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Editor’s note: During each week of the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup, The Joey Logano Foundation will provide grants to a non-profit in each of the race markets in a program called “Chasing Second Chances.” Each week, Logano will detail those plans for NASCAR.com.

 

Hey everyone!

What a weekend! Our team worked hard to get to the front at Talladega and it was amazing to walk away with another win. Our goal is to keep winning and keep our No. 22 in victory lane. As always, thank you for your support!

This Week’s Cause: Domestic Violence

 

This is our final week for raising awareness about domestic violence. I hope I have shared some information that can help individuals or families facing this issue.

 

Last week, we focused on the effects domestic violence can have, especially on children. For this week’s blog, I want to talk some about a topic that has been given more attention in recent years — animal abuse and its link to domestic violence. In recent years, researchers have been studying and documenting a stronger correlation between animal abuse and domestic violence.

 

According to the ASPCA, a study of 11 cities showed pet abuse to be a significant indicator of who is at risk for domestic abuse. It makes sense. If someone can harm a living animal, they should be looked at for potential acts of violence against people. Additional information from the site included:

 

• Batterers who also abuse pets are more dangerous and use more violent and controlling behaviors than those who do not harm animals.

• In Wisconsin, 68 percent of battered women revealed that abusive partners had also been violent toward pets or livestock; more than three-quarters of these cases occurred in the presence of the women and/or children to intimidate and control them.

• Children who are exposed to domestic violence were three times more likely to be cruel to animals.

• The Chicago Police Department found that approximately 30 percent of individuals arrested for dog fighting and animal abuse had domestic violence charges on their records. (https://www.aspca.org/fight-cruelty/report-animal-cruelty/domestic-violence-and-animal-cruelty)

Most of you know that Brittany and I are huge animal lovers. We treat our animals like family and are extremely attached to them. It’s hard to think about how abusers use intimidation tactics like threatening to kill the animal if their partner leaves them or battering an animal to force someone to stay. It causes victims of domestic violence to remain in abusive and sometimes deadly relationships because they are afraid something will happen to their beloved animal.

An incident of animal abuse can tell law enforcement a lot about potential for additional abuse in the family. Knowing the correlation between animal abuse and domestic abuse is extremely strong, law enforcement have an opportunity to ask additional questions when called out for an animal abuse case.  They could discover a much bigger issue with the right questions.

It is imperative that first responders understand the connection between animal abuse and family violence. When responding to domestic calls it is imperative to be alert for signs that children and/or pets might be victimized.

This Week’s Joey Logano Foundation Chasing Second Chances Partner

 

This week’s charity partner as we head to Martinsville is Citizens Against Family Violence.

 

Citizens Against Family Violence is a leader in the fight against domestic violence, sexual violence and homelessness. They are the only organization that provides services to victims/survivors in Martinsville, Henry County, and Patrick County that provides post-emergency assistance and support programs.

 

Citizens Against Family Violence is able to make positive changes in the communities and to work toward putting an end to domestic violence through charitable donations by people like you. Your tax-deductible contribution will be used to support our programs that assist victims and survivors of domestic violence. 

 

The Joey Logano Foundation is honored to support this organization and help the women and children that find help through the shelter. Chasing Second Chances will be providing a grant to fund the construction of a new roof.  Thank you Citizens Against Family Violence for being a leader in the fight against domestic violence in your community.

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RELATED: Updated series standings

 

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Jeff Gordon is proud of what his team has accomplished this year, even though among those accomplishments is a string of 32 races without a win.

Not exactly the type of thing you want to tout heading into the final four races of NASCAR’s Sprint Cup Series season.

Fortunately for the 44-year-old, coming soon to a NASCAR on FOX TV booth near you, that lack of success didn’t keep him out of this year’s Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup, and it didn’t keep him from advancing through two three-race elimination rounds.

Survive the next round and the Hendrick Motorsports driver will find himself going for a fifth title, his first under the current Chase format, and the opportunity to literally go out on top.

But that’s down the road, something Gordon will talk about but doesn’t dwell on in the here and now. Sunday’s Goody’s Headache Relief Shot 500 currently has the attention of the driver and his No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports team.

“Obviously we’re focused on Martinsville right now being the next race,” Gordon said Tuesday, arriving at the NASCAR Hall of Fame fresh out of a sit-down with crew chief Alan Gustafson and his band of engineers.

