Posted on by Holly Cain

The finalists for the 2016 Comcast Community Champion Award were announced Thursday night and again it features some of the most dedicated people in the NASCAR garage — all focused on bettering the world around them.

The nominees — one representing each of NASCAR’s three premier series — include Richard Childress Racing pit crew coach Ray Wright’s work helping America’s youth; JR Motorsports fabricator Wade Jackson, whose inspired organization CAMP LUCK (Lucky Unlimited Cardiac Kids) helps young heart disease patients; and Kyle Busch Motorsports co-owner Samantha Busch, who helped found the Kyle and Samantha Busch Bundle of Joy Fund, which helps families deal with financial hardships and last year alone, contributed more than $140,000 to families getting IVF (in vitro fertilization) treatments.

“It is both humbling and empowering to hear so many examples of how individuals within NASCAR are making differences beyond the track,” said Matt Lederer, Executive Director of Sports Marketing at Comcast, who noted the award, “was created to extend our partnership with NASCAR beyond the competitive space and reinforce the importance of bringing positive change to one’s own community.”

Last year’s inaugural winner of this esteemed award was XFINITY Series driver Joey Gase. He was awarded $60,000 to assist with his work with the Iowa Donor Network, which helps educate about organ donation. The effort is real for Gase, who when only 18-years old, lost his mother. Her organ donation, however, helped save the lives of 66 other people.

This year’s nominees have similar heartfelt, far-reaching stories of generosity, care and hope.

The winner will be selected by Comcast and NASCAR executives along with former Sprint Cup driver Kyle Petty and NASCAR.com’s senior writer, Holly Cain and the winner will be revealed during the XFINITY and Camping World Truck Series banquet, Monday Nov. 21. It will air on NBCSN on Sunday, Nov. 27 at 8 p.m. ET.

Wright, who is the Sprint Cup Series nominee, founded Pit Stops for Hope, which provides food for children and is focused on providing a “productive classroom environment.”

Wright’s work is well-known in the garage area, which helps contribute to the cause. He collects old pit crew items and sells them to fans. He also raises money with an agreement through RCR, which gives him donations based upon top-performing pit stops. Wright’s efforts have allowed him to donate thousands of dollars to teachers and educators and his annual fundraising events have made a real difference in ending childhood hunger.

The XFINITY Series nominee, Jackson and his wife Kim began their work with Camp LUCK after an unimaginable personal loss. Their 17-year old son Jacob passed away from a congenital heart defect following open-heart surgery. As they have grieved, they have focused efforts on helping others. The camp was created to offer kids with heart disease a place to “gather together and experience community.’”

The couple volunteers countless hours at the camp, which offers a warm, loving refuge not just for the children, but for their families as well.

Busch has a similar personal origin for her and her husband’s work. While going through in vitro fertilization themselves in 2014, they realized the expenses others faced as well in an effort to welcome a baby through IVF. In just the past year along, the Kyle and Samantha Busch Bundle of Joy Fund has contributed substantial money to 13 couples undergoing the IVF treatment too.

For Samantha, this important cause continued a lengthy history of the couple’s generosity and care. She has also worked with the Pretty in Pink Foundation to raise money for uninsured and under-insured breast cancer patients and also founded an annual Prom Dress Drive to help young girls who couldn’t afford formalwear.

The Comcast Community Champion of the Year Award serves as a reminder of how many in this sport care to make a difference in the world. In addition to the $60,000 award for the winner’s designated charity, Comcast is also giving $30,000 to each of the other finalists’ selected charities.

“Since receiving the award, I’ve had people come up to me almost every race weekend to tell me how they are now organ donors because of my mom’s story, which many learned of thanks to the publicity from Comcast and this award,” Gase said.

Posted on by Staff Report

In the aftermath of Hurricane Matthew, The NASCAR Foundation has responded, doing what it does best — helping people in need.


