The Biggest NASCAR Storylines to Watch Ahead of Sprint Cup Series at Atlanta
With the Daytona 500 behind us but while Joey Logano’s Coca-Cola is still sticky on Victory Lane, it’s time to look ahead to Atlanta as the circuit heads north for the Folds of Honor QuikTrip 500.
No matter what Logano does for the remainder of the year, two things are clear: He’s the Daytona 500 winner, and he locked up one of the 16 coveted spots in the Chase. With the latter locked up Logano can race without that looming sense of pressure suffocated drivers like Greg Biffle and Kyle Larson felt a year ago as they scrambled to get in.
Biffle did; Larson didn’t.
So that brings us to Atlanta where the Jeff Gordon Farewell Tour rolls on. Gordon has won at Atlanta five times in his career. Will he win and get one race closer to 100? Or will Kevin Harvick parlay his runner-up effort at Daytona into speed at Atlanta?
Those are some of the questions in Race 2. Read on for this week’s top storylines in the prelude to Georgia.
Regan Smith Gets the Nod for the No. 41 Car Again
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Just because Stewart-Haas Racing’s Kurt Busch is up to his neck in trouble doesn’t mean the No. 41 car gets put up on blocks.
For the second week in a row Regan Smith gets the call for the fragile SHR team.
Regan, last year’s Xfinity Series runner-up, finished 16th at this year’s Daytona 500 in place of Busch. It was the second-highest SHR finish behind only 2014 Sprint Cup champion Harvick.
Tony Stewart finished off the track after an early wreck, and Danica Patrick finished 21st.
Smith’s success at Atlanta in the Sprint Cup series isn’t promising. In six starts, he’s finished on the lead lap just three times with an average finish of just 24.3. His success on the Xfinity Series is promising, and the hope is that he can parlay some of that speed in the No. 41 car.
Smith has two top 10s in the Xfinity Series at Atlanta.
NASCAR Getting SAFER
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With all the money and time invested in pit-road technology, why did it take Kyle Busch suffering a compound fracture in an Xfinity Series race for Daytona to install SAFER walls everywhere?
After Busch hit an entirely exposed concrete wall on the Daytona infield, DIS then constructed a wall in the event of another accident. It was purely reactive and entirely too late.
NASCAR chairman and CEO Brian France told SiriusXM NASCAR Radio (h/t NASCAR.com):
"Joie Chitwood [DIS President] said it best that, 'hey, look, that's unacceptable.’ We're going to own that and move forward. That's how we're wired. That's a cornerstone of what we do. Safety and performance are the hallmarks of NASCAR.
"
It can’t be considered a cornerstone when careless oversights like this take place. Kyle Busch could have been killed, and his season may be over.
Before a single driver sets a tire on the track, Kentucky is installing SAFER walls, and so is Talladega.
How are these walls not mandatory on any surface open to an out-of-control stock car? It’s sad that Kyle Busch needed to be the sacrificial lamb for NASCAR to get its act together, but at least he’s alive and will live to drive another day.
Yes, it’s expensive, as much as $500 per square foot, but you can’t trumpet safety and then be too cheap to enforce your credo.
Who Will Drive the No. 18 Camry?
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Joe Gibbs Racing must move on from Kyle Busch in the short term, and it has turned its eye to 18-year-old Erik Jones, according to NASCAR Talk's Nate Ryan.
But wait, there’s more.
Ryan also reported that David Ragan, 29, will race this weekend at Atlanta and up to the May 9 race at Kansas. At that point Ragan would head back to Front Row Sports and cede the steering wheel to Jones.
As for Jones, he is under contract with JGR and races the Truck Series and the Xfinity Series.
Whoever sits in the No. 18 car has big shoes to fill. Busch has two wins and four top fives at Atlanta.
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Frustrated Dale Earnhardt Jr. Tries to Put Daytona 500 Behind Him
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There’s nothing quite like the bitter taste of a missed opportunity, especially when that missed opportunity is winning a Daytona 500.
Such is the aftermath that Dale Earnhardt Jr. is dealing with.
"You know, just one of them moves,” Junior said to NASCAR.com's Pat DeCola. “You made some good ones, you make some bad ones. I made a bad one too late. … Just got too cute there. ... Should have won the race."
