Pre Race Picks and Predictions: Off Till January

And people call Dallara's Crapwagons... This is a COT mixed with an overturned bathtub!

  This is the final Pre Race Pick until

  These “wonderful” cars take the track at Daytona.  Of course, don’t discount the possiblility of Pre Season Pick’s and Predictions.  So, since it’s 9:18 PM Friday, The truck race is running, so no Picks for them.  It’s all Cup and Nationwide, and all at Homestead.

It's not a great track, but 6 series end their season there!

   Alright, so Nationwide is securly Kyle Busch’s.  He’s will lock just by starting the race.  The only thing of interest is that Denny Hamlin has threatended to wreck Brad Keselowski.

  Cup wise, Jimmie Johnson has the cup nearly locked.  Mark Martin has a small shot, while Jeff Gordon is completly out.  The interesting thing is if Jimmie Johnson plays it safe or goes for the win.  Clearly, if it’s fuel milage, JJ will play it safe, since he needs only to finish 25th to clinch.  JJ’s comments seem to imply to me that he will want to try and run up front, and he’s learned from Texas that running midpack can get you wrecked. 

Natiowide:

Winner:  Kyle Busch.  Kyle is in a Joe Gibbs car at a 1.5 track.

Likely:  Carl Edwards. He led the practice despite wrecking, and he won last week.

Darkhorse:  Ryan Newman. Ryan was good in practice, and he is in a strong team with KHI.

Sprint Cup:

 Winner:  Mark Martin. Mark will have a great car, and he’ll be running for the win.  With the possiblility that Jimmie Johnson will play it safe, Mark Martin should be able to win the race.  He’s won a lot, and I definitly see him winning again.

Likely:  Jimmie Johnson.  I think he might play it safe.  That’s what he’s done the last few years, at least.  Of course, he also qualified first, and his Texas issue might have made him see that running midpack can get you wrecked. 

Darkhorse:  I’d have to say.. Kyle Busch.  He’s knocking on the door of winning, and I see Homestead as a good place to start.  This is just a gut guess.

  Okay, so this is the end of Pre Race Picks and Predition’s, race wise, for about 80 days.   In the mean time, keep checing up on this site, i’ll try and keep stuff comming over the offseason.

It’s Happened: Jenson Button sign’s with Mclaren

Jenson Button, Lewis Hamitlon's newest...teammate

  According to http://sidepodcast.com/2009/11/18/jenson-button-joins-mclaren-for-2010/ and Speedtv.com, Mclaren has confirmed Jenson Button to the team.  All I’ve got to say is good luck Jenson, have fun playing second fiddle to Hamilton.  Loyal guy, quiting on the team that favored him over Barrichello, and the group that kept him despite a lot of critisism of his driving.  If a team prefered a driver OVER Alonso, and that driver’s still there, I think that might tell you where you rank with them.

This car won you a title NO ONE ever thought you'd win. How do you repay them? Quite for Mclaren!

 

What Indycar Needs Most is Something That won’t Happen

Could the Blue Oval save Indycar?

 Indycar desperatly needs an American engine manufacturer.  There’s a lot of loyalty to American manufaturers from a certain segment of the population.  Trust me, there are lot’s of people who will only buy American cars.  This definitly transfers to racing as well.  A lot of the Open Wheel readers who don’t read NASCAR stuff might not realize this, but, there’s some extreme anti Toyota stuff in NASCAR, despite another Chevey Manufaturer title. 

  I’m not condoning the racisim that certain people in the NASCAR community express against Toyota.  What I will say is that I’d love to see an American manufaturer, like Chevey or Ford compete competitivly in Indycar.  I really feel that for Open Wheel racing, either Indycar or F1 to get more support in the US, an American manufaturer is a must. 

 Will it happen?  Sadly not.  Ford and Chevey already have to cut there NASCAR programs, and so even though Indycar is less expensive, it’s also got ratings lower than the Truck series* which they’ve all bailed out on.  Also, Honda pushed Toyota and Chevy out already by spending sigifinctly more than them.  The only positive for Ford/GM joining is that Honda also has less money to spend, but, again, if Honda’s hurting, GM and Ford are worse.

  If an American manufacturer joins, it would most likely be Ford. Chrysler is dying, so that’s not going to happen.  Racing wise, Chevy is big enough in NASCAR that they don’t need to do that.  Also, Ford is the only US car maker that’s actually making a profit. 

