6. Joey Logano, No. 2 Ford, Team Penske. Logano showed that teammate Brad Keselowski wasn’t the only one with speed at Richmond — the whole Penske stable had it. The 24-year-old started fifth and dropped to eighth on Lap 60, but never fell below seventh the rest of the way. He enters the Chase as the No. 5 overall seed.
7. Kurt Busch, No. 41 Chevrolet, Stewart-Haas Racing. Overall, Saturday’s race was a great showing for the No. 41 team. After starting 21st and finishing 23rd at Richmond earlier this year, they’ll certainly take a race in which they started ninth and finished seventh to build a little momentum entering the Chase as the No. 10 overall seed.
8. Jimmie Johnson, No. 48 Chevrolet, Hendrick Motorsports. After his top-10 finish, Johnson had to be treated for dehydration after the conclusion of the Federated Auto Parts 400. The six-time and defending champion was given five liters of fluids in the infield care center. Despite this, Johnson’s eighth-place result has him rolling into the Chase on a much better note than last year’s 40th-place effort. Watch more on Johnson’s post-race condition.
9. Ryan Newman, No. 31 Chevrolet, Richard Childress Racing. Even though his Chase status was still up in the air entering the night, Newman was on pretty firm ground unless a new race-winner was crowned. Since it was the Blue (White?) Deuce of Brad Keselowski that ended up in Victory Lane while Newman secured his 10th top-10 finish of the season, he’s in for the second straight year. Watch Newman’s post-race interview.
10. Aric Almirola, No. 43 Ford, Richard Petty Motorsports. Almirola notched his second consecutive top-10 finish and sixth of the season, matching his entire total from 2013. RPM would’ve loved to have put both of their cars in the Chase, but in the meantime it’s still a huge step in the right direction for the organization.
11. Kyle Larson, No. 42 Chevrolet, Chip Ganassi Racing. Larson will certainly be bummed after missing the Chase, but he still exceeded the already lofty expectations many had for him heading into his rookie season. He spent a good amount of time in the top 10 during Saturday’s race — a race in which there were several veterans looking for Chase spots behind him in the field — so the future is clearly bright for this young driver.
12. Dale Earnhardt Jr., No. 88 Chevrolet, Hendrick Motorsports. Earnhardt hasn’t fared particularly well at Richmond since his third win there in 2006, but Saturday’s race showed how well his No. 88 team has been in 2014 at taking a car that doesn’t qualify well — he started 24th — and working on it throughout the race to move up in the field. More often than not, these adjustments put him in position to battle for the win, which will be crucial in the Chase.
13. Brian Vickers, No. 55 Toyota, Michael Waltrip Racing. Vickers missed the Chase, but remains on pace for his best Sprint Cup Series finish since placing 12th overall in 2009. He battled back from running 26th on Lap 60, nearly picking up his eighth top-10 finish of the year. For a driver that has only finished one full-time season since 2009, there are still plenty of positives for Vickers to take away from 2014.
14. Kyle Busch, No. 18 Toyota, Joe Gibbs Racing. While it certainly wasn’t the momentum-builder that the No. 18 team was hoping for as it looks to finally make some noise in the Chase, the 14th-place showing was Busch’s best since the Brickyard all the way back in July. He’ll take the No. 8 overall seed into Chicagoland.
15. Tony Stewart, No. 14 Chevrolet, Stewart-Haas Racing. Getting a few normal races under his belt is crucial for Stewart right now, but the SHR driver desperately needed to win the Federated Auto Parts 400 to make the Chase. He finished on the lead lap, but will not have a chance to earn his fourth Sprint Cup Series title for the second year in a row. To subscribe to RaceView and get uncensored in-race audio, click here.
16. Danica Patrick, No. 10 Chevrolet, Stewart-Haas Racing. Improvement has been clear regarding Patrick’s 2014 regular season, but she missed the postseason for the second year in a row after not winning Saturday’s race at Richmond. Still, she was running on the lead lap for most of the race — the same can’t be said about plenty of the series’ stars who also finished at least a lap down — but SHR would’ve loved to have all four cars in the Chase. Instead, they just got two.
