the best average finish at Kansas, although it’s not by much of a margin over Five Time. In eleven starts here, Biffle has collected two victories and recorded eight top 10s. His average finish is 8.3. When you take out Greg’s first start here, though–which came back in 2002 where he finished 36th due to an accident–his average finish jumps up to 5.5. It’s hard to go against a team this hot, and I consider The Biff a near lock for a top 5 this weekend.

3. Jeff Gordon - Gordon got his first top 5 of the season last Saturday in Texas and I fully expect this team to go on a little run here and put together a string of great finishes. At Kansas, Gordon generally finishes in the top 5 unless he has a problem or something. Last fall, the #24 looked like a top 5 car for most of the race (check out the Yahoo! chart here) but the engine blew and Gordon finished 34th. Before that, Jeff had a string of five-straight top 5 finishes at this track, and he won the first two races ever ran at this track (in 2001 and 2002). I’m assuming–as it has been like this all year on the intermediates–that Gordon won’t qualify very well on Saturday, but I think we’ll find him up front by the end of the STP 400.

4. Matt Kenseth - As I said before, it’s a intermediate track so of course you should load up on the Roushkateers. What you may not know, though, is that Kansas hasn’t been too kind to Kenseth, and this is actually his fourth-worst track on the circuit. Through twelve career starts here, Matt has recorded six top 10s but has also ended up 30th or worse in five events. His average finish here is 18th. With that being said, however, Kenseth has finished 7th or better in four of the last five Kansas races and has the sixth-best average driver rating on the intermediate tracks this season (chart here).

5. Carl Edwards - Although Cousin Carl hasn’t been running well at all on the intermediate tracks this year, he’s still getting the finishes. He finished 5th at Las Vegas and Fontana and ended up 8th last weekend after starting 20th. It’ll only be a matter of time before we, once again, see the #99 up front week in and week out once again, though, and I’m guessing that will be sooner rather than later. In nine career starts at Kansas, Edwards has an average finish of 10.7 while compiling six finishes of 6th or better. Three of them have came in the last three events.

6. Tony Stewart - I still don’t understand how in the world the #14 Chevy was so bad last week in Texas, but that is in the past and it’s time to focus on Kansas. Smoke has two victories here in twelve career starts–in 2006 and 2009–and has recorded the best average driver rating in the series over the last three events here (117.4). Stewart ended up in 15th here last fall, but that doesn’t really show how good he really was. When you look at his Yahoo! chart from that race (click here) you will find that Tony was running in the top 5 for about half of the race. They may have struggled last weekend, but I fully expect Stewart-Haas Racing to rebound in Kansas.

7. Kevin Harvick - Kevin Harvick has been a solid pick on the intermediates this season–with an average finish of 8th–and he’s one of only three drivers to have a driver rating of at least 100 in all three races (chart here). Here at Kansas, “Happy” owns an average finish of 13.6 in twelve career starts and has finished 11th or better in seven of those races. Kevin finished 6th here last fall and he has ended up in that position on four separate occasions at Kansas Speedway. Harvick owns the seventh-best average driver rating in the last three races at this track (104.7).

8. Mark Martin - I’m not expecting a repeat performance of last weekend in Texas out of the #55 Toyota, but I think Martin will still be good for a top 10, or at least a top 15. He has the seventh-best average finish here (13.1) of anyone in the series with at least seven starts at this track. Martin finished 10th here last fall while driving for Hendrick Motorsports and has finished on the lead lap in 75% of his starts at this track. Consistency is key with Martin and his worst finish here is 25th.

9. Dale Earnhardt, Jr. - He hasn’t been extremely flashy on the intermediate tracks this year like his team mates, but Junior still owns the fourth-best average finish (7.7) on them this year (chart here) and the fifth-best average driver rating (103.7) over those three races (chart here). His record here at Kansas causes a bit of a worry, but it’s hard to go against the #88 right now. In twelve starts here, Earnhardt owns an average finish of 17.3 and has recorded five top 10s. He finished 2nd in this event last year but his Yahoo! driver chart (click here) shows that the #88 wasn’t that great. Remember, that was a fuel mileage race. Junior should be top 15 with a good chance at a top 10 on Sunday.

10. Martin Truex, Jr. - I’m starting to consider Truex like Brad Keselowski last year when he went on his hot streak: throw away the past history. In seven career Kansas races, Martin’s best finish has been 11th, and that came back in his first start. Since then, he hasn’t finished better than 16th and has three finishes of 36th or worse in those six starts. However, Truex started 8th in both Kansas races last season and he didn’t look too terrible in the fall event (Yahoo! chart here). The #56 has been the 7th-best car on the intermediates this season in terms of both average finish (chart here) and average driver rating (chart here). I wouldn’t advise going against him, as I haven’t for most of this season thus far.

11. Clint Bowyer - This is the sixth-best track on the circuit for Bowyer and also his home track. It’s a bit concerning for me, though, that’s he’s getting worse on the intermediate tracks as the season goes on (driver rating chart here). He should be a good pick this weekend, though, although don’t hold me to that unless I say that after practice is over. In seven starts at Kansas, Clint owns an average finish of 12th and has recorded five finishes in the top 15. Bowyer has completed all but two laps in his career at Kansas Speedway.

12. Kasey Kahne - I’m starting to get some confidence back in Kahne, finally. He has qualified in the top 5 in all of the intermediate races this season and has gotten progressively better in the finish category as they go, with a 19th at Las Vegas followed by a 14th in Fontana. As you probably remember, Kahne ended up in 7th last Saturday in Texas. At Kansas–as you probably would have expected–he has had his ups and downs. In nine starts, Kahne owns an average finish of 17th with just three top 10s. He was good here last season, though, finishing 14th in this event and ending up runner-up to Jimmie Johnson in the fall after starting 5th.

13. Kyle Busch - One top 10 in nine starts is a good reason to stay away from Rowdy Busch this weekend, but I don’t think he’ll be that terrible on Sunday. I still don’t think he will be great by any means, but the #18 Toyota should still end up in the top 15. In the last four Kansas races, Kyle has three finishes of 12th or better, and he owns the ninth-best average driver rating (95.6) over the last two years here. Busch also started 3rd in both events here last season. Busch has an average finish of 12th on the intermediate tracks thus far in 2012 (chart here).

14. Ryan Newman - As I said before, I expect Stewart-Haas to have a nice rebound from this off-weekend in Texas. Newman started in the top 10 last Saturday, but as you know, he ended up a disappointing 21st (sorry fantasy owners who started him). At Kansas, The Rocketman started off great, finishing 2nd in 2001 and 2002, and he finally won here in 2003. Since then, though, Newman hasn’t been too great. In the last nine Kansas races, Ryan has just one top 10 finish and an average finish of 22.6. I’m thinking top 15 for Newman right now but I could bump him up to the top 10 if he impresses me in practice.

15. Kurt Busch - Here’s my dark horse pick of the week. We all know that Phoenix Racing equipment is in no way great, but if you want to be different than everyone else, go ahead and take a shot with Busch. In the last two intermediate races this year, Kurt has finished 9th (Fontana) and 13th (last week in Texas). He sat on the pole in this event last season and led a race-high 152 laps en route to a solid 9th-place finish. Busch followed that up with a 13th-place finish here last fall, and he has finished in 13th or better in five of the last six events here. He’s not as reliable, but Kurt could surprise people this weekend in the #51 Chevy.

Honorable Mentions:

Marcos Ambrose - He ran out of gas last weekend with a lap or two to go and while running 8th, but he had a strong car for the majority of that race (Yahoo! chart here). Ambrose finished 9th here last fall so you may want to keep an eye on him.

Brad Keselowski - In the two events last season, BK finished 1st and 3rd. Sounds good, huh? But let’s look deeper into that. His win came from a fuel gamble, but the Blue Deuce seemed to be in the top 15 for many laps that race (Yahoo! chart here). With his 3rd-place finish last fall, Keselowski looked even better, as you can see from his Yahoo! chart (click here). Brad was doing great until his problems last week in Texas and probably would have had a top 10.

A.J. Allmendinger - Penske Racing as a whole has been good here lately and A.J. has two top 10s in his five career starts at Kansas (in 2008 and 2010). He finished 15th at both Fontana and Texas this season.

Those To Avoid Entering The STP 400:

Jeff Burton - His history at Kansas is a bit concerning and Burton hasn’t been too great on the intermediates this year, both average finish-wise (chart here) and when looking at average driver rating (chart here). In twelve career starts, Jeff has averaged a finish right around 19th and he hasn’t finished better than 18th in his last four starts at this track.

Joey Logano - Sliced Bread may be good for a top 20 finish, but that’s not really what I’m looking for. He ranks 22nd in terms of average finish at the intermediate tracks this year (chart here) and his best finish at Kansas is just 17th, which came back in 2010. He started 4th in that race. That is also Logano’s only top 20 at this race track.