The talk on the HMS campus was of the team’s recent efforts, what’s working and what isn’t, as well as how the last outing at the .526-mile track went earlier in the spring (he led 21 laps and finished ninth). An eight-time winner at Martinsville, Gordon saw a potential victory slip from his grasp when he was penalized for speeding on pit road, a violation that took him from the front of the field (he had led the previous 20 laps) to the end of the longest line.

“We qualified pretty well there, but that number one pit stall is so huge and we want that thing bad,” Gordon said of Martinsville.

“At the end of that race, other than having the issue on pit road where I was trying to jump into my box, got caught speeding, trying to execute that a little bit better, but also get ourselves in a position at the end, I think we have a shot at winning this race.”

Winning races hasn’t been an issue for Gordon for much of his career. He has more victories (92) than any other active driver and more than all but two of the inactive ones (Richard Petty, 200; David Pearson, 105). Yet it’s been more than a year since his last win. The last time he went 0-for-the season was 2010.

Making this year’s Chase wasn’t a problem — his team was consistent enough to finish among the top 16. Advancing was a tougher nut to crack, especially the most recent round that included Charlotte, Kansas and the daunting Talladega.

“This past round was the one I was most nervous about,” he admitted. “Two mile-and-a-half tracks that have rock-hard tires. That does not suit me. I want a tire that falls off, that wears out, that slips and slides around. That was not Kansas or Charlotte.

“Then Talladega, I mean, I can’t remember the last time I finished a race at Talladega with a car in one piece, or a restrictor plate track for that matter.

“So, yeah, I didn’t have a tremendous amount of confidence. But I had a lot of confidence in our team, what we were capable of in the way that we’ve been going about it. I keep saying ‘grinding it out.’ If you analyzed the races the way we analyze our races, you have no idea how much we’ve had to fight for those finishes.”

There’s still time, he said, for additional trophies and a shot at the title. Martinsville, where he last won in 2013, Texas (where he has 13 top 10s) and Phoenix (three straight top-10 runs including a runner-up last fall) stand between Gordon and a ticket to Homestead.

If others don’t see he and his team as a threat, that’s OK. Gordon understands how such assumptions can be made.

“We have not shown the strength that other teams have that are still in (the Chase),” he said. “We’ve not been the dominant cars and team.
I hope after this round that changes. … But up to this point we’re definitely the underdog.”

Perhaps, but Martinsville begins another round and another set of opportunities.

“One thing that we’ve done so well that I think will continue no matter what, because it’s just this team, is we never stop fighting and grinding,” he said. “That’s what we’ve had to do. Now we’re just in that mode. … We seem to really do a great job being consistent and getting the best finish. That’s what we’ve been certainly doing in the Chase.

“If we do that for three more weeks,” he said, “I think we make it to Homestead.”

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CONCORD, N.C. — Chris Buescher always dreaded this part of the job.



He had just finished wheeling the No. 16 Roush Fenway Racing Ford to a seventh-place result at Michigan International Speedway on June 15, 2013. Now, as the race at Road America approached, Buescher was tasked with taking his seat out and putting another one in back at the shop.



It’s a simple maneuver, one that’s necessary in NASCAR as the race car seats are form-fitting to each driver. But the seat represented another ride that was not his, another driver who would be piloting the No. 16 instead of him, while he stood on the sidelines as a part-time employee in the race shop.



“It took a lot of will power to take your seat in and out of a race car and put another driver’s in it, knowing that that’s exactly where you wanted to be, but were not able to at the time,” Buescher said about a task he performed nine times in 2013. “It was a tough one for me, to be able to do that. I had to go to the race track, had to help the guys through the weekend, had to put the pit sign out for pit stops, get the guys on the right spot.”



But soon, it would be just his signature –- no one else’s — on top of the Roush Fenway Racing Ford.


All paths lead to North Carolina



Relaxed and dressed in work pants, a T-shirt and sneakers at the capacious Roush Fenway Racing campus in Concord, North Carolina, Buescher is the epitome of a man’s man — absent is the air of fame that surrounds many who spend their lives in the spotlight.



He grins when he recalls having to buy a tuxedo because he didn’t even own a suit — much less a tux — until recently.



And he recounts moments of humbleness and times of challenge that molded him into the driver he is today: A winning wheelman who is leading the NASCAR XFINITY Series points standings in his second full-time year in the series and ready to contend for his first championship title.



