What a difference four races can make. You can pick any four, and they will make a difference, but the first four in the Chase for the Nextel Cup always seem to underscore the value of consistency and the penalty for performing poorly.

In the beginning of the season, there is the constant jockeying for position, and with the points so few and the margin between drivers so small, the first few weeks of a new season can see huge moves in the standings. It's fun to watch then, it can be nauseating to watch now, especially if your favorite driver is in the Chase. Let alone being on one of the 12 teams competing for the championship.

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I have always looked at Charlotte as the end of the first round of the playoff races. We've seen who has good pitching, who has good hitting, who has been able to score and who has not. You find out who can deliver in a "short" series, and who is a threat to win it all.

You have to decide who still has a chance, and who doesn't have a prayer. Does the cutoff come after Tony Stewart, 154 points off the lead? Or is Stewart too far back with too few to go. I don't think so.

What about Kevin Harvick, Carl Edwards and Kurt Busch? Is 202 points still close enough to make a run in the six remaining races? Is 215 too far back? And if you say Kyle Busch still has a shot from 260 back, then you have to include Denny Hamlin, too, don't you? He is 262 back, but ninth place means there are a lot of guys standing between Hamlin and home plate.

Maybe it is all in how you approach things. For example, in his weekly press release, Kurt Busch made no mention of the Chase, even though he is in it. Busch has had just one top-10 finish in the four Chase races, and that was this past Sunday in Talladega where he finished seventh. That's his best finish since he was sixth at Bristol the week after winning in Michigan. Maybe Busch used up all his pitching. Still, he wants to hit a home run at Charlotte.

"We want to put together a complete race where we are competitive from the beginning until the end," Busch said.

"Over the last couple of years, it's been the case where we've had a really competitive car and led a ton of laps, only to see the handling go away during the race and end our chances for a win or a good finish.

"We've made tremendous progress on these intermediate, 1.5-mile tracks and we're hoping that the trend will continue Saturday night," Busch added. "Since Pat [Tryson] came aboard as our crew chief, one of his biggest priorities has been updating our cars and having the most competitive Miller Lite Dodges prepared for all the races. His hard work and the great team preparation have certainly paid off in that we've proven to be competitive everywhere we go."

Of course, Charlotte, Atlanta and Texas are all "similar" 1.5 mile tracks.

Busch has a good point, it would be nice to finish, even championship leader Jeff Gordon would have to agree with that. Gordon leads Jimmie Johnson by just nine points but Charlotte has not been very, very good to Gordon. In the last seven point paying races at Lowe's Motor Speedway, working back from May, Gordon has finished 41st, 24th, 36th, 38th, 30th, seventh (in the fall of 2004) and 30th in the spring of 2004. In those races he has had a lot of hits, and has been shutout.

"I just want to get to the finish of a race here -- it's been a long time since we've done that," Gordon said.

"The cars have performed well, it's just been one thing or another that has kept us from getting the good finish.

"I expect the guys in the Chase to have strong performances, but the guys not in it have nothing to lose and can gamble on setup or fuel mileage. Jimmie runs very well here, and I thought Tony [Stewart] was strong here in May, too.

"But we won't focus on the competition. We'll focus on making the No. 24 car the best it can possibly be.

"And making it to the end of the race."

And that's when all the math begins, at the end.

Johnson pretty much owns this place. Lowe's car at the Lowe's track. Funny how that seems to work out. There is no way you can take anything away from this driver and this team at this track. Johnson has 11 consecutive top-10 finishes at Charlotte -- only one of those is worse than seventh (he was 10th at Charlotte in May) -- and five of those finishes are wins. Sandwiched between four consecutive victories and his most recent 10th-place result are back-to-back runner-up finishes. That puts Johnson in the cleanup spot.

"It's a track that regardless of the surface and the design of the track we run well, so I [feel] a lot of excitement looking forward at that race," Johnson said.

"When we get to the track and we're off a little bit, sometimes it creeps into our heads 'well it's not working out, something's changed' and we put a little bit more pressure on ourselves than if we're having a tough practice. But leading into it we're typically excited about it and I am this year. I think it's a good opportunity for us to possibility get a win and score some more points in the Chase."

Ya think?

This is the home field for Johnson, and while he has been putting up some numbers, his teammate Gordon is still the man to beat.

"There are still a lot of races left. But, as things unfold here it could be a situation where we are racing one another. In some ways that is what we would hope for and in other ways it's going to be difficult. I am so proud of Hendrick Motorsports for putting three cars in the "Chase." If it does come down to the two of us it would be a good and bad problem all at the same time."

And just to help keep things straight, the fourth Hendrick Motorsports car won the Charlotte race in May, driven by Casey Mears. In your scorebook that's a win for Mears in May, and three drivers in the Chase. A grand slam.

While Johnson is chasing his second championship, Stewart is after his third. Stewart hasn't had a top-five finish in Charlotte since he won there in the fall of 2003. He was sixth there in May, and in the seven races since his last win he has had three top-10s and three finishes of 24th or worse.

It looks like its time for the Home Depot boys to hammer one.

"All we can do is just do our job," Stewart said.

"Even if we win the race for the next seven weeks in a row, there is still no guarantee that we could close the gap. It really takes the pressure off of us. All we can do is go for broke, now. It's been done. Jimmie Johnson did it last year. So for us, it's just a matter of not worrying about what everybody else is doing. We just need to go out and worry about winning races now and hope we are where we need to be at the end of the day."

Or at the end of the night. So what's the scouting report for the coming weeks?

"If you win races, the points will take care of themselves," Stewart said.

"But if you can't win, you can't just throw it away trying to win the race. You've got to be smart and finish as high as you can and not take too many unnecessary chances that can give you the opportunity for having a bad day."

Don't get thrown out trying to steal third, when you can easily score from second.

I think these are the most critical 500 miles in the Chase. For the guys at the back of the pack, there is no reason to hold back; swing for the fences, hope you hit a home run and the other guys get picked off.

For the drivers, and their teams, at or near the top of the standings, the pressure builds, beginning with the moment the garage opens. Then on race day, you send your best guy out there with one thought in mind, shut out the competition.

Have you checked the schedule? It's the playoffs, and this week it's a night game on Saturday. Man, I love October.