Qualifying
June winner Kurt Busch picked up right where he left off with a strong pole qualifying run for today's race. Busch loves Bristol and Bristol seems to love Kurt Busch. Jeff Burton posted another fast qualifying lap to start second. Burton has been near the top of the grid almost every week in 2006.
Bobby Labonte put the legendary Petty #43 car in the third spot. Friday night's Busch race winner Matt Kenseth rolled off fourth. Rounding out the top five was Tony Stewart in his Home Depot #20.
Drop The Green Flag
Kurt Busch took the early lead as the drivers settled into single-file pretty quickly. Jeff Burton and Matt Kenseth got past Busch for the top two spots. Those three held down the top three spots as the early portion of the race was all clean and green until the first yellow flew on lap 61.
There was a lot of give and take through the first portion of the race.
Storylines
The Race to The Chase is becoming a non-event in 2006. Mark Martin took a one lap penalty for pitting out of the box. This bad finish dropped Mark six spots in the points, all the way back to tenth. However, Mark has a 90 point cushion over Kasey Kahne in eleventh. There are only two races to go before the cutoff.
Behind Kahne Greg Biffle and Carl Edwards are more than 250 points behind Mark and effectively out of The Chase. This leaves eleven drivers battling for ten spots over these last two remaining races before the Chase For the NASCAR NEXTEL Cup begins.
Chasing The Checkers
Matt Kenseth drove past Dale Earnhardt Jr. for the lead with exactly 100 laps to go. Matt's team then got him out of the pits first about fifty laps later to seal the deal.
Matt Kenseth won the 2005 Sharpie 500, was fast here in the spring, won the Busch race on Friday and then picked up the 2006 Sharpie 500 victory tonight. There is no doubt that Matt has Bristol wired.
Top Ten
- Matt Kenseth
- Kyle Busch
- Dale Earnhardt Jr.
- Scott Riggs
- Jeff Gordon
- Denny Hamlin
- Carl Edwards
- Ryan Newman
- Jeff Burton
- Jimmie Johnson
The Points
Mark Martin dropped six spots back to tenth, however Mark still has a 90 point margin over eleventh place Kasey Kahne. The back half of the top ten is very tight. Mark Martin is only 21 points behind sixth place Denny Hamlin.
The top ten in points are now:
- Jimmie Johnson -0
- Matt Kenseth -7
- Kevin Harvick -321
- Kyle Busch -402
- Jeff Gordon -408
- Denny Hamlin -429
- Jeff Burton -435
- Tony Stewart -443
- Dale Earnhardt Jr. -448
- Mark Martin -450
Next Week
Next Sunday evening the NEXTEL Cup teams head out west to California Speedway. This track is very similar to Michigan Speedway where we raced just a couple of weeks ago. An intermediate length speedway, California is an important tune-up race for The Chase. The majority of The Chase races are on similar speedways.
