Busch Home on the Pole

LAS VEGAS, Nev. - Kyle Busch backed up his fast practice lap by winning the pole Friday for the UAW-Dodge 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway his first at his home track.Busch turned a lap of 182.352 mph in his Joe Gibbs racing M&M's Toyota. It was Busch's third career Sprint Cup Series pole and his first since Phoenix in 2006.The pole continued Busch's hot streak to start the NASCAR season.He comes into the weekend's race leading the Sprint Cup Series standings as well as the Craftsman Truck Series while sitting in second place over in the Nationwide Series."It’s cool, it’s fun and it’s great and all, but we’re two weeks in," Busch said. "We need it two weeks to go. There’s a lot of stuff, a lot of laps and a lot of corners to go through and a lot of pit stops and everything else."Hopefully we can keep it and ride this wave for however long it lasts. I’m a pretty good surfer, so it shouldn’t be too hard."Last week's Auto Club Speedway winner Carl Edwards qualified second in his Roush Fenway Racing Office Depot Ford.Mark Martin, Jeff Gordon and Mike Skinner, the fastest of the drivers who needed to qualify on time, rounded out the top five.


Greg Biffle, Scott Riggs, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Kurt Busch and Elliott Sadler completed the first ten qualifiers.Jimmie Johnson, who is shooting for his fourth straight UAW-Dodge 400 win, had a tough qualifying effort and turned in the 35th fastest lap.Despite the effort and the bad start to the season at Daytona, Johnson isn't concerned.“Man it’s only two races in," he said. "From our standpoint, we finished second and third last week and unfortunately two cars were wrecked early. Daytona is Daytona; we’ve thrown that out the window. We feel like we’re doing just fine. We have nothing to fear, nothing to worry about."

Vegas crucial stop if Mears is to make a run in 2008

This wasn't the way Casey Mears wanted to start his 2008 season. Running third in the closing laps of the Daytona 500, he tried to block Tony Stewart and crashed hard into the outside wall, finishing 35th. And at Fontana, Mears lost control of his car after running over water on the track, and wound up having to climb out of his overturned vehicle, saddled with a 42nd-place finish (watch video).
After two races, Mears has accumulated 95 points and is mired in 42nd place in the Sprint Cup standings. So what are his chances of rebounding to make the Chase for the Sprint Cup some 24 races from now?
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Taking into consideration the current championship structure, of the 120 drivers who would have qualified for the Chase in the past 10 seasons, just 26 were outside of the top 20 after the first two races of the year. And only five had fewer than 130 points -- and none had less than 118.
For the most point, drivers who had a miserable Daytona 500 were able to bounce back in the season's second race -- or vice versa. Tony Stewart's done it three times, including 2007, when he finished last at Daytona but eighth at Fontana. Jeff Burton, Terry Labonte, Mark Martin, Jimmie Johnson and Matt Kenseth have done it two times each.
It's rarer to see a Chase contender start out with two consecutive finishes outside of the top 20 -- and even rarer still for a driver with an average finish of 30th or worse rebound to make the Chase.
However, it has been done. In fact, at least one driver in two of the past three seasons has had less than 130 points after two races and still gone on to make the Chase. A third rallied to a top-12 position in points by Richmond, but 2006 marked the last year only 10 drivers were eligible for the Chase. In each case, however, that driver used Las Vegas as a springboard to jump-start his season.
In 2005, Kenseth finished 42nd at Daytona and 26th at Fontana, then came to Vegas and wound up eighth. In 2006, Greg Biffle started slowly -- 31st at Daytona and 42nd at Fontana -- and used an eighth-place finish at Las Vegas to regain his momentum. And last season, Martin Truex Jr. had just 118 points after poor finishes in his first two seasons, but was 12th at Las Vegas and eighth at Atlanta.
In 2003, Dale Earnhardt Jr. had 124 points after consecutive top-30 finishes to start the season. He promptly tore off finishes of second, third and sixth on his way to an eventual third-place finish in the points. Had there been a Chase that season, he would have been second in the standings behind Kenseth after 26 races.
And then there's the special case of Kevin Harvick's 2001 season. Taking over at Rockingham after Dale Earnhardt was killed in the season-opener, Harvick finished 14th. He would go on to finish eighth at Las Vegas and then beat Jeff Gordon in a thrilling finish at Atlanta, giving him enough momentum to overcome missing one race. After the race at Richmond, Harvick was eighth in the standings.
So Mears will be facing uncharted territory if he is able to turn his season around to that extent. However, there are some factors that do play in his favor.
Those two crashes were the first time Mears had suffered consecutive DNFs since his rookie season with Chip Ganassi in 2003. In four full seasons since, he was running at the finish in all but 11 races. In addition, Mears began to show the ability last season to string together good finishes.
After his surprising victory in the Coca-Cola 600, Mears finished 13th at Dover and then scored back-to-back fourth-place finishes at Pocono and Michigan. Later in the season, he went on a streak of 10 consecutive finishes of 22nd or better, culminating in four top-10 finishes in a row from New Hampshire to Talladega.
So there's still time, but Las Vegas looms as a major turning point in his season if Mears has any hopes of getting back into championship contention in 2008

Book explains science of NASCAR in, out of garage

About halfway into The Physics of NASCAR: How to Make Steel + Gas + Rubber = Speed, Larry McReynolds describes a race car as "a science experiment."
The former crew chief nailed what's most compelling about physicist Dr. Diandra Leslie-Pelecky's scientific deep-dive into NASCAR. During a race weekend, teams must capture data on, make sense of, and ultimately correctly adjust thousands of complex variables on a car. The author ultimately succeeds in the unenviable task of making this unfolding science experiment interesting to the reader.
Each NASCAR team's battles in the ongoing war against continuing critical balances -- in tire pressure, myriad chassis adjustments, aerodynamics, even how much a driver can safely perspire -- comes through most vividly as Leslie-Pelecky observes Elliott Sadler's No. 19 team from the pits at several races last season.
I won't give away the ending. Let's just say the driver from Virginia exhibits grace and charm amid significant challenges.
Leslie-Pelecky, a physics professor at the University of Texas, is an inquisitive scientist packing a novelist's eye -- and nose. Walking into a race shop for the first time, she notes a "characteristic aroma." She later learns it's a mixture of brake cleaner and gear oil.
Common fan experiences, like the traditional pre-race flyover, become a data-rich science lesson: "The planes are never where you expect them to be when you look up because light waves travel about a million times faster than sound waves."
An explanation of car paint schemes (which today are mostly decal wraps) gloriously detours into cow farts (the smell of a unique chemical in automotive paints), and why the Wood Brothers employ a removable decal wrap on the Little Debbie car (sponsor executives, who are Seventh Day Adventists, don't conduct business on Saturdays, which includes NASCAR practice).
Teams use lighter oil during qualifying. Right side tires are bigger than left side tires. NASCAR windshields are made from the same plastic as you iPod screen. Lug nuts are painted florescent pink because that's the most jarring color to the human eye.
Do we really need to know all this? Well, if you are a NASCAR fan, yes -- you do!
More substantively, Leslie-Pelecky brings readers inside many off-limits places: the fabrication department at Hendrick Motorsports; the No. 19 hauler at Atlanta Motor Speedway; the shop floor at Roush Fenway Racing; a crash test in Lincoln, Neb.; and the NASCAR Research & Development Center.
Dr. Diandra Leslie-Pelecky's scientific deep-dive into NASCAR is profiled in this week's TIME magazine.
Leslie-Pelecky likes explaining things. Some are endemic to NASCAR, like how engines, brakes, shocks and springs work, and why torque is as important as horsepower in producing speed.
Her tangential points are the most fun. In explaining the sport's safety advances, she detours into the story of a spider silk handkerchief stopping a bullet in a gunfight. The author's cheery tone keeps her liberally sprinkled esoteric references away from intellectual show off-ism. The drivers start their engines, and the wide-eyed physicist inserts her ear plugs. She can't help but note that chickens and sharks can grow back the hair cells that loud noises damage, but humans cannot.
In simple language, with sometimes funny descriptions, Leslie-Pelecky explains track and sway bars, wedge, and tire camber, how a "toed-in" car looks and handles.
It may seem downright bizarre to explain oil viscosity by comparing engine oil flow to Dale Earnhardt Jr. dodging media in a crowded garage, but she makes it work.
The Physics of NASCAR is an "idiot's guide" for those of us who have watched too many races to be dummies.
Consider this book required curriculum in our sport for anyone who wants to work in NASCAR, announce a race, or simply be the smartest NASCAR fan in the room.