Now Earnhardt, frustrated with himself, heads to Atlanta, where he has won before and registered five top fives. Still, he’ll have to dispel the demons from Sunday’s race—put it in a box and seal it up until next year.
He said following the race, per DeCola:
"You don't get cars that good too often. I had one of the best cars out there and that gave me a ton of confidence to keep digging. We were able to get back up to third place... I’m just really disappointed that I didn’t do everything I needed to do. Good cars like that don’t come every week and you like to take advantage of those and when you're put in a car like that you've got to deliver and we fell a little short today.
"
That confidence in his the crew and the car will only help as he heads up to Atlanta as one of the favorites to win the race.
Roger Penske Not Happiest About Daytona 500 Win
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For Roger Penske, spraying champagne all over Logano wasn’t what brought him the most joy after winning the Daytona 500. It was knowing that the No. 22 car locked up a spot in the Chase.
"(Making the Chase) to me, you win prize money, you win the 500, but when you really step back, that might be the biggest thing that comes out of this weekend, that we know we're in the Chase, Penske said on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio (h/t NASCAR.com). “It's no vacation obviously. ... We can run the whole season, roughly 25 races, and be able to know that we're going to have a shot at it.”
As pressurized as the Chase (and the run up to the Chase) became in 2014, getting that win early in the season eases some—not all—but some of the pressure that comes with racing.
There’s still performing well for sponsors and pride, but Logano needs not worry about points until the Challenger Round of the 2015 Chase.
“That's a byproduct of the new format, one that I think is terrific,” Penske said. “Obviously last year, we didn't get what we wanted to, but to me, that's a great part of this. And to see our car here in the museum is amazing again after seeing the Alltel car here a number of years ago."
Now all he needs is for Brad Keselowski to qualify. In six races at Atlanta, BK has yet to win, though he has one top five and two top 10s.
You Were Penalized, but for What?
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Jimmie Johnson finished fifth in the Daytona 500. It wasn’t the perfect start to the season, but it was pretty close.
In 2014 Johnson didn’t win until the Coca-Cola 600. That catalyzed a hot spring that dried up in the summer heat. He’d win four races in 2014 but was never much in contention in the Chase.
Johnson was very much in contention in the 500, but a penalty on pit road—caught by the eyes in the sky—forced him to pass through pit road and put him last on the lead lap.
"(It made our day) more difficult," Johnson said, per DeCola. "To almost lose a lap and then come back and have to start dead last and climb my way up through the middle, I took a lot of risks to get up there. We did have to work a lot today."
It wasn’t the penalty so much but being left in the dark that miffed the No. 48 team.
Chad Knaus, Johnson’s crew chief, said during the race, “NASCAR...I would appreciate an explanation. We do not know what we did wrong."
This is paramount to an NFL ref throwing the flag, penalizing a team and not telling the players or the coaches.
Johnson pointed out on NASCAR.com, per DeCola: “We couldn't get clarification on why we were penalized, so in order for us to make a correction for the other three or four stops, we didn't know what to do. We just kind of went back to doing our thing like we had been and fortunately there were no more penalties.”
NASCAR: Just radio down and tell them what they did wrong and who was at fault so they can make the right adjustments.
Why is this even an issue?
Jeff Gordon Goes for Win No. 6
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Jeff Gordon led 87 laps at the Daytona 500 but got involved in the biggest wreck of the day at the end of the race, forcing him back to 33rd.
He won the pole at Daytona, but that was it. Gordon said, per Fox Sports' Jared Turner:
"It was hairy,I knew there was high potential of a wreck. I was just ... holding on tight to get through the corner. I saw where I had a pretty good amount of momentum coming. I think we maybe could have gotten a top five out of it. Then they started wrecking, or somebody hit me. I don't know.
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Gordon wasn’t upset at the end of the race. Rather, his interview with Fox’s Jamie Little was cordial.
With Atlanta around the corner, Gordon turns his focus to the track where he won five times with 16 top fives and 26 top 10s. According to FoxSports.com, Gordon makes No. 2 on its power rankings heading into Georgia.
It’s one of his best tracks, and an early win will ensure him a spot in the Chase, a 93rd win and one more closer to 100.
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