Aric Almirola - For those that play Yahoo! Auto Racing, there’s simply no reason to waste a start on Almirola when you can get close to the same finish out of Casey Mears or David Reutimann. Wait until another short track comes around–or Aric shows something at an intermediate track–before starting the #43 Ford.

After the first weekend off of the 2012 season, the Sprint Cup Series will now have five straight points-paying races before another “break,” which will be the All Star weekend at Charlotte Motor Speedway

During The Last Race At Texas…Tony Stewart led a race-high 173 laps en route to his fourth win of the 2012 season. This was in the midst of Smoke’s battle with Carl Edwards, who finished 2nd. Kasey Kahne, Matt Kenseth, and pole-sitter Greg Biffle rounded out the top 5. Kenseth won the spring race earlier in the season. Interesting fact: eight drivers who started in the top 10 finished there in the April Texas race, with five doing the same in November.

Practice Schedule…Things will be a little different than most weekends. Practice #1 will start at 5:30 pm on Thursday evening. Once that is over, the cars won’t be on the track until the next day; Happy Hour will be at 3:00 pm on Friday followed by qualifying at 6:30. The Samsung Mobile 500 is set to start a little after 7:00 pm on Saturday. That could be a little interesting because the cars won’t be on track for practice at any of the same time frame when the actual race will be ran. For those that play Yahoo! Auto Racing: the deadline to set your rosters is Friday morning.

Click here for the entry list for the 2012 Samsung Mobile 500 at Texas.

Top Fifteen Ranking Entering The Samsung Mobile 500:

1. Tony Stewart - Not sure how much detail I need to go into here. Stewart is on absolute fire at the intermediate tracks and should be on your roster, no matter what, until further notice. As I said before, Smoke won the last race at Texas in 2011, which was the second of his career here (the first coming back in 2006). His average finish of 12.6 in twenty starts at Texas Motor Speedway is fourth-best in the series, and Stewart has the third-best average driver rating over the last four events here. Make no mistake about it, the #14 will be up front at some point on Saturday night, and right now I’m thinking he’s going to win the Samsung Mobile 500.

2. Greg Biffle - These next three drivers could be ranked any way in spots 2 through 4 this weekend. They should all three be good picks, but I’m just giving the nod to The Biff and Kenseth because Roush-Fenway Racing has been the best organization at Texas over the last two years. The Biff has been the only driver in the series to finish in the top 10 in each of the last seven races here, and the last three have all been top 5s. When it comes to driver rating, Biffle hasn’t had one under 92.5 at Texas since early 2008. I’d consider Greg a lock for a top 5 on Saturday night.

3. Matt Kenseth - Matt Kenseth has the best average finish of anyone in the series at Texas Motor Speedway (8.7) and has just one finish outside of the top 20 in nineteen career starts here. He’s led 756 laps here–also a series-best–and like his team mate Greg Biffle, Kenseth has three straight top 5 finishes here. He put the #17 Ford in the top 5 during qualifying in both 2011 events here, but Matt has yet to record a pole at Texas. Kenseth’s finishes have been lacking on the intermediates so far in 2012 (22nd at Las Vegas and 16th at Fontana) but there’s no reason to think this team won’t turn that around on Saturday night. He won this event last season and had a near-perfect driver rating of 144.7 while doing so. As usual, Kenseth will be good pick at Texas, but I’m not considering him a lock for a top 5 yet.

4. Jimmie Johnson - When you look at Five Time’s record at all of the current tracks, you might be surprised to find that Texas is pretty far down the list (in 13th). However, Johnson still owns an average finish of 10.2 here and twelve top 10s in seventeen starts. He won the fall race in 2007 and Jimmie has recorded three top 10s in the last four races here. Johnson has the second-best average driver rating on the intermediates thus far in 2012 (chart here) and still hasn’t finished worse than 12th since Daytona. I wouldn’t expect that to change on Saturday night, although I don’t see Johnson fighting for the win. He should, however, still have a nice, solid race, as usual.

5. Carl Edwards - Despite having three victories at this track, Cousin Carl’s average finish here isn’t that great (although it’s not terrible, either). In fourteen career starts, Edwards has amassed six top 10s, but also four finishes outside of the top 25. When you add it all up, Carl’s average finish is 15.5. There’s no reason for that to scare you away from picking him this weekend, though. I have a hunch that this team is finally getting their wheels underneath them, and that this “hangover” they are experiencing will go away this weekend. Edwards finished 3rd and 2nd in the two Texas races in 2011 and has posted top 5s in both intermediate races thus far in 2012. He had led the fifth-most laps at this track of anyone in the series (493).

6. Dale Earnhardt, Jr. - Somewhat quietly (for who it is, anyway) Dale Earnhardt, Jr. is off to the absolute best start of the season in a very long time (maybe even his whole career). Junior now has two straight 3rd-place finishes after Martinsville a couple weeks ago, and–ironically–that is also the number of top 5s he has recorded in nineteen career starts at Texas Motor Speedway. His average finish of 14.1 is eighth-best in the series at this track and Earnhardt has notched three top 10s in the last four races here, which is where I expect him to end up on Saturday. In the intermediate races thus far this season, Junior has the fourth-best average driver rating (chart here) and has finished 10th and 3rd. He’s one of only four drivers with two career poles at this track.

7. Kevin Harvick - Harvick has averaged the fifth-best driver rating in the two cookie cutter races this season (chart here) and I expect him to have another solid Chevy at Texas this weekend. In eighteen starts at this track, “Happy” has averaged a finish of 12.9–which is fifth best in the series–and owns eight top 10s. He doesn’t lead many laps, though, with just five total coming in four different races. Harvick’s best finish here has been 3rd, which came back in 2006, and in seven of the last nine events here, Kevin has finished 13th or better. Texas is his sixth-best track on the circuit (statistically).

8. Ryan Newman -This ranking may be a little too high for The Rocketman, but I can’t look past the fact of how strong him and his owner have been on the intermediate tracks this season. Newman finished 4th at Las Vegas and wound up in 7th at Fontana, and he ran in the top 10 for most of those two races. At Texas, though, Newman’s record is a little bit discouraging. However, I’m not too worried about it. In seventeen starts here, The Rocketman has averaged a finish of 20.7 while amassing just three top 10s. The good news? He’s been consistent. In the last six events at Texas, Newman hasn’t finished worse than 20th and in five of the six he’s ended up between 11th and 16th. I like him for a fourth top 10 at Texas going into this weekend.

9. Clint Bowyer - I’ve jumped the gun a bit on Bowyer at the intermediates this season, but that’s not to say he isn’t a bad pick. I think this team is capable of grabbing their fourth top 10 of the 2012 season this Saturday night, but it’s nowhere near a lock. Clint’s history at this track, however, is pretty good, so it’s probably going to come down to how strong the #15 Toyota is this weekend. In twelve career starts at Texas, Bowyer has notched seven top 10s, and even finished runner-up in this race last year. In the last five events at this track, Clint has finished in the top 10 in four of them. This is the seventh-best track on the circuit for Bowyer (statistically) and he should be a solid pick on Sunday night, but make sure he looks good in practice before committing.

10. Martin Truex, Jr. - Another week down and another solid finish for Truex, so that begs the question: is he a real Chase contender? You can vote by clicking here. At Texas, Martin tends to have a good race unless he gets in an accident, which happened in the fall race of 2010 and this race last season, where he finished 38th and 35th, respectively. However, Truex six top 10s in thirteen starts to his name here, and you know what I always say: pick ‘em while they’re hot. He finished 17th at Las Vegas and 8th at Fontana. I’m not sure what happened during the Vegas race, but the #56 Toyota was in the top 10 for the majority of the event (Yahoo! chart here). I’m expecting another top 10 out of Martin Truex, Jr. this weekend.

11. Denny Hamlin - Denny seems to have a really good finish at Texas or end up in the lower teens or worse, and with his performance at the intermediates in 2012 thus far, I’m not giving him the benefit of the doubt going into this weekend. Hamlin won both Texas races in 2010 and has three more top 5s to his name in thirteen career starts. His average finish of 10.2 is second best in the series at this track, but qualifying has been a sort of struggle for this team here lately: in the last six Texas races, Hamlin hasn’t started any race in a spot better than 22nd. We’ll see what #11 shows up this weekend because it’s been a tale of two cars in the two intermediate races this season.

12. Kyle Busch - Rowdy was an early favorite of mine to take the championship this season, but he’s really letting me down–as well as fantasy owners–thus far. I’m not sure what to expect out of Kyle this weekend in Texas, to be honest with you. His record here is decent: thirteen starts, five top 10s, with an average finish of 16.2, and he owns the ninth-best average driver rating in the last four races here. He didn’t race in the fall event here last season (suspension) but Kyle ran a decent race here in April last year, starting 11th and finishing 16th. If he starts in the top 10, I’d give Rowdy more consideration, but going into the weekend there are simply too many other options that would be better than the #18.

