7/4/04… Jeff Gordon took DEI's edge off of restrictor plate racing in the rain delayed Pepsi 400 night race. The rout was Gordon's second in a row, fourth of the season, and the 68th of his Cup racing career. It was also Gordon's eighth overall restrictor plate win and his fourth win at the Daytona facility.

Gordon only has to score two more victories to move past Cale Yarborough on the "modern era" win list. Yarborough is listed in third with 69 wins, Dale Earnhardt is listed in second with 76 wins, and Darrel Waltrip is listed in the first position with 84 wins.

The usually domineering duo of Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Michael Waltrip seemed to be ineffective in the event. Waltrip suffered from an ill handling car and couldn't assist his teammate to much avail, finally finishing in the 13th position. The DEI team also had a third entry in the event, John Andretti - driving the #1 Coca-Cola C2 Chevy, but he was out of the event on lap 44, not amounting to any help for the team.

Following Gordon and his teammate Jimmie Johnson across the finish line were Dale Earnhardt Jr., Kurt Busch, Tony Stewart, Mark Martin, Bobby Labonte, Terry Labonte, Brian Vickers, and Joe Nemechek. The top ten starters and how they finished:

1. Jeff Gordon -- #24 Chevy – finished 1st
2. Michael Waltrip -- #15 Chevy – finished 13th
3. Ricky Rudd -- #21 Ford – finished 17th
4. Dale Jarrett -- #88 Ford -- finished 16th
5. Dale Earnhardt Jr. -- #8 Chevy – finished 3rd
6. Joe Nemechek -- #01 Chevy – finished 10th
7. Scott Riggs* -- #10 Chevy – finished 21st
8. Ward Burton -- #0 Chevy – finished 40th
9. Greg Biffle -- #16 Ford – finished 31st
10. Terry Labonte -- #5 Chevy – finished 8th

Jimmie Johnson's second place finish insured his retention of the driver's point's lead. Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s third place finish also kept him in the second position, now just 27 points behind Johnson. Jeff Gordon's scoring two wins in a row has moved him up one more spot into the third position with a 232 point deficit. Tony Stewart's top five finish at Daytona moved him up two spots to fourth listed with a -342, followed by defending "Winston Cup" Champion Matt Kenseth who dropped down two spots to round out the top five with a -356. Bobby Labonte and Kurt Busch each moved up one spot to sixth and seventh listed with a -381 and a -392. Elliott Sadler dropped down three spots to eighth listed with a -393, followed by Ryan Newman and Kevin Harvick who remain in ninth and tenth listed with a -433 and a -450.

There are only nine races remaining before the Chase for the Championship competition begins. You'll remember that at this time the top ten in points will have their points re-arranged. The leader will be awarded 5000 points with the second place driver being awarded 4950 points while the rest of the eight competitors will be listed with a five point reduction from the second place driver. The actual number of 5000 may not prove to be accurate, but the scenario will be the same with the leader getting a 50 point spread over the rest of the field.

It will be interesting to watch the infighting among the other drivers left from the eleventh position on down to the 25th. At this time it doesn't appear that any driver outside of the top ten will qualify to join the competition by being within 400 points of the leader. Only the top 25 driver's point's positions pay at the end of the season. There will be a frenzy to be ranked from the 15th to the 11th, and if I remember correctly there will be a bonus for winner of the 11th place position, in order to make the position worth fighting for.

Net week the Cup Series heads back up north for the Tropicana 400 at Chicagoland Speedway. The event will be aired by the NBC network on Sunday, July 11th at 2:30 pm eastern. Qualifying for the event will be aired on Friday, July 9th at 4 pm eastern by the SPEED channel.

Last season's winner of the event was Ryan Newman. He was followed across the finish line by Tony Stewart, Jimmie Johnson, Jeff Gordon, Michael Waltrip, Jeff Burton, Robby Gordon, rookie Jamie McMurray, Elliott Sadler, and Jeremy Mayfield.

