Kenseth, Edwards pace wreck-filled Saturday practices

Posted on March 19, 2016 by Staff Report

Practice 3 recap | RELATED: Practice 3 results

Matt Kenseth topped the final Sprint Cup Series practice on Saturday at Auto Club Speedway, but the story from the session was a somewhat bizarre wreck between Kyle Larson and Greg Biffle.

Midway through the practice, Larson rose up and hit the outside wall, forcing Biffle to make a split-second decision about where he’d try to avoid the No. 42 Chevrolet, but chose the high side. Needless to say, it was not the correct choice.

The front end of Biffle’s No. 16 crunched in — along with the rear of Larson’s ride — forcing his hood to pop up. Both teams are attempting repairs but may need to use backup entries in Sunday’s Auto Club 400 (3:30 p.m. ET, FOX, MRN, Sirius XM NASCAR Radio).

“I just had to slow down so much that the 16 caught me,” Larson told FOX. “It was my fault. I apologize to Greg Biffle.”

The pair talked after the wreck and appeared to come to an understanding with what happened.

Kenseth’s best speed of 185.419 mph narrowly edged his Joe Gibbs Racing teammate, Carl Edwards, who was second at 185.347 mph. Ryan Blaney (185.161 mph), Joey Logano (185.099 mph) and Aric Almirola (185.071 mph) rounded out the top five.

Kurt Busch wrecked his primary car in the opening practice of the day. He was 24th fastest in the final session at 183.299 mph in his backup.

Practice 2 recap | RELATED: Practice 2 results

Carl Edwards paced the opening Saturday morning practice at Auto Club Speedway, topping the leaderboard with a best speed of 187.906 mph.

Speeds were slightly down from where they were on Friday as heavy fog surrounded the California track.

Martin Truex Jr. was next on the charts at 187.632 mph, followed by Ryan Newman (186.640 mph), Kyle Busch (186.635 mph) and pole-winner Austin Dillon (186.587 mph) to round out the top five.

Midway through the practice, Kurt Busch got into the wall and, while the damage appeared to be slight, his No. 41 team elected to go to a backup Chevrolet. He had qualified 26th, but will now have to start from the rear.

Aric Almirola also slapped the Turn 2 wall early on in the session, pancaking the right side of his No. 43 Ford Fusion. The Richard Petty Motorsports team was working on his car, attempting to fix it.

Posted on March 19, 2016 by Staff Report

Posted on March 19, 2016 by Reid Spencer

FONTANA, Calif. — Seconds after crossing the finish line .714 seconds ahead of runner-up Kyle Busch, Austin Dillon summed up Saturday’s TreatMyClot.com 300 by Janssen in one short sentence.

“I’d rather be lucky than good,” Dillon chortled on his team radio after ending evading Busch’s last-ditch attempt to pinch the winning No. 2 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet into the outside wall at Auto Club Speedway.

And that was just the final stanza of a crazy final lap that saw: 1) Busch slow to a crawl, short on fuel; 2) Daniel Suárez take the lead from his Joe Gibbs racing teammate on the backstretch, only to run out of fuel; 3) Busch regain the lead despite cutting a left front tire on his final lap; and 4) Dillon come from a half-lap down to pass Busch as the drivers approached the finish line.

Dillon led only one lap, but it was the lap that counted.

“Well, I just had to stay focused,” said Dillon, who did a masterful job of saving fuel in snapping Busch’s three-race winning streak. “(My team) said (Busch) had a flat. I was worried about our fuel and stayed focused on that the whole time.

“He tried to screw me right there at the end, but it didn’t work out for him, did it? I’m proud of these guys. Man, that was fun. I didn’t think we had a car to do that, and we didn’t, but we did what we had to do to win the race …

“Sometimes things just go your way, and today they definitely did.”

Busch, on the other hand, led 133 of the 150 laps and appeared destined to tie Sam Ard’s record of four victories in as many consecutive races. In fact, Joe Gibbs Racing seemed headed for its third straight 1-2-3 finish before Erik Jones ran out of fuel on the next-to-last lap, Daniel Suárez emptied his tank a lap later, and Busch cut his tire after taking the white flag.