Working in conjunction with other organizations, The NASCAR Foundation has supplied vital support to communities affected — starting this past Tuesday at the International Motorsports Center in Daytona Beach, Florida, where NASCAR, the International Speedway Corporation and Daytona International Speedway conducted a Food Drive to support the Council on Aging.  Another “Food Drive Day” is scheduled for Wednesday at the International Motorsports Center in Daytona Beach.


Saturday at 9 a.m. ET, in conjunction with the Feed the Children organization, a Foundation-sponsored food delivery will be made to the Halifax Urban Ministries warehouse at 223 Fentress Blvd. in Daytona Beach. Food distribution to families in need is scheduled for next week at the Halifax Urban Ministries offices at 215 Bay St. 

The NASCAR Foundation is also sponsoring a Feed the Children food truck delivery this weekend to Waterboro, South Carolina. The amount of food items distributed at each stop will feed approximately 400 families for a full week.

“This sort of thing is what THE NASCAR Foundation is all about — being there for people who are facing tough challenges,” said Foundation Executive Director Lorene King. “Hurricane Matthew hit our area, and other areas, very hard. The need is obvious — and immediate. We want to do as much as we can, as quickly and completely as we can.”

Motor Racing Outreach, another non-profit in the NASCAR “family,” collaborated with The NASCAR Foundation to work with Feed the Children.  MRO funded a truck which delivered food to the Goldsboro, North Carolina, area on Thursday; the Seymour Johnson Air Force Base in Goldsboro in particular sustained significant damage. MRO, Feed the Children and the USO combined on that delivery.

As part of an overall Employee Engagement effort, The NASCAR Foundation is engaging NASCAR, DIS, ISC and IMSA employees to support local disaster efforts. Employees will be given an opportunity to donate food and supplies for people and pets.

In addition, a $25,000 Foundation contribution will be made to the United Way to be distributed directly to five local organizations — Council on Aging, Domestic Abuse Council, Halifax Urban Ministries, Neighborhood Center of West Volusia and Second Harvest Food Bank. 

“Worthy causes, all,” King said. “As we expected, our employees are responding with donations to support these important organizations. It’s another example of the compassion shown by people involved in the NASCAR industry and in the motorsports industry overall.”

Posted on by Staff Report

From high-pressure stakes in the garage to split-second decisions on pit road, NASCAR teams are driven by the most skilled pit crew members and technicians in the motorsports industry. For those very capable hands, very capable tools are needed — which is why NASCAR teams use products from Ingersoll Rand, a global leader in reliable and innovative power tools and the “Official Power Tools of NASCAR.”

 

Ingersoll Rand’s power tools revolutionized NASCAR pit stop tire changes at their introduction to the sport in 1959, and the company quickly became a familiar sight in the garage selling and servicing the tools for peak performance. Ingersoll Rand’s story and commitment to quality certainly isn’t just relegated to NASCAR, however.

 

The same technology and quality materials that go into those NASCAR tools go into tools that technicians across the country use every day.

 

Fans have a chance to experience the craftsmanship first-hand with Ingersoll Rand’s IQV Power Trip Sweepstakes. The grand prize here is an all-expense paid four-day a trip for two to Champion’s Week in Las Vegas (Nov. 30-Dec. 4), plus a 20V and 12V cordless power tool prize pack. The winner will break from the daily grind and the cords that tie one down as the entire Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup field celebrates the end of the 2016 season.

 

Second prize is a 20V cordless power tool prize pack and third prize is a 12V cordless power tool prize pack.

 

Sound intriguing? It’s free to enter — simply go here by Nov. 7, 2016.

No purchase required. See official rules for details.

Posted on by Staff Report

RELATED: Practice 1 results | Best 10-lap averages | Chase Grid 

Defending champion Kyle Busch landed atop the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series leaderboard Friday afternoon in opening practice at Kansas Speedway.

Busch ripped off a lap of 194.595 mph around the 1.5-mile track in the Joe Gibbs Racing No. 18 Toyota. His speed slightly slower than the track qualifying record of 197.612 mph, set by Kevin Harvick in October 2014.