Tony Stewart set a track record in winning the Bud Pole Award in the #20 Home Depot Chevy with a speed of 184.786 miles per hour. There were seven caution periods for a total of 36 laps out of the 267 lap event on the 1.5 mile tri-oval. At this time last season after 18 races, Matt Kenseth was leading the points (2,678) followed by Jeff Gordon (2,513/-165), Dale Earnhardt Jr. (2,420/-258), Bobby Labonte (2,351/-327), and Michael Waltrip (2,294/-384).

7/11/04… Jeff Gordon has taken center stage again with his pole position win at Chicagoland Speedway. The pole win for the Tropicana 400 was his fourth consecutive pole. It goes without saying that he will be going for five pole wins at the next event in Loudon, New Hampshire. It also goes without saying that the pole position is hard to win on the flat one mile facility in Loudon, but, someone always wins it!

Here's a little tidbit or two to wet your whistles with: Three drivers in NASCAR's history have won five consecutive pole positions. No one has ever won six. The first driver to win five consecutive pole positions in Cup racing was Bobby Allison back in '72. Cale Yarborough tied the feat in '80 followed by Bill Elliott, who consummated the three way tie in '85.

With his four consecutive pole position wins, Jeff Gordon is now tied with Herb Thomas ('53), Tim Flock ('55), Rex White ('58), Richard Petty ('67), Bobby Allison ('71), and Darrell Waltrip ('81). Regardless of whether he manages to join the ranks of the five in a row winners, Jeff Gordon is still among some stellar company.

The all-time pole winner's records list Richard Petty, 123; David Pearson, 113; Cale Yarborough, 69; Bobby Allison, 58; Jeff Gordon, 51; Bill Elliott & Bobby Isaac, 49; Buck Baker & Junior Johnson, 45; and Mark Martin & Herb Thomas, 39. Back when Petty and Pearson won so many poles there were as many as 60 races per season. It's unlikely (but not impossible) that a driver in this modern era could amass that many pole wins. However, it is highly probable that Jeff Gordon could end up bypassing Cale Yarborough and Bobby Allison in his career, ending up in third place on the all-time pole winner's list.

Mike Helton, stated at Chicagoland this weekend that the scoring rules have been changed again for cars caught on pit road when a caution period is called. The powers that be have decided to revert back to the old way of scoring before the rule was implemented forbidding competitors from racing back to the finish line when a caution period was called. Apparently, the new technological system of scoring the cars was too much for some of the moderately intelligent officials to comprehend, and I have to admit that I say that with a bit of trepidation…

The way the new rule modification works is like this:

(1. Cars situated on pit road before the start/finish line only have to beat the leader to the line to stay on the lead lap. In case some of you haven't noticed, the start/finish line extends in theory across the grass or barriers to be evenly painted on the pit road, perpendicular to the actual start/finish line.

(2. Cars situated on pit road past the start/finish line only have to beat the leader to the pit road exit line. Meaning that if a team's pit box is located on the side of the start/finish line toward turn one, then the car leaving pit road will have to get to the pit road exit before the race leader slowly passes it under caution in order to stay on the lead lap.

Of course, with NASCAR, nothing is exactly cut and dried, there are still ifs and buts to consider with this new rule modification. Suppose the leader doesn't slow down when the caution is called and the cars on pit road don't have a chance to beat him to either of the lines, depending on their position? Then, the leader will be penalized for speeding under caution, and all competitors on pit road will remain on the lead lap. But, it was made clear that it remains to be seen how it will be determined if the leader is actually speeding after the caution period is called. I assume a lot of it will have to do with the leader's position on the track as opposed to the start\finish line. That may determine the measurement of the leader's speed depending on the distance he has to travel to approach the line. The leader who doesn't slow down enough to suit the particular NASCAR officials in charge, will be relegated to the end of the longest line.

On the other hand, if car is caught exceeding the pit road speed limit in order to beat the leader back to either the start/finish or pit exit lines, then the speeding driver will be relegated a lap down. According to Helton, these modifications have been put in place to simplify things and to make the rules less confusing.

On another front, NASCAR has stated that a new rule is forthcoming that will determine how to end races under the green flag instead of under caution. There has been a ton of controversy this season about the events ending under caution, as well as how NASCAR scores the field after being frozen when the caution periods are called. The new rules concerning this are said to be forthcoming during or after the off week coming up next weekend. When the competitors head into New Hampshire, on the weekend of July 25th, the new rule should be in place.

