Chevy Rock & Roll 400 preview

Each week Ridebuyer delves deep into the misunderstood, oft terrifying, world of American saloon-car racing known as NASCAR.

This week: Chevy Rock & Roll 400
TV: ABC 7:00pm EST (Saturday)
Location: Richmond International Raceway (Richmond, VA)
Distance: 300 miles/400 laps
Past winners: J. Johnson (5/07); J. Johnson (9/07); C. Bowyer (5/08).


*Who makes The Chase and some hurricane related humor and forecasting*

-Remember when Bill Nye the Science Guy did "Consider the Following..." segments near the end of his shows? We sure do. It was one of the highlights of the show that, thinking back on it, were always the same, regardless of the episode. Each program seemed to revolve around baking soda and crash test car wreck footage. Every. Single. Show.

We can distinctly remember watching Science Guy in 9th grade biology class. We sat behind Jenna, who was a mature woman in the 10th grade. She smoked Marlboro Milds in the parking lot between classes and wore thongs before it was the social norm of the girls in our grade. To say she was the fancy of guys in Mr. Schuster's 3rd period class would be a drastic understatement. (Clearly intellectual prowess was not taken into account by the horn-goats in that class. Jenna was almost certainly was dumb as fuck. Clearly she failed the same class one year prior, thus leading her to the position of 'mature woman'.)

Well, the majority of our time in that class was split between the following: staring at the undergarments of Jenna, quoting Top Gun, and watching Bill Nye the Science Guy. In that order.

Needless to say, save for the few and far between music videos (see below), "Consider the Following..." was the highlight of the program that overwhelmingly occupied the science portion of Schuster's class.



We tip our collective hats to Mr. (Dr.?) Nye. Certainly many folks share similar fond memories of that show.

In that vain, (and because you need to be a fucking scientist to figure out The Chase point system) we invite you to Consider the Following... (About Saturday's final race before The Chase, that is)-

Consider:

Technically speaking, seven drivers are jockeying for five remaining positions in The Chase. Those drivers are Tony Stewart, Matt Kenseth, Jeff Gordon, Denny Hamlin, Clint Bowyer, David Ragan and Kasey Kahne. However, barring some crazy shit happening, the real race for the final Chase spot will be between Bowyer, Ragan and Kahne. The rest of the field is pretty much locked into the playoffs. It's Bowyer who holds the precarious p12 going into Saturday's event, leading Ragan by 17 points. Kahne is 48 points adrift of Bowyer and 31 points from Ragan. That's your race right there.

Consider:

In three of the last four seasons, a driver outside the field of 12 has raced his way in at Richmond: Jeremy Mayfield did it in '04, Ryan Newman in '05 and Kasey Kahne in '06. Historically speaking, this would indicate Clint Bowyer is not in a favorable spot.

Consider:

Bowyer won the first Richmond race of the year and has never finished outside of the top-12 at RIR. Kahne has one RIR win (2005) but his average finishing spot is only 17.3. Ragan is only making his third career start at RIR. Historically speaking, this would indicate Clint Bowyer is in a favorable spot.

Considering over.

-Does Bill Nye know anything about weather patterns? How about hurricanes in particular? If he does, the science Czar would surely tell you this race has exactly zero chance of being run on Saturday night. Tropical Storm Hanna is expected to hit the greater Richmond-area on Saturday, and that sounds like it could produce some moisture. The Weather Channel says there is a 100% chance of precipitation in Richmond through Saturday night. We'll help you out, Richmond is in one the green areas below.

We're thinking the race will likely play itself out on Sunday.

Insert Katrina joke...Here.

About this race:

*What to know:

Lame Duckiness: The drivers who are already locked into The Chase have little incentive to do well at this race (you know, aside from the sizable purse, glory associated with winning a Cup event and the bonus points awarded for winning a race that carry into The Chase). This event really comes down to Bowyer, Ragan and Kahne fighting for the final playoff spot. Unless Kyle Busch wrecks Carl Edwards, there will be few other story lines to follow. Sorry.

*Who to watch:

Clint Bowyer: Currently in Chase. Could be bounced out of Chase.

David Ragan: Currently not in Chase. Could bounce into Chase

Kasey Kahne: Ibid.

*For those heading to the track: Pertinent tailgating information is here. Because of the apocalyptic rains being expected for the entire eastern U.S., we'd be leery of parking in grass lots on RIR's rounds. There is nothing worse than getting thoroughly boozed-up before a race, sitting through a long rain delay, have the race cancelled, be hangover by the time you get back to your car, then find out that your dually is hopelessly stuck in the Virgina clay. Been there, done that. We recommend finding something -not race related- to do on Saturday, then regroup for Sunday's rain date.