His brother, Kurt Busch, was second-fastest in the 70-minute session with a best lap of 194.119 mph in the Stewart-Haas Racing No. 41 Chevrolet. Carl Edwards was third-fastest at 194.098 mph in the Gibbs No. 19 Toyota in opening prep for Sunday’s Hollywood Casino 400 (2:15 p.m. ET, NBC, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio), the fifth of 10 races in the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup playoffs.

Alex Bowman, scheduled for his sixth Sprint Cup start of the season in place of Dale Earnhardt Jr., was fourth-fastest in the Hendrick Motorsports No. 88 Chevrolet. Teammate Chase Elliott, a top Sunoco Rookie of the Year candidate, completed the top five in his No. 24 Chevy (194.056 mph).

The cars of Kyle Busch, a first-time Kansas winner in May, and Kyle Larson were both held in the garage for 30 minutes as a penalty for post-race actions in last weekend’s Bank of America 500 at Charlotte Motor Speedway. NASCAR competition officials had warned teams three weeks ago in the drivers’ and crew chiefs’ meeting at New Hampshire Motor Speedway to avoid taking measures on the cool-down lap that might circumvent the post-race Laser Inspection Station (LIS) platform.

“We told them then that we would look at our resources after the races and we’ve been doing that,” said Scott Miller, NASCAR Senior Vice President of Competition. “They swerved. That’s about all there is to it.”

The cars of Tony Stewart, Regan Smith, Paul Menard and Kasey Kahne were also held 15 minutes on pit road for an accumulation of written warnings and minor infractions.

The practice session began 20 minutes after its scheduled 1 p.m. ET start time because of persistent damp conditions after a morning rain. To allow teams more practice time, the end of the session was extended five minutes to 2:30 p.m. ET.

Martin Truex Jr., set to make his 400th premier-series start Sunday, was seventh-fastest in the Furniture Row Racing No. 78 Toyota (193.882 mph). Jimmie Johnson, last weekend’s winner in Charlotte, was eighth-best on the early leaderboard in his No. 48 HMS Chevy (193.653 mph).

Posted on by Staff Report

Joe Gibbs Racing‘s Daniel Suarez has exciting things happening for him on and off the track with his XFINITY Series championship hopes still alive and a month-long Hispanic Heritage Month celebration underway. 

 

Tuesday, the Mexican-born wheelman visited the White House, representing NASCAR for Hispanic Heritage Month. Take a peak inside his busy day in Washington, D.C.

 

Posted on by Reid Spencer

RELATED: Starting lineup | See Sunday’s full roster | Chase Grid

KANSAS CITY, Kan. — To learn how to master the track that continued to jinx him, Kyle Busch paid close attention to the way Matt Kenseth drove Kansas Speedway.

Though Kenseth was helpful, he apparently kept a thousandth of a second in his pocket. That was the margin by which Kenseth edged Busch in Friday’s NASCAR Sprint Cup Series knockout qualifying session at the 1.5-mile track.

Touring Kansas in 28.112 seconds (192.089 mph) to Busch’s 28.113 seconds (192.082 mph), Kenseth earned the top starting spot for Sunday’s Hollywood Casino 400 (at 2:15 p.m. ET on NBC, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio), the fifth race in the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup and the second race in the Chase’s Round of 12.

“Smoked him!” chortled Kenseth, as Busch emerged from the radio room after an interview on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio. “Smoked him!”

The Coors Light Pole Award was Kenseth’s first of the season, his third at Kansas and the 18th of his career. With Busch claiming the second spot on the grid and teammate Carl Edwards (191.015 mph) qualifying third, JGR cars will start 1-2-3 for the first time since August at Bristol.

“It’s nice to get a pole,” Kenseth said. “I feel like our qualifying hasn’t been nearly as good this year as it has been in the rest of the years I’ve been at JGR. We barely got it — it was by a thousandth, or something like that.

“Obviously, our Camrys have been fast … Round one we were pretty decent — it was off a little bit — and then round three it was just right. We almost got beat, but it was as good of a lap as we were going to run. They did a good job today.”