  Remeber that during CART’s hayday, Ford badged Cosworths were being raced around.  Now, is any of this likely, no, and thats the sad thing.  I do not think that an American manufaturer is necessary for Indycar to be successful, and I don’t think that having one would solve all of the problems, but, I do think that having an American car company in Indycar would do a lot for the series.  I hope Terry Angust spends more time at the Ford and Chevey HQ’s than going to China and India. 

 

Interesting thoughts on the Top 35

 

 

I like this Black and White logo over the Sprint Black and YELLOW!

  NASCAR’s top 35 rule is about to get crazy.  Already, at the start of this season.  Originally NASCAR said that if a team folded, it’s the owners points would simply shift downwards.  However, multiple teams decided to “merge” to gain owners points.   This created some hard feelings as RPM expected the 44, formerly the 10, to be moved up into the top 35, but, because of some of the deals, they were not, despite, according to Petty, being told by NASCAR they would.  The big problem was they had told sponsors they would be locked in. 

This car may be going away, will it take it's owner's points with it, or will it be sold off?

 

Looking forward, 4 locked in teams look like they’ll die.  Roush, Yates, and Childress look likely to drop a team, and the Hall of Fame and Robby Gordon don’t look too good, either.  Depending on what happens, NEMCO, Phoniex, Red Bull,  and TRG will all get locked in next season, unless someone buys the current owners points, and I don’t see anyone who would do that, unless Penske or Gibbs expands a team. 

This team might have a locked in spot!

 

  What worries me is that a Start and Park might get locked into races.  My hope is that the teams would start to get enough money to run the full distance.  I really dislike giving the locked in spot to a Start and Park team, because that hurt’s teams that might actually be trying to become full time teams that run races.  Of course, if you let a bottom tier team beat you for the top 35, that says something about you.  

  In reality, this isn’t that important.  NASCAR won’t sink or swim based on teams that have no top ten finishes all year!  Still, it is an issue, and it’s going to give NASCAR management headaches.

A New Team is Born: Mercedes GP

 

 Brawn GP is no more.  Mercedes has decided to switch from Mclaren to Brawn, largely to gain more control over the team, and to develop a separate brand, instead of being part of the Mclaren brand.  

  First off, this means that going into next year there will be 4 strong teams, financially, Mclaren, Ferrari, Red Bull, and Mercedes. I think this is really good for the former Brawn group, because Brawn built a good car, but, without Honda or a major sponsor, it looked like they wouldn’t be able  to maintain the momentum.  Mercedes will likely add enough money that this won’t be an issue. 

Cross off that last part...

For Mclaren, I think they’ll be fine.  They should be fine, they’ve still got high level sponsors.  The big problem is that they’ll no longer have 1st priority in the engine department.  They supposedly have a contract until something like 2015.  I think they’ll be fine, and I really have no way to predict if they decide to change engine manufacturer in 5 years.

 

    The other interesting thing is how this will affect the Jenson Button saga.  Reports are coming out that he has in fact signed with Mclaren, which is a whole post in itself.  I’d have thought that Mercedes GP would both be likely to be competitive, and have enough money to satisfy Button.  So I’m pretty surprised about him moving on, particularly because Brawn and that group kept him around for years, why bail out on them now that they might be able to be competitive?  I’d have to say, I would predict the 2010 Mclaren to be very good, so in that sense it makes sense to switch, but, Mclaren loves Hamilton, and so you’ll just be the second driver, they didn’t care about Alonso, so why would they care about Button?

Team Meeting: Weekend in Review; End of Excitment

  This weekend, NASCAR’s season unofficially ended.  There haven’t been many (any?) F1 or Indycar developments since the last weekend in review, posted on Tuesday.  So, I’m really digging for stuff right now.

  NASCAR Sprint Cup, Nationwide, and Camping World Trucks:

  NASCAR effectively ended the season this weekend.  Ron Hornaday officially clinched the title, while Kyle Busch will clinch if he simply starts next race, as he has a 195 points lead.   Jimmie Johnson now has a 108 points lead, which means, to borrow Pressdog’s phrase, barring an air strike, he’s won the title.  So, this might be the most anti-climactic Championship weekend in a long time, everything is clinched!

