Kyle Busch

Michigan

/ Trixie / Leave a comment

I didn’t watch much of the race yesterday.  I have to get the homestead ready for our caseworker’s walk through on Tuesday.  She is prepping us for our certification/licensing review that is upon us.  This is something as foster/legal risk to adopt parents have to go through.  I did have the race on in two rooms–our bedroom and the livng room.  I would occassionally look up from time to time in between moving things from our bedroom to the office as well as tryign to get a 5-year to clean his room.  Let’s just say, I think hearding cats would have been much easier for me yesterday. 

In this whole cleaning process, I had to crate up my Tony Stewart shrine and move it to the office.  I know…I should be allowed to have some kind of mourning period today, but I will perseveer thorough the trauma.  Look at it this way, it will allow me to make room for all the NEW Tony Stewart items I will be purchasing in the near future.

Congratulations to Carl Edwards for not only his win yesterday, but for the weekend sweep at Michigan.  He really did have the car to beat yesterday.  I don’t know if Kyle could have caught him.  He definitely had a car that could have, but catchign Carl and passing Carl were two different things entirely.  Kyle Busch finished 2nd and clinched the number one seed for The Chase yesterday however.  In fact the top 5 in the standings didn’t change positions from the previous week.  It looks like those five are solidly in the Chase, but with NASCAR things aren’t settled until that checkered flag flies.  There were a few in 6-12 position that took big hits yesterday–Jeff Gordon (from 6th to 9th), Kasey Kahne (from 8th to 11th) and Denny Hamlin (from 9th to 12th).  Clint Bowyer is still out of the top 12 sitting tied for 13th with David Ragan.  I have to say I am impressed wtih David Ragan.  He is giving everything he has to get into the Top 12.  Yesterday increased his chances to getting that 12th spot.  He finisheed 3rd.  Both he and Clint are only 26 points out of the 12th and final spot.  For those on teams on the bubble now is the time to step it up and just race balls to wall.  There are only 3 races left until the Chase.   

I know Tony still has won a race this year and I am handling as best as I can about not seeing the #20 Home Depot in Victory Lane. If Tony is going to make a push for his 3rd championship he is going to have to get across the finish line in first place.  That’s just the way it is this year.  With the way both Kyle Busch and Carl Edwards have been running this year, you are going to have put together a string of wins to beat these guys.  That’s the bottom line…

Now…I was a little stunned when I heard of the cheating incidents over at JGR with the #18 and #20 in the Nationwide Series.  Of all teams in the garage, JGR and cheating just doesn’t like something they do.  It was discovered that shims (1/4 inch magnet) were placed under the gas-pedal stop. What does this mean? In essence, shims were used to keep the gas pedal from being fully depressed, thus limiting the engines’ output thus affecting the results when going through the dyno. Penalties will probably be assessed on Tuesday.

Chicago

/ Trixie / 1 Comment

I didn’t watch much racing this weekend.  I was in the middle of preparing for a birthday for a now 5 year-old.  If you are a regular reader to The Park, you know Postman and myself are in the process of adopting a little boy (Little Smoke).  His birthday was on Saturday so I was quite busy running around trying to get things all in place for him and his guests.  

I did get a chance to watch a little of the Nationwide race on Friday night.  Congratulations to Kyle Busch for his victory.  

I did Tivo the prerace and part of the race since I wouldn’t be back home until after the race started.  However, I was so tired from the party, I really didn’t have the strength to get into the race.  I was semi-conscious enough to see Kyle make a last lap pass on Jimmie Johnson to take his 7th win of the season.   Congrats to Tony on a top 5 finish which moves him two spots in the standings. 

That’s about it for me.  I know there isn’t much about the race, but sometimes even I need a break from the grind.

One more thing…here is a picture of Little Smoke’s birthday cake.  He loves Wall-E so I proceeded to take the time to make him a Wall-E cake.  I have to say it was worth the hours I spent on Friday to see his reaction. (Please note, that is not a smudge on the actual cake.  I cannot release his name due to legal reasons at this point.)

Coke Zero 400 and a little extra

/ Trixie / Leave a comment

I hope everyone had a wonderful July 4th weekend.  Like Tony, I too was under the weather. 

I want to touch on a couple of things before getting into Saturday night’s race.  Congratulations to the #20 Nationwide team for winning another race.  This time it was Denny driving the #20.That makes what 9 wins this season for that team with Tony leading with 5 wins for the #20.  