By the Numbers: Las Vegas

One grew up 337 miles from the site of Las Vegas Motor Speedway, the other grew up on a three-eighths-mile tract of land adjacent to Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
One is 32, the other is 22.
One traveled 2,391 miles to join Hendrick Motorsports, the other traveled 2,233 miles to work for Hendrick before packing up after four years and moving to Joe Gibbs Racing.
There are miles of differences between Jimmie Johnson and Kyle Busch, but their roads have brought them to Busch's hometown this weekend -- one seeking to extend a streak, the other seeking to break one.
Johnson has won three consecutive races at Las Vegas heading into Sunday's UAW-Dodge 400 (3:30 p.m. ET, FOX) and aims to make it four in a row (listen to more). But it's been 33 races since Busch celebrated the first victory in the new car (Bristol, March 25, 2007). Johnson is the defending champion; Busch is the current points leader.
Although not a sure bet, seeing either of them in Victory Lane Sunday night isn't a high-stakes gamble -- the numbers line up.
4Consecutive victories by Jimmie Johnson at Lowe's Motor Speedway between 2004-2005, the last time a Cup driver won at the same track four consecutive times.
4Consecutive victories by Jeff Gordon in the fall event at Darlington Raceway between 1995-1998, the last time a Cup driver won the same event four consecutive times.
4Consecutive victories by Jimmie Johnson in 2007 between Oct. 21-Nov. 11, the last time a Cup driver won four consecutive races on the schedule.
4Finishing position of Kyle Busch in the season's first two races. Busch has three consecutive top-10 finishes at his home track of Las Vegas (second, third

N'wide race moved again, will run Monday at Fontana

History was almost made Sunday night at Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, Calif., but Mother Nature had other ideas. Now it moves to Monday.
Extensive rain delays forced NASCAR to reschedule a doubleheader on Monday. The Stater Bros. 300 Nationwide Series race will be run immediately following the postponed Auto Club 500 Sprint Cup race, set for a 1 p.m. start.
Jeff Burton will start on the pole as the grid was set per the NASCAR rulebook after qualifying was rained out.
The doubleheader had first been scheduled for Sunday. After rain washed out the Nationwide race on Saturday night, NASCAR officials rescheduled the race for Sunday immediately following the Sprint Cup race, scheduled to start at 4 p.m. ET. It would have been the first time in NASCAR history a race was run at the same track after a Cup race on the same day.
But that didn't work.
The start of the Cup race was delayed, then endured multiple red flags and weather delays. It forced officials to move the Nationwide Series race to Monday. Hours after that, the Cup race was also rescheduled.
The weather is supposed to be much better on Monday, with sunny skies and highs in the mid-60s.

Much more than race day lost when rain pours down

As the rain pounded down over Auto Club Speedway of Southern California this past weekend, it might as well have been pennies hitting the ground rather than water.
The postponement from Sunday afternoon to early Monday was costly to ACS officials in terms of lost revenues for concessions, souvenirs and the like, but what really rang the cash register was paying for all the hourly employees to come back for another day's work.

"Anybody that is working your race is an hourly employee," said one former track official. "If you want them to come back and direct traffic, park cars or whatever it is they do for you, you have to pay that hourly rate."
Security guards, concession-stand staffers, ushers, program sellers, waste management personnel, you name it and there's a time clock attached. Say there's 1,000 people working the rainout, at about $8 an hour -- that's $8,000 an hour times 10 hours or $80,000. It's likely more than that, much more since it's California we're talking about, and that's just the hourly staffing requirement.
That's in addition to another day's worth of insurance for the entire track -- most tracks are covered 24/7, 365, but the rates go up a bit for a race weekend, and the coverage changes.
Lest you think that ACS went broke this past weekend, there is the fact that ticket monies were not refunded because of rain. "Fans with a ticket stub for either Saturday's NASCAR doubleheader or Sunday's Auto Club 500 will be entitled to free general admission grandstand seating for both of [Monday's] rescheduled races," was the way it was put on Auto Club Speedway's Web site.
Vendors lose money too, because if it's raining, there aren't many lines at the souvenir trailers. If it's raining like it was at California, there's a good chance that many people never left the hotel.
The cost to race fans is fairly steep, too. Another hotel room at $250 per, another meal out at $75, more gas for the car, lost hours at work ... the list goes on.
NASCAR itself has costs associated with a rainout. The same costs that fans incur -- lodging, travel, rental cars, rebooked flights -- apply to the NASCAR officials on the road, and there's another day's pay involved as well.
In short, rainouts profit no one except hotels, airlines, car rental companies and other service outlets.
Think of the drivers, who lose a day of precious "free time" with family, and crew members who have one less day to turn around the next racecar as well as one less day at home.
Reporters, TV personnel, media center staffers, radio personalities, all are forced to stay another day as well.
It's a cost of doing business when you hold events that are subject to the fickleness of Mother Nature.

Of course, there are those in the sport who attempt to make a bad situation just a little more palatable. Take Las Vegas Motor Speedway, for instance.
LVMS, owned by Speedway Motorsports Inc, is offering a special promotion for Nationwide Series fans this week. Race fans who bring a ticket stub from the rain-delayed Stater Bros. 300 can buy tickets to the Sam's Town 300 on Saturday for just $25.
"We're making this gesture to do our part to help the series grow," LVMS president Chris Powell said. "While we have sold more than 100,000 tickets to the Sam's Town 300 this Saturday, we have plenty of room to accommodate those loyal race fans who have endured the poor weather in Southern California."
Nothing like a little gamesmanship in the midst of torrents of rainwater, is there?
Ticket insurance, an idea that caught on last year, is available for races at Auto Club Speedway, but rain is not among the covered reasons for a claim, which are:
• "Illness or serious Injury; • Traffic accidents -- which could prevent you from getting to an event; • Mechanical Breakdown -- if your car breaks down within 48 hours of the event ; • Airline delay -- if your plane or other Common Carrier is delayed (includes bad weather) while going to the event; • Home or Business Issues -- if your home or business is uninhabitable due to fire, flood, vandalism, burglary or natural disasters; Care for a family member -- serious injury to a family member, requiring you to provide care; • Felonious Assault -- if you are a victim of a felonious assault within 3 days prior to an event; • Employer Termination -- providing protection against a lay-off; • Jury Duty -- if you are required to serve on jury duty after having purchased an event ticket; • Required to Work -- if your employer requires you to work during the event; • Work Relocation -- if you are relocated by your company over 100 miles from your home; • Military Duty -- if you are required to miss an event as a result of military orders."
Nowhere in the document on the site or in the policy itself is rain mentioned as a reason for an insurance claim.
So now you know at least one reason why NASCAR does its best to complete its events on the day advertised. It's a whole lot cheaper for everyone involved!