  Worse, in my opinion, is how almost certainly Jimmie Johnson will simply point’s race his way into the title.  I know it’s a tried and tested NASCAR strategy, done by Jeff Gordon, Tony Stewart, and many others.  That doesn’t mean I have to like it.  JJ only needs to finish 25 to win the title, no matter what.  So, expect JJ to run for 15th place, and lock it up the same as the last couple years. I’d enjoy it a little more if JJ would race to win, or at least top 5 at Homestead.

  Speaking of Homestead, why does everyone want to end there season there?  It’s not a good track, yet all three NASCAR series, plus Indy Lights, Indycar, and Grand (Sh)am ( I hope you get the joke…)  all end the season there.  The Indycar race got a lot of abuse, but, I bet it will be the best race of the live on TV races ran there…

  The Brad Keselowski/Denny Hamlin rivalry is real.  I really think that could be somewhat promising.  Of course, NASCAR will probably try and clamp down on the only interesting thing going on next weekend, because you can’t have anything interesting to get in the way of three clinched titles. 

  Speaking of Brad K, his Cup starts at Penske haven’t been great.  I think he’s wrecked both times, although not of his making.  What I don’t understand is why Keselowski is so far behind Kurt Busch, you’d think he could at least run top 20…

  The testing ban has proven to be a failure.  When teams, such as Roush and Childress, fall behind, they’ve got a terrible time to catch up.  The only NASCAR style tracks they actually can test on are Texas World Speedway, and Rockingham.  Worse, rookies like Joey Lagono and Scott Speed really need testing.  I know it hurts teams like TRG, but, with them starting and parking half the time, who cares?  They’re not going to run top 10 anyways, so why not help teams that might actually catch Hendrick.  Red Bull could afford testing, too bad they aren’t allowed too. 

  I know it probably doesn’t matter, but I really don’t like how the tire testing works.  I think it might give certain teams an advantage.   I’m not saying that it’s why JJ is dominating, but, I just think there’s no need to bring the “sniff of impropriety” to the series. 

  Still, I don’t believe in the JJ conspiracy, I don’t see how JJ winning helps NASCAR at all.

  NASCAR has got to fix the Cup racing.  Ed Hinton posted an interesting article http://sports.espn.go.com/rpm/nascar/cup/columns/story?columnist=hinton_ed&id=4647144, where NASCAR management basically says everything’s okay, and none of the proposed changes would make a difference.  I’m not an engineer, so I don’t know the accuracy of these statements.  However, if the commonly proposed changes won’t work, NASCAR has got to find something that will.  NO ONE wants to watch these boring races.  This week at Phoenix, which I’d consider a short track, had no action up front.  Indycar proved that sometimes radical changes to aero is what’s needed.  NASCAR has got to do something because another year of boring COT racing is just too much to expect anyone to want to stick around with. 

  I’m re-evaluating my view that the NASCAR season is too long.  I’ve always said no, but, I’m not so sure.  38 race weekends, over 42 plus races is a lot.  I think 36 might work, if we didn’t go back to the same tracks over and over again.  36 races at 36 tracks might not be quite as boring.

  You’ve got to feel bad for Mark Martin, though, he’ll likely have finished second behind every multiple season champion in the last 20 years, besides Terry Labonte. 

  Lastly, on NASCAR, I’m starting to see why certain blogger’s get tired of Danica stuff.  I’ll probably refrain from too much coverage until some real news comes up. 

  F1:

  Seriously, is USGPE paying Speedtv.com?  Speedtv.com dedicates whole articles, http://formula-one.speedtv.com/article/f1-usf1-will-be-on-2010-grid/ to the teams being on grid.  I’ve got no sources anywhere, but, people who do mainly say this teams dead in the water. 

  The whole Jarno Trulli to NASCAR makes no sense.  He’s not even that successful of driver.  He’s got 1 win, admittedly at Monaco.  Also, I find it fairly amusing that he’s testing for MWR. 

  I can’t believe Jenson Button may want to go to Mclearn.  I know it’s a better team, but, he does understand that he’ll be Lewis’s b**ch, right?! Plus, he would never have won that title without Brawn.

  Indycar: 

  Did anything noteworthy happen this week?  The only thing I can think of is the Indycar Trackside, which, if you haven’t heard, go find the link from last week and download it, it’s good stuff, with many blogger’s who aren’t normally on podcasts, sadly, I couldn’t be available to call in.

  Open Wheel Development:  You know it’s slow when you’re posting about this stuff.

  The Atlantic series posted at 2010 schedule, which is strange, seeing that they’ll have like 5 cars on grid at best.