Kenseth joined Joe Gibbs Racing in 2013. Busch didn’t get his first top five at Kansas until the spring race of 2015, which started a run of third, fifth and first in consecutive events at a track where his average finish is 19.2.

Busch’s second-place qualifying run on Friday was his best so far at the 1.5-mile track, and he freely acknowledged learning from Kenseth.

“We’ve talked a little bit, and I’ve certainly used some of the things that we’ve talked about with all of my teammates in order to get better here,” Busch told the NASCAR Wire Service. “Just looking and studying about technique and things that he does and being able to work on how Matt carries his car around the track and where he makes his speed and me trying to be able to do the same thing.


“A lot of it has just come through technique and just being able to mimic the things that he does, and we’ve gotten a lot better at that. Certainly, our balance could have been a tick better in order to give me a little more security and feeling in order to go out there and run two thousandths faster.”

Chase driver Martin Truex Jr. made it a quartet of Toyotas on the front two rows with a fourth-place qualifying effort at 190.786 mph. Alex Bowman was the only non-Chase driver to crack the top five, turning in a lap at 190.315 mph.

Of the five drivers who finished 30th or worse last Sunday at Charlotte and put their advancement to the Chase’s Round of 8 in jeopardy, Joey Logano had the best recovery, qualifying sixth.

“That’s better than where we have been,” Logano said. “We qualified 14th here the last two times we’ve come here. We made a serious effort at changing some things here with the way we qualified to start closer to the front which is important.

“That’s kind of where we were. We were about a sixth-place car today, and we need to find a little more, but we made progress.” 

Denny Hamlin, 30th at Charlotte and the eighth-place Chase driver entering Sunday’s race, will start seventh. Kevin Harvick and Austin Dillon, both currently below the Round of 8 cutoff, qualified 11th and 12th, respectively.

Chase Elliott, victim of a late wreck and resulting 33rd-place finish last Sunday, failed to make the final round on Friday and will start 13th. Two other Chase drivers qualified outside the top 12: Kurt Busch (15th) and Charlotte winner Jimmie Johnson (19th).

“From Round 1 to Round 2, the car was much tighter,” said Johnson, who was 10th in the first round. “We attempted to free it up, but I’m not sure some of those adjustments didn’t change the ride height of the car and affected the splitter orientation with the ground. So, maybe we were on the splitter a little bit. 


“But a ton tighter than what we had in the opening round. But, other than that, our car was repeating very well earlier in the day so kind of leaning that way. I don’t know if it is good or bad, but I’m not accustomed to qualifying well all the time. I’m used to racing through traffic. I’m not worried about this; we’ll just get that Lowe’s Chevy up there.”

Posted on by Pat DeCola

RELATED: Why Truex won’t be at Homestead-Miami test

KANSAS CITY, Kan. — Martin Truex Jr. enters this weekend’s Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Kansas Speedway set to cross the milestone of 400 career Sprint Cup Series starts.

Looking back to the not too distant past, the Furniture Row Racing driver wasn’t even sure he’d hit 300.

“There was a point in time there, Monday or Tuesday after Richmond, I was, like, worried if I’d ever get to race again,” Truex said Friday at Kansas Speedway, site of Sunday’s Hollywood Casino 400 (2:15 p.m. ET, NBC, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).

Following events that occurred on track at Richmond International Raceway in 2013, NASCAR deemed that Michael Waltrip Racing manipulated the results of the regular season finale, levying the now-defunct organization with hefty penalties. NAPA, the long-running MWR sponsor and Truex’s primary sponsor at the time, decided to leave the team — saddling the veteran with the burden of finding a new home and support, late in the season and after many open rides had already been snatched up.

Truex landed on his feet with Furniture Row Racing for the following year, but struggled mightily with the single — soon to be two — car organization, with just five top 10s and one lap led on the season. A major turnaround came in 2015, as he notched a career high in top-10 finishes (22) and raced for his first title at Homestead-Miami Speedway in the Championship 4.

Undoubtedly difficult for Truex to see the forest for the trees at the time, he now understands that those series of events — speedbumps, if you will — set him up for the success he’s finding today, especially as he stands as arguably the favorite to win the 2016 title.