For Las Vegas, California may offer a cautionary tale

They are two facilities bound by geography and the NASCAR schedule, separated only by the width of the Mojave Desert and 237 miles of Interstate 15. Las Vegas Motor Speedway and Auto Club Speedway of Southern California both opened in the late 1990s. They both feature snow-capped mountains in the distance. They're both intermediate tracks with sparkling infield facilities, and the occasional celebrity seen wandering through the garage area.
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There's another similarity, as well. Las Vegas wants a second annual Sprint Cup date. And California is an example of what can happen if you get one.
For years now Speedway Motorsports Inc. chairman Bruton Smith has been lobbying for a second NASCAR weekend for his 1.5-mile track in the desert, a refrain that increased in significance the instant he acquired New Hampshire Motor Speedway and the two dates that came with it. And who can blame him? Las Vegas is a complete, unqualified hit, a 142,000-seat facility that's sold out six years in a row. It's provided a needed pro sports presence to a city that otherwise hangs its hat on a golf tournament and the occasional fight. And it's received overwhelming support from local leaders in return. When Smith wanted to build a drag strip in Las Vegas, he didn't have to threaten to move the racetrack to Pahrump.
They've expanded the grandstand, they've increased the banking, they've repaved the surface, they've revamped the garage. The Las Vegas Motor Speedway that the Sprint Cup tour visits on Sunday is an absolute temple of speed, an unparalleled facility in the most visited city in America. A second date would be a sure thing, right?
Maybe. The last time something in NASCAR seemed like a sure thing, it was the awarding of a second date to another racetrack far west with a long line of sellout crowds behind it. The facility then known as California Speedway had drawn a full house for every Cup event it had ever hosted when parent company International Speedway Corp. and NASCAR took a date from North Carolina Speedway and a schedule spot from Darlington Raceway so the 2-mile facility in Fontana could have a second race weekend. With a metro area of 16 million to draw from, a car-crazy Southern California culture, and a speedway that had lived seven years without seeing an empty seat, the move seemed as sure as a Kobe Bryant dunk.
Except it wasn't. In the five years since California was awarded that second date, the speedway hasn't sold out. In some cases, it hasn't come close. ISC officials seemed to overestimate the demand. NASCAR saddled the track with a rainy spring date and a 100-degree summer one. Track officials have the thankless and unenviable job of trying to sell tickets in a fractured and fickle market with plenty of people, but also plenty of other sports teams, plenty of diversions, and plenty of other things to do.
Fast facts
What
UAW-Dodge 400
When
4:30 p.m. ET Sunday
TV
FOX, 3:30 p.m. ET
Radio
PRN, 4:30 p.m. ET
Track Page Tickets Travel
The result is the 92,000-seat gorilla in the NASCAR universe, an under-performing facility that draws more critics by the hour. In their defense, speedway officials have tried nearly everything -- bridging the 50-mile gap between Los Angeles and the Inland Empire, using Juan Montoya to market to the Hispanic population, cross-promoting with other area pro teams. And certain things are beyond their control, as this past weekend's rain-delayed Auto Club 500 will attest. Native Southern Californians will tell you that late February often brings not the blue skies and sunshine the region is known for, but wet, cold weather. In that regard, California and Rockingham have something in common.
Rain is rarely an issue across the desert and over the state line in Las Vegas, where NASCAR has been a bigger hit than Celine Dion. As the big casinos on the Strip would indicate, visitors to Sin City like large, fancy facilities with plenty of bells and whistles, and they certainly have one in a racetrack with a spa and a double-decked garage. Las Vegas Motor Speedway is a gleaming facility with plenty of amenities and tremendous ticket demand. In fact, it's a lot like the California Speedway of five years ago, albeit with 62,000 more seats.
So what happens if Bruton Smith one day gets his second Sprint Cup date for his 1.5-mile desert oasis? Does it take off like Bristol or New Hampshire, and pack in another 142,000? Or do the crowds tail off as officials realize their demand was plenty enough for one annual race, but not enough for two? Yes, Las Vegas draws a staggering 39 million visitors annually. As Smith will gladly point out, it has more hotel rooms than any other city on earth. It's a beguiling place where you can drink on the sidewalk and win money and pack a month's worth of living into one long weekend.
SMI has put a lot of capital improvement dollars into the Las Vegas track, and you don't recoup that cash while a facility is sitting idle. But could general manager Chris Powell and his capable staff fill the place twice a year? The population of metro Las Vegas is 1.7 million, but California hasn't been able to do it despite a population of 4 million in the San Bernardino area, and 12 million more in greater L.A., and 50,000 fewer seats. The housing slump has taken a bite out of southern Nevada's otherwise robust economy, and all those service industry jobs don't make for the highest of median household incomes.
But what about those 39 million annual visitors, roughly a quarter of which come from Southern California? Las Vegas Motor Speedway is no different from the rest of the city -- tourist dollars make it go. According to the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Bureau, more than 114,000 of the 142,000 spectators attending last season's event were from outside southern Nevada. Ultimately, the success of a second race at Las Vegas would hinge on whether those people would be willing to come back. No question, Las Vegas Boulevard is a more attractive return destination than the old steel mill that is Fontana. But in a region of the country that's becoming almost as saturated with Sprint Cup races as the Southeast was 10 years ago, that's still no guarantee.
Yet if anyplace can make it work, surely it's Las Vegas, that dizzying neon empire where risk is all part of the allure. Bruton Smith has the city, has the speedway, has the fan base -- has everything, it seems, but that elusive second date. Yet all the motorsports mogul needs to do is look west, beyond the McCullough Range and the Devil's Playground and all those tall mountains and dry canyons, to find a very real cautionary tale.
The opinions expressed are solely of the writer.

Adidas increasing its brand presence within NASCAR

Adidas is negotiating with Hendrick Motorsports and a handful of speedways to broaden its rights in NASCAR beyond its deal with Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Mark Clinard, Adidas' business director of motorsports, said in Daytona that he'd like to acquire rights at select tracks to develop a fan experience that would expose consumers to its ClimaCool wear. He has had some initial discussions with Lowe's Motor Speedway.
Adidas launched its first line of Earnhardt signature wear on Feb. 15, the Friday before the Daytona 500, at The Sports Authority with GMR Marketing, Charlotte, handling the debut. Those jackets, T-shirts, jerseys and hats are available at The Sports Authority, Adidas' own retail stores and online. NASCAR gear has been extremely limited and often nonexistent in the major sporting goods retailers.
AutostockDale Earnhardt Jr. showed up for a test session last year wearing an Adidas firesuit.
"We're asking Dale Jr. fans to shop in a different place," Clinard said. "This is apparel that will be exclusive to the sporting goods channel, not department stores or lower-level retailers."
Clinard did not discount the possibility of selling the apparel trackside at some point.
The beauty of its entrée to the sport is that Adidas encounters virtually no competition in its category. Nike, which used a sponsorship at Joe Gibbs Racing to introduce its Starter brand to NASCAR, has since vacated the sport, in part because it could not secure rights to Earnhardt.
Clinard's talks with Hendrick have centered on researching in-car conditions and ways in which its ClimaCool technology could possibly be used for the seat material. Adidas already is working with Earnhardt on a ClimaCool firesuit, which is expected to debut later this season.
A deal with Hendrick also might give Adidas rights to put the Amp and National Guard marks from the car on its sports wear. Adidas' initial line of product features mostly the black and orange of Earnhardt's JR Motorsports and the fan club marks, JR Nation, as well as Junior's signature.
Adidas also has interest in putting its marks on Earnhardt's No. 88 Chevy. Adidas marks are currently on Earnhardt's firesuit and his crew's uniforms, as well. Whether Adidas comes back with any ad spots this year remains to be seen.
"I'd rather have the exposure we get through athlete wear than anything we might buy with a bunch of media," Clinard said. If Adidas does an ad, it likely will debut in August for the back-to-school sales season, he said.
Clinard also shared a story about working with Earnhardt that he has found to be a bonus.
When Earnhardt signed with Adidas, the equipment manager at the University of Nebraska, an Adidas school, sent him a bag of assorted Cornhusker apparel and a helmet because Earnhardt collects helmets. The equipment manager was surprised when the phone rang soon thereafter and it was Earnhardt on the other end, calling to say thanks.
"With Dale Jr., there's always this sense that he's going above and beyond," Clinard said.

If NASCAR doesn't learn, history sure to be repeated

The Auto Club 500 at Auto Club Speedway of Southern California -- that's a mouthful -- is finally history.
Hallelujah.
The seemingly endless nightmare that was Sunday's eventually aborted attempted running of the event impacted even those of us not forced to sit through the ordeal live and in rainsuits.

