Dover and Las Vegas Preview

Dover and Las Vegas

  September 24, 2012

Two plus two equals one. That’s Jimmie Johnson’s Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup™ math having parlayed a pair of second-place finishes into the championship lead following Sunday’s Round 2 at New Hampshire Motor Speedway. Johnson moved up a spot displacing Chicagoland winner Brad Keselowski, whose sixth-place SYLVANIA 300 finish leaves him a point off the lead heading to this week’s AAA 400 at Dover International Speedway.

Both math and history give Johnson a virtual lock on holding or extending his lead at the "Monster Mile," where the five-time NASCAR Sprint Cup champion’s record is superlative: four wins, six top-five finishes and 54% of laps led in his most recent eight trips to the concrete-surfaced mile track. Johnson won June’s Dover race.

Neither Keselowski nor New Hampshire winner Denny Hamlin – third, seven points behind Johnson - can point to anything resembling Johnson’s Dover record. In fact, Dover would seem to be a significant challenge for both. Keselowski ranks 11^th in Dover Driver Rating without a top-10 finish. Hamlin has finished 20^th or worse on five occasions and was 18^th in Dover’s June race – 11^th among Chase qualifiers.

Fourth-place Tony Stewart can’t be feeling optimistic this week either. The three-time and reigning champion has back-to-back 25^th-place finishes in his two most recent trips to Delaware.

No. 1 has proved to be a hot potato in the NASCAR Nationwide Series. Elliott Sadler, the leader through most of the season until surrendering to reigning champion Ricky Stenhouse Jr., is back in the top spot after Stenhouse ran into multiple troubles in Kentucky. Sadler’s lead is four points with Sunoco Rookie of the Year contender Austin Dillon – who swept both Kentucky stops – 15 points further back in third.

Kyle Busch continues his battle to erase the zero from the win column as the series heads back to Dover International Speedway. Busch – who has three series victories at Dover – has won at least one NASCAR Nationwide Series race for eight straight seasons dating back to his first series victory in 2004.

NASCAR Camping World Truck Series teams head west to Las Vegas Motor Speedway, also on Saturday. Ty Dillon remains the points leader following a third-place finish in Kentucky, where James Buescher recorded a season sweep with his fourth victory of 2012. Dillon’s lead over Buescher is four points with six races remaining on the schedule.

Action sports star Travis Pastrana makes his first series start, taking over the No. 98 ThorSport Toyota as teammate to Johnny Sauter and Matt Crafton. Pastrana has made spot starts in both NASCAR Nationwide and NASCAR K&N Pro Series East this season. He led his first NNS laps earlier this month in Atlanta. Sauter collected his first NCWTS victory at the 1.5-mile track in 2009.