The victory was Dillon’s first of the season, first at the two-mile track and seventh of his career.

Darrell Wallace Jr. finished third, and Suárez limped across the finish line in fourth place, maintaining a 10-point lead over fifth-place finisher Elliott Sadler in the series standings. Kevin Harvick, Brendan Gaughan, Kyle Larson, Brandon Jones and Justin Allgaier completed the top 10.

Second with two laps left, Jones came home 15th, one lap down.

After pit stops under caution on Lap 101, Suárez came up a half-lap short of his elusive first victory.

“In the whole run we were saving fuel,” Suárez said. “I knew that we were one to one-and-a-half laps short. I was saving fuel. I wasn’t worrying about the 20 (Jones) or 18 (Busch). I was just trying to finish the race, because I knew that we were short. I knew that the 20 was a little bit shorter than us and eventually he ran out. When he ran out I started saving more because I knew that I had more fuel than him, but not a lot.

“I was just trying to save as much as I can. I passed the 18 when he blew the left front tire in (Turns) 1 and 2, and on the exit of 2 I ran out of fuel, and on the exit of four the 2 (Dillon) and the 18 passed me back. Very unfortunate, but it’s part of racing. I really think that our first victory is coming and hopefully we can get it very soon.”

The pole winner for Sunday’s NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race (3:30 p.m. ET on FOX, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio), Dillon will try to complete a career-first weekend sweep in the Auto Club 400.

Note: Wallace’s car failed post-race Laser Inspection Station. NASCAR will determine next week if a penalty is warranted.

MORE: Harvick gets heated | Wallace fails post-race inspection

Posted on March 18, 2016 by Nascar

FONTANA, Calif. – Kyle Larson, the can’t miss kid of Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates was expected to see his Sprint Cup Series career flourish with NASCAR’s most recent rules package change.

Looser, harder to driver cars with less downforce, it was surmised, would be right in the youngster’s wheelhouse. And it may be yet.

But four races into the 2016 season and Larson, 23, is 17th in points with just one top-15 finish in three races utilizing the new platform.

“Whether you have zero downforce or thousands of (pounds of) downforce, you still have to have a good car, good handling, good speed and all of that,” Larson said Friday at Auto Club Speedway, site of Sunday’s Auto Club 400 (3:30 p.m. ET, FOX, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.)

“Right now we’ve just kind of struggled with getting the speed really. I feel like our balance has been close for the few races we’ve run (with this package). Just lack speed, especially on the long runs. That’s where I feel like we struggled last year and so far this season … as well.”

The former USAC open-wheel standout raced his way to eight top-five and 17 top-10 finishes in his first full season of Sprint Cup competition with CGR in 2014, including a runnerup finish to Kyle Busch here at Auto Club Speedway. That was good enough for 17th in the final points standings and saw him knocking on the door of a spot in the Chase for the Sprint Cup battle.

But the numbers fell off dramatically last season (two top fives and 10 top 10s) and resulted in a 19th-place finish.

A crew chief change for the No. 42 team — Chad Johnston replaced Chris Heroy — came during the offseason. Larson, still seeking his first Sprint Cup victory, opened the year with a seventh-place run at Daytona International Speedway. But he could muster only a 26th-best result at Atlanta and followed that with a 34th-place run a week later at Las Vegas.

He finished 12th last week at Phoenix.

“Hopefully we can take what we have learned here on the West Coast, get back to the shop and try and make our cars better,” he said. “We’ve gotten a little better the last couple of weeks; we still have a long way to go. Trying to stay positive and stay confident and hopefully our guys can figure it out.”

Teammate Jamie McMurray has fared somewhat better yet sits 15th in points and has yet to post a top-15 finish.

No Ganassi driver has won a points race since 2013.

Both teams, Larson acknowledged, “are struggling.”

