Hamlin Dodges Bullets to Win Talladega Racin with Russ By RUSSELL SCHMIDT In a race filled with numerous BIG wrecks, Virginia driver Denny Hamlin managed to be in the right place at the right time to win NASCARs latest round of Sprint Cup racing at the famous Talladega Speedway. Oh, there were more than a dozen leaders on the big 2.66-mile race track, but the day was filled with multi-car wrecks, the result of a myriad of reasons, but mostly slight driver errors. The first incident started early on lap 14 when Brad Keselowski narrowly tangled with Danica Patrick, essentially ruining BKs day. No fingers were really pointed, simply a racing incident. Other incidents began when Jimmie Johnson started to spin all by himself, yet collected more than half-a-dozen cars such as Kurt Busch and Tony Stewart. When the smoke cleared on the day, Hamlin wound up the winner under caution with Greg Biffle, Clint Bowyer, Brian Vickers and A.J. Allmendinger. Fan Favorite Dale Earnhardt Jr hung back most of the day and made a very late race charge on the high side, only to have another competitor block his progress to the front. Junior later told the media he essentially threw in the towel at that point not to chance wrecking the car on the final few laps, which netted a 26th place finish. Race Notes: Six-time champ Jimmie Johnson had yet another tough day when he spun out unassisted and while he was able to drive away and have his crew make repairs to return, the 10 cars involved were not happy about it to say the least. Tony Stewart also had a day to forget with various mechanical problems capped off by a late race wreck leaving the three-time champ with a last place finish. Danica Patrick qualified among the top 10, led a few laps, yet netted a 22nd place finish. Allmendinger notched his second top six finish in as many weeks, moving up two spots in the standings to 15th for a team that had only one top 10 with AJ last year and zero with Bobby Labonte. Jeff Gordon became collected in a nasty multi-car wreck, ending his day in 39th, yet retains his point lead, but now only three points over Kenseth and four over Kyle Busch. Nationwide The minor league NASCAR series saw just as many bad multi-car wrecks as the Cup venue on Saturday afternoon as Elliott Sadler picked up his 10th career and first trophy at Dega. Numerous drivers took turns out front including Brian Scott, Regan Smith, David Starr and Ford driver Ryan Reed, but Sadler wound up with some good dancing partners to put he and his Toyota in the winners circle. Points leader and rookie driver Chase Elliott was among the top three in the closing stages, but got caught up in someone elses mess as did other top runners such as Kyle Larson, Brian Scott and Darrell Wallace, leaving them all with sub-19th place finishes. Rounding out the top five were drivers Chris Buescher, Smith, David Ragan and Sam Hornish Jr. The latest results finds Elliott just one point in front of Sadler with Smith three points in arrears. From Rumorville - Biggest news from this department includes Nationwide Insurance bailing out on being NASCARs second tier series sponsor after this year. The surprise announcement included their change of direction to become a part-time sponsor of Dale Earnhardts Cup car for the next three years. That leaves NASCAR to scramble for a multi-million dollar sponsor in just a handful of months. Anyone have $10 - $30 million laying around for a long term commitment? - Marcos Ambrose and Casey Mears were each fined $25,000 and $15,000 respectively for their involvement in last weeks post-race scuffle after RIR. Throw in a 30 day probation period and many people are questioning NASCARs boys have-at-it policy! Thats it for this week. Next weeks RWR will review the action from Kansas for the Cup and Camping World Truck series along with more racing news from around the globe. Questions? Comments? Contact Russ at [email protected]
Posted on: Mon, 05 May 2014 02:37:47 +0000
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