13. Mark Martin - Martin is back behind the wheel of the #55 Toyota this weekend, and I expect another solid teen finish out of him like we have gotten in the other cookie cutter events in 2012 (he wound up 18th at Las Vegas and 12th at Fontana). Mark has made twenty-two career starts at Texas Motor Speedway and owns twelve top 10s, including a win back in 1998. He struggled in the two 2011 events here but in 2009 and 2010, Martin wound up in the top 10 in all four Texas races. He will probably look faster than he is in practice, just to warn you.

14. Kasey Kahne - One of these weeks, the #5 team is going to break out and finally put together a complete race, but the question is when. Kahne’s history here at Texas is hit-or-miss; in fifteen career starts, he’s notched four top 5s (including a win from the pole back in 2006) as well as five finishes of 25th or worse. What I’m expecting out of Kasey this weekend is similar to what we saw out of him in Fontana: have a good qualifying effort but then fall back early and just ride around and get the finish. He wound up in 14th that race and you can view his Yahoo! chart by clicking here.

15. Brad Keselowski - I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: BK just has a knack for getting to the front in races this year; he’s led at least one lap in four of the first six events in 2012. His finishes on the cookie cutters this season have been less than stellar (32nd at Las Vegas and 18th at Fontana), but when you look at his Yahoo! Driver Charts for those races (here and here, respectively), the Blue Deuce was at least a top 15 car. At Texas, Brad’s best finish has been 14th in seven career starts, and I expect him to finish right around that mark on Saturday. He’s also my dark horse pick of the week.

Those To Avoid Entering The Samsung Mobile 500:

Joey Logano - If his 26th-place average finish at Texas doesn’t scare you away from Sliced Bread this week, then his performance on the intermediate tracks thus far in 2012 surely will. He finished 16th at Las Vegas but Logano’s Yahoo! chart (click here) shows that he had really a mid-twenties car until the end of the race. He has a 4th-place finish to his credit at Texas (back in 2010) but other than that race, Logano hasn’t finished on the lead lap in any other of his seven career starts at this track.

Juan Montoya - Like Logano, Juan Pablo Montoya rarely finishes all of the laps when the series visits Texas Motor Speedway. He has made ten career starts at this race track and has ended up with just two top 10s (in 2007 and 2009), in which he was on the lead lap at the end. In the seven starts here that Montoya has finished at least one lap down, he owns an average finish of 26.6. His average driver rating in the first two intermediate tracks this year has been 59.0. I wouldn’t expect much out of the #42 this weekend.

Aric Almirola - I’m not a big advocate of “start saving” when it comes to Yahoo! Auto Racing, but I just see no point in taking Almirola on the intermediate tracks; it has been obvious so far this season that the #43 team is at its best on the short/flat tracks. He’s going to be a mid-twenties driver just like the Las Vegas and Fontana (24th and 25th, respectively) and you should be able to at least match that by picking Trevor Bayne, who finished 17th in this race last season (IF he is entered this week).

That’s what Kasey Kahne might be asking himself after a difficult start to the 2012 Sprint Cup season that sees him a mediocre 27th in points, worst among the four Hendrick Motorsports drivers in his first year with the team. Last week’s 14th place finish at Fontana was his best run of the year, and before that, the team was scarily close to the top-35 owners’ points cutoff that could have enabled them to miss a race.

It’s not what Kahne was hoping for after contract issues forced him to spend an up and down year in a holding pattern at Team Red Bull last season. A gutsy win in that organization’s second-to-last race at Phoenix in November suggested that good times were ahead for the Washington native. But what had been expected to be a winning, Chase-contending combination at the onset of the year now looks every bit like the team that Mark Martin took to 22nd place in points in 2011.

Granted, stranger things - and greater comebacks - have happened in NASCAR’s premier series. Jimmie Johnson went from last in the world (even I had more than -23 points coming out of Daytona) in the standings to ninth coming into this weekend’s race at Martinsville. In this same car, Martin went from 34th place through four races in 2009 to make the Chase and finish second overall. All hope is not lost.

But Kahne has shown an incredible ability this season to beat the one driver that no driver should ever beat - himself. He crashed out at Daytona, walled it in Phoenix, and made an overly aggressive move early at Bristol to effectively end his race before it could even start. At Las Vegas, he qualified on pole, but couldn’t even manage to lead a lap; despite spending over 95% of the race in the top 15, he drifted back to a disappointing 19th at the finish.

That doesn’t do too much to inspire hope in the legions of Kahne-iacs who expected the move from Red Bull to Hendrick to take his career to the next level.

For his part, Kahne is doing whatever it takes to turn this season around. It may seem counter-intuitive to enter the Camping World Truck race at Rockingham on April 15, the day after a night race at Texas for the Sprint Cup boys, but for Kahne, it could serve as a major confidence builder. He’ll be with Turner Motorsports, which qualified its three trucks 1-2-3 at Daytona and fields Kahne in a handful of Nationwide races every year. Kahne has never finished worse than second in four career Truck starts. The combination has every shot at success.

But if Kahne really wants to get it together quickly, he may have no better opportunity than Sunday’s race at Martinsville. In 174 combined starts, Hendrick Motorsports cars have taken 18 wins, most recently in spring 2009 with Jimmie Johnson, and 100 top-10s, including six of eight possible last year.

It would be a great way for Kahne to establish himself at the track, where a pedestrian 20.7 average finish makes the paper clip-shaped short track his fifth-worst track on the schedule. It would also be a great way for Kahne to make his mark at Hendrick; the team has been stuck at 199 wins since October 9, and scoring the organization’s 200th would help build momentum for the rest of the season.

It’s not too late for Kahne to turn his season around. If he can contend for race wins and climb into the top 20, he has a shot at making the Chase as a wild card driver. But the time to turn it around is now, not later. And if Kahne can’t put together a string of strong finishes by Memorial Day, last year’s motto - “wait ’til next year” - may be the phrase of the hour once again.

After the 500 laps–well, if the rain stays away–of the Goody’s Fast Relief 500 are completed this Sunday at Martinsville Speedway, the Sprint Cup Series will have its first weekend off of the season before heading to Texas Motor Speedway for the first Saturday night race of the year.

During The Last Race At Martinsville…Tony Stewart grabbed his third win in the Chase back in October at The Paperclip despite leading just 14 laps. The Hendrick duo of Jimmie Johnson and Jeff Gordon finished 2nd and 3rd, leading 61 and 113 laps, respectively. Kevin Harvick and Denny Hamlin rounded out the top 5. Kyle Busch led a race-high 126 laps but hit the wall late and finished a disappointing 27th.

Practice Schedule…Everyone who plays Yahoo! Auto Racing should like the practice schedule this weekend because we get to see the cars on track before locking down our drivers. On Friday, there will be two practice sessions (at 12:30 pm and 3:30 pm) followed by qualifying on Saturday morning at 11:30 am. Once the starting lineup is set, the cars won’t hit the track again until Sunday’s 500-lap event. All times are in EST.

Top Fifteen Ranking Entering The Goody’s Fast Relief 500:

1. Kyle Busch - Rowdy has never won at Martinsville in fourteen career starts, but that’s bound to change soon, and right now I think it’s going to be this Sunday. The #18 was the best car in Fontana a week ago and Dave Rogers and crew should prepare another hot rod for Kyle again this weekend. Busch has had a top 5 car in each of the last three races at The Paperclip (average driver rating of 110.6) and would have three straight top 5 finishes if it weren’t for getting put into the wall by Matt Kenseth (video here). He was in the top 5 for much of that day (Yahoo! Race Chart here). Rowdy’s six top 5s is tied for third-best in the series among drivers with twenty or fewer starts here.

2. Jimmie Johnson - No surprise here. This is Five Time’s third-best track on the circuit and he owns the best average finish here of anyone in the series with 5.5. In twenty career starts, Johnson has amassed six wins and has just one finish outside of the top 20, which was a 35th-place effort in his very first start here (caused by a vibration). Jimmie’s 11th-place effort in this race last season broke a streak of seventeen-straight single-digit finishes at Martinsville, but he started a new one in the fall with a runner-up, as I said before. He’s had triple-digit driver ratings in every single race here since 2006. Not much more of a safer pick than the #48 Chevrolet this weekend.

3. Denny Hamlin - As long as there isn’t any rain so Darian Grubb can make another idiotic pit road call, I’ll consider Hamlin a lock for a top 5 this weekend. His resume at Martinsville is quite impressive: thirteen starts, four wins, nine top 5s, and an average finish of 6.5. Denny has just one finish worse than 12th here, and that was a 37th back in 2006 when he started 41st and got caught up in an accident. His minimum driver rating in the last six events at The Paperclip has been 118.7 and he averaged a rating of 127.6 during those three years. Also in that span, Hamlin has led 861 laps. This is best track on the circuit statistically and it’s coming at a good time: the #11 crew will be able to wipe their memory or Fontana clean with a solid run (and maybe even a win) this weekend in Martinsville.