I mean, geez, has it ever been more difficult to tape a race? Even my 8-year-old couldn't keep up with it, and usually he's my ace tape-the-race guy.
Alas, before I complain too much, I'll just stop. I wasn't assigned to cover the race live for NASCAR.COM, as we rotate the writers who attend events to keep everyone fresh.
Fresh, but not necessarily dry. Get that one, Mark Aumann and Raygan Swan?
Those pour souls and tens of thousands others sat through Sunday's never-ending nightmare on location at the track formerly known as California Speedway. Well, attendance may have dropped off to merely thousands after probably 16 to 18 hours of unsuccessfully dueling with the raindrops (as well as pre-race and post-race traffic), but you get the idea. It had to be pure misery for them.
The rest of us were trying to watch the "action" on television. Little did anyone know that aside from two spectacular and possibly unnecessary accidents that took out the likes of Denny Hamlin, Casey Mears and a pair of Juniors in Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Sam Hornish Jr., the most exciting action to watch would result from speedway workers manning circular saws (read more).
Yes, the 2008 running of the Auto Club 500, which at least was completed Monday, was a bungled mess and cost NASCAR some of the valuable momentum it had built through Speedweeks and a competitive, exciting season-opening Daytona 500 one week earlier.
But could it have been avoided? Or should this one be chalked up to Mother Nature still being in charge -- and when she decides to mess with us, there's little or nothing any of us mere earthlings can do about it?
What went wrong
You can't blame NASCAR for trying to get the Sprint Cup Series race in on Sunday. The Nationwide Series event already had been postponed from Saturday -- first to Sunday and then, as the Cup event dragged on and continued to fight weather- and track-induced delays -- to Monday. NASCAR was trying (in vain, as it turned out) to avoid running both events on the same day.
But in the long run, NASCAR tried way too hard.
To recap, the race didn't start until roughly three hours after it was scheduled to begin -- and even then, there were legitimate questions about the wisdom of giving it a go. Just 16 laps into the event, driver Denny Hamlin lost control of his No. 11 Toyota and slammed into the Turn 3 wall.

At first the accident was blamed on a blown tire, but then it was determined all four of his tires were up. Hamlin said he hit a wet spot on the track that was like "black ice." Furthermore, he said there was so much debris from all the "speedy dry" that had been put down that he couldn't even see out of his windshield to try to figure out where the wet spots might be. The speedy dry was laid down not to combat the rain or water seepage, but because the No. 55 Toyota of driver Michael Waltrip had spewed oil all over the track during the parade lap before the green flag was dropped.
Michael Waltrip waited and waited.
"I think there are 42 other drivers that would agree that we should not be racing on that racetrack right now," Hamlin told reporters afterward.
If he wasn't one of them then, Casey Mears was five laps later when he hit yet another wet spot that sent him into a wild spin that ultimately collected the cars of his famous Hendrick Motorsports teammate (Earnhardt), Sorensen and Hornish. That accident ended with Mears' No. 5 Chevrolet turned on its side and Hornish's No. 77 Dodge in flames after running into it (watch video).
It also concerned NASCAR officials to the point that they finally admitted what Hamlin and others already knew: they had a water seepage problem. There were "weepers" in the house, and this was in reference not only to all those folks who paid for high-priced tickets and saw their envisioned day of fun in the sun getting washed away before their eyes.
This isn't the first track to suffer from weepers, and it won't be the last. It also has been an issue in between grooves at tracks such as Indianapolis, Texas and Martinsville. But this time it seemed particularly bad, plus continuing rain promised to make it worse, not better, as the night wore on and drastically cooler temperatures prevailed.
Water was weeping from seams in the track, particularly in the turns. So NASCAR did what only NASCAR might have done: it implored track officials to come out with the saws to cut channels in the track and help the weepers drain.
This process took one hour and seven minutes and, quite frankly, looked futile from the start no matter how many drivers or talking heads on television claimed that it seemed "the right thing to do."
America sleeps
Earnhardt was more sympathetic toward Mears than he was toward the governing body that seemed to be trying to get the event going at all costs (watch video).
"I think we were too excited. We got going a little too soon. The racetrack was a little dirty and everybody was losing grip and there were a lot of wet spots out there," Earnhardt told reporters. "Once you slip up, sometimes you don't save it enough. And Casey [Mears] got up there and into some water or dirt or something and ended up out of the groove.
"And way out of the groove is just terrible. It's like a dirt track up there. There was a lot of speedy dry and he just lost it. I didn't have anywhere I could go to miss him."
Veteran driver Mark Martin added: "This is really a tough deal. We just can't seem to get racing here."
The Mears accident brought out the dreaded red flag that froze the field for that one hour and seven minutes. But at about 8 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, NASCAR tried to go racing again. This time the race lasted about 20 laps before rain interrupted again, bringing out the third caution of the day from Laps 41-47.
Still more heavy rain came later, bringing out another excruciatingly long red-flag delay that made the earlier one look like child's play. Yet NASCAR stubbornly refused to call it a night until it was nearly 11 p.m. local California time, or nearly 2 a.m. Eastern -- about 11 hours after the scheduled start. All the jet dryers and all the king's men could not have kept the track from continuing to weep after all that rain.
And while the track wept, most of America slept.
Even the most ardent of the sport's followers couldn't stay with it that long, once again making everyone wonder, in the end, why in the France family's name do they keep coming to Fontana not once but twice a year?
In the fall, heat will be the issue if it's not raining again. Last Labor Day weekend the heat got so intense it appeared to cause track president Gillian Zucker to hallucinate, as she apparently mistook several thousand empty seats for paying customers during her post-race analysis of the event to the media.
And to think that it was unpredictable weather and empty seats that led to NASCAR moving the second date of its season out of Rockingham, N.C., in the first place.
Weepers, jeepers. The mere thought of making another trip to the place now called Auto Club Speedway is enough to make some of us cry -- or at least hope we're not on the schedule to cover the next race there live.
The opinions expressed are solely of the writer.

Delays, postponement can't ruin weekend for all

FONTANA, Calif. -- Southern California native Caryn Yokota is crazy.
Well, not clinically, but she was insane enough to endure cold rains and wind for 13 hours on Sunday in hopes of watching NASCAR's Sprint Cup race at Auto Club Speedway.

The 27-year-old finally gave up on seeing her favorite driver, Jimmie Johnson, take the green flag. She had to make her 12 a.m. shift at UPS. The race was postponed about an hour later and rescheduled for Monday morning.
And guess who was bright-eyed and all smiles, snagging autographs left and right at 9 a.m.? Crazy Caryn!
"I called my other job and told them I wasn't coming, because I had a race to see," said Yokota, also a welding instructor at El Camino College. "I had great tickets and there's a good chance I'll never have these again."
"NASCAR. How bad have you got it?" It's much more than a marketing slogan.
Evidently, some have it pretty bad. When I wandered into the infield checking on fans Monday morning I expected them to be irate with NASCAR's decision to reschedule the Auto Club 500, to finally postpone the race after several hours of weather-related delays.
I expected to hear phrases like, "Don't they know how to read a weather map," or "Does NASCAR like to waste jet fuel drying the track," etc. Those were some of the statements running through my mind last night as I reached my 14th hour sitting in the media center wreaking of mildew from my rain-soaked pants.
Finally walking out to my car at 2 a.m. ET, I was floored to still see dozens of fans in the grandstands, but I was not surprised to hear disapproving boos and a couple of other discouraging words coming from those same grandstands intended for NASCAR decision-makers.
"Well ,what else are they supposed to do," asked Willie Cronn, a 45-year-old from Bullhead, Ariz., who after 54 hours finally watched the Cup race with his son Matt. "It's frustrating but I'd rather pay for a full race rather than a half a race."
Matt Cronn watches the race from the perch of his bike.
Good point.
Matt Cronn was happy to miss class Monday. The 13-year-old seventh-grader made no excuse as to why he would miss school. He merely stated, "Hey, I'm at a NASCAR race and won't be there [Monday]."
Cronn and his son have been attending NASCAR races since the Auto Club Speedway's inaugural event in 1997.
They plan a regular vacation around the February date, so when the rain came and the track began to crumble like the Coliseum, the Cronn fellas were not worried.
They threw some burgers on the grill and cracked open some beverages. Cronn rode his bike around and chatted up crew members playing football on pit road Sunday afternoon waiting for track officials to repair the asphalt damaged by weepers.
"You make due because we spend more than $1,500 to make a NASCAR weekend happen," Cronn explained.
Mark West of Scottsdale, Ariz., said delays are just part of racing.
"We don't mind the delay so much, we visit out here with friends and we saw the forecast and knew it was a possibility," he said. But his friend Floyd Bedsaul of Orange County disagreed and expected NASCAR to "come to grips with reality" about 6 p.m. and should've called the race hours before 11 p.m. on Sunday, he said.
Jeff Gordon, who finished third despite blowing an engine on the final lap, was impressed with NASCAR's efforts to keep the show going.
"They were bound and determined to run that race [Sunday] night," Gordon said. "I think they actually did fans a favor. [NASCAR] gave them every best effort but the track needs to do a little bit of work on the drainage issue."
Johnson, who finished second to Carl Edwards, said NASCAR must exhaust every option possible to run a Cup race on its intended weekend to keep the flow of the schedule going.
"NASCAR was in a tough situation," he said. "Getting cars turned around and equipment turned around, every hour counts. In their minds, we have to do this to keep the show on the road. Sometimes it's not the best for the TV audience or the fans ... this is the first time that I've ever seen that since I've been a Sprint Cup driver."
It was the first time I'd seen a delay of that nature, too. But as a Sprint Cup reporter it's my job and, like the drivers, I'm happy to do it.
The fans, on the other hand, sacrificed valuable vacation days, time and money. They suffered through Sunday and some showed up again on Monday. A crowd that started at 70,000 had dwindled to 25,000.
"I've never seen people wait that long," Gordon added. "I understand why fans are upset."

