Kevin Harvick Attacks Kyle Busch Car During Showtime Southern 500

It's been awhile since we had a post on the glorious thing that is NASCAR and I promised that this was worth the wait.

During the Showtime Southern 500 in Darlington, Kevin Harvick took issue with fellow driver Kyle Busch and the bizarre scene unfolded in the below video:



(Courtesy of No Guts, No Glory)

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NASCAR's Aaron's 499 Ends In Photo Finish For Jimmie Johnson

With all the playoff basketball and hockey, you might have forgotten that NASCAR held the Aaron's 499 on Sunday in Talladega.

The race was one of the closest in NASCAR history as Jimmie Johnson won by less than 0.002 seconds with a little assistance with teammate Dale Earnhardt Jr.:



(Courtesy of Now Public)

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Fantasy Drafthelp: 2011 NASCAR Rankings

TOP TIER

1 Jimmy Johnson

2 Kevin Harvick

3 Denny Hamlin

4 Kyle Busch

5 Carl Edwards

6 Jeff Gordon

7 Matt Kenseth

8 Tony Stewart

9 Clint Bowyer

10 Greg Biffle

11 Mark Martin

12 Jeff Burton

SECOND TIER

13 Joey Logano

14 Kurt Busch

15 Ryan Newman

16 Jamie McMurray

17 Brian Vickers

18 Juan Pablo Montoya

THIRD TIER

19 Dale Earnhardt, Jr.

20 David Reutimann

21 Kasey Kahne

FOURTH TIER

22 Martin Truex, Jr.

23 Brad Keselowski

24 AJ Allmendinger

25 Paul Menard

FIFTH TIER

26 Marcos Ambrose

27 David Ragan

28 Regan Smith

29 Bobby Labonte

30 David Gilliland

31 Travis Kvapil

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FDH Lounge: Midseason motorsports update - NASCAR

The biggest story of the year in NASCAR concerns the man at the top of the season’s leaderboard – a Chase qualifier from 2006 to 2008 who tumbled to 19th last year.

Kevin Harvick has rebounded in stunning fashion and has rounded out his game to levels unforeseen by just about anyone. For example, he did not average a Top-20 finish on restrictor plate tracks in ’09, but won the Bud Shootout and also the July Daytona race this year. His name was not among those widely speculated as those having a decent chance to dethrone four-time defending champ Jimmie Johnson, but he has established himself on that short list with a fury as the top driver at present.

Elsewhere on the landscape …

^ Jeff Gordon (second at present), Jimmie Johnson (third), Denny Hamlin (fourth), Kurt Busch (fifth), Kyle Busch (sixth), Matt Kenseth (eighth), Tony Stewart (ninth), Carl Edwards (tenth), Greg Biffle (eleventh) and Clint Bowyer (twelfth) are all in position to qualify for the Chase as was expected by most observers. Kyle in particular is putting the fluky 13th-place finish of 2009 behind him strongly. Jeff Burton (seventh after a 17th place finish in ’09) and Dale Earnhardt, Jr. (13th after a 25th place finish in ’09) are also sitting in Chase contention at present with decent comeback campaigns. Lil’ E still has a current winless streak of more than two years; however, his recent Nationwide series win at Daytona is expected to deliver momentum to he and his team. We shall see.

^ Of the other drivers widely expected to be in contention for the Chase, Mark Martin is in 14th place and won’t need to run too much better than he has thus far to edge into the qualifying. Ryan Newman and Kasey Kahne are positioned not far behind him. Brian Vickers’ blood clots sadly cut short his campaign and took him out of contention altogether. Juan Pablo Montoya has been a huge disappointment, following his breakthrough finish of eighth in 2009 with a plunge back to 21st at present.

^ As expected, David Reutimann, phenom Joey Logano and Martin Truex, Jr. are on the absolute periphery of Chase contention at the moment. They are joined at that level by surprise Daytona 500 winner Jamie McMurray, who predictably was not able to sustain that early level of success.

^ AJ Allmendinger and Sam Hornish, Jr. continue their fitful transitions from open-wheel racing and each has to be eyeballing what would be significantly greener pastures back in IndyCar right about now.

NASCAR chairman Brian France has indicated that the series is considering tweaking the Chase rules for 2011 to try to ensure that more drivers are in strong contention leading up to the final races. This would of course dilute the effect of strong racing all throughout the Chase, which is the exact element that has allowed Johnson to more or less coast to the title at the very end frequently through the course of his four consecutive victories. Such a modification would be reminiscent of the creation of the Chase in the first place, when Matt Kenseth floated through the 2003 season with only one win but claimed the title anyway and led series officials to believe that a playoff format was necessary. Unsurprisingly, Johnson thinks little of the proposed changes, which would cause the championship to be decided over a smaller sample size over the last month or so. He likes the system just the way it is – and why wouldn’t he?

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FOX's Daytona 500 Commercial: Mixing U2 and NASCAR

Let's be honest, when first think of music that is associated with NASCAR, I'm pretty sure that U2 is not high on the list.

However, Fox decided to use a U2 song called, "Bad" for a Daytona 500 promotional commercial.

The commercial is actually pretty cool, "If you wear Richard Petty's Hat, You will see highlights."

(Courtesy of From the Marbles)

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Even NASCAR is going "green"

I can picture it now, the environmentalists tree huggers and the drunk NASCAR fans in a drum circle.

Last week on an episode of Jimmy Kimmel Live, he mentioned that NASCAR was holding a "green race" over the weekend and NASCAR's initative of going green. If there was not a more unlikely marriage, sans Liza Minnelli and David Gest.

