Last night marked the end of the NASCAR regular season, next weekend we start what is known as ‘The Chase’ at Chicagoland Speedway. In The Chase, the top ten drivers plus Kasey Kahne and Jeff Gordon (the two “wild card” holders) will battle for their chance to take home the title at Homestead.
At Richmond last night, it was down to the wire for the last wild card spot. It was mostly Kyle Busch and Jeff Gordon’s spot to win, although Joey Logano, Ryan Newman, Marcos Ambrose and Carl Edwards had an outside shot at sneaking in.
The race started, the drivers and officials knew rain was on the way but had hopes they could get the 400 lap race in. Denny Hamlin seemed like he had the car to beat while Gordon led a lap at the beginning and then just went backwards from there complaining of being lose and tight all at the same time. Then it happened… It rained. The race was red flagged for about an hour.
The race started back up with thoughts that they might be able to only make it to half way as another storm cell was being watched.
Bowyer’s car was fast, but Kahne who earlier said his car was really good on the long runs starting passing cars one by one. Then we got to half way, 200 laps complete and no rain.
At this point I fell asleep it was somewhere around lap 206 and didn’t wake up until they were talking to Gordon telling him he beat out Busch for the second Wild Card spot. Then I heard Bowyer won. I can’t say enough about Michael Waltrip Racing this year they have been nothing short of amazing so it was nice to see him in victory lane.
It feels like the race was a daze to me. It being so late like that. I know Kyle Busch had lug nut issues and that hurt his chances but before I fell asleep Gordon’s car was as good as trash. It seemed like Kyle had it all tied up with Logano and Edwards being laps down.
Somehow Gordon managed to pull off what many thought was impossible. He beat Busch by 3 points to put himself in position to win the Championship. Now the question is, can he? RELATED: Gordon is Bringing Back the Stache?
Can he pull momentum in the next ten races to being the trophy home to the No. 24 Team?
We’ve seen a lot of crazy things in the last 26 races to get to this point, so why not? Gordon is a solid Championship contender having four under his belt already.
I guess this is why they call it silly season… Because anything can happen and I don’t think it’s going to be any less “sillier” in the next ten races. The Chase has a solid group of drivers, and they don’t have all the time in the world, only ten races to prove they have what it takes to stand up at Homestead as the 2012 Sprint Cup Series Champion.