Looks like the #5 will be occupied for the next two years by none other than Mark Martin.  Mark Martin announced this past weekend that he will run a full time schedule in 2009 for HMS.  I guess Mark wants to give it one more shot at winning a championship before he makes his exit out of NASCAR.  Well, he has a pretty good shot over at HMS.  But as with any championship run it will be a challenge, but if anyone is up to the challenge Mark Martin is.  Postman was very excited about the prospect of his favorite driver making a run for the championship next year.  I think it is kind of funny that he will be doing it in an HMS car.  He is not a big fan of the #88 and don’t even get him talking about the #24.  He told me the other day #48 is growing on him (and I have to admit it too, #48 doesn’t rub me the wrong way as in year’s past).  But either way he will be rooting on Mark. 

Now on to the festivities…in case you didn’t know with the numerous annoncements throught the broadcast and with commercials…if a Coke Racing Family driver won the Coke Zero 400 everyone would get a free 20 oz Coke Zero.

I have to say I enjoyed the race for the most part.  Nothing out of the ordinary really upset me other than the fact that Tony had to come out of the car.  I have to give major props to J.J. Yeley for bringing home the #20 in pretty good shape.  In fact he was in the Top 10 late in the race, but several cautions prevented J.J. from giving the boys a decent finish.  The #20 finished 20th and Tony dropped 3 spots to 12th in the point standings.  I know drivers hate to come out of their cars and hand it over to another driver, but at some point you have to decide what is best for your team as well as the other competitors and that is what Tony was feeling on Saturday. 

From the get go, I thought this was going to be an HMS dominated race and for the most part it was.  But with everything that is Daytona, only one of the 4 drivers finished in the top 10.  Dale Jr. who lead the most laps finished 8th.  While Jeff, Jimmie, and Casey finished 23rd, 30th, and 34th repsectively.  I would have found it somewhat funny if Jeff had gone on to win the race.  I mean, here we have THE Pepsi driver winning the Coke Zero 400.  I wonder if the Coke Executives were having heart attacks when they saw the #24 that close to victory.  Do you think they sent a case of Coke Zero to Carl?  And what was up with Jimmie in the pits?  Every time he exited his pit stall he swung wide. There were times he was moving cars close to or on the grass.  I believe one of the broadcasters mentioned about the pit selection causing some of the issues.  If that is the case, Chad needs to make note of it.  Next time choose a different pit.

As always with Daytona racing gets pretty hairy within the last 25 or so laps and Saturday was no exception.  As well all have been told cautions breed cautions.  Starting with lap 131, when the 6th caution flew, we had caution 7 (lap 136), caution 8 (lap 140), caution 9 (lap 149) and caution 10 (lap 157) what seemed like back to back cautions.  Just when the cars would get up to speed and moving, another caution would come out.  Caution 10 of course caused the race to move into overtime.  Jeff Gordon brought the field to the green and the next thing you know, there goes Jeff heading for the infield.  No yellow was thrown until Michael Waltrip, Sam Hornish, Dave Blaney, Travis Kvapil, J.J. Yeley and a host of others decided to come together. 

Have viewing footage, it was determined that Kyle Busch was ahead of Carl Edwards when the caution flew.  Congratulations to Kyle for winning his first race at Daytona and his 6th win of the season.  Was it me or did I hear fewer boos and more cheers from the fans?   There were still quite a few of boos, but now there were more cheers than weeks past.

Way to go David Reutiman…what was it 5 Lucky Dogs?  You finished a respectable 21st and on the lead lap.

Elliott Sadler is off the market.  Apparently Elliott is now engaged and is planning on a wedding some time next year I believe I heard them say.  Congratulations Elliott.

One last thing…testing policy changes…not sure how I feel about this one.  If NASCAR is going to change their policies regarding testing they need to make it fair for all teams.  I don’t know if just opening up Pandora’s box will fix things.  Because once you open it up, it will be a little difficult to close it.  We will just have to wait and see.

Funny thing happened on the way to work….sometimes you just have to laugh at yourself.  I was heading down to the ladies room at work this morning and noticed there was something not quite right with my shoe.  I thought maybe there was soemthing on it and that is why it felt weird.  If only that were it…but no it wasn’t.  I looked down and saw the problem.  I WAS WEARING TWO DIFFERENT SHOES!  Yep…that’s right I have on a brown sandel on my right foot and a black sandel on my left foot.  It wouldn’t be so bad because I have a pair of brown sandels that look like the black one I am wearing, but I put on the nice pretty one that has a decorative strap.  It’s ok to point and ridicule and even roll your hinies off laughing…because if you can’t laugh about life, then why bother living.