The Ridebuyer cocktail of the race is the movie Cocktail. Watch it on Saturday when the race gets cancelled. It stars Tom Cruise, Elisabeth Shue and some guy with an accent who kills himself in the end. It's phenomenally bad.





Points:

1 Kyle Busch
2 Carl Edwards
3 Jimmie Johnson
4 Dale Earnhardt Jr.
5 Jeff Burton
6 Greg Biffle
7 Kevin Harvick
8 Tony Stewart
9 Matt Kenseth
10 Jeff Gordon
11 Denny Hamlin
12 Clint Bowyer

Next race: Sylvania 300 (New Hampshire Motor Speedway). In your best Jim Mora voice, let us all ring in the "playoffs?" commencing.

Rowdy holeshots The Sarge

Kyle Busch seems to be infallible. He has won 18 times in NASCAR's three national divisions and leads the Sprint Cup Series with eight victories this season. He is also quite the little drag racer.

Earlier this week, Busch, along with perhaps the greatest Top Fuel racer ever, Tony Schumacher, went to the new zMAX Dragway at Concord for a promotional match race before the NHRA event in two weeks.

Racing identically prepped Camry pace cars, Busch took the first heat over Schumacher in a holeshot, Schumacher then went red on race two. The event culminated with Busch's .102-second RT and 14.544 ET, which again resulted in a holeshot loss for The Sarge.

Ouch.

Had this been an episode of Pinks, Schumacher would have lost his ride.

Busch, Schumacher Battle at zMAX Dragway

Weekend recap

What you missed while learning about the baby-momma drama of the possible VP.

- Tony Schumacher might be the best to ever wheel a dragster. He tallied his seventh career victory at the Mac Tools U.S. Nationals on Monday, has six straight Top Fuel victories this season and is now tied with Joe Amato atop the all time TF wins list with 52. Since the NHRA instituted 1000-ft races for fuel cars, Schumacher has not lost a single round. Impressive.

-Other winners from the U.S. Nationals:

Robert Hight (FC); Dave Connolly in (PS), and Steve Johnson (PSB). It was the second career "Big Go" wins each driver. Props to Larry Morgan (from Columbus, OH) and Doug Kalitta for making the finals in their respective classes.

Schumacher claims seventh Indy win; Hight, Connolly, S. Johnson also score

- Jimmie Johnson ruined the show at the Auto Club Speedway on Sunday night. He led 228 of 250 laps. Greg Biffle finished second followed by Denny Hamlin.

Johnson finds Chase form with convincing victory

-With one race to go until the field for The Chase is set, David Ragan sits 13th in the standings, 17 points behind 12th-place Clint Bowyer. Kasey Kahne's p8 left him 48 points out of 12th, the final Chase-eligible position.

-Kyle Busch and "Hot" Carl Edwards finished 1-2 in Saturday's Nationwide race. They didn't even wreck into one another. Not once. Boring.

2008- Camping World 300 at California Results

-The IRL IndyCar Series ran in between Windsor (Canada) and Detroit (US of A) on Sunday. Justin Wilson won his first race of the merged open wheeled series. The big story was Helio Castroneves being penalized for blocking Wilson while HCN was leading. He was forced to relinquish the lead and lost a likely victory. He finished p2 and thus lost out on 10 extra points. HCN trails Scott Dixon by 30 points going into the finale at Chicagoland.

INDYCAR: Wilson Breaks Through in Detroit

-The ALMS was also in between Windsor (Canada) and Detroit (US of A) this past weekend. Andretti Green Racing took their first overall victory with their Acura. (This is still not enough to get AGR a LMP 1 Acura for next year. Or any Acura, for that matter.) The race-winning Audi R10 of Emanuele Pirro and Marcel Fässler failed post race tech, giving Intersport Racing (from Columbus, OH) LMP 1 honors. That ends Audi's 30-race class winning streak. Corvette Racing's Oliver Gavin and Olivier Beretta won in GT1 and Flying Lizard Motorsports took GT2 with Jörg Bergmeister and Wolf Henzler.

ALMS: AGR Acura Wins Detroit as Intersport Takes LMP1!