Anything to race



Buescher is 12 years old. He’s seated in his living room in his Prosper, Texas, home with his parents. And they’re asking him to make a big decision, one that will impact his entire life. 



He still remembers that day vividly.



“They said, ‘Look, if you want to do this as a hobby, great. We’ll go run on Saturday nights, we’ll have fun here in Texas and you can continue to go through school and figure out something you want to do as your career. Or you can make racing your career.'”



Buescher surrounded himself with racing. He spent summers racing Legends cars in the racing capital of the United States — Charlotte, North Carolina. He slept many nights on the couch of now-No. 16 Sprint Cup crew chief Matt Puccia, trying to gain experience during the summer in the little time he had away from school.



“Just happened to be the short couch, so my knees would end up on one armrest and my neck on the other,” Buescher joked. “Not the most comfortable way to spend three months.”



“It usually started out with, ‘Hey, do you mind if we stay at your house for a few nights?'” Puccia said with a chuckle at Talladega Superspeedway on Oct. 23. “And it ended up being the whole summer and into fall sometimes.

“But you could tell really at a young age when he was first running Legends cars how much talent that he was going to have. He just had a natural ability of being able to adapt to those cars.”

Eventually it was time for him to make a more permanent decision. In 2008 —  without a driver’s license, even — 15-year-old Buescher left his childhood town in Texas for Charlotte. This time, he wouldn’t return home at summer’s end.



“(I said to myself) ‘Man, you better take this opportunity or somebody else will,'” Buescher said. “… It was that time where you really had to commit. I had to drive the 17, 18 hours up to Charlotte, unpack what little belongings I had at the time and try and make racing work.



“… That was the hardest part of it was trying to leave home so young, knowing I had two sisters, I had all my friends back there still and not wanting to leave at all just to try and make this work.”



But Buescher wasn’t alone. He had a family waiting for him up in the Tarheel State that was ready to embrace him with open arms and would ultimately help advance his racing career: The Ragans.



A second family



Buescher had met Ken Ragan — Cup driver and father of Sprint Cup Series regular David Ragan — while racing Legends cars. At the time, Ragan was in charge of 600 Racing, Inc., a company that manufactures and sponsors Legends cars worldwide.



Their initial meeting, however, wasn’t ideal.



“Through unfortunate circumstances, (I) got to be in his office for a lengthy lecture after I got black-flagged one weekend,” Buescher recalled with a smile and chuckle. “So, it was a rocky start, but it turned into a great friendship over the course of the next few summers.”



The Ragans gave Buescher a roof over his head, while offering a valuable connection to the racing community. He maintained the family’s yard, completed his high school work online and tried to make it as a race car driver. 



Soon, that success came for Buescher, as he joined Roush Fenway Racing as a part-time XFINITY driver in 2011 and won his first ARCA championship in 2012. But even in times of triumph, the journey to the top doesn’t always pay as it should.



“It got to the point where I was ready to go get a job part-time so I could afford to live and still race,” Buescher said.



The solution came in the form of a job as an interior specialist in the shop, which provided him with the monetary support he needed — and allowed him to learn how his own race cars operate.



“You want to know if a piece of suspension is broken and you’re out on the race track, you want to be able to describe where it’s coming from and you want to know a basic idea of what you’re describing,” Buescher said. “You want to be able to tell them, ‘Look here first.’ … And I think that’s important and there’s a lot of guys that don’t have that now.”



Buescher enjoyed the side gig so much that he continues to work in the shop today, decaling many of his own helmets, helping the shop employees during teardown and even building a small AC box for the garage. It’s a bit of an old-school approach, reminiscent of a time in NASCAR when drivers would pull their own trailers to the track.



But that’s just how Buescher operates — an old soul in the body of a 23-year-old race car driver.



Turning bad luck into opportunity



Mother Nature was not on Buescher’s side that day down at Daytona International Speedway.



He had finally gotten his start as a XFINITY Series full-time driver for Roush Fenway Racing and was set to qualify for his first race that season in February 2014. During the opening round of knockout qualifying, rain began to fall, halting the first session and ultimately canceling the final two rounds.



Buescher’s No. 60 Ford didn’t make the field.



“I didn’t get to run the first race of the season and that really hurt,” Buescher said. “That was one of those times when you had to sit in a motorhome or on a pit box during the race and watch when you should have been in there, that you were fast enough all through testing, that you were fast enough through practice, you were top-five on the charts — there was no reason not to be in that race.