“There’s a few big (crossroads in my career). Obviously 2013 after Richmond that was probably the big one which ultimately led to today,” said Truex, who won two races in the Chase-opening Round of 16.

“You never know in this sport. It was so late in the season, you don’t know what rides are open, all that stuff. To be sitting here just a few years later going for a championship is pretty amazing, so as bad as that week was it led into some really good opportunities and you never … when bad things happen, you never really know what the future holds for you and I just feel fortunate to be here and have another shot at it and hopefully we’ll take advantage of it.”

Truex’s 400th start — which he referred to as a “wow moment,” once he was told he was going to hit the mark this weekend — has high potential to be a celebratory one.

Much of his 2016 success has come predominantly at intermediate tracks a la Kansas’ 1.5-mile layout — as evidenced by marquee wins at Charlotte and Darlington (1.366 mi.) — and he led 172 of 267 laps from the pole in the spring race here before a parts failure relegated him to a 14th-place finish.

RELATED: Tough luck trips up Truex in Kansas night race

“Yeah, I definitely get a positive vibe coming here; a positive feeling that we’ve been so close. We’ve done just about everything here but win and I feel like it’s time for us to make that happen,” Truex said. “I don’t think there’s ever been a time where I’ve come here more confident and so, yeah, I mean I’m looking forward to seeing how the weekend goes and seeing if we can finally close the deal here.

“I feel like we can do it and just ready to go out there and give it a shot.”

Posted on by Nascar

Open campfires, long a staple of fans attending NASCAR races at Talladega Superspeedway, will not be allowed on track property during next weekend’s race events at the track featuring the Sprint Cup Series and the Camping World Truck Series.

The ban is in conjunction with a Drought Emergency Declaration signed by Alabama Governor Robert Bentley that covers 46 counties, including Talladega County.

“We’re not going to allow any open fires,” Grant Lynch, Chairman of the 2.66-mile track, told NASCAR.com Thursday.

Campfires, fire pits, fireworks, flying lanterns and other similar outdoor activities or items will not be permitted. The use of grills for cooking will still be allowed “but you can’t use it as a heat source (to stay warm),” he said.

“We are probably just a couple of days ahead of the state putting the same (restrictions) on maybe all the counties that are currently under the burn ban. It’s just really a tough situation in the fact that our parking lots, our campgrounds, everywhere is just bone dry and crunches under your feet.

“I’ve been here 23 years and we’ve never had to do this. There are fires everywhere in Alabama right now. And it’s depleting the resources. We are doing the thing that is safest for our fans and to protect the folks that are going to be here having to put out any potential issues we have anyway.”

While the Carolinas coastal region continues to recover from Hurricane Matthew’s heavy rain and high winds, Lynch said last week’s wet weather never made it far enough inland to impact his facility.

“Not a drop. It never got this far,” he said. “We would have taken all we could have gotten. There is no green grass on the property; it’s all brown.”

Approximately 1,200 acres of track property is used for parking and campgrounds. The infield alone accounts for nearly 250 acres.

“People say, ‘Well, you should water everything,'” Lynch said. “You can’t water 1,200 acres.”

If there’s a bright side to the situation, it’s the weather outlook for next weekend’s doubleheader. Currently, the extended forecast calls for unseasonably warm temperatures.

“It’s not like we’re telling fans you can’t have a campfire and it’s going to be 30 degrees at night,” Lynch said. “A nice jacket and you should be fine all weekend.

“If everyone cooperates, it will keep everyone safe here and we don’t have unnecessary, runaway fires. We’ve already had a fire by the International Motorsports Hall of Fame. We put it out and about three hours later it came back. We put it out again. This stuff can go down into the ground and come up somewhere else.

“We’re not doing this without a lot of thought and a lot of concern for taking care of everybody that’s going to come to our property in the best way we can and we have to enforce this. It’s our duty to do that for our fans.”

