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


Posted on by Zack Albert

Dale Earnhardt Jr. turned 42 on Monday, marking another trip around the sun for the Hendrick Motorsports star. Adding another candle to the cake may solidify his place among the so-called elder statesmen in the NASCAR garage, but it hasn’t made him feel any older or any less passionate about stock car racing.

Earnhardt Jr., sidelined since July through the remainder of the season after being diagnosed with a concussion, cited several fellow competitors who have had success into their 40s — Jeff Gordon and Greg Biffle, in particular — to illustrate that there’s no firm timetable for retirement.

“I don’t know if age is really a factor. It’s really about the passion you have for it, if you can get out of bed and get up on the wheel and want to do it,” Earnhardt said Wednesday at Martinsville Speedway‘s announcement for its offseason lighting project. “When you get up and you don’t want it as much as the next guy, then you’ve got to start thinking about whether you belong there, whether the team deserves that kind of commitment.


MORE: Martinsville to add lights for 2017


“The team’s going to go in there and work their guts out; they need a driver with the same attitude. And any time you feel like you just don’t have that attitude, you need to start thinking about letting someone else get in there and giving the team an opportunity.”

Earnhardt said he was unsure why some drivers’ careers fade, chalking it up to several different factors: “The cars, the team, the organization, maybe.” The common thread — regardless of age, he said — was the desire to compete at a high level, especially with a young crop of teens and 20-somethings knocking down the door to NASCAR’s national series.

“It came real easy when you’re young, but the older you get, it’s a little bit harder,” Earnhardt said of staying motivated. “And them young guys, man, they’re coming. They’re coming into the sport wide-open and it’s getting harder and harder to keep up with ’em. But I feel good, I feel young. I feel younger than my years, but as long as you have the passion and commitment to do what you have to do, not just on Sunday and Friday and Saturday, but during the week.

“There’s a lot of commitments, not only with sponsors, but you’ve got meetings and you’ve got to be at the shop and you’ve got to make yourself available and accountable with the team. There’s just so much that goes into being successful, and if you don’t have the passion for that, then you probably don’t need to be wasting anybody’s time. I think that’s probably what happens is you sort of lose that want-to, to be able to get up and go do it.”

Posted on by Nascar

RELATED: Kansas Race Center


Brad Keselowski said his seventh-place finish at Charlotte Motor Speedway this past Sunday put his team “in a good spot,” but the former series champion admitted, “You can’t take it for granted.”


“We need to go to this weekend’s race in Kansas, put up a solid finish and get ourselves in position to where we can sleep easy for Talladega,” he said Tuesday. “That’s kind of where my head is at.”


It was the seventh consecutive top-10 result for the driver of the No. 2 Team Penske Ford, a streak of consistency no one else in the Chase can claim.


He enters this weekend’s Kansas event, the Hollywood Casino 400, fourth in points, and the 22-point gap back to eighth could be described as comfortable.


Only the top eight from the Round of 12 advance after stops at Kansas and Talladega have been completed.


The Charlotte race took quite a toll on the Chase field, with five drivers finishing 30th or worse, thus creating an unexpectedly large gap between those up top and those in the rear of the field. Even though Denny Hamlin sits eighth in the latest standings, the Joe Gibbs Racing driver is only eight points ahead of Kevin Harvick (Stewart-Haas Racing) in 12th. Sandwiched in between are Austin Dillon (Richard Childress Racing), Chase Elliott (Hendrick Motorsports), and Joey Logano (Team Penske).


Meanwhile, Martin Truex sits seventh, but a much more comfortable 19 points ahead of the first driver on the outside and 16 ahead of Hamlin. The points gap expands substantially going in the other direction, with race winner Jimmie Johnson, Matt Kenseth, Kyle Busch, Keselowski and others in the top half of the 12-team field seemingly out of harm’s way.


It is a situation, Keselowski said, that “drastically changes the dynamic” of the Chase going forward.


“When I look at this format that we have, there’s really two ways you can get in, that’s through consistency and winning,” he said. “When you look at the simple math, there are four cars that are going to be eliminated and five cars that are in really rough shape, that aren’t going to have the opportunity to be consistent and make their way in. So they’re kind of pigeonholed into the other half of the equation, so to speak.


“Being one of the cars that is kind of in-between, that had a strong run and has a pretty good point gap, that all but guarantees that you can use consistency if you are one of those cars. That certainly changes mindsets.”


The expectation is that one of the five will likely win — at either Kansas or Talladega. “Because they are going to take chances,” he said. “And when there are five of them you can take more chances and it makes more sense to do that when you are in that hole.”


That’s not to say trouble won’t find one of those higher up in the standings — that’s certainly been the case in previous Chase races — but Keselowski said it’s a less-likely scenario.


“Because if you’re a car that has any kind of a gap right now, you’re just going to go and lay up at Kansas,” he said. “You’re going to try really hard not to put yourself in that situation.


“Certainly there are some situations that you can’t avoid — you blow a tire or things like that happened to Joey (Logano) this weekend, those aren’t avoidable situations. You could break down. But the reality is if you have a pretty good gap, you’re probably going to take a log off the fire.


“It can happen. There are things you can’t control. But there are things you can control.”

Posted on by

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Kyle Busch has traded his fire suit for a state trooper’s uniform.


(Disclaimer: It’s not permanent.)


Busch is one of the drivers who will make cameo appearances in the upcoming film “Logan Lucky,” a heist movie set at a NASCAR track. Under the watch of multi-time Academy Award winning-director Steven Soderbergh, the film features a star-studded cast including Daniel Craig, Channing Tatum, two-time Academy Award winner Hilary Swank, Seth MacFarlane and Riley Keough. Academy and Emmy Award winner Mark Johnson — who also produced “Rain Man,” “Breaking Bad,” and “The Notebook,” among others — will serve as one of the film’s executive producers.