4. Jeff Gordon - And the bad luck bug strikes Jeff Gordon again… I wasn’t going to rank him this high when I was originally putting this post together (I had him around 8th or 9th), but when you look at his record at Martinsville, it’s hard to justify not having Gordon in the top 5; he’s just that good at this half-mile race track. Jeff has made thirty-eight starts at this venue and 81.5% of the time he has ended up in the top 10. In the last fourteen races, Gordon has ended up in the top 5 in thirteen of them. It’s his best track on the circuit and even with his bad luck to start the 2012 season, I wouldn’t be afraid to take the four-time champion this weekend.

5. Dale Earnhardt, Jr. - If Junebug is going to win a race soon, this will probably be the best chance he has in the next month or so. Statistically, he’s the fourth-best driver at Martinsville (with an average finish of 13.1) although he has yet to visit victory lane at this half-mile track. In twenty-four career starts, however, Junior has amassed thirteen top 10s (nine being top 5s) and he finished 2nd in this event last season. He’s on a streak of three straight top 10s here and also has had a driver rating of at least 100.1 in all three. Earnhardt hasn’t finished outside of the top 15 all season thus far and I wouldn’t bank on that changing this week.

6. Kevin Harvick - “Happy” is really getting the hang of The Paperclip here lately. Going into the 2010 season, he had never posted a top 5 finish in seventeen starts at the track, but in the spring race he went and put his #29 Chevy on the pole and led 57 laps. He had a brake problem that day and finished 35th. In the fall race that year, though, Harvick posted his first top 5 at Martinsville (a 3rd-place effort) after leading 97 laps, and came back in 2011 and grabbed his first career win here in the spring and ended up in 4th in the fall. History isn’t on his side here, but Kevin should have one of the best cars this weekend in Martinsville, and should improve on his career average finish of 15.9.

7. Ryan Newman - I’m going to watch this team closely in practice on Friday because they just don’t seem on top of their game as of late to me. Be sure to check out my final Predictions for the Goody’s Fast Relief 500 at www.ifantasyrace.com to see whether or not “The Rocketman” is worthy of this spot after practice and qualifying. With that being said, Newman is generally a pretty solid pick on the short tracks. In the last six Martinsville races, he has come away with four top 10s and led a total of 99 laps (over half of his total 182 in twenty career starts here). He has three top 5 starts here in the six races since joining Stewart-Haas Racing so you may be able to snag some qualifying bonus points from him this weekend. His career average start here is 8.9 compared to his career average finish of 14.4.

8. Clint Bowyer - I kind of jumped the guns on him last weekend in Fontana, but the strong run by this team in Bristol a couple weeks ago along with Bowyer’s history at Martinsville makes me think we’re going to see another good run out of this #15 Toyota on Sunday. In twelve starts here, Clint has averaged a finish of right around 15th and recorded seven finishes of 11th or better. If you like patterns, in the last five spring races here, Bowyer has finished 11th, 10th, 5th, 7th, and 9th, compared to his fall finishes of 9th, 9th, 19th 38th, and 19th. His average driver rating of 90.0 over the past two years here is ninth-best in the series.

9. Carl Edwards - The #99 Ford was finally starting to come back to form last weekend when the rain started. Will that continue this weekend? We’ll find out. If you’re going to pick a Roush Ford this weekend, I’d go with Cousin Carl (although I wouldn’t recommend any of them because there are many better picks out there). Edwards has made fifteen starts at The Paperclip and has just one top 5 finish to his name (a 3rd in 2008). He does, however, have five top 10s and just four finishes outside of the top 20. In the last four events here, Carl has one pole and three finishes of 8th or 9th.

10. Tony Stewart - Yeah, Smoke won again last weekend (since when does this happen so early in the season?) and is the most recent winner at this track, so this ranking is probably pretty low in many people’s minds. However, his runs in this race last season as well as both events in 2010 are really sticking out at me. He finished 34th here last year after starting 28th and finished 26th and 24th in 2010 despite starting 5th and 6th, respectively. His driver ratings in those races aren’t much to ride home about, either (best of 88.3). He could sneak up on me and grab a top 5 but I think a top 10 or top 15 is much more likely for Smoke this weekend.

11. Martin Truex, Jr. - Say hello to my dark horse pick of the week. With his (albeit lucky) 8th-place finish last weekend in Fontana, Truex now has an average finish of 9.6 in the last ten (ten!) Sprint Cup races. I think this is the most consistent stretch of finishes during his career in NASCAR’s top series, but don’t quote me on that because I haven’t went back and checked it. Still, this guy has momentum and confidence, and so does this entire Michael Waltrip Racing stable. Will we see a top 5 sweep again like a couple weeks ago in Bristol? Martin’s best finish at Martinsville came in this event in 2010, where he finished 5th, which was his first start here for MWR. He stumbled in the next two events at this track, but last fall, Truex placed the #56 Toyota in 8th-place, and his Yahoo! chart shows that it wasn’t exactly luck.

12. Brad Keselowski - BK is one-for-one on the short tracks in the 2012 season, but I don’t see him getting his first career victory at Martinsville this weekend. Still, I’m expecting another solid run out of the Blue Deuce on Sunday. I’ve been saying it for a couple of weeks: Keselowski knows how to get to the front, he just sometimes has difficulty finishing. In four starts at The Paperclip, BK has averaged a finish right around 14th, and has finished on the lead lap in three of those races. Last fall, Brad had a top 10 car for most of the race but fell back late and finished 17th (Yahoo! race chart here).

13. Matt Kenseth - It’s no secret that the Roush-Fenway Fords aren’t very good here (6 cumulative top 10s in 16 cumulative starts here in the past two years), and I’d consider Kenseth the second-best option in that group of three. He finished 6th in this race last season but his driver rating didn’t back that up (13th-best). Still, he has three finishes of 15th or better in the last five events here and Matt has averaged a finish in the teens (16.5) over his twenty-four career starts at The Paperclip. If you take the #17 this weekend, I wouldn’t expect a top 5, but a top 10 may be possible with some strategy by Jimmy Fennig. I wouldn’t expect him and Brian Vickers to tangle again. Kenseth had a top 10 car before that happened last fall.

14. Joey Logano - In his first start at The Paperclip, Sliced Bread finished four laps off the pace in 32nd place. He learned the track quickly, though, and in the four races after, Logano never finished worse than 13th (including a runner-up finish in 2010). Joey struggled here a bit last fall (driver rating of 67.9) but managed to bring the #20 Toyota home in 18th. Gibbs is one of the two best organizations at this track and Logano has been qualifying well this season, which is a plus on these real short tracks.

15. Jeff Burton - Very rarely will you see Jeff Burton on my top 15 rankings entering a weekend, but I can’t skip over the guy that has the sixth-best average driver rating at Martinsville in the past two years. Over those four events, Burton has amassed two top 10s, but both of those came in the fall events of 2010 and 2011. He was good here back in the day while driving for Roush Racing but since joining Richard Childress Racing, the successful runs have been few and far between for Burton. I’m expecting a mid-teens finish out of the #31 on Sunday. Jeff has nine top 20s in the last ten Martinsville races.

Special Note: Brian Vickers is back behind the wheel of the #55 Toyota this weekend. I don’t see him having another run like a few weeks ago at Bristol, but then again, I didn’t expect much more than a top 20 out of The Sheriff in Thunder Valley, either. His career average finish in thirteen starts at Martinsville is 20.5.

Those To Avoid Entering The Goody’s Fast Relief 500:

Kasey Kahne - He’s with Hendrick now, so his performance might be better at Martinsville than before, but I’m waiting for a real good run out of this team before considering him at a track where his average finish is 20.7. He owns just two top 10s in sixteen career starts and hasn’t finished there since 2006. Unless he looks flat out phenomenal in practice (think Denny Hamlin last weekend) I’m going to pass on KK for this race.

Juan Montoya - He ended up with a top 10 a couple of weeks ago in Bristol, but Montoya had just the sixteenth-best driver rating in that race. At Martinsville, JPM has a career average finish of 14.7, but three of the last four events have ended with him in 19th place or worse. He might be a sleeper in some people’s minds, but I’d rather take his team mate, Jamie McMurray, in that role this weekend.

Paul Menard - He finished in the teens in both Martinsville races during the 2010 season, but overall Paul’s history at this track is very shaky. In nine career starts here, he owns an average finish of 22.7 and has completed just 94.5% of the laps ran. His best driver rating has been 79.4 in all of his starts here.

Photo credit: Charlie Turner - OnPitRow.com

NASCAR debate: Would you rather be Kyle Busch with a whole bunch of wins AND haters galore, or Dale Earhardt Jr, with adoring fans and…….?

This week the Auto Club 400 will be held at Auto Club Speedway in California, which will be the only event at the track, a tradition started last season after seven straight years of holding two events annually.

During The Last Race At Fontana…Kyle Busch led over 75% of the 200 laps ran in last year’s Auto Club 400, but it was “The Closer” Kevin Harvick who passed Jimmie Johnson on the last lap–in the last turn–to take the victory. Rowdy finished a distant 3rd that day, followed by Matt Kenseth and Ryan Newman to round out the top 5. The victory was Harvick’s first at this track in his eighteenth start here.