“If one car was a lot better than the other, then we could place blame on the driver more,” he said. “We just haven’t hit on the right thing, I guess, to make speed.

“There are a lot of other teams that we ran around last year that are better than we are I feel like this year. That has been a little disappointing, but having that stuff happen early in the year, it just makes everybody work really hard.”

Thirteenth in the day’s only practice at ACS and starting 32nd after failing to advance out of the first round of qualifying Friday, Larson says he remains confident in his team and the entire organization.

“They’ve got the brains,” he said. “I just hold the wheel. They will get it better and we will start running up front more often.”

Posted on March 18, 2016 by Nascar

FONTANA, Calif. – Brian Vickers will be the first NASCAR Sprint Cup Series driver to make two consecutive starts in the Stewart-Haas Racing No. 14 Chevrolet for 2016.

Vickers, filling in for SHR owner/driver Tony Stewart here at Auto Club Speedway this weekend, said Friday that he will also be behind the wheel in two weeks when the series heads to Martinsville Speedway.

Vickers will make his third start for the team this weekend at ACS after finishing 26th at Daytona International Speedway and 36th at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

NASCAR XFINITY Series driver Ty Dillon has driven in relief for the team on two occasions this season as well, finishing 17th at Atlanta Motor Speedway and 15th last weekend at Phoenix International Raceway.

“As of right now, I’m going to be (in the car) at Martinsville. … Then we’re figuring out everything from there,” Vickers said during a media appearance at the track. “As you know nothing has really changed. I think everyone is really just kind of waiting to see how Tony shakes out.”

Stewart, scheduled to retire from Sprint Cup competition at the end of the ’16 season, was injured during an off-season off-road accident and has yet to compete this year.

Following last week’s race Stewart said no date has been set for his return to competition, although doctors had cleared him to begin driving his personal car – something he said he had been doing for three weeks without medical approval.

Vickers’ own racing career has been interrupted by medical issues (blood clots), and sponsorship on the No. 14 entry this weekend as well as for the Martinsville race has a tie-in to his condition. For the next two races, the car will carry branding featuring the drug company Janssen and Arnie’s Army Charitable Foundation, the charitable organization founded by legendary golfer Arnold Palmer.

“I can honestly say this: As much as I want to race this car as long as I can … I really want to see Tony back in it,” Vickers said. “I’ve been in his shoes. I know exactly what it’s like. It’s his last season (and) he deserves to be in this car as much as he can be.

“I’m honored to race it as long as I need to and as long as I can, but I’m happy to turn the keys back over as soon as he is ready.”

Posted on March 18, 2016 by

FONTANA, Calif. — The sprawling and lightning fast Auto Club Speedway can be a little daunting for rookie drivers.

Just ask NASCAR XFINITY Series rookie Brandon Jones.

“The first time I pulled up here a couple hours ago — man, this place is really big,” Jones said on Friday at the speedway. “It looked a little intimidating when you pulled up at first.”

But while Jones is contending for Sunoco Rookie of the Year, his performance on-track isn’t reminiscent of a beginner. In his four starts this season, Jones, 19, has finished 11th or better in every race in his No. 33 Richard Childress Chevrolet, making his XFINITY debut on all four tracks.

For Jones, the new tracks have been opportunities to be a student of the sport, studying as much as he can as a young driver.

“The biggest thing is just trying to learn these places I haven’t been to yet,” Jones said. “We kind of kicked off with a pretty tough schedule going from Daytona to pretty bumpy Atlanta. … So some of these places that I haven’t seen so far, it’s been kind of tough to learn right off the trailer.

“(But) every time we’ve unloaded so far, we’ve been top 10 on the speed charts, so I’ve been really happy about where we’ve been firing up at these places.”

He’ll hit the books again this weekend, as he makes his debut at Auto Club Speedway in Saturday’s TreatMyClot.com 300 (4 p.m. ET, FS1, MRN, SiriusXM Radio). There’s uncertainty that comes with the tricky seams and speed characteristic of the California track — but there’s also confidence that comes from having strong teammates.