The production team was on the ground during a rainy Bank of America 500 weekend shooting for the film. The crew also shot during Coca-Cola 600 weekend at Charlotte Motor Speedway in May, as well as at Atlanta Motor Speedway.


“It’s a movie that’s designed to be a lot of fun,” Johnson said Sunday at Charlotte, prior to a day of shooting at the track. “It’s designed to be very, very commercial, where I joke we’re not out to win Oscars — we’re out to win the Bank of America award … (Viewers) should laugh and they should have fun with the intricacies of the robbery itself.


“It’s a robbery that couldn’t really take place, but (it can) in our world, and it’s very important to us that the world of NASCAR be real.”

What’s more real than casting an actual NASCAR driver in a racing film? In addition to Busch, Carl Edwards, Brad Keselowski, Joey Logano, Ryan Blaney and Kyle Larson will all be popping into the film for brief roles.

“We wanted to make sure that NASCAR was treated in a positive light, was the big, world-class, glossy event that it is,” said Zane Stoddard, NASCAR Vice President of Entertainment, Marking and Content Development. “The thing that we worked closely with Mark and the production on was getting drivers into driver cameo roles. We thought that would fun for the fans, sort of Easter eggs throughout the film with these drivers in these roles for our fans.


“But it’s also a bit of a wink and a nod that we’re on the inside of the fun of this film. So, we think the fans are going to love these roles that these guys are in.”


Part of Stoddard’s role in the production process was to help marry the worlds of NASCAR and Hollywood, a process that he says has been seamless on both ends.


“The general audience wouldn’t have too much trouble buying into the authenticity of this,” Stoddard said. “For us, the most important sort of a litmus for us is that it passes the smell test with the core fan because they know the sport so much better. These guys — we haven’t had to push at all in terms of getting them to want to be as authentic as possible. They are the best in the business and so it’s been a collaboration on making sure everything is right.


“… It’s amazing the detail that exists in our sport just on the race car, not even taking into consideration the tracks or the teams and everything that happens in our universe. These guys have been meticulous about all of that.”


That starts with shooting at the track and getting into the garage. For Johnson, authenticity came from that hands-on research, where he spent about a week and a half simply observing NASCAR’s version of Hollywood Blvd.


“I produced two baseball movies, “The Natural” and “The Rookie” and those taught me a lot about baseball and you have to do the research and understand the world and NASCAR was not a world I understood,” Johnson said. “I was fascinated by it, but I really didn’t know how it worked.


“Look at this big all-access pass,” he said with a smile, gesturing to his hot pass. “I can go into the garage and watch how people work and I ask stupid questions about cars and it’s great because I will have spent a concentrated amount of time learning about NASCAR.”

He echoed Stoddard’s sentiment about this movie working for the core fan.

“We would be very upset if this movie doesn’t work for the NASCAR fan,” Johnson said. “So we want to make sure the NASCAR fan, no matter who he or she is, that they see the movie and say ‘They got it right.'”


But just who is the typical NASCAR fan? Not whom you would think, Johnson says.


“It’s interesting — any preconceptions I had about who the NASCAR fans were, were all wrong,” Johnson said. “They come from all walks; surprising number of women. Quick revelation.”

“Logan Lucky” will debut in theaters October 2017.

Posted on by Staff Report

NASCAR gave warnings to several Sprint Cup Series teams for failing either laser inspection station or template inspection during last weekend’s on-track action at Charlotte Motor Speedway for the Bank of America 500, including the No. 27 Richard Childress Racing team for driver Paul Menard.


The No. 27 team failed pre-qualifying LIS three times, resulting in a written warning and a loss of 15 minutes of practice time for this weekend at Kansas Speedway for the Hollywood Casino 400 (2:15 p.m. ET, NBC, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). 


The No. 30 team of Josh Wise received a written warning and 15-minute loss of practice time, as well, after failing pre-qualifying template inspection three times. 


The No. 6 Roush Fenway Racing team of Trevor Bayne, the No. 7 Tommy Baldwin Racing team of Regan Smith, the No. 20 Joe Gibbs Racing team of Matt Kenseth, the No. 41 Stewart-Haas Racing team of Kurt Busch, the No. 42 Chip Ganassi Racing team of Kyle Larson, the No. 78 Furniture Row Racing team of Martin Truex Jr., and the No. 88 Hendrick Motorsports team of Alex Bowman all received written warnings for failing pre-race template inspection twice.

The No. 17 Roush Fenway Racing team of Ricky Stenhouse Jr., the No. 20 of Kenseth, the No. 23 BK Racing team of David Ragan, the No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports team of Chase Elliott, the No. 31 RCR team of Ryan Newman, the No. 34 Front Row Motorsports team of Chris Buescher and the No. 43 Richard Petty Motorsports team of Aric Almirola all received written warnings after failing pre-qualifying LIS inspection twice. 


Stewart Haas Racing’s Nos. 4, 10 and 14 teams — wheeled by Kevin Harvick, Danica Patrick, and Tony Stewart, respectively — failed pre-qualifying template inspection twice and received written warnings along with the No. 88 HMS team — driven Charlotte weekend by Alex Bowman.

 

Both Newman and Patrick served their respective penalties in Charlotte. 

 

The No. 3 RCR team of Ty Dillon was the sole XFINITY Series team to receive a written warning after failing pre-race LIS twice.