Qualifying
Greg Biffle was quickest in qualifying in his Roush-Fenway Racing Ford. Starting along side him on the outside of the front raw was Chaser Kurt Busch.
Row two saw Dale Jarrett find a bright spot in his disappointing 2007 season as he posted the best qualifying effort of his season. Dodge's Kasey Kahne started on the outside of the second row in his Evernham Motorsports number nine.
Dale Earnhardt Jr. rounded out the top five for Dale Earnhardt Inc.
Drop Of The Green
Biffle and Busch got in line before the field got to turn one. Biffle lead lap one but Kurt got past and collected the five bonus points for leading a lap just one lap later.
Kurt Busch and Greg Biffe held down the top two spots during the early part of the race. On lap 27 Greg Biffle had a motor problem pop up and started to slip back through the field. After Biffle slid backwards point leaders Jimmie Johnson and Jeff Gordon were running second and fourth.
Storylines
There were a ton of face fans who must have dressed up for Halloween as empty aluminum bleachers. The overhead shots showed a lot of emtpy seats for today's race.
NASCAR needs to take a serious look at why attendance is down and solve this problem. It is nice that the remaining fans can get race tickets more easily, but the lack of fans in the stands signals a real problem for the sport.
Chasing The Checkers
The green flag flew for the final time with 53 laps to go. Martin Trux Jr. lead over Kurt Busch and Kyle Busch. This race had the potential to be a fuel mileage battle as 53 laps is almost exactly how far teams were expecting to run on a tank of fuel.
The race stayed green and with twenty-five laps remaining Kyle Busch had moved to the top spot. Matt Kenseth was running him down from second place and Kurt Busch was holding down third.
The yellow flag came out with seven laps to go. All of the leaders pitted and charged back onto the track for the restart. Jimmie Johnson, Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Jamie McMurray gambled with two tires and won the battle off of pit road. Those three drivers lined up behind Denny Hamlin who stayed out on the race track.
Hamlin ran out of gas on the restart with three laps to go and caused a major pileup at the start/finish line. Martin Truex Jr. Denny Hamlin, Jeff Burton, Jamie McMurray and Kyle Busch were among the drivers that took damage during that restart mess.
That incident set up a green-white-checkers dash for cash. Jimmie Johnson, Carl Edwards and Dale Earnhardt Jr. lead the pack to the final green flag. Jimmie Johnson got away on the restart but Dale Earnhardt Jr. had a tire come off in turn one and crashed hard into the outside wall. The caution ended the race and Jimmie Johnson claimed the win.
Top Ten
- Jimmie Johnson
- Carl Edwards
- Reed Sorenson
- Matt Kenseth
- Jeff Burton
- Clint Bowyer
- Jeff Gordon
- Kurt Busch
- Kasey Kahne
- Brian Vickers
The Points
Another Jimmie Johnson victory allowed him to close the gap on his teammate Jeff Gordon. Johnson is now just nine points out of first place as the 2007 Chase has just three races remaining.
The top twelve are now:
- Jeff Gordon
- Jimmie Johnson -9
- Clint Bowyer -111
- Carl Edwards -261
- Tony Stewart -322
- Kyle Busch -328
- Kevin Harvick -392
- Denny Hamlin -400
- Kurt Busch -419
- Jeff Burton -424
- Matt Kenseth -448
- Martin Truex Jr. -513
Next Week
Next week the Chase will visit another mile and a half tri-oval similar to today's Atlanta race track. Texas Motor Speedway is the fastest track on the NEXTEL Cup schedule while Atlanta is second on that same list. If you want to watch NASCAR's best drivers racing at over 200MPH Texas is the race for you.
