Gordon Masters Indy for Fifth Checkers Racin with Russ By RUSSELL SCHMIDT Jeff Gordon became the winningest NASCAR Sprint Cup driver at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway after nailing down his fifth win at the iconic speedway. The four-time champion proved to have the strongest car on Sunday afternoon, leading for 40 laps and earning his 90th career trophy. Nine different drivers took turns out front with Kasey Kahne leading the most laps with 70, followed by Gordon, Denny Hamlin and Harvick. The middle stages found Hendrick drivers Kahne and Gordon leading the most of the time. In the closing stages, Gordon went on a mission to catch and pass Kahne, doing so on a late race restart when Gordon bolted for the finish line and Kahne faded to sixth. Incidents and accidents were kept to a minimum with Trevor Bayne’s day ending before the half, spinning into the inside wall unassisted. Danica Patrick had a top 20 going before leaving the pits a bit hard, smoking a rear axle in the process, sending the diminutive driver to the pits for repairs for more than 20 laps and a 42nd place finish. Notes: Several of the top drivers, such as Brad Keselowski, Jimmie Johnson and Kurt Busch had tough days for one reason or another, leaving them with disappointing 12th, 14th and 28th place finishes respectively. - Juan Pablo Montoyas return to Cup racing was less than stellar, starting eighth and finishing 23rd. No surprise from this writer. The latest results finds Keselowski, Johnson and Gordon among the top three Chasers. There are six more races before Chase members are decided. Nationwide Saturday afternoons Nationwide race at Indy saw full-time Cuppers such as Kyle Busch, Matt Kenseth and Kevin Harvick among the top five all day. But when the checkers flew, rookie Ty Dillon took his very first series win, holding off Busch, Kenneth, Hayrick and Joey Logano. Pole sitter Busch set the pace early, yet his teammate Matt Kenneth led laps as did a rapid Kevin Harvick. After a late race caution for debris, Ty Dillon edged the rest of the pack to emerge first off pit lane and able to hold off Kyle Busch for his first checkers. Chase Elliott performed well, running among the top 10 for much of the race before falling down to a 12th place finish, yet still remains out front in the points by four over Regan Smith and 11 over Elliott Sadler. Camping World Trucks Once a year, the truck set gets to slide around on the dirt at Elnora Speedway. The crowd packs in from 45 states and several countries to witness some of the best side-by-side racing of the season. Track organizers reconfigured the track somewhat, filling in the middle of the soupbowl banking which created lots of room to pass and slide around. The end results was an epic battle between two young lions, those being Darrell “Bubba Wallace and Kyle Larson. With Wallace out front, Larson drove the wheels....and the sides, and the front off his ride to catch the leader only to succumb to mechanical damages after smacking the outside wall more than 70 times! Wallace went on to win his second feature of the year, while Larson dropped out with two to go, leaving Ron Hornaday Jr, Ryan Blaney, Ken Schrader and Ty Dillon as top five runners. The crowd seemed to love the overall racing and round three next year will probably have even more race fans trying to squeeze in somewhere. Open Wheel News The Formula One series competed in Hungary this past weekend as Daniel Ricciardo took the lead from Fernando Alonso with two laps to go, and went on to win his second F-1 race of the season. Alonso and Lewis Hamilton capped the top three finishers. Points leader Nico Rosberg wound up close behind in fourth and still tops the charts by 11 over Hamilton. From Rumorville Jack Roush finally released some official news as one of the paddocks worst kept secrets, that being Carl Edwards departure from the team at the end of this season. While Edwards cant deny his ending the 11-year relationship, he cannot shed any light on future plans until November. All signs point to a fourth Gibbs Toyota ride for the popular driver. After a successful NASCAR truck outing at Eldora this past week, track owner Tony Stewart spoke with the press to offer a possible Nationwide or Cup date sometime down the road. Personally, I dont see it happening as the area nor the facility could handle the likes of either venue. Thats it for this week. Next weeks RWR will cover the NASCAR Sprint Cup and Camping World Truck results from Pocono, and Nationwide action from Iowa along with more racing news from around the globe. Questions? Comments? Contact Russ at [email protected]
Posted on: Mon, 28 Jul 2014 03:48:27 +0000
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