Las Vegas Motor Speedway

Las Vegas Motor Speedway

March 4, 2013

  Week of March 4, 2013

 

It’s open to debate whether a 70-race winless streak or the inability to reach last year’s Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup™ made Carl Edwards irrelevant. Edwards rendered the argument moot with Sunday’s victory at Phoenix International Raceway in which he led 122 laps and held off champions Jimmie Johnson and Brad Keselowski in a green-white-checkers shootout.

 

Now it’s on to Las Vegas, where the 2011 Kobalt Tools 400 winner can talk about fond memories – instead of a career milestone of the worst kind.

 

Johnson, a four-time Las Vegas winner – three coming during championship years – heads the standings by eight over Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Keselowski. It’s Junior’s second-best season start and for Keselowski, his pair of fourth-place finishes prove he’s capable of maintaining his 2012 momentum despite a three-month layoff and Penske Racing’s switch to Ford.

 

Thursday’s NASCAR Sprint Cup Series test offers dividends beyond Sunday’s Kobalt Tools 400. Teams get a chance to put the Gen-6 car through its paces on an intermediate track – the backbone of the 2013 schedule.

 

It’s hurry-up time for a number of pre-season championship contenders who find themselves outside the top 20 in points two races into the season.

 

Phoenix winner Kyle Busch snapped a NASCAR Nationwide Series drought that began in September 2011. Now he’s looking for the special victory that continues to elude him, the Sam’s Town 300 in hometown Las Vegas. Sam Hornish Jr. and Justin Allgaier roll into Glitter City in a championship deadlock having finished seventh and third in Phoenix.

 

Four-time NASCAR Camping World Truck Series champion Ron Hornaday Jr. has been voted into the West Coast Stock Car Hall of Fame, an honor previously accorded his father, Ron Hornaday Jr.