I will say though, that video does make me want some hummus.

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I Love the Internet - How Dale Davis Helped Me Find Jesus (Well, His Racing Team Anyways)

In our Game 5 liveblog, Outside the Boxscore talked about tons of random stuff. At one point, Ben noticed Dale Davis in the crowd and mentioned it, with Sean (Snagamat) writing "Dale Davis could be Billy Bob Thornton in Slingblade if not for the night-dark quality of his skin.

So of course I had to look these guys up. Billy Bob. Dale Davis (whose real name is Elliott Lydell, so how weird a nickname is Dale?). I sort of see the comparison, it's mostly in the big lower lip though.

Anyways, I also found this mug shot of Dale (along with this accompanying story) about how Dale was acting out in public one night and ended up getting stun gunned by police. Having had a friend get stun gunned by cops after some wild antics in college, that stuff hurts, and I was kind of surprised to see Dale had been stunned, since he had seemed a nice guy (But I guess he did play for the Portland Jail Trailblazers, so go figure). I found out that Dale was acquitted of all charges, which was reassuring, because I hadn't thought he was a bad guy.

Before I realized that he had been acquitted, I searched the internet for other proof that Dale was a good guy. Maybe he donated money to a good cause, or helped twitter broadcast the Iran protests, or saved a bunny. I was just looking for anything.

What did I find? Dale Davis was once part owner of E and M motorsports, which started as an offshoot of Victory in Jesus racing. Not exactly what I had in mind, but hey it's something Dale Davis did, and it's random, so that's something. A little research into E and M showed that they were very nearly bought by former Atlanta Falcon Terrance Mathis (who is 2nd all time in career 2 point conversions made) and his racing team, Victory Motorsports, but this deal fell through. So that was sort of interesting. But I was more interested in this Victory in Jesus Motorsports, and so I delved a little bit deeper.

Apparently Victory in Jesus Racing started in 2001 as Morgan Shepherd's self founded truck team. With little money to spend, Shepherd spent much of the year acting as his own pit crew, climbing out of the car during pit stops to change his own tires and add his own fuel. Morgan didn't finish very well with these long pit stops, and ended the 2001 season 26th in points with a best finish of 11th (which is still pretty impressive). The next year his best finish (and only race he finished) was 17th, though he somehow beat his points total from the year before and finished 24th in points. He also began racing Nascar on a limited basis, but his best finish of the year was 40th, and so he clearly wasn't very good at that either. More years and more one man pit stops led to more last place finishes and DNFs. Finally, in 2006, Morgan sold some interest of his team to investors and renamed the team Victory Motorsports (and that, my friend, is where Terrance Mathis came in, and where this article basically ends).

On an end note, Morgan Shepherd was not a terrible driver, with 4 Nascar wins (his last in '93) and 15 truck wins (last in '88) to his credit. However, his best finish in Nascar for VIJ was 32nd, which sucks. And when he finally created another Church-based team, Faith Motorsports, in July of 2006, his best finish between two races was 42nd. Now to be fair, many of these races included Morgan showing up, running until he ran out of tires, and then leaving the track because he didn't have any more tires due to lack of funding. But sadly Morgan Shepherd never again found victory (lane) in Jesus. I guess Dale Davis and Terrance Mathis were convinced they might, since they bought shares in the team that once was VIJ. But for the record, I count 0 Nascar wins, 0 Busch wins, and 0 Truck wins for Victory Racing, with or without Jesus. So that's something, and all this random information you just read is why I love the internet.

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Mark Martin wins Nascar race because other drivers ran out of fuel

You just can't make this stuff up.

3 laps to go in yesterday's Lifelock 400 Sprint Cup race at Michigan Speedway. The top three are Jimmie Johnson (who had been dominating all day), Greg Biffle, and 50 year old Mark Martin. Certainly looked like Johnson was going to win the race, as he's done so many times before.

But then, with 2 laps left, Jimmie Johnson ran out of fuel. It happens, Nascar teams try to stretch fuel as far as they can and take chances. And this one simply didn't work out for Johnson. So Biffle passed him and took first. Easy win.

But no. Less than one lap later, Biffle ran out of fuel. So as the final lap began, Biffle was coasting just as Johnson had been a lap before, hoping that his car would somehow make it across the finish line. Mark Martin passed him for the lead, which had to feel great considering he was settling for third just 2 laps ago because he too was conserving fuel.

The best part? As he neared the finish line, Martin ran out of fuel too, and he actually won by coasting over the finish life. Sometimes it's better to be lucky than good (More info on this race can be found here).

The other best part? This is the second time this has happened to Jimmie Johnson this year. How much does that suck?

Biffle finished the race in 5th, Johnson finished 22nd. So next time you run out of fuel on the road and feel like a dumbass when you have to call AAA, remember this: It (literally) happens to the best of us.

UPDATE: Here is TNT's Coverage of the Final 3 Laps of the Lifelock 400

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Carl Edwards channeled his inner Ricky Bobby

During last Sunday's race at Talladega, Carl Edwards got into a late crash before finishing and then brought out shades of Will Ferrell character in Talladega Nights, "Rick Bobby" by running across the finish line.

Kudos to NESW Sports for providing this mash-up of the actual race along with scenes from the movie.

By the way, here is also the clip from Talladega Nights of Ricky Bobby running around thinking that he is on fire.



Also, here is the possibly the funniest clip in the movie with Amy Adams and Will Ferrell with "Inspirational Speech":



"Things are going to get crazy, we're going to make animal noises."

(Courtesy of NESW Sports)

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