Park milestone…I reached the 20,000 vistor mark sometime this weekend!  Thanks to all of my regulars and lurkers.  Here’s to another 20,000.

A Sunday Drive

/ Trixie / 2 Comments

I have to admit I wasn’t looking forward to the Pocono race.  I am not a big fan of this race.  I guess because it can somtimes turn into a snoozefest, but yesterday wasn’t the case.  This race had a little bit of everything for everyone.

Yesterday’s race was the first broadcast for TNT.  TNT will broadcast the next 6 races up to the Brickyard where ESPN will take over the rest of the season.  Now I didn’t have any expectations for TNT.  I am not a fan of their broadcast, but you have to bear the good with the bad sometimes in life.  I have to admit I do like their Pride of NASCAR Series.  Yesterday’s installment was Bobby Allison.  It was a nice segment.  There were some audio issues during the race, but all in all not a bad broadcast.  One sticking point, I think they over did it a little with promos for The Bill Engvall Show, Saving Grace and my favorite of the TNT shows The Closer.  I am sure Fox does quite a few promos for their shows, but for some reason it felt like ever single time they went to commercial there was a promo. 

Now onto the race…

Kasey Kahne was the man to beat yesterday.  He had the fast car and it showed even in the face of adversity.  Around lap 70ish, Kasey made a pit stop to get 2-tires.  I guess they didn’t let the crew guys in on this because they thought it was for 4 tires.  Kasey took off with only 3 lugnuts on and had to come back around to the pits.  This mistake put him back in the pack.  Luckily it was early on in the race so he had some time to make up the ground he had gained early on.  And sure enough there he was around lap 97, in about 7th place. That right they my friends tells you what a good car Mr. Kahne had.  Congratulations to Kasey Kahne for winning his second race in his last 3 races and he did it from the pole.  As I recall in 2006, Kasey liked to start on the pole and go to victory lane.  I think if it weren’t for a early crash last week at Dover Kasey would have been a contender. 

Kyle Busch the points leader took a big hit yesterday in the standings with his 43rd place finish.  Sunday was the third leg of his “Bermuda Triangle” trek to three different race tracks.  He made history by doing this trifecta, however it didn’t yield any wins.  His best finish in the three races was at Texas with a 2nd place finish in the truck race Friday night.  Yesterday’s mishap I don’t believe was a result of all that traveling, I just think it was one  of those too many cars not enough real estate things.  We can’t also forget Kyle was also at Eldora Wednesday night for The Prelude.  I am sure Kyle is catching up on all that sleep he missed over the weekend.  I for one I’m tired just thinking about all that mileage.  Of course he got to travel with style…it’s not like he had to fly Southwest Airlines to all the destinations.

Now there were lots of drivers who had fantastic days, Brian Vickers (2nd), Bobby Labonte (11th), A.J. Allmendinger (12th).  Kudos to both Kurt Busch and Kevin Harvick for their finishes of 8th and 13th respectively.  Kurt spun and had damaged to his splitter, but was able to come back and race his way to a top ten finish.  Same thing for Kevin, he had to start the race at the back of the pack right before the race started due to a battery change.    Greg Biffle looked like he was going to have a great day at Pocono (just like Tony), but he too got nailed for a late speeding penalty which ultimately ruined his good run.  He did however finish 15th which was way better than Smoke.

Now a few words about Smoke.  Once again,  Tony had a car that could win the race.  In fact he was up front leading everyone for a time and I thought this might be the race he would see his first win of the season.  But alas, it was not to be on Sunday.  He was nailed with a late speeding penalty and ended up back in the pack.  He finished 35th.  Guess who finished in front of Tony?  The #19.  Perhaps that was why Tony got caught speeding, he saw Elliott coming and wanted to get way ahead of him–just kidding to all you Sadler fans out there.  UGH!  What does this Stewart fan have to do to get the mojo workin’ for Smoke?  Maybe he just wanted to have his first win of the season in Michigan this week.  I mean talk about a great birthday present!  How ’bout Smoke?  Win one for Trixie!

 

#88 Wins

/ Trixie / Leave a comment

That’s right folks the #88 has seen Victory Lane.  Unfortunately, it was not THE #88.  Congratulations to Brad Keselowski for getting his first win in the Nationwide series. Way to go Brad!