Posted on by Holly Cain

RELATED: Chase Grid | Set your Fantasy lineup for Kansas


With two races remaining to set the Round of 8 to contend for NASCAR’s 2016 Sprint Cup title, the four most vulnerable drivers in the standings have vastly different histories at this week’s venue, Kansas Speedway for the Hollywood Casino 400 (Sun., 2:15 p.m. ET, NBC, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).


And with the unpredictable nature of Talladega Superspeedway‘s restrictor plate brand of racing coming up next week for the Round of 12’s elimination race, the more traditional Kansas 1.5-mile venue offers a relatively calmer opportunity to climb the standings. Now.


The four drivers hoping to race back inside the top eight are separated by only five points. Austin Dillon and Chase Elliott are tied, only three points behind eighth place Denny Hamlin, whose Toyota suffered a rare engine failure last week late in the Charlotte race.


WATCH: Hamlin’s engine blows late at Charlotte


Joey Logano is six back and 2014 Cup champion Kevin Harvick trails Hamlin by eight points.


The two veterans — Harvick and Logano — currently trying to race their way to a top-eight transfer position have historically fared well at Kansas. The younger competition — Dillon and the rookie Elliott — still don’t have much of a track record to lean on.


Harvick sits eight points out of the cutoff position after a 38th-place finish — due to mechanical issues — at Charlotte last weekend and a 37th-place result at Dover International Speedway the week before. Harvick, however, won the fall race at Kansas in 2013 and has three runner-up finishes there in the last five races.


In the last six Kansas races, he has led the most laps (392) of the four drivers hoping to climb back into the top-eight in the standings. In the last three years, he has three pole positions (fall of 2013 and both 2014 races) and an average finish of 10.8 at Kansas.


“The repave is definitely what changed and turned things around for us at Kansas,” Harvick said. “Really, I liked the racetrack the way it was before with the asphalt really worn out and cars sliding all over. But, once the repave happened, we were able to really hit on some things and, for whatever reason, it kind of fits my driving style and we have gotten some good results out of it.


“It has been a really good-performing racetrack for us and one that we look forward to going to and hopefully continue to get good results out of it because it’s been so good for us in the past.”


Logano, who is currently ranked 11th of the 12 still-eligible Chase drivers, had five consecutive top-five finishes at Kansas until a crash this May, which resulted in a 38th-place showing.


But most importantly — and encouraging — to Logano’s Team Penske crew, he is the two-time defending winner of this week’s Chase race.


“Things happen,” Logano said of his 36th-place showing at Charlotte. “It’s part of racing, but we’re not out. We’re not gonna die. This team is resilient.


“We’ve proved it before and we’ll just have to go out and prove it again. We just have to have two flawless races. It’s something we can make up.”


Dillon and Elliott, who are both three points behind the top-eight cutoff, don’t have an extensive Kansas track record to examine.


The 20-year old Elliott finished ninth in his only Sprint Cup race there this Spring. He also scored top-10 finishes in both XFINITY Series races he competed in at the track.


He hasn’t led a lap at Kansas previously in either series. However, his No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet has turned in impressive work out front during the Chase, with 176 laps led in four races — more than half of his season-long total.


Dillon, 26, has two top-10 finishes in six starts at Kansas, including a sixth-place effort this May. However, he also has three finishes of 20th or worse, including a 41st place showing in this race last year.


“What we think of is,’What has made us faster in the past?’ and ‘What can we do to be faster?’ Dillon said this week. “I look at everything I can as a driver, from the lines in the track to the history of the track — what typically happens, who is good there? We’re just going to do our best and try to not leave anything behind. This opportunity is so great. It doesn’t happen often.”


Hamlin — who currently sits in the final playoff transfer position — won at Kansas in Spring of 2012, but has had an inconsistent record here. He crashed out of the spring races the last two seasons, taking finishes of 41st and 37th. He was, though, runner-up to Logano in this race last fall.


“I think each race you’re going to have a handful that are going to have issues — Kansas I don’t think will be any different and Talladega we know will be crazy,” Hamlin said. “That’s why we’re not out of it my any means, we just have a little hole we have to dig out of.”