Tony Stewart had the car to beat at Chicagoland Sunday, but no one could hang in there long enough to do it. The win was the 2002 Winston Cup Champion's first of the 2004 season, and the 18th win in the sixth year of his Cup racing career.

Following Stewart across the finish line were Jimmie Johnson, Dale Jarrett, Jeff Gordon, Jeremy Mayfield, Terry Labonte, Sterling Marlin, Joe Nemechek, Michael Waltrip, and Kevin Harvick. The top ten starters and how they finished:

1. Jeff Gordon -- #24 Chevy – finished 4th
2. Kasey Kahne* -- #9 Dodge – finished 36th
3. Jimmie Johnson -- #48 Chevy – finished 2nd
4. Brian Vickers* -- #25 Chevy -- finished 14th
5. Greg Biffle -- #16 Ford -- finished 20th
6. Jeff Burton -- #99 Ford – finished 33rd
7. Mike Bliss -- #180 Chevy – finished 31st
8. Ryan Newman -- #12 Dodge – finished 34th
9. Joe Nemechek -- #01 Chevy – finished 8th
10. Tony Stewart -- #20 Chevy – finished 1st

The top six positions in the driver's point's standings remain the same with Jimmie Johnson still leading the pack. Dale Jr. is listed in second place with a -105 followed by Jeff Gordon listed with a -242. Tony Stewart is listed in fourth with a -327 followed by Matt Kenseth rounding out the top five with a -399. Bobby Labonte remains in sixth listed with a -442. Elliott Sadler moved up one spot to seventh listed with a -468 followed by Kevin Harvick who moved up two spots to eighth listed now with a -491. Kurt Busch dropped down two spots to ninth listed with a -509, while Ryan Newman dropped down one spot to round out the top ten drivers with a -547.

Did anyone notice how Jeff Gordon had a terrible car all afternoon. He was on the threshold of going a lap down on two different occasions but was saved by caution periods. The first time, Ricky Craven spun out bringing out the caution as Tony Stewart was about to put him a lap down. The second time Stewart put him a lap down and then a caution was called for debris on the track, giving Gordon the lucky dog award allowing him to come around to get back on the lead lap. All of a sudden his car was repaired, running like a rocket, and he ends up with a top five finish? Give me a break!

Tony Stewart just can't stay away from controversy. There are some people out there today that will try to make you believe that he's in big trouble again, but I don't really think that's the case. Most of you saw the same thing I did on the restart where Stewart had four fresh tires starting third with the two cars ahead of him starting on just two fresh tires. Sterling Marlin was starting second and Kasey Kahne was leading. Marlin hasn't been known in recent years to be very good on restarts. Stewart got around him quickly and got in line behind Kahne ahead of Marlin. Kahne got loose and checked up and Stewart had no choice but to run into the back of him, putting Kahne into the wall and out of the event. Kahne's #9 Dodge didn't have any brake lights on it folks, there was no way Stewart could have known that he checked up until he hit him. So, I challenge anyone out there reading this to write and tell me what Stewart did wrong? When you start a race, you don't hit the brakes, you hit the accelerator, you mat that thing to the floor and haul the mail. If you hit the brakes, miss a shift, get loose, or spin on a restart, nine chances out of ten, you're going to get run over by the car, or cars, restarting the race behind you. It's as simple as that.

The deal here has nothing to do with Stewart doing anything wrong at Chicagoland. There are lots of teams and fans out there that think Stewart needed to be suspended for the altercation he had with Brian Vickers after the Sonoma event. NASCAR didn't see it that way, they meted out the punishment to Stewart that they thought he ought to get. There's nothing that can be done about it at this point in time.

It was amusing to see Kahne's crew chief, Tommy Baldwin, run down to the Home Depot pits of Tony Stewart and start trouble with Greg Zipadelli. The way it turned out, after we have all watched the replay of the wreck several times, Baldwin simply made a fool out of himself, he pulled a "Tony Stewart" by getting emotional about his driver getting wrecked. I certainly think that Baldwin deserves a heavy fine, probation, and maybe even a suspension. After all, Baldwin is the one who left his pit box and entered the Home Depot pit area looking for trouble. We all are aware that he found it! As for the Home Depot crew, including crew chief Zipadelli, what did they do other than defend themselves from a bunch of hyped up wild men running into their area looking for trouble?