Practice Schedule…Same schedule as the past two weekends but different times. First practice on Friday at 3:00 pm followed by qualifying Friday evening at 7:00 pm. On Saturday, the second session will start at 12:30 pm and Happy Hour will kick off around 3:30 pm later that day. All times are EST. For those that play Yahoo! Auto Racing, that means rosters will lock before seeing any of the cars on the track.

Top Fifteen Ranking Entering The Auto Club 400:

1. Matt Kenseth - Matty Ice (do people call Kenseth that?) is always a threat on the cookie cutter tracks and he has three victories at Auto Club Speedway–the most recent coming in 2009–to prove that this track isn’t an exception. Kenseth finished 4th in this race last season and has a career average finish of 10th here. What’s even more impressive is that in nineteen career starts at this track, Matt has completed all but two laps out of 4,655. He has just three finishes outside of the top 20, but in two of them he led at least 29 laps, so it’s not like he had a terrible car for the race. At Michigan, Kenseth has three straight top 10s and finished 2nd in the June race last season. Will we see victory number two of 2012 out of the #17 camp this Sunday? Going into the weekend, he’s my pick.

2. Jimmie Johnson - Well, Chad Knaus will be on the pit box this weekend because the suspension was overturned, so expect Johnson’s good run to continue. Furthermore, this is Jimmie’s home track, and his best venue on the schedule, statistically. His record here is ridiculously impressive: seventeen starts, twelve top 5s–five of those being wins–and a worst finish of 16th. Jimmie has led 849 laps at Fontana, which is by far the most of anyone in the series. His run in this race last season was actually kind of an off-day for The Champ: he only led three laps. In the eight races at Auto Club Speedway from 2007 to 2010, Johnson led an average of just under 93 laps per race. Still, he has just one finish outside of the top 3 in the last nine events here, and that was a 9th-place in 2009.

3. Tony Stewart - Smoke is the hottest driver on intermediate tracks and I have no doubt in my mind that h is #14 Chevy will be a force to be reckoned with at Auto Club Speedway this weekend. He won here in 2010 and he had the second-best driver rating in this race last season despite finishing 13th. He had a terrible restart and if there wasn’t that late-race caution, I think Stewart would have finished top 5. In case you have short term memory loss, Tony dominated the race in Las Vegas a couple weeks ago, and he’s been the best driver at Michigan (average finish-wise) in the last two years. Smoke hasn’t finished worse than 13th at Fontana since 2008. That will not change on Sunday.

4. Greg Biffle - First the bad: Biffle hasn’t finished better than 10th at Fontana in the last four events and has led a grand total of zero laps here during that span. Now the good: he’s been great at Michigan (similar track) over that time and has some of the most momentum of anyone in the garage right now, not to mention you can never overlook him (or Roush) when it comes to the cookie cutters. Even though his recent record isn’t great by any means at Auto Club Speedway, Greg did capture a victory here in 2005 and has three other top 5 efforts on top of that in his seventeen career starts. Stick with The Biff!

5. Clint Bowyer - Reach alert! After the race this weekend, I may look back at this ranking of Bowyer and wonder why I put him there, but can we all agree that Michael Waltrip Racing is starting to look more and more like a great race organization? I shrugged Clint’s move there in the off-season off and considered it a downgrade, but I’m starting to re-think that. However, that being said, this is the week that Bowyer will prove to me that it wasn’t. He has made eleven starts at Fontana and has recorded the fourth-best average finish of anyone in the series at this track with 10.6. Clint has never won at Auto Club Speedway, but does own a couple top 5s and has five top 10s in the last six Fontana events. He also hasn’t had a driver rating under 109 in the last three races here.

6. Carl Edwards - I’d like to rank Cousin Carl in the top 5 this week, but I still think this team is off. I know that the #99 got caught up in the early wreck last week in Bristol, but it wasn’t super fast by any means. Edwards grabbed a top 5 at Las Vegas a couple weeks ago, but he didn’t have a top 5 car (his driver rating showed that). I’m really waiting for this team to have a “breakout performance,” if you will, and get over this supposed hangover from losing the championship last season. At Fontana, Carl has a career average finish of 9.0 in fourteen starts and won the race here in 2008. In the last six events, though, he hasn’t finished better than 6th (ironic huh?), but he’s done it three times. What’s even more concerning is Edwards has led just one lap at this track since 2008.

7. Kevin Harvick - I didn’t think it was possible to beat Jimmie Johnson at his best track, but Kevin Harvick proved me wrong last season. He had the sixth-best driver rating at Las Vegas a couple of weeks ago, and I’m expecting “Happy” Harvick to have another top 10 run here in Fontana on Sunday. His win here last season was the first in eighteen career starts at Auto Club Speedway, but that race made it four straight top 10s for Harvick at this track, and six in the last seven races. He hasn’t finished worse than 11th this season thus far and I wouldn’t expect that to change this Sunday.

8. Kyle Busch - If you take Rowdy this week, I’d exercise some caution in doing so. Seriously, who would have expected that happening last weekend in Bristol? Kyle is pretty good at the 2-mile racetracks, as you can tell by his domination in this race last season. He won at Fontana in 2005 and Busch has nine top 10 finishes in fourteen career starts here. At Michigan last year, he finished 3rd and 1st. Not too bad. Kyle struggled at his home track a couple of weeks ago, finishing 23rd, but he did start 2nd in that race. He spun out late in that race but didn’t really have that great of a car in race trim compared to how fast he was in qualifying. Like I said, it will be risky, but Rowdy’s record is pretty good at these type of race tracks recently.

9. Ryan Newman - No Neck Newman has two straight 5th-place finishes at Fontana and has recently been a pretty good pick on these 2-mile ovals (he finished 6th and 5th in the two Michigan races last season). Add in this team’s 4th-place run in Vegas a couple weeks ago and I think Newman has a shot at another top 10 in California this weekend. His history is shaky here (just six top 10s in seventeen career starts) but Stewart-Haas Racing has been incredible at these cookie cutter tracks over the last half year.

10. Mark Martin - Like I’ve said many times, you just can’t go against a hot team early in the year, and this crew and Rodney Childers seem to have the most momentum and confidence right now that it doesn’t even matter who’s driving the race car. Mark has made twenty career starts at Fontana and half of them he brought the car home inside the top 10, including one win back in 1998. What’s even more impressive is the fact that Martin has just three finishes outside of the top 20 here. He struggled last season as the lame-duck with Hendrick, but in the three races prior to that, Martin recorded top 10s and led at least five laps in each. He had a top 12 car at Las Vegas a couple weeks ago before the next guy on this list put him in the fence…

11. Dale Earnhardt, Jr. - Junior had a pretty strong Chevy a couple of weeks ago at Las Vegas and I expect him and Steve Letarte to bring another hot rod to Fontana this weekend. His record isn’t stellar here, but Earnhardt does have three top 5s to his name at this 2-mile race track, and has finished 16th and 12th in the last two events here. It is somewhat of a risky pick, but I like the way this team is running to start off the year. If he looks good in practice, I’d have no problem with Earnhardt, Jr. on my roster this weekend.

12. Joey Logano - Before last year absymal 25th-place finish at Fontana, Sliced Bread had a string of three-straight top 15 finishes here, including a 5th-place effort in the first 2010 event here. Last season at this track, Joey posted a solid 3rd-place qualifying effort but engine woes struck this team again and he had to start the event from the rear of the field. Logano never really recovered and finished 25th. However, as strong as the Gibbs stable was here last season, and with their engine difficulties pretty much gone, I expect to see the #20 somewhere in the top 15 at the end of 400 miles on Sunday.

13. Paul Menard - The beginning of the season is the point where it’s a good idea to pick Paul Menard, as you can tell from his three top 10s in the first four races in 2012. He has had a fair amount of struggles at Auto Club Speedway–as in not having one lead lap finish in his first six starts–but the last three races here have all ended with Menard on the lead lap and he has a couple of teens finishes (16th last season and 18th in 2010). He also ran a nice race at Michigan last June, where he started 9th and finished 4th after leading two laps.

14. Martin Truex, Jr. - I really have no statistics for you of any success that Truex has found at Auto Club Speedway, but sometimes you have to overlook history at a track when a driver has this much momentum (as in the second-best average finish over the last five Sprint Cup races). Martin hasn’t finished better than 18th at Fontana in his last six attempts here, but he did finish 6th here in 2007 and 2008 while driving for Dale Earnhardt, Inc. He had the 9th-best driver rating in Las Vegas a couple weeks ago despite finishing 17th, and his new teammate (Clint Bowyer) may be able to help him a bit this week in California.

