Five Laps: Back from the beach edition
You go away for a couple weeks, and a ton of stuff happens. Here goes:
Lap 1: Shrub continues to tear it up. Chicagoland was his seventh win this season to give him 11 for his career. The key to his latest win? Check out the videotape at about the 3:10 mark. You'd think JJ would have some veteran move to get Shrub off his tail, but I guess not. JJ had no chance with the 18 thisclose on the restart.
Lap 2: Anyone remember last year's race at the Glen? That was Tony Stewart's most recent victory -- and probably his last as a Cup driver. Good for him that he has controlling interest in a race team. It gives Stewart some control that he lacked at Gibbs -- JGR made the switch from Chevy to Toyota over Stewart's objections, and I suspect that move played a big role in his decision. (I don't think it was the change itself -- rather, I think Stewart probably was hacked off more by the fact that there wasn't a danged thing he could do about it.)
But the new Stewart Hass team will be a non-factor. (Ask Robby Gordon how team ownership is working out for him.) He won't have top-35 owners points for at least one of the cars. Chevy won't be in a position to do much for him. And two-car teams just don't win any more. Good luck, Tony. It was nice knowing you.
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Lap 3: No, Ryan Newman won't help much if he ends up as Stewart's teammate. Sure, he'll get you in the race. But after the checkered flag flies? It's always fun to play the "How Soon Newman Will Drop Outside the Top 20" game. It's almost like Penske has forgotten that you need to qualify the car in race trim, not qualifying trim.
Lap 4: Ed Hinton, formerly of the Orlando and Chicago papers, has landed at ESPN.com as a senior writer. He's one of my favorites, and I'm glad he'll be writing again.
Lap 5: OK, admit it: Would you rather be using the old point system, which means Junior and maybe Jeff Burton are within sniffing distance of Kyle Busch; or the Chase, which means Shrub shouldn't be starting construction on his Sprint Cup Championship Trophy Room off the back of his double-wide just right now? Yep, thought so.
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