1on1: Chip Ganassi

Chip Ganassi is unquestionably one of the more notable figures in North American motorsports, based on the championships and significant races that his teams have won.
In NASCAR, Ganassi owns three Sprint Cup teams: The No. 40 Dodge for driver Dario Franchitti, the No. 41 for Reed Sorenson and the No. 42 for Juan Montoya. He owns two cars in the Nationwide Series: the Nos. 40 and 41 that are driven by a combination of Franchitti, Sorenson and development driver Bryan Clauson.
Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates has won Rolex Sports Car Series driver and team championships, and three consecutive editions of the Rolex 24 at Daytona -- North American sports-car racing's signature event.
Chip Ganassi facts
2001
Purchased majority interest in Team SABCO
5
Indianapolis 500 starts as a driver (1982-86, best finish eighth)
5
Open-wheel championships
3
Highest finish in standings (Sterling Marlin, 2001)
3
Consecutive Rolex 24 victories (2006, 07, 08)
2
Former open-wheel drivers in Cup (Juan Montoya, Dario Franchitti)
1
Indianapolis 500 win (Juan Montoya, 2000)
Ganassi Racing has five open-wheel championships -- including four consecutive in CART, the forerunner of the Champ Car World Series, from 1996-1999 -- and won the 2000 Indianapolis 500 with Montoya.
Both of those disciplines regularly contend for race wins and championships, so it's in NASCAR where Ganassi, who transitioned from a driving career that went from local Formula Ford racing in the SCCA all the way to the Indianapolis 500, has found his biggest challenge.
Ganassi came to NASCAR in 2001, when he purchased a majority interest in Team SABCO from Sabates, and he made an immediate impact. Lead driver Sterling Marlin was third in the 2001 Cup championship and, until he was injured in the fall of the next season, led the standings for more than two-thirds of the season and appeared on his way to a coveted series title.
Since then, Ganassi has expanded his Cup and Nationwide operations, as well as maintaining an active driver development program.
As 2008 opens, Ganassi has the potential to get into the Chase for the Sprint Cup for the first time as Sorenson and Montoya, who won the 2007 Cup rookie of the year award, continue to develop.
Q: What are your expectations for this year?
Ganassi: I think when you look at Dario I think we are looking for a season that would parallel Juan's season from last season. I think when you look at Reed and Juan you say 'OK, it's time for those guys to take the next step up -- get to the next rung up the ladder.' It's either close or damn close to the Chase.
I would have been in the Chase twice [with Jamie McMurray in 2004 and 2005] if they would have been in the top 12 before that, right -- or if they hadn't taken 25 points from me at Bristol.
Q: Do you think there's a misperception of how Juan Montoya is, and do you wish people could see him as just someone who loves to race and be around racetracks?
Ganassi: That's what I've been saying all along. That's what I said the day we announced him in Chicago. I still stand by that. I was just at a sponsor function and they were saying that they couldn't believe that he was the last one -- you know Felix has a boat down [at Daytona Beach marina] -- [Montoya] was literally the last one off the boat.
I mean, this wasn't late or anything. It was like 7 p.m. or something and they had a dinner to go to, but he was the last one there. So, what does that tell you about the guy? It's not a story that he enjoys NASCAR. He's enjoying the racing, enjoying the series, enjoying the busy life.
Q: You have two open-wheel guys in your Sprint Cup cars, Juan Montoya and Dario Franchitti, and another in development, Bryan Clauson. So do you feel you have an affinity for open-wheel drivers?
Ganassi: I have an affinity for being at the front. That's my affinity -- being at the front. It doesn't have anything to do with where drivers come from. I don't care if they come from Mars.

Q: What's your take on the way Reed Sorenson early this season?
Ganassi: I think we've seen a maturation process in that guy over the winter and he's stepped up. I think part of that is having Juan as a teammate last year has helped him step up. I think bringing Dario on has helped him step up.
He's stepping up. He's doing what we've asked him and what we want him to do. He's doing exactly what we want him to do. We couldn't be happier.
Q: Why do you think Reed has matured?
Ganassi: That's a good question. I don't have the answer to that. I don't know what it was, because if I knew what it was I would have done it a lot sooner I can tell you that. Or I would have given it to him a lot sooner, whatever it was.
Different people are on what I call the performance treadmill. People are just on different angles and different speeds with their treadmill. They all get there eventually, some sooner than others. I'm just happy to see that Reed had a good offseason in that regard.
Q: What shows that on the track?
Ganassi: You never know. I was talking to Reed the other day about this and a lot of times you could say that he's the same guy and our cars have gotten better. You'd be surprised; when you have a good car it's a hell of a lot easier to look good.
Good cars make people look good, but just in his driving style I've seen some moves that I haven't seen before -- or a level of, I don't want to say aggressiveness, but a level of determination that I haven't seen before."
"I think you should be able to grow $100 bills in your garden, but I don't know what that means."
CHIP GANASSI
Q: You've won championships in several forms of racing, except NASCAR. So is that a testament to how difficult it is, and is it one of your goals to be the first to succeed in North America's three main forms of racing?
Ganassi: I certainly see it as a goal. Yes, I certainly want to be the first to do it. Yeah, that's a goal."
Q: Does all the attention given to Hendrick and Gibbs eat at you a little bit?
Ganassi: No, I think it's kind of good because it takes the focus off. I'm glad that it takes the focus off of us and you can let us get some work done and not have the scrutiny of you [media] guys.
You're over there talking to those guys and you might not be looking at us that close. That's fine. I'm glad. It's fun to work when the spotlight is on you, but it's easier to work when it's on someone else. You'll focus on me at the appropriate time I'm sure.
Q: Does it matter to you when NASCAR makes the move to the new chassis in the Nationwide Series?
Ganassi: It's going to be interesting this year to see how it pans out. For the last few years it seems like the Nationwide Series was a test for the Cup Series because the cars were similar. You're going to see this year that with the cars being so different how that works.
Is the Nationwide Series going to be as interesting as it was in the past? Some drivers looked at that like they were here on Saturday already, and it was a learning experience for Sunday. Some drivers looked at it as a way to put some extra money in their pocket. Some drivers looked at it as a way to get their own little team started.
It's going to be interesting to see if the Nationwide Series is ever going to be more than a Saturday warm-up for Sunday. Can it break off on its own? Again, these are questions to ask NASCAR.
Q: Can you convert your fleet to a new chassis by next year or would you like to see it phased-in, as it was in the Cup Series?
Ganassi: We're in a period now where sponsorship is tight, so I don't think the owners are looking for any more projects that they have to swallow like a COT Nationwide. You can't swallow those kinds of things easily.
It's no coincidence that the announcement of COT in Cup and the injection of outside money into the sport [came at the same time]. That's no coincidence.
Q: Where are you on getting a full season of sponsorship for Dario Franchitti's No. 40 Dodge?
Ganassi: We're piecing it together. We are happy where we are and what we've accomplished in a difficult market. We have every intention of being there and running it, so we're probably a third to a half of the way there right now.
Q: Is NASCAR still a good buy for sponsors?
Ganassi: One of the things that my sales people are telling me is the difference is, we are not losing sponsors to other teams -- we are losing them to them not being in the sport. We're not losing them to Hendrick or Roush or anybody.
I'm not the sales guy so it's hard for me to talk about that, but I can tell you that it's a difficult sales market right now.
Q: Where are you with bringing international sponsors into the sport?
Ganassi: It's a building-block process. Any time you are talking about the kinds of numbers that we're talking about in Cup these days -- you're talking about big numbers. The bigger the numbers the longer the time it takes to put a deal together. That's just a fact of life. You know, we're not talking about $500,000 sponsorships
Q: Felix Sabates is pretty outspoken about NASCAR franchising. Where do you stand on that issue?
Ganassi: I'm sure that in due time NASCAR will do what is best for everybody or what they think is best for everybody. I used to get caught up in all that stuff and I'm happy to do what I do and take care of the team and leave the politics to everyone else. That's why I have a partner that's good at that.
Q: Do you think there should be some equity for someone that has been around for a certain number of years?
Ganassi: I think you should be able to grow $100 bills in your garden, but I don't know what that means. I don't know what everybody else thinks of that, but that's what I think.
Fast Facts
What
UAW-Dodge 400
When
3:30 p.m. ET Sunday
TV
FOX
Radio
PRN / Sirius Ch. 128
• Track Page Tickets Travel
Q: To what degree were you consulted on the re-unification of open-wheel racing?
Ganassi: There can't be five people on the planet that [didn't] want it to happen. The only consultation I had was I got a phone call one day that said if we get this thing back together we might need a car. I said, 'no problem.'
It's probably like the 1994 baseball strike. The work really begins once you get all of the problems behind you. It would be nice to get all of the issues in one place. Get all of the rules-makers in one place. Get all of the promoters in one place. Get everybody at one table instead of two. It would certainly end a lot of confusion in the marketplace.
Q: What are your thoughts on all the talk about Hendrick and Gibbs being the dominant teams?
Ganassi: You know, I was pretty happy in the [Gatorade Duel] 150s when it was Hendrick, Gibbs, Hendrick, Hendrick and us. I can't speak for other teams in where they are in their program.
I just think that we made some moves over the winter and our team has stepped it up a little bit. Whether it's our drivers, our engine program [or] our COT program -- I think everything can come up a step and I'd like to think that we've moved up a notch on the ladder. What that means for other teams I have no idea.
Every winter every team works in the offseason. Every team wants to work better. For our team, where we are in the pecking order, we need to work harder. I'm thinking that we've made a step or two up the rung. In terms of the other guys, I can't say where they're at. I wish them well and here we go.
It's just like that Super Bowl. Everybody thought that the Patriots were going to win and wanted the Giants to win, right? That's why they play the game. You just can't hand the trophy out. They have to have a race first.
You still have to execute. You still have to do pit stops. You still have to have luck on your side. Your engine still has to get to the finish. You can't get caught up in a crash. There are a lot of things that can happen. Look at all the talk about the Patriots -- they still had to play the game.