  Bad news for Atlantics, Cooper Tires signed on for the new US F2000 series.  I still think this series is a mistake, there are way to many open wheel development series already!

  I think it’s funny that one of the two F2000 series is supported by USGPE, and the other is by Indycar.

Team Meeting, Special Edition: Indycar Year in Review

 

  This is what my last article at you-know-where was.  Sadly, that post has been deleted, so I’m starting from scratch.  This may in fact have been the tipping point, because of the “stream of thought” format at the beginning.  Luckily, I doubt I’ll be fired from my own site, at least I hope.

  Anyways, overall, I was disappointed with the 2009 Izod Indycar series.  Here’s the good points, and then the bad points,

Good:  Justin Wilson’s win, Dayle Coyne’s first, Danica top 5, Toronto, Kentucky, Chicagoland races, Good title fight, Izod Indycar sponsorship, Tony George ousted?, Good track mix, Dario’s success, Helio’s acquittal, Helio’s third Indy500, Danica for 2010? De Ferran and Tagliani for 2010 new teams? Will Power’s win, Indycar blogger’s, Rookie blogger’s George from Oilpressure, Me, at the Unnamed Blog and TripleLeaugeRacing, lots of others, who I don’t know if they’re new or not… ,Vs gives good coverage, F2000 Indycar project, good races in Indy Lights, TV coverage for Indylights, Rise of Dayle Coyne on road courses.

Bad: 2 Team Domination, many poor races, teams downsizing, Tony George ousted? Barber and Brazil? for 2010, too many question marks for the future, Tag’s and DeFerran teams potentially not going to happen, Lack of leadership in IRL and IMS, lose of Milwaukee, Injuries of Nelson Philippe, Will Power, Tony Kannan, and Vitor Meria, Fuel Mileage championship decision, Horrific ratings, down ratings at Indy, loss of Rahal Letterman Racing, no wins by Americans, continued fall of Andretti Green Racing, Poor promotions at Toronto, loss of Vs for Direct TV users, Canadian fans had horrible TV coverage, potential loss of Atlantic series, F2000 Indycar project, Dario leading all laps at Infenion, no PT full time.

Expanding on these thoughts…Good points

  Justin Wilson won the race at Watkins Glen, and even more impressively, he and Dayle Coyne Racing also was in contention multiple times, including St. Pete and Mid-Ohio, Dayle Coyne racing really became a force on the Road and Street courses. 

We also had good racing at Toronto, Kentucky, and Chicagoland.  Toronto showed that passing and excitement can happen in Indycar Road and Street racing.  Kentucky and Chicagoland both were slightly controversial, but, they also were exciting, and almost broke the Big Two domination.  Indycar showed that sometime making mid season changes to the car can help make the racing watch able again.

  Despite the Big Two domination, the points battle was exciting.  It came down to three drivers, and the winner of the race won the championship, of course, there were some problems, but, this is the good side…

  The TV coverage of Vs. was quite a bit better than on ESPN.  Vs. seemed to actually care about Indycar, and the product improved.  We were introduced to new people on TV, such as Lindy Thackston, Robbie Buhl, and others who were much better than Jack Arutte and Scott Goodyear. 

  Finally, of the point that needed to be expanded, I really liked the track mix for 2009.  Yes, there were a lot of bad races, but, I’d blame the car design for that. Indycar ran a very diverse schedule, in terms of location and track type, and I’d say I prefer the 2009 schedule to the 2010 schedule.

  Izod also became the title sponsor.  Izod looks like they will be a good partner.  There deal’s a fair amount of money, and they look like they’ll put a good amount of activation in.  When things are this dark, you’ll take what you can get.

Bad Points:

 

  Big Two domination was awful this year.  The only team that won a race besides Penske and Ganassi was the Dayle Coyne Racing team, and they only won one race.  This was a major problem, as very few people want to watch four drivers win every race but two… 

  A problem that may have made Big Two domination worse was the contraction of many of the mid teams.  Even Dayle Coyne went down to running one car.  Conquest went to a partial schedule, KV dropped a car, Vision dropped a car, Rahal Letterman disappeared except at Indy, and HVM ran on a completely shoestring budget, according to people who know more than me… (AKA Meesh Beer from www.meesh-beer.com) The contraction, due mainly to the economy, hurt the field count, and likely stunted KV’s development, because they only had the sophomore Mario Moraes running full time.  There’s not much to be done about this, because of the economy, and the TV ratings, who would want to sponsor a mid tier team….

