Sporting News Power Poll after Talladega

Sporting News Power Poll after Talladega

By the Sporting News NASCAR Wire Service

(April  2011)

Dale Earnhardt Jr. pushed Jimmie Johnson to victory in Sunday’s Aaron’s 499 Sprint Cup race at Talladega Superspeedway, but the shove wasn’t quite hard enough to propel the five-time champ to the top of this week’s Sporting News Power Poll. The No. 1 spot belongs to Carl Edwards, who came home sixth in a wild eight-car finish and retained the series lead by five points over Johnson. The poll is a weekly collaboration of Sporting News, SceneDaily.com, Rowdy.com and NASCAR Illustrated.

1. Carl Edwards (last week: 1st) Edwards ran sixth at Talladega, without the home cooking. The better news? He finished the race.
2. Jimmie Johnson (4th) Five-time stole one in thrilling fashion to put his 15-race winless skid to bed. He’s second in points now and on pace for title No. 6.
3. Kevin Harvick (5th) The blown-engine lesson from Daytona was learned. Harvick was a contender and finished fifth.
4. Dale Earnhardt Jr. (6th) Can you imagine how the house would have come down if it had been Jimmie pushing Junior to victory? Guess who might be pushing who next time?
5. Clint Bowyer (7th) After leading the most laps at Talladega, Bowyer has led 173 in his last three races. His slow start is history.
6. Matt Kenseth (2nd) A victim of Talladega’s now-infamous two-car draft, Kenseth finished an unfair 36th when Joey Logano got into Kyle Busch and Busch’s car picked out Kenseth’s to plow into.
7. Kyle Busch (3rd) Took the high road after being turned off the bumper of teammate Logano. Apparently, New Kyle Busch is here to stay.
8. Jeff Gordon (14th) After recording one top-five finish in the first five races of 2011, Gordon has two in the past three.
9. Greg Biffle (11th) Biffle celebrated a new contract by finishing seventh and in the mix of one of the most exciting finishes in Cup history.
10. Ryan Newman (8th) Newman’s 25th-place finish is a bit more remarkable given his two impressive saves in the final 30 laps.
11. Kurt Busch (9th) Busch repeatedly drove to the front but lost a few friends by causing three wrecks in the two-car draft.
12. Paul Menard (13th) Enjoy the off week, Paul. You’ve earned it. But your best finish at Richmond in the past three years is 26th. That needs to improve. Could be important come September.
13. Mark Martin (20th) The ageless wonder has never been a big fan of plate racing and his eighth-place result could have easily been six spots higher in the four-pod, blanket finish.
14. Tony Stewart (12th) While it’s true that Smoke usually heats up in the summer, he needs to make sure he doesn’t dig himself too big of a hole in the spring. He hasn’t had a top 10 since the third race.
15. Juan Pablo Montoya (10th) Looked as if JP was headed for a third straight top-five finish at Talladega before getting “Newman-ed” in Turn 3 with 18 laps remaining.
16. AJ Allmendinger (18th) Mr. Consistency: Last year finished 11th to 19th in half the races. This year through eight races, Allmendinger has finished 11th twice, 14th twice and 19th twice.
17. Denny Hamlin (16th) After another rough finish this week, Hamlin took to Twitter to solicit good luck charms. That can’t be a good sign.
18. Martin Truex Jr. (24th) With drafting help from teammate David Reutimann, Truex was a player down the stretch. As was anyone in the top 20 at that point.
19. Jeff Burton (21st) Hard to believe we’re celebrating the fact Burton has four top-20 finishes in his past five races. But he did run in the top 10 for much of the Talladega race before being shuffled back.
20. Kasey Kahne (17th) Kahne’s car caught fire after his wreck. That’s not what we meant when we said his team needed to get hot.
21. David Ragan (15th) Ragan appeared poised to duplicate his strong Daytona 500 run before being collected in a crash nearing the midway mark.
22. Jamie McMurray (22nd) McMurray sustained some damage in one of the wrecks, but his biggest damage was not having a strong Montoya to draft with. Finishing 21st is not good for the guy who was second a year ago.
23. Joey Logano (25th) Logano was sorry for spinning teammate Kyle, but he needed a 10th-place finish way more than his teammate. It was his first top-10 of the season.
24. David Reutimann (NR) It’s a miracle this hard-luck driver avoided the wrecks at Talladega.
25. Marcos Ambrose (19th) Ambrose tried to play it safe by hanging in the back with Edwards but learned there’s no hiding from the one-man wrecking crew known as Kurt Busch.