NASCAR at Martinsville: Preview, Prediction for the STP 500
Two weeks.
Two weeks feels like a long, long time, am I right? Think about it. Two weeks ago "Man of Wheel" Jimmie Johnson won the Auto Club 400, and Danica Patrick moronically did the Zoolander at Kasey Kahne.
Batman v. Superman had yet to disappoint viewers, and the NCAA tournament hadn’t even started.
We were just kids!
Now, here we are at "The Paperclip" where we last saw Jeff Gordon like flipping out when he won during the Elimination Round of the Chase to reach Homestead—the moment of the year, IMO.
So here we are again, two weeks older than we were the last time some B-list celeb yelled, “Drivers, start your engines!”
Let’s romp around Martinsville for a bit as we ponder the existential nature of 500 tight laps around this half-mile oval.
By the Numbers: Martinsville Speedway
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STP 500
Place: Martinsville Speedway Speedway
Date: Sunday, April 3
Pre-race Coverage: 11:30 a.m. (ET), NASCAR Raceday, FS1
Green Flag: 1:13 p.m. (ET), FS1
Distance: 500 laps, 250 miles
Defending winner: Denny Hamlin
Current Driver Standings
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1. Kevin Harvick, 195
2. Jimmie Johnson, 184
3. Carl Edwards, 171
4. Denny Hamlin, 179
5. Kyle Busch, 170
6. Joey Logano, 165
7. Kurt Busch, 148
8. Dale Earnhardt Jr., 145
9. Brad Keselowski, 142
10. Austin Dillon, 139
11. Marin Truex Jr., 127
12. Jamie McMurray, 125
13. Aric Almirola, 120
14. Ricky Stenhouse Jr., 119
15. Matt Kenseth, 113
16. Chase Elliott, 110
Bold equals race winner.
The Too-Early-to-Watch Chase Bubble
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Two Above the Line
Matt Kenseth
Here lurks Matt Kenseth as he returns to the site where he snowplowed Joey Logano in blood-hot revenge in the 2015 Chase.
Over the past few weeks, Kenseth has managed to claw back into the Chase grid after treading water in the 20s after some seriously cold cards.
A year ago the Joe Gibbs cars were awfully solid on short tracks and have been excellent (see standings) this year. Kenseth will continue his ascent up the standings.
Chase Elliott
Chase Elliott had yet another solid race at Fontana, concluding a West Coast swing with an average finish of 17.3.
That looks bad on paper, but his three finishes look like this: 38th, eight, sixth. You pick the outlier.
He’s got momentum on his side as he heads back east.
Two Below the Line
Ryan Blaney
Where Elliott started weak and finished strong, Ryan Blaney started strong and finished weak on the West Coast.
Blaney fell out of the Chase Grid after a crash left him in 35th place in the Auto Club 400. This came after back-to-back top 10s at Las Vegas and Phoenix.
He’s in the most volatile spot on the Chase Grid. This is where the pressure remains highest—even in April.
Kasey Kahne
Kasey Kahne, the red-headed stepchild of Hendrick Motorsports, remains a head-scratcher.
Amazingly, he sits in 18th in the driver standings with a single top 10 and three finishes in the 20s.
He’s not worthy of the Chase yet. This teams needs to find its mojo, otherwise this trend will continue all season.
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Biggest Movers
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Biggest Climb
Chase Elliott and Ryan Newman, Up Five
Don’t look now, but Ryan Newman, the perennial point king and upturned middle finger to the win-and-you’re-in establishment, climbed five big spots to No. 20 in the driver standings.
Elliott also made a big move with his second straight top 10.
"Man, they worked hard all weekend, made a lot of gains on our car from when we unloaded on Friday,” Elliott said in Joe Menzer’s FoxSports.com story. “We made even more gains during throughout [sic] race. We were pretty happy with it toward the end and just need to do a better job maximizing those restarts.”
Newman is a slow, rolling boil. He’ll hit 212 degrees Fahrenheit when the timing is right. As it stands, he’s on the move.
Biggest Fall
Kyle Larson, Down Seven
Any of you who follow this slider with any degree of regularity know I have a strange affinity for the rise—but mostly fall—of Kyle Larson.
We can never get a full grasp on Larson. Week in and week out we feel he’s the best young driver not to win a race. Now? Maybe he’s the fourth-best young driver not to win a race.
Austin Dillon, Elliott and Blaney have surpassed Larson as better young talent. This isn’t to say Larson is incapable of winning, but falling seven spots to 24th and off the too-early-to-watch Chase bubble says his slump may be more in his head than on the track.
He survived that brutal, violent head-on crash from a week ago, so we’ll see how he rebounds after that bone-rattler.
Biggest Storylines
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The Biggest Non-issue Awaits Us
It was at this track last fall when Kenseth wrecked Joey Logano—a driver then on a three-race win streak. The circumstances of which are tired at this point, but it still won’t stop people from talking about it. This, after all, has already become a meta-conversation about the thing not worth talking about.
FoxSports.com’s Jared Turner even writes, “While no sequel is expected, it's safe to assume that both Logano and Kenseth haven't forgotten about what happened last fall and will perhaps have a little extra motivation to go to Victory Lane this weekend.”
These drivers don’t need any extra motivation to reach Victory Lane, and you can bet they’ll partake in synchronized eye rolls each time they get asked about what happened last year at Martinsville.
This time around there’s no context for anything of that nature to happen again.
Jeff Gordon Returns to Martinsville
Last fall Jeff Gordon won his ninth grandfather clock at Martinsville and, as a result qualified, for Homestead.
There was no burnout. He exited his car at the start-finish line and partied like he’d won the Super Bowl. He jumped into his teammates' arms. It had a championship feel to it.
Now he returns as a broadcaster, so there will undoubtedly be some walks down Martinsville’s memory lane.
Gordon was famously wrecked by Clint Bowyer at The Paperclip in 2012. Gordon later retaliated at Phoenix and sent Bowyer on a 100-yard dash to find Gordon and give him more than just a 5-Hour Energy.
Gordon’s return will be more heartfelt, but the juxtaposition of 2015’s feel-good moment combined with the pressure-cooker nature of this short track should lead to some excellent stories and anecdotes from drivers past and present.
Dark-Horse Pick: Ryan Newman
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Ryan Newman last won this race in 2012 after the Gordon-Bowyer incident. It was an opportunistic win, but that seems to be Newman’s fresh creamery butter and bread.
Newman earned two top fives in two of the last three runnings at Martinsville and has an average finish of 15.2 from an average start of 9.3. Eight top fives and 13 top 10s make him a viable pick.
He climbed five spots in the driver standings and could be making that steady move to the Chase Grid. A win locks him in.
And the Winner Is...Jimmie Johnson
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Jimmie Johnson leads the Sprint Cup series with two wins already and has a series-high eight career wins at Martinsville.
There was a time when he won at Martinsville at a similar clip to how Kevin Harvick now wins at Phoenix.
Johnson last won at here back in 2013—the last year he held the Sprint Cup.
The No. 48 team has this new aero package down, so two things will happen. Either the team burns out too early or they sustain this kind of dominance all year.
"There's no guarantees about when you're going to win and have success," said Johnson in Jared Turner’s FoxSports.com story. "I've been very, very fortunate to win 77 of these things, which blows my mind on its own.”
And now this team is too good and heads to a track where it is too good to be called anything but the favorite.
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