NASCAR Power Rankings: Pocono

Johnson was penalized on lap 104 for pitting just as a caution closed the pits, and unfortunate event that dropped him to 25th. Upon restarting, the No. 48 Lowe’s Chevrolet roared to the front, briefly passing Carl Edwards for second on lap 199. But, Johnson ran out of gas in Turn 3 and coasted across the finish line in seventh. He maintained the third spot in the point standings, and trails Tony Stewart by 103.

“I simply didn’t see the red lights at the pit entrance,” Johnson said. “Maybe it’s my eyesight, or maybe it’s just my impeccable and clean-cut persona shining through. Some people say that I’m so virtuous that I probably couldn’t even see the red lights in Amsterdam.”

“And, speaking of ‘red light,’ Fox’s coverage of NASCAR is over, while TNT has the green light for six races. Let’s rejoice, because that means no more Digger and no more Darrell Waltrip.”

5. Carl Edwards: Edwards’ No. 99 Ford Fusion was easily the field’s strongest car, leading 103 of 200 laps, but on the race’s most pivotal pit stop on lap 163, Edwards lost the race off pit road to Tony Stewart. Stewart pulled away in clean air, while Edwards chased, hoping Stewart’s No. 14 would run out of fuel. It didn’t happen, and Edwards settled for second, his best finish of the year and fourth straight top 10. He also leapt from 11th to 6th in the Sprint Cup point standings.

“That’s got to be the first time Tony’s ‘stretched’ in his life,” Edwards said. “I haven’t seen someone go so far on so little since Aaron Fike stayed awake for 72 hours on one bag of heroin. In both cases, it seems, just a spoonful can take you a long ways.”

“And while we’re on the subject of the drug issue, it looks like NASCAR has sicked the big dogs on Jeremy Mayfield. And, by ‘big dogs,’ I’m talking about the ‘meth Labs.’”

6. Kyle Busch: Busch faced handling issues in the Pocono 500, a cure for which crew chief Steve Addington could never quite resolve. Busch was running inside the top 20 late in the race, but a pit stop for fuel dropped him back while many of the leaders were able to stretch their mileage to the end. Busch eventually finished 22nd and dropped three places in the points to ninth.

“We were confident after winning the Nationwide race in Nashville on Saturday,” Busch said. “It’s not often a race car driver wins a Gibson Les Paul guitar as a trophy. It’s even less often that a driver smashes his trophy in victory lane. That celebratory act had a lot of people asking ‘Who’ does this guy think he is?’”

“But I didn’t mean to offend race organizers, nor did I mean any disrespect to Gibson, Les, or Paul. It was merely a spontaneous celebration that I’ve been planning on doing for a year now.”

7. Greg Biffle:

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