“I know a couple of our RCR teammates — Brendan Gaughan being one of them — (have) finished pretty high up,” Jones said. “I’ve been talking to him a little bit at the race track, going back and watching a couple videos to see how they run over the seams. Like you said, that’s a pretty big deal, so learn how to take that to your advantage during the race, making your car better over those is going to be a big key.

“I’m just going to try to go out there this first practice session and learn the place as best I can, get behind some people that have been here a lot and try and follow them and see if I can pick up a couple things. But I think we’ll be just fine — I think we’ll be pretty fast right off the hauler and we’ll start going to work on our Nexteer Chevy.”

Posted on March 18, 2016 by Staff Report

Practice 2 recap | Results

Austin Dillon rolled right to the top of the NASCAR XFINITY Series leaderboard in Friday’s second session in his No. 2 Chevrolet after putting the No. 3 Richard Childress Racing Sprint Cup car atop that series’ first practice at Auto Club Speedway.

Dillon’s top speed in the final session was 176.622 mph, compared with Kyle Busch‘s fastest lap of 177.327 mph to pace the opening session.

Busch put his No. 18 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota pretty close to the top of the speed chart again, ranking second at 176.013 mph in the final practice session for the TreatMyClot.com 300 by Janssen (Saturday, 4 p.m. ET, FS1, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.)

Ryan Blaney was third-fastest at 175.863 mph in his No. 22 Team Penske Ford, Ty Dillon‘s No. 3 Chevrolet was fourth (175.623 mph) and Kyle Larson ran fifth (175.588 mph) in the No. 42 Chevrolet.

Brandon Jones made contact with the wall in his RCR machine about halfway through the afternon XFINITY practice session at Fontana, causing some damage on the right side of the No. 33 car.

Practice 1 recap | Results

Kyle Busch continued his 2016 NASCAR XFINITY Series domination by topping the opening practice at Auto Club Speedway ahead of Saturday’s TreatMyClot.com 300 by Janssen (Saturday, 4 p.m. ET, FS1, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).

Busch paced the opening 85-minute session with a fast lap of 177.327 mph, which was just over 2.3 mph faster than the second-place lap of teammate Erik Jones (174.982 mph). Kyle Larson (174.910 mph), Elliott Sadler (174.795 mph) and Austin Dillon (174.681 mph) rounded out the top five.

Busch, Larson and Dillon will be pulling double duty this weekend, running in Saturday’s XFINITY race and Sunday’s NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Auto Club 400 (3:30 p.m. ET, FOX, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).

For Busch, the top spot on the speed chart picks up right where he left off last weekend at Phoenix. The Joe Gibbs Racing driver has won the last three XFINITY Series races of the season and six of the last 10 held at Auto Club.

Points leader Daniel Suarez placed seventh in the session, while defending race winner Kevin Harvick was 11th.

Justin Allgaier, fresh off a fourth-place effort at Phoenix International Raceway, made contact with the wall a little over 20 minutes into practice. That damage led the JR Motorsports driver to go to a backup car.

Posted on March 18, 2016 by Staff Report

RELATED: Practice 1 results

Austin Dillon rose to the top of the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series leaderboard in Friday’s opening practice at Auto Club Speedway.

Dillon drove the Richard Childress Racing No. 3 Chevrolet to a best lap of 188.511 mph on the 2-mile California track. His speed was slightly better than the track qualifying record of 188.425 mph, a benchmark established by Kyle Busch in February 2005.

Martin Truex Jr., piloting the Furniture Row Racing No. 78 Toyota, landed the second-fastest lap in early preparation for Sunday’s Auto Club 400 (3:30 p.m. ET, FOX, MRN, SiriusXM). Home-state favorite Kevin Harvick, last week’s winner by inches at Phoenix, pushed the Stewart-Haas Racing No. 4 Chevrolet to the third-fastest lap at 188.304 mph.

Ricky Stenhouse Jr. (188.289 mph) and Chris Buescher (187.829) completed the top five in a pair of Fords.

