Stretch Run Championship Preview
Dateline: 08/01/2000Somewhere between this weekend's Brickyard 400 and the race in Rockingham on October 22nd the NASCAR Winston Cup championship picture is likely to become much clearer. Bobby Labonte, Dale Jarrett and Dale Earnhardt all have a great chance of winning the title this season. Only one can win, and the next twelve weeks of back-to-back races will go a long ways towards clearing the picture.
The Leader
The current point leader is Bobby Labonte. With zero championships under his belt the stress of being the leader is all new to him and his team. So far the Joe Gibbs crew has been rock solid. They put solid equipment under Bobby every week helping him to finish in the top 13 in 17 of the 19 races run so far this season.
It is exactly this kind of consistency that wins Championships. If Bobby can get through October without posting another 20th-or-worse finish then he will be extremely difficult to beat. But ask any former Champion, the races seem to get tougher as the media attention bears down on the leader towards the end of the season.
The Defending Champ
Dale Jarrett and his Robert Yates Racing team put it all together last year and claimed their first Winston Cup trophy. Dale struggled from Atlanta in the middle of March until Texas in the middle of April posting four finishes of 17th or worse during that six race stretch. His poor finishes include a 36th place finish in Atlanta after starting on the pole and a 31st place effort in Texas.
But on the positive side, those four poor finishes are the only times that the 88 car has finished out of the top ten all season long. Since that unfortunate run in Texas Jarrett has been unstoppable with ten straight top-ten efforts including seven top-fives. Jarrett has run down the leader from deep in the field, easily outscoring all other drivers over the last ten races and now only trails by only 53 points. This team got the job done last season and there is no reason to believe that they will stumble during the stretch.
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