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Filed under: Dale Earnhardt Jr., Sprint Cup, Hendrick Motorsports, NASCAR

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s shoulders may well have borne 500 miles worth of expectations this week at Daytona.

Marking 10 years since the death of his legendary father in NASCAR's most important race, Earnhardt Jr. served as the central beacon of a sport remembering the passing of one of its most legendary drivers.

The sport's most popular driver also has been the most talked about non-factor for most of the last three seasons and has seen his share of changes in the Hendrick Motorsports program around him. A new crew chief -- Steve Letarte -- was in his ear.

Sunday, none of it seemed to be a distraction as Earnhardt sliced his way through the field time and again to find the front -- and occasionally lead -- one of the most unusual Daytona 500s in recent memory.

However, the chaotic nature of NASCAR's season-opening beast, a race marked by the most cautions and lead changes in the event's 53-year history, finally caught up with Earnhardt moments from the end.

 

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Filed under: David Reutimann, Jeff Gordon, Jimmie Johnson, Mark Martin, Michael Waltrip, Sprint Cup, NASCAR

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- The racing may look different at Daytona, but the big crashes are still around.

Less than 30 laps in to Sunday's Daytona 500, contact between a former Daytona winner, Michael Waltrip, and another car he owns set off a 14-car melee in turn four. Waltrip nudged David Reutimann into a spin on the race's 29th lap to start the incident.

Earlier in the race, Waltrip spun Kyle Busch on lap six -- an incident that managed to miss the rest of the pack.

"They make a quick move and it just spins them out," Waltrip said. "I've been doing this all week and I haven't spun anyone out. I'm involved in both of them and I don't know what I could have done different."

The crash collected several of the race's likely contenders, including reigning five-time NASCAR Sprint Cup Series champion Jimmie Johnson as well as his teammates Jeff Gordon and Mark Martin.

 

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Filed under: Clint Bowyer, Tony Stewart, Daytona Int'l Speedway, Nationwide Series, NASCAR

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- The venerable Daytona International Speedway may as well be classified a completely new venue for the Nationwide Series this season.

The victory lane celebration, however, remains much the same.

Tony Stewart pushed by Clint Bowyer in the final feet of Saturday's DRIVE4COPD 300 to win his sixth checkered flag of the season-opener in his last seven tries. The winning margin of .007 seconds was the third closest in series history.

"We just got a great run," Stewart said. "We had a good push from Landon Cassill there at the line."

Cassill, a young driver without a full-time ride this season, finished third to take the Nationwide Series' points lead.

The path to success again for Stewart had plenty of reasons to derail this time around.

 

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Filed under: Ryan Newman, Tony Stewart, Sprint Cup, Stewart-Haas Racing, NASCAR

Not everyone doubted Tony Stewart when he announced his departure from Joe Gibbs Racing in 2008 to form his own Sprint Cup team, Stewart-Haas Racing.

But he will certainly note, as will anyone else around at that point, that so many people from so many corners of NASCAR thought the two-time champion was committing career suicide.

Instead, 2009 proved to be about as far from the gloomy predictions as possible when both Stewart and teammate Ryan Newman qualified for NASCAR's championship battle. Their campaigns in the 2009 Chase to the Sprint Cup were to little avail, but seemed to paint a soon-to-be-dominant future for the race team.

Comparatively, 2010 was a step back for the SHR team -- back to about the level most thought Stewart would be competing at by now.

 

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Filed under: Daytona Int'l Speedway, Sprint Cup, NASCAR

Fans who make it to NASCAR's first event of 2011 -- the Budweiser Shootout exhibition race held a week before the season-opening Daytona 500 -- might want to keep a program nearby.

Feb. 12's Shootout, firmly removed from its days of featuring only the previous season's pole winners, got its sixth change in the past 13 years Friday when NASCAR announced the eligible drivers for the 75-lap race.

It'll include those you would imagine -- all 12 of last year's Chase for the Sprint Cup qualifiers -- and a few others, too, including past NASCAR Sprint Cup champions, past Shootout winners, past winners at Daytona and the Rookie of the Year winners from 2001-2010.

Yep, say hello to last year's de facto rookie of the year Kevin Conway in the Budweiser Shootout.

"When you take a look at the field for this year's Budweiser Shootout at Daytona, it's loaded with all-star caliber drivers," said Robin Pemberton, NASCAR vice president of competition, in the press release revealing the expanded field.

 

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Filed under: Kurt Busch, Sam Hornish Jr., Penske Racing, Chase for the Sprint Cup, Sprint Cup, NASCAR

When Ryan Newman took the checkered flag in the 2008 Daytona 500, Penske Racing, his team at the time, got its first win in NASCAR's biggest race. Now team owner and motorsports mogul Roger Penske is in the market for the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series championship.

In that regard, Penske looked to be in terrible position before the start of last season after it became the lone team operating under the Dodge banner. Penske made the best of the situation and, in fact, may have gained from the undivided attention his operation received from Dodge.

The team's driving leader, former champion Kurt Busch, made a small push by securing another berth in the Chase for the Sprint Cup, while Brad Keselowski often struggled in his first season as a full-time driver in the Cup Series. The team's other driver, Sam Hornish Jr., may see his ride disappear in NASCAR's top division after yet another disappointing season in his three-year career.