Nashville was the second leg of the Busch Bermuda Triangle. Last night wasn’t too good to Busch he finished 20th. Now for the final leg of the triangle is Pocono today. Even though Busch qualified 10th, he crashed his primary car and will start from the back of the pack. It will definitely be interesting to see if Kyle can make his way to the front.

Bermuda Triangle?

/ Trixie / 1 Comment

Kyle Busch will be attempting all three races this weekend.  This may not sound unusual, but all three series are in different locations so it will be a challenge to see how all that traveling will affect his on track performance.  But if anyone can pull it off, it would probably be Kyle.

First stop–Texas Motor Speedway.  Too bad I won’t get the chance to head on over to TMS tonight.  If I didn’t leave 6 hours away I probably would head out after work.  Also running in conjunction with the trucks this weekend are the Indy cars.  Not a bad way to start a race weekend.

2nd stop–Nashville–where he will try to keep to win yet another race.

And finally–Pocono on Sunday where he will be going back to back wins this weekend.

Whew…I just get tired thinking about how much he will spend flying to each desination.

Yes, I did.  I am now an offical member of the Kyle fan club.  It’s not too bad.  I have been a member of Tony’s going on my fourth year.  I good some pretty cool stuff with my membership fee ($35).  I got a key chain, autographed information card (you know the ones you can pick up at the track), mouse pad for my office, one of those wrist bands with his foundation website on it, a koozie, a lightweight fleece blanket, t-shirt, but most importantly little packets of M&Ms.  Not bad for my $35 bucks.

I am hoping Tony’s luck will change this weekend and he comes away with a win at Pocono.  If I can’t I really want him to win at Michigan…why?  IT’S MY BIRTHDAY!  That’s right the boys will be racing at Michigan on my birthday.  For those who might now that is also Father’s Day.  So to all those father’s out there, THANK YOU.  It’s kind of cool that all of you want to celebrate my birthday with me!

UPDATE…KYLE BUSCH FINISHES 2ND AT TEXAS.  He started at the back of the pack and came in second.  One race down and two more to go.

Don’t Go To The Concession Stand

/ Trixie / 2 Comments

That’s right folks!  You don’t want to go to the concession stand because you might miss something.  That is what could be said of today’s race.  

The race wasn’t even in it’s 20 lap and BAM…it was a gigantic meet and greet coming out of Turn 2.  From what I could tell of the numerous replays Fox showed over and over, Sadler came down while passing the #40 and was clipped by the #38.  Next thing we all know, Elliott decided to make his own demolition derby.  Tony had no where to go but into the side of the #19 car along with several other cars.  I know it looked like Denny didn’t slow down, but to be honest going at those speeds that car probably couldn’t get whoaed up in time.  Of course, I saw other cars running around Denny able to whoa up, but I wasn’t driving his car.  For me the race was pretty much a wash.  Tony did come back into the race about a 100 or so laps down, but none the less back on the track.   Tony finished 41st and fell three spots in the standings to 11th.  Oh in case we are keeping score this year, this is the 2nd time Sadler has been involved in a crash that has taken out Stewart. On a lighter note the hood on Sadler’s car was pretty much intact for him.  He was planning to auction off the hood to his car from today’s race to raise money for autism.  

The race for me was pretty much a snoozefest and it wasn’t because Tony was just driving around the track, I really thought it was a snoozefest.  In fact I did take a nap some time during the race.  The race was pretty much dominated by three different drivers–Greg Biffle, Carl Edwards, and Kyle Busch not necessarily in that order with several green flag runs.  Congratulations to Kyle Busch for his 4th win of the season.  Carl finished 2nd with Carl’s teammate finishing 3rd after having voltage issues.

In case anyone wasn’t aware Dale Jr. has gone 74 races without a win.  Of course this statistic didn’t escape the Fox broadcast.  This little tidbit was flashed on the screen at 1:41 pm Central Daylight Savings Time.

One last thing..

Little Smoke was busy playing in the house today because it was way too hot for him to be outside (it reached over the century mark today).  He decided to build a race car using some interesting items sitting around the house.  Please notice the “paint scheme”.  He is such a wonderful little boy who is very creative and will tell you that Tony Stewart is his favorite driver…just ask.  Apologies to my dad who just happends to be a Junior, but there will be no Junior fan in this household. He was so excited when Fox was interviewing Tony before the race.  He stopped what he was doing to watch.   Looks like this #20 faired better today.