Posted on by Staff Report


Here are the hot topics, trending news and key story lines to get you ready for this weekend’s races at Kansas Speedway.


WEATHER

The good news? It doesn’t appear likely that a hurricane will impact this weekend’s racing at Kansas. The highest chance of precipitation is around 20 percent, according to Weather.com.

Otherwise, we’re looking at consistent temps hovering around 81 degrees most of Saturday and Sunday, while it will be mostly cloudy and a little cooler (70 degrees) when cars roll on Friday, according to the National Weather Service.

 

KEY TIMES



Sprint Cup Series: The Sprint Cup Series holds its first practice Friday at 1 p.m. ET (NBCSN/NBC Sports App), with Coors Light Pole qualifying at 6:15 p.m. ET (NBCSN/NBC Sports App).

 The Hollywood Casino 400 is at 2:15 p.m. ET Sunday (NBC/NBC Sports App, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).


XFINITY Series: The XFINITY Series opens practice Friday at 2:30 p.m. ET (NBCSN/NBC Sports App) and qualifies Saturday at noon ET (CNBC/NBC Sports App). The Kansas Lottery 300 is Saturday at 3 p.m. ET (NBC/NBC Sports App, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).



CATCH DRIVERS LIVE



We’ll stream every driver press conference in the Kansas media center at NASCAR.com/presspass. Click here for a full schedule. Click here to tune into the live stream.


LAST TIME

Like last week, Joey Logano is the defending race winner. The Team Penske driver led 42 of 269 laps to secure a victory in the middle of his three-race sweep of the Round of 12 (Charlotte, Kansas and Talladega) last season. In fact, he has won this race the past two years.


YOU SHOULD KNOW


• Joey Logano had three times as many wins in the Round of 12 last year than he does in all of 2016 (one). In need of a stellar finish — if not a win — after limping to a 36th-place finish at Charlotte, Logano certainly isn’t hurting for motivation this weekend and Kansas lines up well for the prospects of regaining his mojo. The Penske driver has won two of the past four races at Kansas and had a top-five streak of five races snapped in the spring race (38th).

• Despite winning the race with driver Kyle Busch, the spring event at Kansas didn’t favor Toyota as we’ve seen much of this year, placing just two drivers (Busch and Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Matt Kenseth) in the top 10. After the pair was the only set of Toyotas in the top 10 at Charlotte, as well, this trend could continue. But then again — it wouldn’t be a shock to see either of those drivers win and advance.

• Some XFINITY Series heavy hitters were knocked out of the Round of 12 after failing to advance at Charlotte in Ty Dillon, Brennan Poole, Brandon Jones and Ryan Sieg. In the series’ first Chase, it’ll be interesting to observe how teams adjust after seeing firsthand (in some cases) how a subpar opening round race can put a group in a serious, unrecoverable hole — quickly.

THE FAVORITE

 

Martin Truex Jr. While his overall numbers at Kansas Speedway aren’t spectacular (17.1 average finish), Truex is still currently the favorite heading into just about every race right now, but in particular on intermediate tracks like this one. Three of his four wins this season have come at tracks similar in length and there’s little reason to believe May’s pole-winner won’t have another stout No. 78 Furniture Row Racing entry this weekend.

 

Others to consider: Matt Kenseth, Kyle Busch.

THE SLEEPER

 

Chase Elliott. Based on how he’s run most of the season, it’s hard to picture a winless Chase Elliott this year, even if it is his rookie campaign. The Hendrick Motorsports driver was having a heck of a run at Charlotte (103 laps led, a career high) before wrecking, and has never finished outside the top 10 at Kansas in the three races he’s run across Sprint Cup and XFINITY competition. Expect him to be in play on Sunday. 

Others to consider: Joey Logano, Carl Edwards.

STAFF PICKS


Matt Kenseth: 2

Chase Elliott: 2

Jimmie Johnson: 2

Martin Truex Jr.: 1

Carl Edwards: 1

Brad Keselowski: 1