15. Brad Keselowski - You didn’t think the most recent winner was going to miss my Preview rankings this week, did you? You know I hate going against them. Look for Bad Brad to get a career-best finish at Fontana this weekend, which won’t be that hard to do considering he hasn’t finished better than 21st in three career starts here. While that isn’t great, BK also hasn’t finished worse than 26th, so at least he’s been consistent. Keselowski has a knack for getting to the front (he’s led at least one lap in the last three races) and that could pay dividends on Sunday.

Those To Avoid Entering The Auto Club 400:

Kasey Kahne - Casey Mears has more Sprint Cup points that Kahne right now, that’s all I need to say. I want to see him go a full race without hitting something before going anywhere near KK in fantasy.

Marcos Ambrose - I like to give this guy a free pass when it comes to history on the big oval tracks, but I just can’t overlook the fact that Ambrose is awful at both Fontana and Michigan. His average finish at those tracks is 28.8 and 27.0, respectively. Marcos has never finished on the lead lap in a race at Auto Club Speedway.

Kurt Busch - He might look like a good pick by simply looking at this average finish of 12.9 at this track, but I’m still waiting for this Phoenix Racing team to put together a whole race this season. I’d be surprised if Kurt brought his Chevy home in the top 20 on Sunday to be honest with you. The last two events at Auto Club Speedway have ended with Busch in 21st and 17th.

During The Last Race At Bristol…Brad Keselowski–in the midst of this hot streak–grabbed the victory, which was his third (and ultimately final) of the 2011 season. He led 89 of the 500 laps ran. Martin Truex, Jr. finished 2nd–a career-best for him at the track–with Jeff Gordon ending up 3rd. He led the most laps that night with 206. Gordon’s Hendrick team mate, Jimmie Johnson, finished 4th, and Jamie McMurray rounded out the top 5 after starting 6th. Keselowski and Matt Kenseth (who ended up 6th after leading 110 laps) were accused of taking advantage of the timing lines on pit road after the race, although I believe it was perfectly legal.

Practice Schedule…Very similar to the schedule last week in Las Vegas: practice on Friday at noon followed by qualifying at 3:30. On Saturday, a second practice session will be held, starting at 9:30 am, and then Happy Hour will take place at noon. The Food City 500 should start around 1:15 pm on Sunday. All times are in EST.

Top Fifteen Ranking Entering The Food City 500:

1. Kyle Busch - I’m not ready to hand him the checkered flag yet, but there really is no reason why Rowdy Busch shouldn’t be on the top of everyone’s boards going into this race weekend. Fourteen starts, five wins, 1,374 laps led, and an average finish of 9.1. And that’s just in the Sprint Cup Series… More impressive? Not a single DNF.

2. Tony Stewart - “Smoke” has really struggled lately at Bristol, as in five finishes of 17th or worse in his last six starts. So why would I have him ranked 2nd going into the race this weekend, other than the fact that he’s the most recent winner? One person: Steve Addington. In the two years with Kurt Busch, those two compiled three top 10s in four starts at Bristol, and he was Kyle Busch’s crew chief in 2009 when Rowdy led 415 of the 500 laps in the August race despite finishing 2nd. Smoke won at Bristol in 2001 and has amassed eight top 10s in twenty-six starts at the track. I full expect that to be at least nine of twenty-seven after Sunday.

3. Matt Kenseth - He’s known for his flat track expertise, but Matt Kenseth is a very good racer at Bristol. In twenty-four starts in Thunder Valley, the 2012 Daytona 500 champ has collected two wins while amassing sixteen top 10s. He’s only finished outside of the top 20 four times at this track, which is extremely impressive. Matt is on a five-event streak of top 10s at Bristol and has finished there in seven of the last eight as well. His average finish of 12.0 is fifth-best in the series at this track, and Kenseth has also led the fifth-most laps (852) of anyone in the series here.

4. Greg Biffle - It’s hard to go against a driver this hot, especially when the next stop is a track that he has found success at in the past. Biffle finished 31st here last fall, but before that he went on a streak of four straight top 10s at this track, with two finishes of 4th and two finishes of 8th between 2009 and 2011. Surprisingly (to me, anyway) The Biff has the fourth-best average finish at this track (11.8) despite never visiting victory lane. However, eleven of Biffle’s eighteen starts here have ended with top 10 finishes, and he has ended up outside of the top 20 just three times. The Roush-Fenway camp has been the best organization at Bristol over the last two years.

5. Jimmie Johnson - Chad Knaus will be on top of the pit box this weekend, and I fully expect this team to continue their “dig out of the hole” run this weekend. “Five Time” won this race in 2010 and he has finished 8th or better in five of his last six starts at this track. Johnson has made twenty starts at Bristol and over half of them have ended in top 10 finishes for him. Over the last two years, Jimmie has averaged the best driver rating of anyone in the series in Thunder Valley (119.6) and has led 499 laps. In the last six, Johnson has led at least 76 laps in every single event. I see no reason to not pick the #48 this weekend.

6. Carl Edwards - I still don’t like how this team is running despite the 5th-place finish posted by Cousin Carl last week in Sin City. He may be able to turn that around this weekend, though. Edwards started his Bristol career off with some struggles (33rd, 26th, and 24th-place finishes in his first three starts), but in the twelve races since then, Carl hasn’t finished worse than 16th, and seven of those twelve races ended with him in the top 10, including two victories (in the fall races of 2007 and 2008). Edwards’ average driver rating of 104.2 over the last two years at Bristol is fourth-best in the series.

7. Ryan Newman - His owner may have had a few speed bumps at this track over the last few years, but the same cannot be said for “The Rocketman”: he is the most recent pole winner at this track and hasn’t finished worse than 16th here since early 2008. Newman has never visited victory lane here, but he has finished inside the top 10 in 60% of his starts in Thunder Valley. His average driver rating of 96.8 if seventh-best in the series at this track over the last two seasons. Newman is a lot better than his average finish here (16.7).

8. Kevin Harvick - One of the most surprising things thus far in the 2012 season is how well Kevin Harvick has qualified. Hopefully that continues this weekend because it can be hard to pass at Bristol, although it’s not impossible. In fact, four of Harvick’s twelve top 10s at this track have came when he started the race outside of the top 20. He owns one victory here (which came back in 2005), and although Harvick has struggled here recently, I like how this team is running, and it’s not like he hasn’t been good at this track (seventh-best average finish–12.5–of anyone in the series). Only six of Kevin’s twenty-two starts in Thunder Valley have ended with him outside of the top 20, and twelve have ended with him inside the top 10.

9. Dale Earnhardt, Jr. - In case you missed ESPN’s breaking news (click here) that was more important than Tony Stewart winning the race or Greg Biffle’s awesome start, Dale Earnhardt, Jr. is off to the best start in his career. NASCAR’s most popular driver has the third-best average finish (11.7) in the series at Bristol and he has finished in the top 20 in twenty-one of his twenty-four starts at this short track. Junior hasn’t grabbed a top ten here since early 2010, but he has finished there in exactly half of his races in Thunder Valley. Junior ranks 7th in the amount of laps led (with 743) of all active drivers at Bristol. He was better when he drove for Dale Earnhardt, Inc., but Junior should still be a solid pick this weekend, continuing his “awesome” start.

10. Marcos Ambrose - Marcos has never led a lap at The Bullring, but I still consider him a good driver here, just like I do at most tracks when it can help to conserve your brakes. His first start at Bristol netted Marcos a top 10 finish, and he followed that up with a 3rd-place run in the fall race that year. He struggled in 2010, but Ambrose bounced back last season with finishes of 15th and 10th in the two Bristol events. In six starts, he has just one finish outside of the top 20 at this track.

11. Brad Keselowski - I’m just hoping that this team has the fuel issue figured out from last week. As I said before, Bad Brad is the most recent winner at this track, and he’s actually been pretty consistent here throughout his career. Keselowski has made four career starts in Thunder Valley and has finished inside the top 20 in all of them. He has completed all but one lap in those four races and has led a total of 115 laps. My sleeper pick for the week, by the way, is BK’s teammate, A.J. Allmendinger. Penske has been the third-best organization at Bristol over the last two years.

12. Jeff Gordon - I’m still waiting for a breakout performance from this team in 2012. However, I don’t think that’s going to happen this weekend. Jeff has five wins at Bristol, but the most recent of those came in 2002. Fact of the matter is, Gordon has just one top 10 finish in the last five events in Thunder Valley and has led more than 6 laps just once in all of the races here since 2006. Still, Gordon had a great car here last fall, leading 206 laps, so this weekend could be the great performance this team needs, although I wouldn’t bank on it. Gordon’s average finish of 11.5 at Bristol is second-best in the series behind Kyle Busch.

13. Denny Hamlin - Denny has really struggled at Bristol recently (three finishes of 19th or worse in the last four events) but that doesn’t make me look past the fact that half of his starts here have ended with the #11 in the top 10, including a streak of four straight finishes of 6th or better in 2008 and 2009. Denny finished 7th in the fall race here last year despite having just the 12th-best driver rating in that race. If he looks just decent (or worse) in practice this week, I’d stay away from Hamlin this week. But if he looks fast, I wouldn’t let his recent struggles here keep you from starting him on Sunday.