“And you sit there the whole time and think, ‘What can I do to make sure this never happens again?’ And that was the time we really put our heads down as a team — we’re a new team, we’re all together for the first race, and we didn’t get to run it. So, as we went into the next handful of races in the year, we decided we had nothing to lose. We could take chances, let’s all learn together and let’s go win some races.”



That’s what they did. Buescher earned his first XFINITY win at Mid-Ohio that year, carrying momentum into the 2015 season, where two wins and 11 top-fives have propelled him to No. 1 in the series standings. With three races remaining on the schedule, the No. 60 driver’s chance at a trophy draws closer.



“I looked at what we have coming up and I feel great about our chances,” Buescher said.  “… It’s been a tough several weeks leading up to this point and these last (three) are not going to be any easier. I know that.”



The champion won’t be crowned until November, but given his chances as we look to Homestead, Buescher had better have a tuxedo ready — just in case.

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After a successful summer that included a win at Eldora Speedway, dirt track racer Christopher Bell is moving up to a national series full-time ride with Kyle Busch Motorsports, the team announced Thursday on “Race Hub.”

 

Bell has won two of the three Super Late Model tour races he has entered this year, with a runner-up finish in the third. He also had a runner-up finish at Iowa Speedway in the K&N Pro Series West in May. And in addition to his victory at Eldora, he also has a top-five finish at Iowa among his five NASCAR Camping World Truck Series races in 2015.

Bell, 20, is the 2013 USAC National Midget Champion.

Another up-and-comer, William Byron, is joining Bell at KBM in 2016. Byron, who is 17 and still in high school, attending Country Day School in Charlotte, North Carolina, just wrapped up the NASCAR K&N Pro Series East championship driving for HScott Motorsports.

Byron led the championship standings since the third race of the season, finishing up Oct. 3 at Dover with four wins, five top fives and 11 top 10s in 14 starts. He will be crowned series champion Dec. 12.

 

The third member of the KBM roster for 2016 is Cody Coughlin, a 19-year-old driver who has come up through the Joe Gibbs Racing development organization. Coughlin ran two NCWTS events in 2015, finishing 20th at both Kentucky and Michigan.

 

Joe Gibbs Racing driver Daniel Suarez will also contribute on a part-time basis, sharing a ride with Coughlin.

Posted on by Staff Report

RELATED: Champion’s Week sweepstakes

 

In just four short weeks, the 2016 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series champion will be crowned at Homestead-Miami Speedway. Eight drivers, representing five different teams and all three manufacturers, are competing to etch their name in the NASCAR history books, with the designation as champion. 

 

Once the new champion hoists the Sprint Cup trophy over his head, closing yet another exciting Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup, the industry will collectively set its sights on Las Vegas, and the week-long celebration of the season titled Champion’s Week.

During the first week of December, the NASCAR industry will converge on Las Vegas for the seventh consecutive year. This year, all 16 Chase drivers will be in attendance to celebrate the 2016 Champion, with an array of live fan events, appearances and banquets. Possibly the most iconic moment during Champion’s Week is Victory Lap fueled by Sunoco, when the drivers parade down Las Vegas Boulevard in their race cars. Fans have the opportunity to experience the excitement of NASCAR with two burnout sessions and viewing areas along the route.

For the first time, NASCAR Victory Lap will have a title sponsor, a brand familiar to all NASCAR fans due to its crucial role in the sport, Sunoco. 

“We are very excited to be fueling this year’s NASCAR Victory Lap. This tremendous event has been a fan favorite, as well as a favorite of ours. We are proud to be part of bringing the celebration back to the streets of Las Vegas,” said Drew Kabakoff, Director Brand Marketing, Sunoco. “After this year’s launch of Burnt Rubbèr, the most exclusive fragrance in motorsports, we felt it only made sense to cap the year off with NASCAR’s top drivers burning some rubber of their own on Las Vegas Boulevard.”

Fans have turned this into one of the most anticipated moments of Champion’s Week. So to thank them, Sunoco is offering one lucky fan and their guest the opportunity to win a trip to Las Vegas for a VIP experience during NASCAR Victory Lap fueled by Sunoco.