17. Kasey Kahne, No. 5 Chevrolet, Hendrick Motorsports. It’s a good thing Kahne secured his Chase berth with his win at Atlanta last week, because he didn’t even finish on the lead lap at Richmond. Still, it was the first race he hasn’t led a lap in since Pocono, so things could still be trending in a positive direction for the HMS driver.
18. Paul Menard, No. 27 Chevrolet, Richard Childress Racing. Menard has now completed the most successful regular season of his eight-year full-time Sprint Cup Series career, but even that wasn’t enough to make the 2014 Chase. The Richard Childress Racing driver has led the most laps — 45 — of his entire team this year, but failed to even finish on the lead lap Saturday.
19. Greg Biffle, No. 16 Ford, Roush Fenway Racing. Biffle’s race at Richmond was certainly nothing to jump for joy over, but as a driver that needed to race his was into the Chase, he did just that. The RFR driver remained cautiously passive throughout the race, knowing that as long as now-four-time 2014 winner and Ford stablemate Brad Keselowski was running the show, he could afford to take less risks and maintain his position. Watch Biffle’s post-race interview.
20. Austin Dillon, No. 3 Chevrolet, Richard Childress Racing. So much for seeing the No. 3 in contention for the 2014 Sprint Cup Series title. Dillon needed to win Saturday’s race at Richmond, but failed to finish on the lead lap. Overall, his regular season had a few highlights — most notably the Daytona 500 pole — but his absence from Victory Lane cost him a chance at the postseason.
21. Denny Hamlin, No. 11 Toyota, Joe Gibbs Racing. Richmond used to be one of Hamlin’s best venues, if not the best, but he hasn’t finished in the top 10 at the short track since 2012. Saturday again proved he’s been slipping there after he qualified 11th and finished outside the top 20 for the third consecutive race at the track. Still, Hamlin is in the Chase by virtue of his Talladega win.
22. Carl Edwards, No. 99 Ford, Roush Fenway Racing. As Edwards pointed out on the broadcast after the race, he won this event last year but did not enjoy the same success during last season’s Chase, so he’s hopeful that his crummy showing Saturday night will result in a solid Chase run in 2014. Who knows if that logic will end up working out, but in the meantime Edwards has 10 races to go in his Roush tenure and he’s sure to make them memorable.
23. AJ Allmendinger, No. 47 Chevrolet, JTG Daugherty Racing. Well, Allmendinger definitely showed his consistency at Richmond, starting and finishing 23rd. He was as high as 20th on Lap 60, as low as 26th on Lap 120 and finished smack-dab in the middle. That consistency will pay off in the Chase — if he’s able to make passes.
24. Reed Sorenson, No. 36 Chevrolet, Tommy Baldwin Racing. While a 24th-place finish certainly isn’t a huge victory for a smaller organization, you have to give Sorenson some credit. For the eighth time in a row, he’s finished at least four spots ahead of where he started.
25. Martin Truex Jr., No. 78 Chevrolet, Furniture Row Racing. A disappointing regular season comes to a close for Truex Jr., who experienced Richmond heartbreak for the second year in a row. Last year it was being removed from the Chase after the Michael Waltrip Racing race manipulation scandal, while this year he just failed to qualify completely in his first season with one-car organization Furniture Row Racing. A pit road speeding penalty on Lap 239 certainly didn’t help matters much, either.
26. Ricky Stenhouse Jr., No. 17 Ford, Roush Fenway Racing. Stenhouse is two years removed from winning the Nationwide Series title, but has yet to make many moves on the Sprint Cup Series side of things, missing the Chase for the second consecutive year. To make matters worse, his finishing position of 26th was a far cry from his starting position of seventh.
27. Marcos Ambrose, No. 9 Ford, Richard Petty Motorsports. The Australian driver once again misses the Chase after his disappointing Richmond finish. After placing second at Watkins Glen — perhaps the road course ace’s best shot at a win — the writing was on the wall, but the RPM driver still held out hope until the end of the Federated Auto Parts 400.
