26 races, thousands of laps, heart break and triumph and NASCAR has reached the end of its regular season with a real humdinger at Richmond. While the Chase was on everybody’s mind leading up to this weekend’s race, wouldn’t you know it we had bigger news. Richard Petty Motorsports announced Thursday they had signed a letter of intent to merge with Yates Racing in 2010. The combined organization will utilize Yates’ Ford power, and will bring together Kasey Kahne, Elliott Sadler, AJ Allmendinger and Paul Menard. This means Reed Sorenson is the odd man out, though he has said he was told several weeks ago that he would not be back with RPM for 2010. In other news, Pat Tryson announced he would be leaving Penske Racing and Kurt Busch after the 2009 season. Tryson is believed to be heading to Michael Waltrip Racing to crew chief for Martin Truex Jr. And finally in the final race before the Chase, Brian Vickers knocked out Matt Kenseth and held back Kyle Busch to become the final driver locked into the fight for the Sprint Cup. This is the NASCAR week that was September 6 to 12, 2009.
Love in the fast lane: How NASCAR couples make it work, at work
Racecar driver turns life of hell into sweet dreams and ‘Dangerous Curves’
Don’t undersell Montoya as a championship threat
Gillett says team VP suspended
Kurt Busch crew chief Pat Tryson leaving Penske Racing; expected to join MWR
Vintage Insiders
Why Tony Stewart Won’t Suck as an Owner
The Incredible Revolving Drivers
**Remember if you have a NASCAR blog or website and would like a recent article you wrote featured in this section email me and you could be part of next week’s NASCAR Week That Was. Please only send stuff you have written.**
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on Sep 13th, 2009 at 6:32 am
Congrats to Vickers for driving his way into the chase (dancing on glass).
Regrets to Kyle who ended up only 8 points out of chase (ouch).
Any comments about TS UPending Duane, rear tire changer for the 00 car?
on Sep 13th, 2009 at 6:44 am
PS
I will say it again,
GO MARK MARTIN, YOU CAN DO IT!!!
on Sep 13th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
That was a very entertaining race, especially the Hamlin/Gordon duel early on.
I also admit (and I have long been a vocal opponent of the chase) that the Vickers-Busch-Kenseth story was a great one – I was paying more attention to the 18 and 83 than the 11. It gave me a wacky idea, yet another variation on the chase:
divide the first 28 races into four “legs” of seven races. The three leading pointgetters in each “leg” get into the chase, which is now the final eight races. If there are duplicates, the next highest point totals in any leg court. Say Gordon wins the first leg with 1000 points, followed by Hamlin with 960, Montoya with 930, and Stewart with 920. Gordon wins the second leg as well, again with 1000, followed by Harvick at 960, Burton at 940, and Johnson at 960. Gordon, Hamlin, Montoya (first leg) are in; Harvick and Burton (second leg) are in, and Stewart gets the final slot because of his 920 point leg topping Johnson’s 860.
You still have the season-ending chase, but you have FOUR mini-chases, and you don’t know who gets the “wild cards” until after the 28th race! These “mini-chases” will also feature far less points racing, because after only seven races, the points totals are bound to be pretty close. The guy fourth in points after six races is going to bust a– trying to finish as high as possible, because even if he doesn’t get a guaranteed slot, maybe one more position will give him the wild card later on. It also recognizes teams that have a hot streak, even if they later have a slump.
on Sep 13th, 2009 at 7:53 pm
Good for BV & Red Bull (eventhough I never touch the stuff)!
Per Kennseth’s post race comments that they weren’t capable of being a Championship contender anyway. At least his outage opens a spot “for” potential contender.
The real question now is how difficult is Baby Busch gonna make it on the Chasers now that he has nothing to lose? Should be interesting.