14. Martin Truex, Jr. - Did you know that over the last five Sprint Cup Series races (yes, I’m going back to last season) that Martin Truex, Jr. has the sixth-best average finish of anyone with 11.8? I expected more out of him last week in Las Vegas but, as I always say, you have to forget quickly in fantasy racing when someone disappoints. Truex will be entering Bristol this weekend to prove that his 2nd-place run here last fall wasn’t a fluke. Although I don’t see him repeating that performance, I’m still expecting a solid run out of the #56 this weekend. Martin hasn’t finished worse than 17th in the last four races at The Bullring and had led a total of 68 laps in the last two races here. His average finish of 20.7 here may scare you off but Truex has finished 99.9% of the laps ran here in the last three years (2,997 of 3,000).

15. Jamie McMurray - After last week’s solid run in Sin City, I’m hoping this is a sign of things to come from Jamie Mac and the #1 team. He’s had his fair share of struggles in Thunder Valley (eight finishes outside the top 20 in eighteen starts), but lately McMurray has found some success: in the four races here since joining Earnhardt-Ganassi, he has amassed three top 10s and a worst finish of 21st. Jamie has had a driver rating of over 100.0 in three of those four as well. It’s risky, but I like to think of Bristol as a place to take some risk. If he looks good in practice and likes his car again this week, I’d take a shot with McMurray.

Those To Avoid Entering The Food City 500:

Clint Bowyer - He owns three top 5s in twelve starts in Thunder Valley, but that doesn’t hide the fact that six of those starts have ended in finishes outside of the top 20 for Bowyer. Michael Waltrip Racing as whole is majorly hit-or-miss at Bristol (with most the races being “miss”) and like I’ve said before, I want consistently good races out of this team before I consider Clint at tracks other than the ones he’s good at. His career average finish here is 18.9.

Kasey Kahne - Kahne is a wrecking machine lately and I want nothing to do with that going into a track where you have to survive for 500 laps. His stats here of late have been good (three straight finishes of 11th or better) but he has just six top 10s in sixteen career starts at The Bullring and had led in only one race. Kahne has an average finish of 18.7 in his career at Bristol while completing just 86.3% of the laps.

Brian Vickers - He may be a good “start saver” pick in the Yahoo! game but I’m seeing no value anywhere else for this guy. Another season concluded in 2011 with Brian Vickers still not notching a top 10 at Bristol. Fourteen starts here, zero top 10s, and an average finish of 24.6. Michael Waltrip Racing has been just the eighth-best organization at this race track in the last two years.

chad knaus jimmie johnson chandra and baby on pit road

After losing today’s appeal to the National Stock Car Racing Appeals Panel, Hendrick will continue to pursue the overturning of NASCAR sanctions imposed against Jimmie Johnson’s team on opening day of Daytona 500 inspection. The infraction in question, unapproved C-posts that didn’t fit NASCAR’s template, cost Johnson’s team 25 points, crew chief Chad Knaus $100,000, and Knaus and car chief Ron Malec six weeks of track appearances.

Today, a three-person appeals board decided that those penalties were just. Hendrick, unsatisfied with the decision, will take the issue to the board’s chief appellate officer, once again deferring any adjustments to Johnson’s team in the process.

Now, Hendrick’s case, if entirely accurate, might suggest that NASCAR’s handling of the car was a bit off. Hendrick claims that the C-posts, which were taken at Daytona before going through tech, had passed through NASCAR inspection 16 times previously (four times in each restrictor plate race last year) without fail.

The only problem is, proving something like that makes NASCAR look pretty bad. And if Johnson, Knaus, and Hendrick ran unapproved pieces all year in 2011, it’s pretty unlikely that they’re going to get any sympathy from anyone.

Knaus, meanwhile, wouldn’t be a likely recipient of any leniency from the board, no matter the significance of the infraction. He’s frequently been suspended, particularly in Johnson’s peak years. In both 2006 and 2007, the team’s two first championship years, Knaus found himself suspended at one point or another. In fact, his history of “bending the rules” (or cheating, if you’d like) started before he even joined Hendrick; back in 2001, an unapproved window net on Stacy Compton’s car drew NASCAR’s ire for the first time, and Knaus has been “innovating” ever since.

That’s not the kind of reputation that you want to have going into a visit with the head honcho of appeals.

Granted, under the highly unlikely scenario that the penalty is completely overturned, Johnson’s road to the Chase becomes much easier. With -23 points coming out of Daytona, Johnson has successfully climbed back to 23rd in points through Las Vegas, but he would jump into a three-way tie for 13th if he gets the 25 points back. Six weeks with Knaus and Malec at the track would be six less weeks of (likely) working with Lance McGrew, whose results as a crew chief with multiple Hendrick drivers have been so-so.

But the odds are stacked against them.

Without Knaus, Johnson will have to climb back into the top part of the points without the crew chief he’s won most of his races with (remember, Knaus was suspended for the 2006 Daytona 500 win). He’ll be in a situation he hasn’t had to deal with since running Busch races in the early 2000s - working with an average crew chief. We’ll have an opportunity to see just how good of a driver Johnson is without his biggest aide.

Maybe that’s why Hendrick is pursuing this so much. Maybe he doesn’t have faith in his top team to fully climb out of the Daytona hole without Johnson and Knaus working together, especially not with Malec (who served as crew chief for the four races that Knaus missed in 2007) unavailable. Maybe the season is as good as over if this fails. Maybe Johnson will have to work so hard in the early part of the season just to get back into Chase contention that they’ll have nothing left in the tank for the Chase itself.

Maybe going all the way makes a little more sense than we thought.

Your comments are your vote. Vote early and often.

The evolution continues. So does the aesthetic weirdness. That aero device attached to the driver’s side c-pillar and deck lid - the so-called sharkfin - just keeps getting bigger.

In the NNWS race at Vegas, I kept thinking that the cars had a winged sprint car look to them. Maybe that’s why Ricky Stenhouse Jr was so good in his. He can wheel a sprint car.

I know that there is often a trade-off between good looks and  performance on the track. I also know that NASCAR is working with the manufacturers to make the cars more street-car like.

NASCAR - and the teams - also fight the urge for more billboard space to sell to sponsors. That fin has possibilities.

But I digress. It seems to me that it’s only a matter of time before Bruton Smith gets a second date in Las Vegas. The France family parlayed their Kansas City combination of casino games and stock car racing into two dates for Kansas Speedway. With the show that LVMS puts on, I’d like another one there too.

This week, the drivers of the Sprint Cup Series will be in Sin City for the Kobalt Tools 400.

During The Last Race At Las Vegas…It was the Tony Stewart and Carl Edwards show here last March. Those two led 232 of the 267 laps ran (163 and 69, respectively) but it was Carl backflipping in the end. Smoke finished 2nd with Juan Montoya, Marcos Ambrose, and Ryan Newman rounding out the top 5.

Practice Schedule…This is the type of practice schedule that I prefer. There will be one practice session on Friday afternoon (3:00 pm) followed by qualifying at 6:30 pm that evening. On Saturday at noon, a second practice will be ran, and at 3:00 pm, Happy Hour will be held. All cars should be in race trim on Saturday. The race is set to start around 3:00 pm on Sunday. All times are in EST.

Top Fifteen Ranking Entering The Kobalt Tools 400:

1. Greg Biffle - You really can’t ignore the hot start that The Biff has gotten off to in 2012, and I wouldn’t expect him to cool off in Sin City this weekend. It seems like Biffle always runs well at Vegas, but sometimes he fails to get the finish he deserves (like last season when his pit crew ruined his great day). Well, good thing for Greg is that he pretty much has an entire new crew. Before that, he had three straight top 10s at Vegas and has finished there in five of his eight starts here. Biffle has had a driver rating of at least 103.6 in six of the last seven races here, which is real impressive to me. The #16 should be challenging for the win at the end of the 400 miles on Sunday, as long as he doesn’t run out of gas again.

2. Tony Stewart - Speaking of gas, I bet “Smoke” doesn’t make the same mistake he made in Phoenix again. Someone has to learn, I guess. Anyway, Vegas has been a good track for Stewart over his career, although he hit a bit of a rough patch from 2006 to 2009. However, after his 36th-place finish here in 1999 (Tony’s rookie year), Smoke six straight finishes of 12th or better, and four of those were top 5s. As I said before, Stewart led the most laps here last season, and in 2010 he led seven laps en route to a 7th-place finish. Over the last two years, Stewart has the third-best average finish (10.1) on the tri-oval tracks, and Stewart-Haas Racing has been the best at Vegas over that span.