Everyone seems to be on Tony Stewart's case. Even team owner Ray Evernham got into the act by slamming Stewart's recent behavior. Maybe Stewart has behaved badly of late, but it doesn't have anything to do with the situation at hand. Stewart is innocent of wrong doing at Chicagoland, he won the event fair and square. Now that he has the reputation of being NASCAR's bad boy for the 2004 season, all of the teams seem to be laying for him, blaming any little thing they can on the beleaguered driver. We all saw Kevin Harvick, Kurt Busch, and Jimmy Spencer go through the same thing during the last couple of seasons. This mess will blow over soon when the attention will shift on the Chase for the Championship.

Next week the Cup competitors have a break from competition. They will return to the track at Loudon, New Hampshire on July 25th.

7/18/04… Cup drivers aren't the only ones on the circuit with flaring tempers. We've all seen Michael "Fatback" McSwain throwing stuff around in his pit box when things didn't go right on a pit stop for Bobby Labonte's #18 Interstate Batteries Chevrolet.

According to published reports, Fatback got into an altercation with a team member during the Pocono event and it apparently escalated to the point where one of them had to go. Ousting the crew chief because of one of those head butting personality conflict problems is something that we don't often see. I have n idea who McSwain was at odds with, but they must have wielded more clout than he does, because he was shown the door.

Regardless, McSwain does indeed have a foul temper, maybe he would have been a better crew chief for Tony Stewart's team than the easy going Bobby Labonte. Let that be a message to Tony Stewart, the handwriting is on the wall. Foul temper flare-ups won't be tolerated at Joe Gibbs racing. Stewart has gotten by with it for quite a while now; I'm wondering how many flare-ups McSwain had before being ousted…

Ricky Craven has been rumored to be out of the #32 Tide Ford. At the time of this writing the rumor has been denied, but you can rest assured, as we've seen it time and time again, usually where there's smoke, fire is soon to follow.

Also along with the rumor was news concerning Craven being let go at the time when the Cup circuit was about to head up to New Hampshire, which the Maine native Craven tends to call his home track because of it's close proximity to his home state. Actually, as we all know, that's the only venue in New England proper, the next closest being the road course track at Watkins Glen.

The rumor could have been just a public relations plow to bring attention to the mediocre driver at a time when he may be heading up the pike to attempt to impress his hometown fans. If he impresses them, it will be a first. Craven's best finish at the New Hampshire facility is a 25th place finish, which isn't very impressive regardless of what venue it happened at.

Looking back at Craven's record as a Cup competitor, there's really not a lot there to write home to mother about. He started racing full time in the Cup Series in 1995. He's had two wins, one in the fall race at the Martinsville, Virginia short track in 2001 and one at the spring race at Darlington, South Carolina in 2003. Looking at his stats up to the present, in 270 starts, he's accumulated two wins, 17 top five finishes, 41 top ten finishes, and six Bud poles. Out of nine full seasons, his best finish in the driver's point's standings was 15th in 2003. So far this season out of 18 races, his best finish is 16th, on three different occasions, with a ranking of 31st in the driver's point's standings.

I wouldn't be a bit surprised to see Craven get the axe due to poor performance. According to early (since refuted) reports at Jayski.com ,those rumored to be taking over the #32 Tide ride include Bobby Hamilton Jr. with crew chief Harold Holly, and maybe even Johnny Benson for a couple of races beginning with the New Hampshire event.

The "Green, White, Checkers" rule has been implemented by NASCAR for the Cup and Busch Series, much to the dismay of the majority of driver's and teams.

There are two sides to this coin, just as with any controversial issue. At least on the bright side of the spectrum, we won't be seeing the red flag coming out to stop the races so that they can have the chance to end under green anymore. I think that's one of the main aspects of the new rule that I like. I was never a red flag advocate; the red flag was initially only supposed to be used to stop a race if the track was totally blocked by a wreck, and not to play games with the outcome of a race.