Edwards' victory small part of bigger picture for Roush

FONTANA, Calif. -- Kyle Busch, one of the most talked about drivers in the garage, left California with bragging rights for leading two of the three premier series points in NASCAR at the same time.
In his first season with Joe Gibbs Racing, Busch nearly escaped the weekend leading all three seires in what would have been a first in the history of the sport, according to Kerry Tharp, spokesperson for NASCAR.
On at least 11 other occasions, the same driver has led both the Cup and Nationwide series standings -- but one driver has never led all three series at one time, Tharp said.
Busch took over the Sprint Cup points lead with his fourth-place finish in Monday's Auto Club 500, marking the first time a Toyota driver has held the points lead in the Cup Series. Busch is six points ahead of second-place Ryan Newman and 25 points ahead of teammate Tony Stewart in the Cup standings.
He also leads the Craftsman Truck Series point standings by 20 ahead of Todd Bodine. Busch finished second at Daytona and won Saturday's Truck event in California.
Busch was second in the Nationwide Series standings entering Monday's Stater Bros. 300, trailing Tony Stewart by just 10 points. But Stewart won the race with Busch finishing second -- giving Stewart a 30-point lead in the Nationwide standings heading to Las Vegas.
"It's a good championship points day. It was pretty cool out there to run the way we did in our Toyota," Busch said after Monday's Cup race. "Unfortunately we didn't have quite the car to get up there and contend with those boys at the end, but overall a good day and that's all we can ask for."
Jimmie Johnson, Busch's former teammate last season, said the Gibbs driver is immensely talented no matter what he drives.
"It's awfully early in the year to put too much weight into it, but it doesn't surprise me -- the guy knows how to stand on the right pedal," Johnson said.
Added former teammate Jeff Gordon of Busch's two-series points lead: "If that's the case in Homestead I'll be really impressed. We know how talented he is. But if he does that for the whole year I'll be way impressed."
When Busch left Hendrick Motorsports at the end of last season, making room for Dale Earnhardt Jr. to join the Hendrick stable, it was a tumultuous situation, but since then fences have appeared to be mended.
"It was cool to race with the 24 [Gordon] and 48 [Johnson] like that -- we aren't teammates anymore, but still we respect each other," Busch said. "That was fun."
The Truck Series lead will be short-lived as Busch doesn't compete full time, driving a partial schedule for team owner Billy Ballew. And as for the Cup Series lead, Busch is realistic; he knows it is early in the season.
"It doesn't mean much right here in California," he said. "We've still got 33 weeks left in this deal. We'll take it now and hopefully hold on to it for a while and keep battling with the 24, 48 -- we know they'll come back strong in the points

Points leader in Cup, Truck has Busch enjoying view

FONTANA, Calif. -- Kyle Busch, one of the most talked about drivers in the garage, left California with bragging rights for leading two of the three premier series points in NASCAR at the same time.
In his first season with Joe Gibbs Racing, Busch nearly escaped the weekend leading all three seires in what would have been a first in the history of the sport, according to Kerry Tharp, spokesperson for NASCAR.
On at least 11 other occasions, the same driver has led both the Cup and Nationwide series standings -- but one driver has never led all three series at one time, Tharp said.
Busch took over the Sprint Cup points lead with his fourth-place finish in Monday's Auto Club 500, marking the first time a Toyota driver has held the points lead in the Cup Series. Busch is six points ahead of second-place Ryan Newman and 25 points ahead of teammate Tony Stewart in the Cup standings.
Top trucker
Kyle Busch led 51 of 100 laps and won the Truck Series race at Auto Club Speedway to take the series points lead.
Complete story, click here
He also leads the Craftsman Truck Series point standings by 20 ahead of Todd Bodine. Busch finished second at Daytona and won Saturday's Truck event in California.
Busch was second in the Nationwide Series standings entering Monday's Stater Bros. 300, trailing Tony Stewart by just 10 points. But Stewart won the race with Busch finishing second -- giving Stewart a 30-point lead in the Nationwide standings heading to Las Vegas.
"It's a good championship points day. It was pretty cool out there to run the way we did in our Toyota," Busch said after Monday's Cup race. "Unfortunately we didn't have quite the car to get up there and contend with those boys at the end, but overall a good day and that's all we can ask for."
Jimmie Johnson, Busch's former teammate last season, said the Gibbs driver is immensely talented no matter what he drives.
"It's awfully early in the year to put too much weight into it, but it doesn't surprise me -- the guy knows how to stand on the right pedal," Johnson said.
Added former teammate Jeff Gordon of Busch's two-series points lead: "If that's the case in Homestead I'll be really impressed. We know how talented he is. But if he does that for the whole year I'll be way impressed."
When Busch left Hendrick Motorsports at the end of last season, making room for Dale Earnhardt Jr. to join the Hendrick stable, it was a tumultuous situation, but since then fences have appeared to be mended.
"It was cool to race with the 24 [Gordon] and 48 [Johnson] like that -- we aren't teammates anymore, but still we respect each other," Busch said. "That was fun."
The Truck Series lead will be short-lived as Busch doesn't compete full time, driving a partial schedule for team owner Billy Ballew. And as for the Cup Series lead, Busch is realistic; he knows it is early in the season.
"It doesn't mean much right here in California," he said. "We've still got 33 weeks left in this deal. We'll take it now and hopefully hold on to it for a while and keep battling with the 24, 48 -- we know they'll come back strong in the points."