  Speaking of TV, the ratings sucked.  Indycar got way to close to the “perfect zero” too many times.  Many of the races on Vs. drew what ESPN Classic drew for Montegi last year!  ABC struggled too.  Indy drew lower ratings than normal, and Milwaukee was as low rated as most Vs. races.  This is despite the fact that NHL, Bull Riding, Tour De France, and Cage fighting all pull decent to good ratings.  From what I’ve read, Cage fighting averages about a 1.3 ratings points, when Indycar managed something like .4!  It’s not even UFC!  And, Vs did a pretty big marketing campaign during these events.  I know some people, well, mainly one blogger, say that TV ratings don’t matter, a sponsor who sees these races aren’t going to be that likely to drop the 5 million needed to run a truly completive team, unless they feel the Indy 500 has enough viewers.

  Speaking of TV, from what I’ve heard, from Canadian blogger’s, at least, watching Indycar on TV wasn’t easy.  That’s not good, because there are a lot of loyal Canadian Indycar fans, whatever my old blog’s owner says. 

  And, of course, PT didn’t have a full time ride!

Al Unser Jr's 1994 Penske Car, note that more American's won during CART's Hayday then this year!

  The fact no American’s won a race makes the “split” seem even more ridiculous.  In 1995, 4 American drivers won races, winning 8 times combined.  The winners were Al Unser Jr., Robby Gordon, Michael Andretti, and Scott Pruett.  Compare this to the ZERO Americans winning this year.  Wasn’t the split about getting more American’s winning races?!

  Tony George “left” the Speedway and IRL.  Although, as the stat’s I just showed clearly show his “vision” has failed, the loss of TG, and his money, has hurt the league.  It still, despite Izod, feels very unstable, and it feels like there is no real plan for the future.   Things look kinda dark right now…

  Too many races were boring, and decided by fuel mileage.  I know fuel races happen, but, to have Homestead, and the Championship, decided by fuel mileage sucked.  I’m not going to say Dario is an unworthy champion, but, I wish it wasn’t done by fuel mileage!  Fans do not want to watch that.  An occasional fuel race can be exciting, but, not when it’s the rule instead of the exception.  Dario led all of the laps at Infenion, and Mid Ohio, and Edmonton were almost the same.  The Indy 500 was not exciting at all, and Richmond and Texas were completely worthless.  Next year, Richmond is gone, but, Barber is coming, and a lot of people I respect, feel that this track will be a disaster.  If you don’t believe me, listen to the www.livefastracing.com pdocast, particularly the “comeback” show, episode 24, and www.mynameisirl.com go look at the April/March archives to see what I mean. 

Competes with the Tilke tracks, Sinapore, Valencia, and many generic street courses, and Fontana for worst track in the world

  Finally, I have to say, I was bothered by the amount of injuries in Indycar this year.  I am bothered that 4 major injuries happened (Tony Kannan and Vitor Meria at Indy, and Nelson Philippe and Will Power at Infenion).  Now, I know that injuries happen, and all of these drivers should make a full recovery, but, so far, 4 major injuries are more than F1 or NASCAR have had.   Also of note, the injuries happened not at the “down force” tracks, but, at Indy, which makes some sense, and Infenion, which makes a boring race weekend even worse. 

   Well, that’s the end of this post.  I’ll try and do one for F1 soon.  Hopefully I won’t get fired this time for this post.  I know I haven’t done the driver breakdown’s in a while, I’ll try and get another one out eventually, but, I can’t promise when.

Another One Bites the Dust: Kyle Busch Effectivly clinches the Nationwide Title

 

Carl Edwards wins, but....

   Carl Edwards won the Nationwide race, but, despite his problems, Kyle Busch managed to hold onto 9th place, and get a 190 point lead, completley insurmountable even if he decides to Start and Park.    Seeing Valvoline on Carl Edwards car is very wierd!

 

 

And Then There Were Two: Ron Hornaday wins the truck title.

 

  My pre race predictions were somewhat wrong, Kevin Harvick won the race, although Ron Hornaday did clinch the drivers title.  Not sure about owners yet, the race just finished, and I caught NONE of it.   Still, good job to Ron Hornaday, he ran by far the best of the full time Truck drivers, I’d say he earned clinching it.  Two races to go, will all three titles be clinched?  I’d say both the Truck and Nationwide will, and Cup won’t. 