Oswaldo Negri and Mark Patterson (Michael Shank Racing, from Columbus, OH) won their second race in Grand-AM DP competition. Scott Pruett and Memo Rojas clinched the DP team championship with a p9 finish in a backup car. Tim George Jr. and Andy Lally won in GT for TRG. This was the first professional feature race at New Jersey Motorsports Park. Bada Bing.

GRAND-AM: Negri/Patterson Win in New Jersey

Big weekend for C-Bus, Ohio racing outfits.

Pepsi 500 preview

Each week Ridebuyer delves deep into the misunderstood, oft terrifying, world of American saloon-car racing known as NASCAR.

This week: Pepsi 500

TV: ESPN 7:00pm EST (Sunday)
Location: Auto Club Speedway (Fontana, CA)
Distance: 500 miles/250 laps
Past winners: M. Kenseth (2/07); J. Johnson (9/07); C. Edwards (2/08).

*Racing on a Sunday night, Chase-isms and the history of the "Hot Carl" *

The weather in SoCal dictates that Fontana's second Cup race is a night affair. There is no possible way to wage this race in the afternoon heat of greater-LA in August. Fans would be keeling over in the stands and reaching the brink of heat-induced delirium and hallucinations before the ceremonial flyover of Navy F-37whatevers. The crews and drivers would, of course, deal with the oppressive heat as they are being paid to sweat their respective balls off in three-layer nomex jumpers. It is the fans that would suffer, as they would be expected to spend valuable cash for the honor of getting a sun burn. We, (you know, the editorial we) got a sun burn in Florida a month ago and thought our skin was going to separate itself from the bones and other inner workings of our body. That shit hurts. And we didn't have to suffer the indignity of paying money to get ass raped by the sun.

So, merciful NASCAR contests this particular race at night. That's not terribly noteworthy as many events get the under-the-lights treatment. But, not many get the Sunday under-the-lights treatment. That's because most people have to go to work/school on Mondays, thus the prospects of watching or attending a 500-mile motor race that will undoubtedly stretch into the wee hours of Monday morning (EST, that is) is not very appealing. Labor Day weekend is the perfect fit, with Monday void of any activity save pounding beer until the grill need lit. But, the advantage doesn't stop there. It's "two fold" as they say. The second fold rhymes with football. This is kickoff weekend for college f-ball and NASCAR would be crazy to stage a race against that.

Consider: Because of the aforementioned climate concerns, this weekend's race must happen at night. Typically... NASCAR schedules Cup night races on Saturday evenings. If that were to happen in this case, the race would be opposite a host of games including Alabama v. Clemson, Illinois v. Missouri and the highlight of our kickoff weekend, Cal Poly v. San Diego State. NASCAR, you don't want to/can't compete with that shit.

-This is race #25 of 36 in the Sprint Cup schedule. More importantly, after Sunday night's race, there will be only one event left until the field for The Chase is set in stone. Thanks to the stat crunching abilities of the crack staff over at nascar.com, here is a handy chart to determine who could, conceivably, make or not make the playoffs. Note that "ACS" is the Auto Club Speedway. Here to help.

Pos.	Driver	Points	Behind	ACS Starts	ACS Wins	ACS Avg. Finish
6.	Tony Stewart	3013	-596	14	0	16.0
7.	Greg Biffle	2984	-625	11	1	19.6
8.	Kevin Harvick	2972	-637	12	0	19.1
9.	Jeff Gordon	2951	-658	16	3	11.2
10.	Matt Kenseth	2921	-688	13	2	9.9
11.	Denny Hamlin	2900	-709	5	0	17.8
12.	Clint Bowyer	2855	-754	5	0	12.4
13.	David Ragan	2843	-766	3	0	14.0
14.	Kasey Kahne	2799	-810	9	1	13.7
15.	Ryan Newman	2674	-935	11	0	18.6

There are your bubble drivers. Keep an eye on them, if inclined.

-Other Chase points of interest:

Nine drivers could clinch spots in The Chase on Sunday.

Any driver who leaves Fontana with a 196-point (or more) advantage over the driver in point position 13 will have clinched a Chase spot.

Dale Earnhardt Jr.-- Can clinch with a finish of 40th or better; 41st and lead at least one lap.

Jimmie Johnson -- Can clinch with a finish of 40th or better; 41st and lead at least one lap.

Jeff Burton -- Can clinch with a finish of 15th or better; 16th or 17th and lead one lap; 20th and lead the most laps.