Kasey Kahne and Jimmie Johnson, Hendrick Motorsports teammates, were sixth- and seventh-fastest, respectively. Defending race winner Brad Keselowski registered the 14th-fastest lap in the Team Penske No. 2 Ford.

No driver ran more than 10 consecutive laps in the opening 85-minute session.

Opening practice was slowed once by debris in Turns 1 and 2. Stenhouse’s Roush Fenway Racing No. 17 Ford was held 15 minutes at the start of the session as punishment for difficulties passing through the laser inspection station last week at Phoenix.

Friday’s Coors Light Pole Qualifying for the Sprint Cup Series is scheduled for 7:45 p.m. ET (FS1).

Posted on March 18, 2016 by Zack Albert

With the newness of the current NASCAR racing season yet to wear off, Brian France — the sanctioning body’s chairman and CEO — discussed the possibilities of more new touches coming to stock-car racing’s future.

The possibility of new manufacturers, new tracks and a new premier-series entitlement sponsor were just some of the topics France discussed in an impromptu phone interview Friday afternoon with SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.

SiriusXM host Dave Moody said callers often asked whether they could anticipate the return of Dodge or another manufacturer to join the three existing automakers — Chevrolet, Ford and Toyota — that currently compete in the sport.

“There is some interest by a couple of different manufacturers, and we would be open to that in the right conditions,” France said. “A lot of the car companies are understandably looking at the terrific job that Toyota has done by partnering with NASCAR and the success and all the things that come along with that. They’ve been an incredible success story for a car manufacturer looking to come into a sport that’s very difficult to come in, compete and win every weekend.

“But there’s interest and this is obviously the biggest opportunity in auto racing in North America and we would probably say the world, so it’s always on some attention span one way or the other.”

France was less optimistic about the prospects of a new raceway joining the 23 facilities that currently host NASCAR Sprint Cup Series events, citing economic conditions. Those 23 tracks, plus the handful of venues that host other national series events, have their race dates guaranteed through a five-year sanctioning agreement that went into effect this year.

RELATED: Complete schedule for NASCAR’s top series

“The economy, obviously — going back to ’08 — has been either slow or non-existent depending on which industry you’re in, so that’s been a headwind for a lot of people, including our industry,” France said. “I don’t see that any time soon, but that has a tendency to go in waves, so when things are in a different situation with the economy and other things, you tend to see two or three more tracks going at once. …

“Nothing immediate, but I will say of course the tracks are making sure the facilities are ever-better and have more amenities for our fans.”

France also mentioned the negotiations and talks with prospective companies to replace Sprint as the entitlement sponsor of NASCAR’s top division. The cellular phone provider signed on as the series’ title sponsor as Nextel in 2004, but its run will end at the conclusion of 2016.

“Good,” France said in characterizing the nature of the discussions. “It’s the most coveted position in sports because of the rights that are granted, so we’ve got a good group of companies that are on our short list and so hopefully in the coming weeks or months, we’ll get to the right place on that.”

Among the other topics France discussed:

• The new reduced downforce aerodynamic package and the type of racing it has produced:

“It’s off to a really good start. Obviously, it’s not in a situation where we’re ready to say everything is perfect, because we’re always searching for terrific things on the race track. But clearly, this start of this season and the new downforce package, in combination with Goodyear really producing a good tire matchup for that, has really given the drivers more of what they want, and they’re putting on one heck of a race.”

• On whether NASCAR competition officials could take the aerodynamic rules a step further during the middle of the season:

“As long as it doesn’t break the bank financially for the team owners and others — and/or if it’s a safety benefit; those are the criteria we use to make any rules changes midstream — then we’ll look at that.”

• On the close-quarters, full-contact battle between Kevin Harvick and Carl Edwards on the final lap last Sunday at Phoenix International Raceway:

“Another thing that we’ve talked about this week is the finish at Phoenix and the contact in that, and you’ve heard me say many, many times: that’s classic NASCAR racing when that happens, but it’s interesting to note that not all the drivers — present or past — would’ve made the move that Carl Edwards try to do to get around Harvick, and they both did a great job.