Edwards wins at Fontana on a sunny California day

Under blue skies Monday, some 21 hours after the race had started, Carl Edwards put the finishing touches on the rain-delayed Auto Club 500 at beleaguered Auto Club Speedway.
After caution flew on the final lap for Dale Jarrett's spin, Edwards crossed the finish ahead of runner-up Jimmie Johnson and Hendrick Motorsports teammate Jeff Gordon, who atoned for disappointing finishes in the Feb. 17 Daytona 500.
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Kyle Busch claimed the Sprint Cup points lead with a fourth-place finish in his No. 18 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota, and Matt Kenseth, who had won the previous two February races at the 2-mile track, ran fifth. Martin Truex Jr., Tony Stewart, Kevin Harvick, Kasey Kahne and Daytona 500 winner Ryan Newman completed the top 10.
The sunshine that bathed Edwards' run to victory was a sharp contrast to the conditions that stopped the race shortly after 2 a.m. ET. After a rain delay that began at 9:12 p.m. Sunday, NASCAR's efforts to dry the track were frustrated by a high dew point, high humidity and seepage of water through the racing surface (read more).
Accordingly, the sanctioning body postponed the final 163 laps of the 250-lap race until 1 p.m. ET Monday, extending the red-flag period to 15 hours, 49 minutes and 54 seconds before the resumption.
"The track was a little bit different," Edwards said of the conditions on Monday. "It was fun to race here in the sun. ... If we have a 55-hour red flag, we're still going to go out there and race as hard as possible. We've all had to wait through rain delays when the anxiety builds up.
"I was lucky that [Johnson] was a little bit loose, because it would have been really, really tough to get by him if he wasn't loose."
Edwards restarted fourth on Lap 225 after a pit stop under caution for four tires. After dispatching Roush Fenway teammate Jamie McMurray, who had taken two tires, Edwards passed Gordon for second position on Lap 233 and overtook Johnson through Turns 1 and 2 on Lap 238.
Johnson regained the top position in Turn 3 and won a drag race to the finish line, but Edwards retook the lead on Lap 239 and expanded his advantage until Jarrett's spin on the white-flag lap froze the field.
"Nobody was going to beat the 99 today," Gordon said. "I blew up off Turn 2 on the final lap, so we were very fortunate."
Busch heads to Sunday's race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway with a six-point lead over Newman and a 19-point advantage over JGR teammate Stewart.
"Overall, it was a good points day for us," said Busch, who also claimed the points lead in the Craftsman Truck Series with a win in Saturday's San Bernardino County 200. "When you don't have a winning car, the mission is to get a top-five."
What had seemed an interminable Sprint Cup weekend finally came to an end Monday after two red-flag periods had interrupted Sunday's racing -- the first to cut grooves in Turns 3 and 4 to help drain seeping water from the racing surface and the second because of a downpour that ultimately forced the postponement after 87 laps were complete.
Gordon had the dominant car at that point, having led 57 of the 87 laps, but thanks to quick work in the pits under caution on Lap 83, it was Johnson who led the field to the restart on Lap 91 after the overnight stoppage.
Wet conditions in the corners created havoc in the early stages of the race, as Denny Hamlin hit a wet spot and slammed into the Turn 4 wall on Lap 14. On Lap 21, Casey Mears lost control of his No. 5 Chevy after his left-side tires rolled across a wet seam in Turn 1.
After bouncing off the wall, Mears collected the No. 88 Chevy of Hendrick Motorsports teammate Dale Earnhardt Jr. That wreck also crippled the cars of Reed Sorenson and rookie Sam Hornish Jr.
Notes: Dale Jarrett stayed on the track and led three laps under the third caution of the race, the first laps he has led since Oct. 8, 2006, at Talladega. ... Dario Franchitti also led a lap before pitting under caution on Lap 85. That's the first time the open-wheel star has led a Cup race.

Rain, seeping water turn Cup race into marathon

FONTANA, Calif. -- A water crisis in California usually means there's too little of it. On Sunday at Auto Club Speedway, the opposite was true.
Just about everything liquid-related that could go wrong, did in the Auto Club 500, but it wasn't from lack of trying. The race started three hours late because of heavy overnight and morning showers, and even then was delayed when Michael Waltrip's car began spewing oil during the parade lap.
Then water -- standing and falling -- played a key role in a pair of red flags before the race reached the 100-lap mark.
AutostockOfficials cut grooves in the racing surface so water could seep during a red flag.
After two accidents in the first 21 laps, both appearing to be the results of water seeping up through cracks in the track surface, NASCAR officials stopped the race and spent 67 minutes working to resolve the issue.
First, Denny Hamlin skittered up the track in Turn 3 and belted the outside wall on Lap 15, heavily damaging the right side of his No. 11 Toyota. Hamlin was adamant that wet spots on the track were the culprit (watch video).
"I think we can get back out there, but I think there are 42 other drivers that would agree that we should not be racing on that racetrack right now," Hamlin said. "I hit a slick spot and my car took off. You can see it on television -- right at the seams, it's seeping a lot of water. I hit a wet spot and I'm not going to be the last one."
Hamlin proved to be a prophet when six laps later, Casey Mears lost control coming out of Turn 2, spun back in front of traffic, was clipped by Dale Earnhardt Jr. and then lifted and turned upside down by Sam Hornish Jr.'s car. Reed Sorenson also suffered damage in the incident (watch video).
Again, it appeared that crossing from one groove to another over the seams in the track was not a good idea.
"We got a little bit loose getting down into [Turn] 1," Mears said. "A couple of times, I hit the water there that's at the seam there seeping through. I hit it quite a bit down in 3 and 4, it's a little bit worse down there.
"And there's a little bit down in 1 and 2 -- and right as I got to the bottom, I got loose. And I don't know if it was right about the time I crossed that seam. I don't know if that was the reason or not but I hadn't been real loose, and that time I was. We about had it saved. It just kind of brushed the wall and unfortunately, it had to come back across the track and all the cars were coming by."
Hornish didn't blame NASCAR for the situation, which had been a problem ever since Friday's day-long deluge that wiped out Sprint Cup qualifying.
"There's a lot of weepers in between the first and second groove," he said. "We could, in a lot of ways, have the jet dryers run until [Monday] and still maybe not even get it [dry] and that's if it doesn't rain anymore.
"I think that NASCAR made the decision that they thought was the best. You had to pick your line going into the corner. You couldn't cross that center section, so maybe not the best conditions for racing, but as the cars ran it was definitely going to get better and better."
Junior was not pleased with the condition of the track from the start, as several cars -- including Matt Kenseth and Kevin Harvick -- were forced to make unscheduled stops to clear debris from their grilles.
"We were just sitting there trying to chill," Earnhardt said. "The track's real dirty and everybody's sliding around. The track ain't ready today. The track's dirty, and this was a bad move."
Harvick seconded that opinion.
"The racetrack wasn't really ready to start with," he said. "There was water running down the track in 3 and 4, and I think a lot of [drivers] were telling [NASCAR officials] that. Now it's worse. It's just really wet."
At that point, NASCAR officials halted the event and sent track crews to cut vertical stripes in the offending areas, hoping to create channels for the water to dissipate.
"We saw some weepers developing, so we asked the track to come out and cut some straight lines in those areas in order to relieve the water that had begun to seep up there," NASCAR spokesman Kerry Tharp said.
With that issue apparently settled for the time being, light precipitation brought out under caution at Lap 41.
But it was another stray shower that pelted the track after 87 laps, forcing the cars back onto pit road, where they were covered. While crews huddled under cover, shivering in the cool, damp, decidedly un-California-like weather, the jet dryers once again went to work.
However, the dewpoint and humidity worked against efforts to make the track suitable to continue the race -- and in the end, or 2 a.m. ET, officials were forced to concede, at least for now. So the Auto Club 500 will resume Monday at 1 p.m. ET, with the Nationwide Series Stater Bros. 300 -- postponed from Saturday night -- to follow.
Jimmie Johnson is leading, followed by Travis Kvapil, Kyle Busch, Greg Biffle and Kasey Kahne. Jeff Gordon, currently sixth, dominated much of the early going, leading five times for 57 laps. Forty-one of the 43 starters were still running, including Sorenson, Earnhardt and Hamlin, all down several laps to the leaders.