The grand prize includes hotel, airfare and an exclusive opportunity to experience the Essence of Racing by joining the field of 16 Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup Challengers as they drive the Las Vegas Strip. In addition, Sunoco is giving away hundreds of bottles of Burnt Rubbèr to daily winners. Fans can enter at www.essenceofracing.com for a chance to win.

“We thought this would be a great way to bring our fans closer to the action and raise the level of excitement around this year’s event,” said Kabakoff.

 

Just like the field of race cars competing on the track each weekend, NASCAR Victory Lap will be fueled by Sunoco.

Posted on by Staff Report

LEARN MORE: About Bing
PLAY NOW: Play The Chase Grid Battle Game Powered by Bing

With just four races remaining till the season’s close, the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup has moved onto the Eliminator Round in which eight drivers are fighting to keep their title hopes alive. 

 

Bing is back with its Chase predictions and breaking down who has the best chances, and who does not, during this round as well as in the Homestead-Miami championship.  

 

Joey Logano‘s Contender Round sweep has moved him up in predictions for this round, which includes races at Martinsville Speedway, Texas Motor Speedway and Phoenix International Raceway.

 

Bing predicts that the Team Penske driver will continue his dominance and most likely add another win to his resume at Martinsville’s Goody’s Headache Relief Shot 500.

 

Kevin Harvick, who currently sits seventh on the Chase grid, will win at least one of the Texas or Phoenix races, according to Bing Predicts, to automatically qualify for the Championship race.

 

And Bing Predicts forsees that Kurt Busch and Brad Keselowski will be close to one another in the standings and one or two positions (up or down) will determine their advancement fates.

 

Looking back at Bing’s previous predictions, its original top four are all a part of the eight remaining contenders — Kevin Harvick, Joey Logano, Kyle Busch and Brad Keselowski.

 

In an almost perfect scenario, Bing predicted Dale Earnhardt Jr. would struggle during the races at Charlotte and Kansas but thrive at Talladega and snag the win. All that played out according to plan until Talladega, where Junior led for 61 laps but was unable to secure a first-place finish after the eventful final laps.

 

In addition to helping you win the NASCAR Chase Grid Battle game, Bing also wants to send you on a trip of a lifetime to celebrate the NASCAR Chase for the Sprint Cup champion. Now you can enter a sweepstakes through Bing Rewards for a chance to win a trip to Las Vegas for the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Champion’s Week.

Posted on by Zack Albert

RELATED: Updated series standings 


Talking shop Tuesday in the shadow of the NASCAR Hall of Fame’s Glory Road, Brad Keselowski only had to look around to find a source of major motivation for his second NASCAR Sprint Cup Series title.

“We’re in the NASCAR Hall of Fame,” said Keselowski, the 2012 premier series champ. “Title number two gives you this.”

With a seat among stock-car royalty and the Hall’s coveted blue blazer among the incentives, Keselowski’s quest comes down to its final four races once the Eliminator Round kicks off with Sunday’s Goody’s Headache Relief Shot 500 (1:15 p.m. ET, NBCSN, MRN, SiriusXM) at Martinsville Speedway. Should he land among the championship quartet and convert in the season’s final race at Homestead-Miami Speedway, enshrinement would be all but certain. Every Hall-eligible driver with multiple premier-series titles has been voted for induction.

“That comes with a whole other connotation to your name, your career, your life,” Keselowski said as he held court in the facility’s Great Hall. “I feel like that’s something that’s really attractive to me, but, beyond that, it’s important for me in anything I do in life to make the most of my opportunities and I have a great opportunity right now with Team Penske and I want to make the most of it.”

Keselowski was buoyant Tuesday, thankful to escape the uncertainty of last weekend’s trip to Talladega with his title dreams intact. The 31-year-old driver gave a playful photo-bomb to Penske teammate Joey Logano, grinning for the cameras with a skip-step strut as he arrived for media rotations.

Though he may not carry the same sort of momentum as Logano, winner of the last three Sprint Cup races, Keselowski has found new life and comfort in the round-by-round points reset, which has placed the remaining eight-driver field on equal points footing heading to Martinsville.

“It’s very rejuvenating. I feel very refreshed,” Keselowski said. “Have we had the season we want to date? No, we haven’t won as many races as we’d like to have won, but it doesn’t matter. It just doesn’t matter. It matters what we can do from here on out. Last year we won the most races throughout the year, but at this point specifically we’d won the most races of anyone and we went to Martinsville and had a parts failure and we were sitting last in the points. It doesn’t matter what you’ve done to date. It matters what you do from here.”