Ron Hornaday celibrates winning the Title as boss Kevin Harvick celibrates the win

Pre Race Picks and Predictions:Phoniex

Phoenix, Danica Patrick’s home, and supposed start of her Nationwide career.  Sadly, Danica’s not going to be in the field.  The rumored debut at Phoenix isn’t going to happen this year, although there’s always next year (Note, Phoenix is one of the earlier races in the year, although she’ll likely debut at Daytona).

  What’s the point of these facts?  Nothing, really, just other than trying to set the mood for the weekend, as in that in many ways this is incredibly anti-climatic.  Nationwide and Trucks most likely will be clinched this weekend.  Kyle Busch and Ron Hornaday both are within inches of clinching the titles.  An area of interest in the Truck series is that the 51 that Kyle Busch drivers for is within 75 points of the 33 that Hornaday driver.  Busch is going to try and steal the owners title from KHI, and if he could, it would be a major blow to KHI.  

  On the Cup side, Hendrick Motorsports will almost certainly win the owners title, unless Kurt Bush goes out and win’s the next two races and Jimmie Johnson struggles.  Mark Martin and Jeff Gordon are within striking distance, although Jeff Gordon’s chances look poor, considering that he didn’t gain as much as he should have considering were Jimmie Johnson finished.  Mark Martin is the main hope for the non Jimmie Johnson fans. I believe that for Mark Martin to have a good chance at winning the title, he must not be farther back in points than he is now, and it would be better for him if he could get up within 50 points.  So, basically, Mark Martin needs to finish ahead of Jimmie Johnson to really keep this competive.  Now to the predictions… oh, and if you didn’t notice, all three series are running at Phoenix. 

Camping World Truck Series: Note, I started this in the afternoon, but, as of publishing, the Truck race is running. 

Winner:  Kyle Busch.  He is very good in the Truck series, and is trying to take the Owners Title away from KHI.  There’s not much to say, it obvious why he’s the favorite.

Likely:  Ron Hornaday.  Ron has won a lot, and he’s about to win the drivers title.  The problem is the owners title, and nothing would help him more than winning the race.  As with Busch, there’s not much to say about him.

Dark Horse:  I’ll pick Mike Skinner to win as the dark horse.  I don’t follow Trucks super closely, so I don’t have a ton of thoughts here….

NASCAR Nationwide:

Winner:  Kyle Busch.  He’s about to clinch the title and he almost always are in the top 5.   Joe Gibbs Racing wins a ton of races.  Kyle Busch ran incredibly well last week, and I would expect him to be up front again this weekend.

Likely:  Carl Edwards.    Last years champion is most likely going to not repeat, but, the Joe Gibbs Horsepower advantage seems less on the slower tracks, so he will likely have a better chance to win here than Homestead.

Darkhorse:  Brad Keselowski.  He’s fast, he’s in Hendrick cars, and, I haven’t followed the speed charts for Nationwide this weekend, so I’m going by the top 3 in points, basically.  Plus, Keselowski will push hard, which might be good or bad this weekend.

NASCAR Sprint Cup:

Winner:  Mark Martin.  Mark Martin needs this win bad.  If he cannot win today, his title hope’s are not over, but, they will be in doubt.  Jimmie Johnson’s won 3 races in the Chase, Mark has won one.  So, to dethrone Johnson, the best thing to do is to win.  Mark has to know this, and thus he will be trying very hard this weekend. 

Likely:  Jimmie Johnson.  As the points leader by a significant margin, one interesting thing to wonder is if he’s going to try and “points race” as he has at Homestead the last few years, or if he’ll race for the win, or at least a top 5.  I think, with Martin still pretty close, he’ll have to go for a top 5, because Martin almost certainly will be doing that also.   Johnson always has a good car in the Chase, and this weekend shouldn’t be any different.  If he can win, it will seriously damage the hopes of Mark Martin, regardless of where Mark finishes.  If Jimmie Johnson dominates, most people will, rightly or wrongly, hand him the title completely.  

Darkhorse:  Kurt Busch.  I’d pick Jeff Gordon, but, he’s kinda failed me recently. I’ll pick Kurt, because I’m writing this part of the post at 9:23PM, and I know he’ll start second.  He has serious momentum, and if not for Talladega, he’d be right in this title fight.  If only Pat Tryson wasn’t leaving… Still, Penske has to feel good about his team moving into next season.