By the Numbers: California (Nascar.com)

-Carl Edwards is on quite the tear. As we've said previously, he appears to be "peaking" at the right time this season and has to be considered the favorite heading into The Chase. It's been six races since Edwards' finished outside of the the top-10. It's been this string of consistent performances that has led us to christen him "Hot" Carl. Makes sense, right? Turns out, this has a duel meaning. Check it out. (NSFW. Unless your work deals with shitting in girls faces, that is.) Way to go Carl.

View Larger Map

About this race:

*What to know:

Busch v. "Hot" Carl, the next Kimbo v. Shamrock?: In a word, no. The two played wreck-um after the Bristol race and were subsequently placed on "probation" by NASCAR. Despite the fact that NASCAR "probation" does nothing and no further penalties will be levied against the two regardless of their future on track conduct, they are not going to repeat the shenanigans of last weekend. First, the Auto Club Speedway is far too fast of a circuit to take revenge. No one is going to wreck someone at 200-mph. That is how appendages get forcibly separated from bodies. Second, with the way The Chase is formulated, regular-season race wins are too important to toss away on a vendetta. If either drivers are challenging for the "W" on Sunday (which they both will be), then they will keep their respective noses clean. Sorry wreck mongers.

Ford v. Toyota, the next Kimbo v. Shamrock?: In a word, maybe. The first half of the season was dominated by the foreign marque and now the lads from MI are getting nasty. "Hot" Carl v. Busch is a mildly interesting subplot, the real drama comes from USA v. Japan, Good v. Evil, Traditional Stock Car Racing v. Contemporary NASCAR, etc. That is the real intrigue as the season winds down. Think larger scale than the battle between two drivers or even the battle between two teams. Hopefully the tiff continues on Sunday.

*Who to watch:

Kyle Busch: Remains point-leader (and is locked as such until The Chase starts), has one Cup victory at ACS and has not finished outside of the top-10 there since the winter race in 2005. He has seven career wins on intermediate tracks and his JGR Toyota has been the class of the field every week. Busch's inclusion in "Who to watch" has officially become redundant and silly.

Carl Edwards: Where there's a Busch, there's a "Hot" Carl in close pursuit. Edwards has amassed an nearly incredible record at ACS. Since his first SoCal race in 2004, he has finished outside of the top-10 exactly once. He has finished outside of the top-five exactly twice. His average ACS finishing spot is a staggering 6.8. RFR regularly dominates intermediate tracks and will be a force come Sunday evening.

Denny Hamlin: Currently in The Chase. That could change unless he has a solid effort on Sunday. He will. While never winning at ACS, Hamlin is historically solid at similar tracks. He needed a good result last weekend to get back into the top-12, he got it, and now needs a repeat performance. We've got a good feeling about young Denny.

*For those heading to the track: Pertinent tailgating information is here. We think this could be a bit of a moot point, as people in Southern California probably don't tailgate anything beside USC games. But, we also don't think people in Southern California would go to a NASCAR race. So, what do we know?

The Ridebuyer cocktail of the race is the Cali-Barn Banger. That's a bottle of beer with a shot of SPF 30. It tastes like shit, but your throat will be moisturized like nobody's business.

Points:

1	--	Kyle Busch
2	--	Carl Edwards
3	+1	Dale Earnhardt Jr.
4	-1	Jimmie Johnson
5	--	Jeff Burton
6	--	Tony Stewart
7	--	Greg Biffle
8	--	Kevin Harvick
9	--	Jeff Gordon
10	--	Matt Kenseth
11	+1	Denny Hamlin
12	+1	Clint Bowyer

Next race: Chevy Rock & Roll 400 (Richmond International Raceway). This race is named after the presenting sponsor. Rick Derringer.

Rolling Stone does Smoke

For all of you who quit reading Rolling Stone after Hunter Thompson stopped writing for them/died, you should give the rag another chance and pick up the latest edition. If nothing else, check out the Mike Guy article on Tony Stewart. It pretty much confirms our suspicions that Smoke is the incarnate of motor racing's old guard, loves Schlitz, and eats doughnuts at a heroic pace.

The best quote of the article comes from Smoke putting life into perspective:

"Pussy, money and race cars. That's pretty much all I care about." Then he winks at me.

Full text below.