28. Justin Allgaier, No. 51 Chevrolet, HScott Motorsports. Allgaier didn’t move too far from his starting spot of 27th throughout the race, but he couldn’t seem to make any passes, either — which he did in the spring when he started 31st and finished 21st.
29. David Gilliland, No. 38 Ford, Front Row Racing. Not much to take away from Gilliand’s race — he started 30th and finished 29th — but he did pick up the fastest lap once during the race, so there’s at least that to hang his hat on.
30. Cole Whitt, No. 26 Toyota, BK Racing. Of the three BK Racing entries, Whitt finished best at Richmond and remains the highest (33rd) in the Sprint Cup Series standings.
31. Casey Mears, No. 13 Ford, Geico Racing. No, Casey Mears didn’t make the Chase with his 31st-place finish, but at least he escaped Richmond this time without getting punched in the face by Marcos Ambrose.
32. Josh Wise, No. 98 Chevrolet, Phil Parsons Racing. For Wise and his small-organization team, every small gain has to be counted, and for a team that started and finished 39th at Richmond in the spring, starting 36th and finishing 32nd Saturday night can be considered a success.
33. David Ragan, No. 34 Ford, Front Row Motorsports. Ragan may have timed his Talladega victory a year early, as he would have made the Chase last year under this year’s rules. That said, he didn’t exactly put himself in position much this year, with no top-15 finishes — including Saturday’s 33rd-place result at Richmond.
34. Landon Cassill, No. 40 Chevrolet, Hillman Racing. Cassill’s 34th-place showing was his worst finish since finishing 41st at Pocono last month. It’s also a downgrade from his solid 26th-place result after starting 43rd last time out at Richmond.
35. Mike Bliss, No. 37 Chevrolet, Tommy Baldwin Racing. For Bliss, it’s his best finish of the season. His previous best among the four races he’s competed in this year was 41st at Kentucky.
36. David Stremme, No. 90 Chevrolet, Circle Sport. Stremme’s 58 green flag passes ranked him among the race leaders in the category. Unfortunately, they didn’t get him very far.
37. Michael Annett, No. 7 Chevrolet, Tommy Baldwin Racing. Early in the race, Annett improved his position by 10 spots, moving up from 40th to 30th by Lap 60, but he steadily fell back down to finish a disappointing 37th.
38. Alex Bowman, No. 23 Toyota, BK Racing. Richmond marked the third consecutive race that Bowman finished worse than he qualified, which is not the direction the Sprint Cup Series rookie wants to be trending this late in the season.
39. Travis Kvapil, No. 32 Ford, FAS Lane Racing. Kvapil finished 39th for the third time this season in 16 starts. It was also the first time in five races that the driver of the No. 32 Ford did not improve on his starting position with his end result.
40. Joe Nemechek, No. 66 Toyota, Jay Robinson Racing. Nemechek improved one spot on his starting position, but overall it was his fifth finish of 40th-or-worse this season in 14 Sprint Cup races. For the spring Richmond race winner in 2003, it was also his sixth finish of 40th-or-worse in his last 10 races at the 0.75-mile track.
41. Matt Kenseth, No. 20 Toyota, Joe Gibbs Racing. On Lap 120, Kenseth briefly lost control of his No. 20 Toyota, but it was enough to send his ride sailing into the outside wall. After incurring extensive suspension damage during the incident that sent him to the garage for repairs, Kenseth got back out on the track to complete 330 laps, but remains winless in 2014. Watch Kenseth’s early pit stop.
42. Ryan Truex, No. 83 Toyota, BK Racing. It’s a disappointing race when a driver finishes 42nd. It has to be even more disappointing to run a race and move up only a single spot from the lowest possible qualifying position of 43rd.
43. J.J. Yeley, No. 93 Toyota, BK Racing. A brakes issue forced Yeley from the race just over 30 laps into the race. It’s his worst finish of the season and the second time he’s finished 43rd at Richmond (April 2011).
NASCAR.com’s RJ Kraft contributed to this article.
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