Nationwide California race postponed to Sunday night

FONTANA, Calif. -- For the second consecutive day, rain played havoc with the racing schedule at Auto Club Speedway, forcing postponement of Saturday's Stater Bros. 300 Nationwide Series race and shortening Sprint Cup practice to 34 minutes.
The Nationwide race has been rescheduled for Sunday, to be run after the conclusion of the Auto Club 500 Sprint Cup race, which has a scheduled start time of 4 p.m. ET.
Jeff burtonwill start the Stater Bros. 300 from the pole because the No. 29 Chevrolet he drives won the owners' championship for Richard Childress Racing last season, with Burton and Scott Wimmer splitting seat time in the car.
Drivers in the Cup series will start Sunday's Auto Club 500 with the benefit only of the one rain-shortened practice session. All on-track activity, including qualifying for the Cup race and the Craftsman Truck Series San Bernardino 200, were washed out by rain on Friday.
kyle busch, who won the Truck Series race before the rain began to fall Saturday afternoon, says he could have used more practice time in preparation for Sunday's Cup race.
"Our car wasn't as good as I would have wanted it to be," he said after the rain-shortened practice. "But it's a long 500-mile race, and we've just got to keep on top of it and make changes as we need to and try to make this thing better all day long -- and not get too frustrated with it and come up through the field."
Hoping to become the first driver to win a race in each of NASCAR's top three series on the same weekend, Busch will start 22nd in the Auto Club 500, having inherited the owner points earned by J.J. Yeley in Joe Gibbs Racing's No. 18 car last year. Busch signed with Gibbs for the 2008 season after driving for Hendrick Motorsports in 2007.
Last November, Busch won the Craftsman Truck and Nationwide Series events at Phoenix before finishing eighth in the Cup race on the same weekend. Last July at Daytona International Speedway, he won the Nationwide race and finished second by .005 seconds to jamie McMurray in the Pepsi 400 when rain forced both races to be run on the same

Some moonlighting Cup drivers prefer N'wide car

While the Sprint Cup cars are said to be improving competition and becoming more favorable to drive, the Nationwide Series cars, like an old shoe, just fit better for some.
The 2008 season marked the first where NASCAR's new chassis will be used for all 36 races, and Cup drivers moonlighting in the Nationwide Series don't mind getting back into the old chassis. There's no significant benefit or cross-over information transferred for Sunday's Cup event; some just enjoy the racing.

Although the Nationwide cars are running on significantly few horsepower for cost reasons, a handful of Cup drivers practicing their Nationwide cars Saturday at the Auto Club Speedway said they are still better to drive.
After practice, Roush Fenway driver David ragan said the experience can be the difference between driving a luxury cruiser and a sports car.
"The Cup car is kind of like a Ford Econoline van and the Nationwide Car is like a Ford Mustang, you sit down low and it's sucked down to the ground," Ragan said. "The Cup car, you're rolling over you're top heavy. But sometimes the Cup car is more fun to race, because it is all over the track and you can fight it. This Nationwide car is more stuck to the racetrack."
The major difference Cup drivers are finding between the two cars with respect to California's intermediate track is that you can hold the Nationwide car nearly wide open in the corners.
"You roll out of the throttle pretty early in the Cup car and you get to the gas later," said Dave Reutimann, driver of the No. 99 Toyota for Michael Waltrip Racing.
Reutimann still prefers to wheel the Nationwide car over the Cup car.
Reutimann
Ragan said they drive better because they have more downforce and a lower center of gravity.
"The Cup cars are heavier and you have to use more brake," Ragan said. "In the Nationwide car, you tend to feather out of the throttle and get right back in."
Roush Fenway teammate Carl Edwards said he spends a lot more time on the throttle in his Nationwide car than his Cup car.
"The corner speeds are a lot higher compared to straightaway speeds, whereas the Cup car, you have to slow down a lot more because the car slides around a lot more, there's more horse power."
That said; his Cup car is more about the driver.
"You have to drive a lot, it slides around a lot," he said. "My Cup car is a little better than the Econoline. My car doesn't feel that extreme, but I know what my teammate is getting at."

NASCAR RACING

FONTANA, Calif. -- jeff gordon believes NASCAR made the right call in canceling Friday's on-track activity at Auto Club Speedway.
Intermittent rain, along with "weepers," or seepage through the racing surface, made conditions unsafe. The weepers frustrated speedway officials' efforts to dry the track, forcing cancellation of qualifying sessions for all three of NASCAR's top touring series.
Auto Club 500
"It just was wet," said Gordon, who according to NASCAR's rainout rules, will start second in Sunday's Auto Club 500 as the second-place finisher in 2007 owner points. "They would go through there with the jet dryer, and it just would continue to seep up through there. The way I've always approached it over the years looking at tracks like what we had today, is if you put your hand on it and you get no moisture back on your hand, then it'll dry up fast or you can go ahead and work around that. The tires will still grip to the track.
"But when you put your hand on it and you come back and it's wet with moisture, then you've got a problem. It was more the location of the spots that I saw. It was right in the entry of [Turn] 3, which is already a tricky spot here. And it was just a couple of feet above the groove that we run. So if you went down into the corner and you went across that and you hit one of those little spots, because there was a long streak of it but they were just little spots, you could get into some issues.
"Or, if you went down in the corner and you drifted up just a little bit, you're going to get into it as well. I thought NASCAR made the right call, and, of course, the weather kind of made the decision a little easier for them."
Bowyer, Burton bury the hatchet
The bottom line is that Richard Childress Racing teammates Jeff Burton and Clint Bowyer were steaming after last Sunday's Daytona 500, and their frustration led to an angry exchange captured by TV cameras in the garage after the race.
Television reports alleged Burton was angry at his teammate for side-drafting off Burton's No. 31 Chevrolet and causing him to fall back through the field, but Burton indicated that wasn't the case.
"Clint and I were mad, but we weren't mad at what people thought we were mad at," Burton said. "The conversation that Clint and I had we'll keep to ourselves. There's no strife amongst the drivers -- there's none of that. We did have a discussion, and it is clear that you can't have productive conversations as soon as the race is over. I never at any point felt like Clint did anything to jeopardize my opportunity to win the race."
Bowyer was upset at being punted by Juan Montoya while leading with 17 laps left in the 200-lap event.
"It's not much fun when you get wrecked leading the 500," said Bowyer, who will start third on owner points in Sunday's race. "That's the race you want to win. But it just wasn't meant to be. I probably shouldn't have been in that situation, and the deal at the end of the race with me and Jeff, I mean, you're ticked off.
"When you're leading the biggest race of the year and the one you want to win more than anything and things don't go your way, you're ticked off. I was mad. He was mad. And you just get over it. He called me at 8:30 the next morning and [we] kissed and made up and went on about our day. But that's part of the sport. You can't always put a smile on your face and be happy all the time."
Newman had a feeling
With an assist from Penske Racing teammate Kurt Busch, Ryan Newman won last Sunday's 50th Daytona 500 with a last-lap pass, but he knew much earlier that he had a car capable of winning the race.
"At the halfway point when I pushes kyle busch second into the lead past Jeff Gordon, I knew I had a car that was capable," said Newman, who will start 13th on owner points in the Auto Club 500. "Everybody tries to be up front, and when you're up front at the halfway [point], usually it's a good sign that you have a capable piece -- and our Alltel Dodge Charger I thought was that.
"Down the backstretch [on the final lap] when I saw Kurt push me -- and when Tony [Stewart] pulled down -- that was the ultimate eye-opener for me. Obviously, I've been in that position before, and you never know until you cross the finish line."