Where There's Smoke... (Rolling Stone)

Five reasons The Chase is the balls

In the interest of equal time, we present the reasons why The Chase is an absolute must-see, can't be missed, rather die with a hooker in a Motel 6 than skip a Chase race, event. Enjoy:

5) The races directly before The Chase are fucking awesome

Drivers and teams are starting to feel the pressure of perhaps missing the NASCAR playoffs. Oh, the horror. This will cause those on the bubble to take chances, get crazy with strategies and otherwise get racy in an effort to make The Chase. The night race in Richmond where the final Chase positions are figured is an incredibly dramatic sporting event on par with the best of stick and ball events.

4) Brent Musberger

There's no good reason for the sportscaster to have any involvement in the production of NASCAR events. He doesn't appear to have any more than a cursory knowledge (or interest) of/in motor racing. But, alas, Musberger is ABC's biggest deal of talent guys, and The Chase is their biggest deal in sports' productions. So, it's a fit for old Musberger to crack open a cold one and watch/talk bout some racin'. We love Musberger and his inclusion in The Chase-casts is worth the price of admission. Which is free, because it don't cost nothing to watch TV.

3) In case you're wondering who the best is...

If you haven't had a great season, you don't make The Chase. It's like natural selection for stockcar racing. Scrub-ass drivers and teams need not apply. If you like watching the best of the best of the best do their things, The Chase is for you. It is unbridled performance at its best. Only unpatriotic pinkos would not want to see this. The Chase is to NASCAR as Top Gun is to fighter pilots. Think about it.

2) Final race/final lap excitement

The Chase provides excitement. No longer can a driver amass a huge points lead and just coast to the championship. All points get reset, a clean slate is made and the season effectively restarts, as The Chase commences. Every year of The Chase, the championship was not decided until the final race of the year. That's like the World Series always having a Game 7, or like the Nathans' Hot Dog Championship going into an eat-off each year. An eat-off with reversal. You can't buy that kind of excitement.

1) Race until it snows

The Chase schedule goes until mid-November. Awesome. It's pretty much winter most places in the country, yet NASCAR still manages to schedule races. Football be damned. If you like racing, you should want that shit to happen year-round. And it does. With The Chase (or just NASCAR's schedule in general), you can always find a race. 15-inches of snow in your area? No worries The Chase goes to warm places like Phoenix and Miami to race. The season lasts forever and you fucking love it. God bless The Chase.

Five reasons The Chase sucks

Only two weeks remain until the field will be set for the fifth iteration of the Chase for the Sprint Cup. Well, it's actually the first iteration for the Chase for the Sprint Cup, but you get the point. The plan for the NASCAR-Cup series playoff system has seen loads of criticism and praise. Some like it, some hate it, some would rather see their grandparents banging in a Gatlinburg motel than watch the seemingly contrived spectacle. This is for those people. This is for the people who think The Chase is lame, the season is too long anyway, and racing should by over by November. In short, this is for the haters. Prepare for devil's advocacy.

5) Baseball

The pennant races are getting good as The Chase starts, the playoffs are in full swing by the middle of The Chase, and the World Series will be long over by the time the final flag waves in Homestead (on November 16th). Why would anyone watch racing when fall baseball is so good?


4) It's contrived (made up)

The Chase was pretty much invented because Matt Kenseth won the Winston Cup in 2003 after only winning one race that season. Before The Chase was instituted, there was no huge points incentives to winning races. Ryan Newman won eight races in 2003, yet only finished sixth in points. Since that's just not American, The Chase, and its screwball scoring were put in place much to the chagrin of steady pacers across the world.

3) It's complicated as shit

You almost need a personal Asian tutor to explain the damn scoring system to the masses. Dale Earnhardt Jr. admitted he didn't understand how points were awarded in The Chase, and he's a fucking participant. How in the hell are Joe Sixpack and ourselves supposed to figure this out? These guys can't even figure out the race win bonus allotments.

2) Ken Schrader will never make it

Only the top-12 drivers make The Chase. That immediately makes the Ken Schrader/Dave Blaney fans of the world tune out. Some drivers are just never going make the "playoffs." Sure, they still race in all of the events, but the thrill is gone. What's the point of watching a race when your dude is not in contention to win the whole fucking thing? It's why people stop going to Royals' games in July. Nobody gives a shit.

1) Football

Goddamn football is sweet. The NFL, college games, whatever. That shit is the balls. No sport should ever attempt to compete with the real American pastime. Football starts on Labor Day weekend, you'd better get you silly races finished by that time. Playoffs? For NASCAR? You're kidding me. Not even close to the NFL playoffs or bowl season. Don't even try. All this "Chase" does is waste precious Sportscenter time when they could be talking about football. Fuck. That. Fall=Football. Chase=Gay.