11th - Kurt Busch [2 wins, 9 Top-5s, 17 Top-10s, 2 DNFs, 15.3 Avg. Finish]

It took just four races in the 2010 season for Kurt Busch to lay claim to his first win of the year, taking the checkered flag at Atlanta Motor Speedway in March. The win -- which featured Busch scraping the wall several times -- seemed to galvanize Busch's chance of being a real championship contender.

 

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Filed under: Carl Edwards, David Ragan, Greg Biffle, Matt Kenseth, Roush Fenway Racing, Chase for the Sprint Cup, Sprint Cup, NASCAR

Roush Fenway Racing, coming off a 2009 season that started with a bang after Matt Kenseth's Daytona 500 win and ended with the thud of being largely uncompetitive, moved in the right direction again in 2010.

Carl Edwards, Greg Biffle and Matt Kenseth all raced their way into the Chase for the Sprint Cup field this time around, a nice turnaround after the former champ Kenseth failed to secure a spot in last year's championship battle. David Ragan, however, continued down the same path of his dismal 2009 season.

The team reeled off three wins in the 2010 campaign, but most notably finished it on quite a high note with Edwards' end-of-the-season dominance as Jimmie Johnson strutted to the Sprint Cup title.

Outside of the stats, Edwards also made it an interesting year for the Roush-Fenway public relations department with his on-track actions, particularly with Brad Keselowski.

But no one was involved in more dramatics than team co-owner Jack Roush himself, who survived his second plane crash when he crash-landed his jet while trying to touch down at Oshkosh, Wis., in July. The crash cost Roush the sight in his left eye, among other non-permanent injuries.

4th - Carl Edwards [2 wins, 9 Top-5s, 19 Top-10s, 2 DNFs, 11.8 Avg. Finish]

The Carl Edwards roller coaster -- a ride that featured a loop around the 2007 Chase and a near-miss at dethroning Jimmie Johnson and then a steep drop into a mediocre 2009 season -- started back up the next hill in 2010, complete with some jaw-dropping bumps along the way.

The most obvious reflection on 2010 for Edwards was his late-season performance that netted him wins in the season's final two races. They were the culmination of the steady progress Edwards started to most noticeably show in mid-summer races. After his long drought, winning 2010's final two races had to leave Edwards and No. 99 team feeling good headed to Daytona Beach in February.

 

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Filed under: Clint Bowyer, Jeff Burton, Kevin Harvick, Sprint Cup, Richard Childress Racing, NASCAR

If there was an award for the biggest season-to-season turnaround by an entire team, the folks at Welcome, N.C.'s Richard Childress Racing would have walked away with an uncontested victory.

In a word, their change in competitiveness from 2009 to 2010 was astonishing.

In fact, RCR placed all three of its drivers in the 2010 Chase for the Sprint Cup -- quite a change after those same three wheelmen missed the championship fight completely in 2009.

Yes, 2009 was a drag for the proud organization, with Clint Bowyer, Jeff Burton and Kevin Harvick all missing victory lane. That all changed -- and changed quickly in 2010 -- when Harvick assumed the points lead after just ten races.

He didn't relinquish it until the Chase standings were shuffled and the drivers seeded in September.

Had the RCR bunch managed to string together a more-dominating late performance by Harvick or even avoided the Chase-ravaging penalty levied against Clint Bowyer after winning at New Hampshire, the team as a whole may have moved higher up the NASCAR team ladder.

 

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Filed under: Denny Hamlin, Kyle Busch, Sprint Cup, Joe Gibbs Racing, Joey Logano, NASCAR

As easily the most staunch threat to unseat Jimmie Johnson and Co. from their record-setting run through the previous four seasons, Joe Gibbs Racing takes second spot in our review of the top teams in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series from 2010.

Denny Hamlin (above) delivered the last, best threat to Johnson's run to five consecutive championships at Homestead in November by holding a narrow points lead on the No. 48 before the season finale. However, a risky decision early in the race left Hamlin spinning and scrambling while Johnson cruised to his fifth.

It was a storyline we've seen before from the JGR camp -- most notably in Kyle Busch's 2008 Chase implosion.

Labeling the 2010 season a failure for JGR with one gaffe in one race, however, isn't fair to the otherwise notable successes the team saw during the campaign. Here's a look back, and the reasoning why, JGR was the second-best NASCAR organization in 2010.

2nd- Denny Hamlin [8 wins, 14 Top-5s, 18 Top-10s, 2 DNFs, 12.9 Avg Finish]

 

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Filed under: Dale Earnhardt Jr., Jeff Gordon, Jimmie Johnson, Mark Martin, Chase for the Sprint Cup, Sprint Cup, Hendrick Motorsports

Just days after Jimmie Johnson secured his record-extending fifth NASCAR Sprint Cup title, Hendrick Motorsports experienced quite possibly the largest shift within its organization, ever.

With the exception of Johnson and crew chief Chad Knaus, crew chiefs changed teams and drivers switched shops. All of it, goofy enough, in a bid to become as good or better than Johnson & Knaus in 2011.

But before they get there, it's worth noting what Hendrick Motorsports did in 2010 that earned them the distinction of FanHouse's top NASCAR team of the past season:


1st - Jimmie Johnson [6 wins, 17 Top-5s, 23 Top-10s, 4 DNFs, 12.2 Avg Finish]

Johnson obviously carried the Hendrick load most impressively this season by the sheer fact that he won, yet again, the Sprint Cup title. However, it was Johnson's first season in which he looked terrifically vulnerable down the stretch -- even needed to outrace Denny Hamlin and Kevin Harvick in the season finale to lay claim to his fifth title.

 

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