From here, Keselowski aims to go one segment further than last season, when he was eliminated before the championship finale. Though he hasn’t visited Victory Lane in the Sprint Cup Series at any of the round’s three tracks — Martinsville, Texas and Phoenix — Keselowski said he still views this three-race series as his team’s “best bracket yet.”

“I feel the opportunity,” Keselowski said. “I feel like we’re going to at least two great tracks for us and if we can find a little more speed at Texas, three great tracks for us. I feel like we’re really in the driver’s seat in a lot of ways.”

Posted on by RJ Kraft

HAMPTON, Ga. — It’s never too early to get a jump on next season and that was the case for teams at Atlanta Motor Speedway on Thursday.

The track hosted seven teams for a NASCAR open team test on the 2016 rules package. The teams at Atlanta were: the No. 17 Roush Fenway Racing team with Ricky Stenhouse Jr., the No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing team with David Ragan, the No. 21 Wood Brothers Racing team with Ryan Blaney, the No. 22 Team Penske team with Joey Logano, the No. 25 Hendrick Motorsports team with Chase Elliott, the No. 41 Stewart-Haas Racing team with Kurt Busch and the No. 43 Richard Petty Motorsports team with Aric Almirola.

The 2016 rules package is similar to the rules packages that were in place this year at Kentucky Speedway and Darlington Raceway where reduced downforce was prevalent. Next year’s base package includes a 3.5-inch spoiler (currently 6 inches), a 0.25-inch front leading splitter edge (currently 2 inches) and a 33-inch wide radiator pan (currently 38 inches; it was 28 inches at the Darlington and Kentucky races).

 

Like many drivers, Almirola, who finished 12th at Kentucky and 11th at Darlington, is a fan of the direction the sport is heading. The Richard Petty Motorsports driver compared and contrasted the setups in recent years. 

 

“I just think as they pull the downforce away and stuff, it allows me to drive my race car a little more,” Almirola said during a media availability during a NASCAR open team test at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

“The more downforce that we have had the last couple of years, it really puts us drivers in a box. If you have a really good car, you run good. And if you have a bad car, you run bad and it’s really hard to make any difference inside the car because everybody is carrying so much throttle.

 

“So as we have transitioned to this lower downforce, I think its been an improvement for our sport but its been an improvement for me as well. Because I feel like I can make a difference now and when our car is not handling as good as we want it to. I can kind of do some different things in the cockpit and lift earlier. I can use more brake. All things that you can’t do when you are running close to wide open.”


Chase Elliott, who will be driving the No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet in the sport’s top series in 2016, believes that this package should be just the first step.


“I think it’s a step in the right direction. Keyword, step,” the defending NASCAR XFINITY Series champion said. “I don’t think we need to be satisfied and happy with the location that we’ve landed at right now. I think we need to continue to try and improve and get better.

“There’s always room for improvement, definitely, on our side, trying to get better from a driver’s perspective, try to make the cars drive better. Also, from a package standpoint, trying to put on a good show for the fans. I think this is a great step and I think this is the direction we need to go in.”

The morning portion saw teams making short runs, while the afternoon saw some teams going out for extended runs. There was a brief delay in the afternoon for a sprinkle of rain but after about a 20-minute stoppage, cars were back on track.

Atlanta hosts the second race of the 2016 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series season on Feb. 28 and the first race of the year that will use the new rules package. The season-opening Daytona 500 on Feb. 21 will not be using this package since it’s a restrictor-plate track.

“We’ve run Kentucky. We’ve run Darlington,” Almirola said of the 2015 races that used a reduced downforce package. “We got a pretty good idea of what to expect. Coming back here for the second race of the year, you will really know where everybody stacks up to start the season.”

 

A two-day Goodyear tire test that had been scheduled at the track for Oct. 27-28 was moved to next week, Nov. 3-4, due to bad weather in the area. Teams from Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates, Richard Childress Racing, Roush Fenway Racing and Joe Gibbs Racing are scheduled to take part.

Posted on by RJ Kraft

HAMPTON, Ga. — Chase Elliott as the weakest link?

It’s hard to imagine that being the case for the reigning XFINITY Series champion, but Elliott was upfront with this feeling that will indeed be the case in 2016 when he embarks on his first full-time season in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series with the No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports team.