“But that’s classic NASCAR. We expect that. Sometimes that’s misunderstood when I say that, but it’s a great example of that’s part of NASCAR when you’re late in the race, a little faster, you’re going to have some contact to either scrub off speed or move somebody around a little bit. Carl’s one of the best at that, and it gave us a great finish.”

RELATED: See the fantastic finish at Phoenix

• On Kyle Busch’s dominance in the NASCAR XFINITY Series this season and suggestions that Sprint Cup drivers’ participation in the series be limited:

“It’s always a real strong debate, depending on which side you’re on. Mark Martin , back in the day, was known to dominate that series known as the Busch Series back then. We’ve always had some of that. Kyle has just got a mastery of that division. On the other hand, it makes the younger drivers better. They get to compete with one of the best of the business every weekend. Obviously, we have a new championship Chase format that will reward the eventual champion in the end; it’ll have to be somebody other than Kyle.

“I can get on either side of it, but right now that’s the rules.”

Posted on March 18, 2016 by Reid Spencer

FONTANA, Calif. – Austin Dillon delivered a parting shot that turned out to be a called shot.

After taking questions from reporters after Friday’s opening NASCAR Sprint Cup Series practice at Auto Club Speedway, Dillon paused to watch the last minute of Middle Tennessee State’s upset victory over Michigan State in the NCAA basketball tournament.

On his way out the door, Dillon was asked about his prospects for Sunday’s Auto Club 400 (3:30 p.m. ET on FOX, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) at the two-mile track.

“Ask me tomorrow (after practice),” Dillon said. “But I think we’ve got a shot at the pole today.”

Dillon’s parting comment proved prophetic. In the money round of knockout qualifying, the driver of the No. 3 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet toured the abrasive track in 38.200 seconds (188.482 mph) to earn the top starting spot for Sunday’s race.

The Coors Light Pole Award was Dillon’s first since he topped qualifying for the season-opening Daytona 500 in his 2014 rookie season.

“I’m not (just) a Daytona 500 polesitter now—I got a pole somewhere else,” Dillon said. “And to do it at a driver’s race track like this here at Fontana means a lot to me.

“I’m just proud of this American Ethanol team. We’ve had fast cars all year long, and I knew going into that third session, if I didn’t make mistakes I would have a shot. I just stayed with it off of (Turn) 4. … It worked out for us.”

Dillon edged last week’s Phoenix winner, Kevin Harvick (188.329 mph), by .031 seconds. Denny Hamlin qualified third after leading the second round with a track-record run at (188.511 mph), breaking the mark of 188.245 mph set by current Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Kyle Busch in 2005.

Conserving his equipment for the final run, Dillon adhered to a blueprint devised by his engineers.

“We wanted to be from 13th to 24th in that first (round),” Dillon said. “We were 13th (tied with Kyle Busch) on the front side of that. On the second run I was a little tight. We just kept freeing the car up a little bit there to help ourselves in that third run and it all worked out.”

Ryan Newman earned the fourth spot in the grid, followed by Carl Edwards, Kyle Busch, and Trevor Bayne.

Harvick lost time through the first two turns on his final-round lap.

“Each round was a little bit different,” said the 2014 series champion. “The second round, I had a little traffic getting onto the race track. The first round was pretty clean. I didn’t really change anything. (In the third round) I think I caught the inside of that seam with the right-side tires a little more than I wanted to through (Turns) 1 and 2 and it just started to step out and I had to pedal it three or four times down there because it was loose.

“Pretty good through (Turns) 3 and 4, but, all in all, a good day for our team, and hopefully we can cap that off with a win when we get done on Sunday.”

Notes: Dillon’s Daytona 500 pole was also the last pole for RCR. … Jimmie Johnson qualified 19th, and Dale Earnhardt Jr. will start 27th after failing to advance past the first round. … Chase Elliott qualified eighth, six spots ahead of fellow rookie Ryan Blaney.