By Lou Modestino
NASCAR’s Generation 6 Cars are still a big ? even after Vegas
When the black and whites flew at Sin City, it was Matt Kenseth with Kasey Kahne next, Brad Keselowski, Kyle Busch, Carl Edwards, Jimmie Johnson, Junior, Martin Truex, Kevin Harvick and Paul Menard before what appeared to be a pretty decent crowd.
In Victory Lane Kenseth admitted that he was nervous because he thought that Kasey had the best car. He blurted, “But we were successful because we did our pit stops without any incidents.” Kahne didn’t exactly agree when he revealed, “I felt that Matt was going to beat us anyway. He was able to run better lines. All things considered, we still had a great day and lots of fun.”
After the race, Kezelowski wasn’t harsh on himself and his crew when he said, “We kept working on the pit stops. It was a good effort, and it was better than what we did in practice. But we just weren’t as fast as Kasey.” Kyle Busch said, “We had tire problems which resulted in having to claw our way back to the front.” Yet he thought that he did well on the short runs. And according to Carl Edwards, “It was knife edge racing all day!” A little dejected, consistent front runner Jimmie Johnson said, “We were flexy and I wish I had more at the end.” But JR seemed positive, “We had a real good race. I enjoyed the racetrack, and I’m pretty happy.”
SPEED’s Bob Dilner post-race belief was that the Gen. 6 cars were designed to run better on a 1-1/2 miler like Vegas, yet we heard comments from others that the cars were loose all week. Dilner also said that Toyota had a great run, especially Kenseth, but admitted that “these cars need to be tweaked.” So if he knows that, and we know that, what’s NASCAR’s problem with Danny Hamlin saying almost the same thing and then getting hit with a 25 Grand fine?
As far as points are concerned, after Vegas JJ is the leader, Keselowski is -5, JR is -10 and Hamlin is -27.
The talking heads in the booth yapped that besides Johnson and Keselowski going at each other on the track, there was also a battle between their crew chiefs, Chad Knaus and Paul “The Howler” Wolf. Competition going nowhere fast.
In Saturday’s Nationwide race at Vegas, Sam Hornish, Jr., won it by holding off Kyle Busch. Hornish is now the Nationwide point leader. So now it’s off to Bristol next weekend to witness lots of crashes and crumpled machinery. That’s the reason that teams bring their worst cars.
Elsewhere, Sebastian Olger won the Rally of Mexico, his second of the year, while Ryan Vilopoto won the SuperX at Daytona.
NASCAR Sprint Cup Series racing on FOX posted a 5.6/12 with 9.1 million viewers on Sunday for the Subway Fresh Fit 500 from Phoenix. Though that’s flat with last year’s performance of a 5.6/12 (9.2 million), Sunday’s race easily ranks as the highest-rated and most-watched event of the weekend. Through two telecasts, NASCAR Sprint Cup Racing on FOX is averaging a 7.8/17 (13.0 million viewers), up +11% on Households and up +9% on average audience over last year’s 7.0/13 (11.9 million). That came from Fox Sports.