“I know for a fact going to the 24 team next year, I’m going to be by far the weakest link in the chain,” Elliott said during a media availability at Atlanta Motor Speedway during a NASCAR open team test.

“I just really feel like that’s a good group and I feel like if I can step up and do my job, there’s no reason why we can’t give ourselves a chance to compete for a win. I think that would be great but I just have a real long ways to go myself, personally to get to that point right now.”

Elliott was at Atlanta to test the 2016 rules package that will see reduced downforce as a prevalent part of the package. He also tested the package at Michigan International Speedway last week.

In a race he admitted he’d “like to forget” due to a 41st-place finish, Elliott drove with the reduced downforce package over Labor Day weekend at Darlington Raceway. Elliott made five starts this season in the No. 25 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet (Martinsville in March, Richmond in April, Charlotte in May, Indianapolis in July and Darlington in September). His best finish was a 16th-place result at Richmond.

“Those five races that we ran this year were not where I wanted to be by any means,” Elliott said. “I didn’t feel like I did a very good job at all to be completely honest with you. I thought I did very, very poorly, personally in the Cup races that we ran this year. 

 

The 19-year-old doesn’t believe he is being hard on himself, just honest.

 

“I just like to be honest with myself and the situation,” Elliott explained. “When you show up to the racetrack like we have this year, for those Cup races, showing up in really good equipment, there’s no excuse to go and not run better for me. I look at that across the board. I just try to be honest with myself and if I don’t feel like I did the job I need to do, I like to just be upfront with my mind and myself personally first.”

 

And while he is his toughest critic at times, his dream of becoming a full-time driver in the sport’s top series is moving closer and closer.

 

Prior to the start of the 2015 season after four-time premier series champion Jeff Gordon had already announced that 2015 would be his final full-time season, Hendrick tapped Elliott to drive the No. 24 Chevrolet starting in 2016.

 

“I’m really looking forward to next season,” Elliott said. “The more days we spend doing tests like this I think it starts to set in for me that the next time we come to this track will be next year in the 24 car we’ll be racing Sprint Cup, full-time. All those things are things I’ve dreamed of doing for a very long time. …

 

“I just hope to make the most of a great opportunity that’s in front of me.”

Posted on by RJ Kraft

HAMPTON, Ga. — With the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup in full swing, it’s easy for drivers outside the postseason to get overlooked.


And while the battle for the championship is down to four races, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. is coming into his own during the latter stretch of his third full-time season.


In the past five weeks, the 28-year-old has scored two top 10s (an eighth-place finish at Dover and a ninth-place finish last weekend at Talladega). His five straight top-15 finishes are the first time he has accomplished that in his Sprint Cup career. To put that in perspective, Stenhouse had just five top-15 finishes in the first 27 races of the season.


Since the Richmond race in September, the 2013 Sunoco Rookie of the Year has jumped up five spots in the standings to 24th and is only two points behind Danica Patrick for 23rd.


“My team is doing a great job. Nick (Sandler, crew chief) and my engineers and my car chief are all working together making sure that we are being as consistent as we can be,” Stenhouse said during a media availability at a NASCAR open team test at Atlanta Motor Speedway on Thursday.


“That’s doing everything in the shop, making sure that everything gets done the way it needs to. We’re going to the track each week with a set gameplan and trying to stick to that gameplan every week. Our cars are getting better as well, so it’s a combination of just a lot of hard work throughout this year.


“We really wanted to start the year running off inside the top 15 and work on it from there and get it even better, but we started the year off and it just wasn’t there. It’s been a good last month and a half or so for us and looking forward to finishing the year strong.”


The Roush Fenway Racing driver touched on the program’s struggles over 2015 but thinks there are plenty of reasons for optimism moving forward.


“I think we’ve definitely been behind for a couple of years now and we’re trying to put a lot of people in place. I think we’ve got some good hires that are going to come in this off-season that I’m real excited about to hopefully make our program better and build better race cars. Hopefully, this ending to the year that we’re having, hopefully we can start next year really similar.”


And with a new rules package in place for 2016, Stenhouse thinks that the low downforce package will help his team build off its late surge.


“I think everything we’ve been doing lately will really kind of go hand in hand with the issues that we are going to have next year with balance and the way the car handles. So I’m encouraged with the things that we have done that will also help for next year.”