3. Matt Kenseth - The Daytona 500 champion is a two-time winner at Las Vegas (in 2003 and 2004) and sat on the pole in last season’s event. He cut a tire down early (like lap 13 early) but battled back for an 11th-place finish in the end. Kenseth’s average finish in Sin City is 11.7 and he has led a total of 450 laps in twelve career starts, which is second-best in the series. It shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone that Matt has the best average finish on tri-oval tracks in the past two seasons (8.1) without a single DNF. Kenseth has just one finish out of the top 20 in his twelve career starts at Las Vegas, and I highly doubt he adds to that total this weekend.

4. Jimmie Johnson - Five Time isn’t consistently dominant at Las Vegas like he is at other tracks, but he still has the best average finish of anyone in the series here (10.6 in ten races). His car wasn’t great here last season when he finished 16th, but that was right around the time the #48 team was struggling on the cookie-cutter tracks, so I’m not really worried about that. Jimmie has four victories at Las Vegas (in 2005, 2006, 2007, and 2010) and he has led at least one lap in eight of his ten starts here. Chad Knaus may be gone this week starting his suspension, so that might bring Jimmie’s ranking down a little but, but I still see him as a top 10 driver at least on Sunday, with or without Knaus.

5. Kyle Busch - When you look at the tri-oval race statistics over the last two years, there’s really nothing there to show that Rowdy deserves this ranking. However, it looks like Gibbs is over their engine problems from a season ago, and Kyle is due for a good run in my book. He’s had some great cars at Las Vegas over the last four races (top 5 qualifying effort in all four), but the finishes haven’t really shown that (one lone top 10, a win in 2009 from the pole). With that being said, Busch had a great car here last season but blew an engine early, and he’s had only one race here in the last seven with a driver rating under 100.0. Last week was a quiet top 10 for Rowdy in the desert, but I expect this team to make more of a statement all weekend in Las Vegas and come away with a solid top 5.

6. Carl Edwards - I’m really starting to believe the whole “hangover” theory for drivers that lose the championship even though Cousin Carl hasn’t ran too terrible thus far in 2012. However, I think this week will be a big test for the #99 team to prove they still have it; this is Edwards’ bread and butter track type and he has two wins here in seven starts. Those two victories, though, are his only top 5s here in seven career starts, which is a bit surprising. Still, Carl averages an 11th-place finish in Sin City and should at least run top 10 come Sunday, along with the other big three at Roush-Fenway.

7. Kevin Harvick - Statistically, “Happy” Harvick has been great on the tri-oval tracks in the last two years, and he hasn’t been too shabby at Las Vegas, either. In the nineteen tri-oval cookie-cutter races in the last two years, Harvick has recorded eleven top 10s and has the fifth-best average finish of anyone in the series, with 11.2. Kevin’s never won in Sin City, but he did finish 2nd here in 2010, and he had another top 5 in 2008 (4th-place). If this little streak continues, maybe another top 5 is in the cards for Harvick on Sunday. Right now, though, I have him as just top 10.

8. Denny Hamlin - If you haven’t read much of my fantasy advice, then you don’t know that I hate going against the most recent winner. And this week is no exception. Denny looks like he got over his hangover of last season, and Darian Grubb is getting calls on Twitter as the best crew chief in the series. We’ll see about that, there’s still a lot of season to go. Anyway, Hamlin has the fifth-best average finish at Las Vegas Motor Speedway and has just one finish outside of the top 20 in his six career starts here (and that was 22nd in 2010). Last year, Hamlin finished 7th at Las Vegas, and he has been the eighth-best driver on the tri-oval tracks in the last two years (with just three finishes outside of the top 20 in nineteen races). Got to pick the drivers that are hot.

9. Kasey Kahne - Yep, he burned me on most of my rosters last weekend as well. However, in fantasy racing, you have to be able to get over things quick, and Kahne should get a solid top 10 this weekend as long as he doesn’t nail the wall…on lap twenty-two…again. We all know how good Kasey is on the cookie-cutter tracks, and the Hendrick Chevys have found success here in the past with Jimmie Johnson and Jeff Gordon collecting six wins combined. In Kahne’s eight career starts here, he owns an average finish of 14.9 and is on a streak of four straight finishes of 14th or better. His two bad finishes here (38th in 2005 and 35th in 2007) were due to accidents. Real surprising…

10. Jeff Gordon - Jeff has won twice at Las Vegas Motor Speedway and has five top 5 finishes in the seven races at Las Vegas since 2005. So why is he ranked this low? Because Gordon hasn’t been too great on the tri-oval tracks in the last two years. In those nineteen races, Jeff has just eight top 10s and an average finish of 16.7. I have no doubt that the #24 Chevy can be top 5 material on Sunday, but I’m being conservative right now with this ranking. His six top 5s in Sin City is tied with the next driver in this ranking for best in the series.

11. Mark Martin - I’m a firm believer in picking people often when they start off the season hot (like Scott Speed a few years ago, for example) and Mark Martin is your best bet this weekend. He hasn’t been too bad at Las Vegas in his career (13.1 average finish and one win in fourteen starts) and it helps that his Michael Waltrip Racing equipment was strong here a season ago, with Martin Truex, Jr. finishing 6th and David Reutimann finishing 13th. Mark finished 4th here in 2010 and has four straight top 10 qualifying efforts in Sin City. I see it as very obtainable for Martin to go 3-for-3 in top 10s for this season.

12. Marcos Ambrose - Man, what a heart breaker for this guy last weekend in the desert. Luckily, the series is going to a track that Marcos has found some success at in the past, especially his 4th-place run here last season. Ambrose has only made three starts at Las Vegas, but he hasn’t finished outside of the top 20 and has an average finish of 12.7. For all those looking to bank in on qualifying bonus points, remember that Marcos started on the outside pole here last season. Surprisingly enough (to some), Ambrose really has been consistent on these tri-ovals over the past two years, with an average finish of 16.1 and fourteen top 20s in nineteen starts. I’ll pencil the Tasmanian in around the teens for Sunday, but he may bump up if his Ford looks sporty in practice.

13. Joey Logano - And Joey’s make-it-or-break-it season continues with another “make it” run in Phoenix… A good thing for Logano is that he has been pretty good in Las Vegas, at least qualifying wise. In the last two events here, Sliced Bread has started both of them in 6th place, and in the 2010 event he finished there as well (a career-best in his three starts here). He ended up in 23rd in the event last season, but I’m overlooking that stat because of how miserable the #20 team’s 2011 was. Logano finished 13th in his other start here after starting 23rd. I’m expecting a result similar to that this Sunday.

14. Jeff Burton - As Ryan from ifantasyrace.com said, “2012 is Jeff Burton’s come back year and Las Vegas is a good track for his renaissance to continue (10.7 career average finish).” Jeff’s average finish here is second-best in the series and he has just two finishes outside of the top 20 in fourteen starts at this track. He won here in 1999 and 2000 and Burton had five-straight top 15s at Vegas before his 21st-place showing here last season. I’m not expecting a great run out of this team on Sunday, but a mid-teens finish wouldn’t surprise me one bit, and if they get a little luck maybe a top 10.

15. Clint Bowyer - I’m giving Clint the nod over Dale Earnhardt, Jr. in this spot right now simply because I think Bowyer is a better cookie-cutter racer. In four of his six starts at Las Vegas, Bowyer has finished in the top 15 (including each of the last three events here) and he finished 2nd in the 2009 race. His driver ratings worry me a bit, though, as Bowyer’s best has been 89.4, which came in the 2010 race where he ended up 8th after starting 13th. Like I said before, I think the MWR Toyotas will be good in Sin City this weekend, but if Clint doesn’t blow me away in practice, I may just leave him off of my rosters this weekend.

Those To Avoid Entering The Kobalt Tools 400:

Juan Montoya - I’m not convinced with JPM’s 3rd-place run in this race last season. Before that, Montoya’s best finish was 19th in his first four starts and he only finished on the lead lap in one of those events. Statistically, Earnhardt-Ganassi Racing has been the worst team at Las Vegas over the last two seasons. Obviously, I’d stay away from Montoya’s teammate, Jamie McMurray, as well.

David Reutimann - If Reutty was in the same #10 car that Danica Patrick drives, I might have given him a chance this weekend, but I’m just not convinced that this team has the equipment to make it through the race (remember last week in Phoenix?). Even at the tri-oval tracks in 2010, Reutimann wasn’t very great and he was in a lot better equipment. David finished 4th here in 2009 and ended up 13th in the last two events at Vegas, but I’d be surprised to see this team crack the top 25 on Sunday.

A.J. Allmendinger - Penske Racing has struggled to get finishes here over the last few years–although Kurt Busch did qualify well here in this Double Deuce–and when you couple that with the fact that The Dinger struggles at Vegas as well, I’d suggest leaving him off your rosters this week. Last year, Allmendinger looked promising with a 7th-place start, and he also posted a career-best finish at this track. With that being said, he ended up 19th in that race, and I just don’t see him improving on that this weekend.

Martin qualified his Michael Waltrip Racing #55 fastest.

He is the all-time leader in top fives, top tens and lead lap finished at Phoenix International Raceway.

Nice though, a win would be, hmmm.

Photo credit: Getty Images for NASCAR

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