With the new rule, if a caution period is called during the waning laps of an event, the race is guaranteed to run the two more laps, one green flag lap to restart the event and then the following white flag lap signifying the last lap of the event. If a wreck occurs during the green, white, checkers rule's implementation, or a caution period has to be called during these last two laps for debris on the track, the event will still end under caution. Only one green, white, checker rule implementation will be allowed during an event. We have all seen that caution periods breed caution periods. How many times have we seen antsy drivers lose control in late race restarts? When this happens during a green white checkers restart, the event will still end under caution, so what's the point of the green, white, checkers?

Keeping all of this in mind, the new rule does not guarantee that any given event will end under green flag racing conditions. What it does guarantee is that the new rule could extend the event another two miles, three miles, or five miles, depending on the size of the track. This is going to play havoc with the teams fuel mileage calculations and may have an impact on the outcome of the event due to leaders having to make pit stops for fuel.

Not too long ago, NASCAR was its best to insure that fuel mileage did not have such a severe impact on the outcome of events, and were taking steps to prevent fuel mileage races. The new rule implementation is a complete reversal of that strategy, by possibly extending the event another two laps; fuel mileage could come into play as being one of the most important factors guiding its outcome.

Net week the Cup Series makes its way up to New England for the Siemens 300 at the New Hampshire International Speedway at Loudon, New Hampshire. The event is scheduled to be aired live by the TNT channel on Sunday, July 25th at 1:30 pm eastern. Qualifying for the event will be aired by the TNT channel on Friday, July 23rd, at 3 pm eastern.

Last season's winner of the July New Hampshire event was Jimmie Johnson. He was followed by Kevin Harvick, Matt Kenseth, Ryan Newman, Robby Gordon, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Dale Jarrett, Steve Park, Jeff Burton, and rookie Greg Biffle.

There was no Bud Pole Award due to inclement weather. The field was set via owner's points relegating Matt Kenseth to the pole position. There were 12 caution periods for a total of 63 laps out of the 300 lap event on the 1.058 mile paperclip shaped oval.

7/25/04… Kurt Busch rose to the occasion and cemented his chances for the time being to be among the drivers eligible for the Chase for the Championship. The victory was the second this season for Busch, and his tenth win in the fourth full year of his Cup career.

As is the norm at the New England facility, the lap leader of the race doesn't usually win the event. Ryan Newman led a little over half of the 300 lap event, but his car fell off in the waning laps to be overtaken by Kurt Busch and Jeff Gordon.

The Cup event wasn't quite as bad as the Busch Series crashfest, but there were 12 caution periods called for wrecks and debris on the track that took up a total of 68 laps out of the 300. All in all, it was a rather clean race, considering all of the personality problems that have prevailed on and off of the track so far this season. Maybe at this stage of the game, the drivers are more tuned in on positioning themselves into a secure spot within the top ten in driver's points.

A little side note here about Ricky Craven, who calls the New England International Speedway his home track. The previously circulated rumor that he is going to be leaving the Cal Wells #32 Tide ride has been substantiated. According to published reports, Craven and Wells will part ways at the end of the season. If Craven doesn't do any better in the next few weeks than he did at New England, he may get the boot before then. Craven treated his home town fans to two crashes into the wall and a paltry 38th place finish out of the race with his sixth DNF (did not finish) of the season at lap number 213. The best finish he's ever had at New England in front of his home town fans is 25th. So much for Ricky Craven, maybe a truck team will pick him up next season, but I don't have any idea why.

Getting back to the New Hampshire event -- following Kurt Busch across the finish line were Jeff Gordon, Ryan Newman, Matt Kenseth, Tony Stewart, Michael Waltrip, Jamie McMurray, rookie Kasey Kahne, Dale Jarrett, and Jeremy Mayfield. The top ten starters and how they finished:

1. Ryan Newman -- #12 Dodge – finished 3rd
2. Jimmie Johnson -- #12 Chevy – finished 11th
3. Martin Truex Jr. -- #8 Chevy – finished 31st
4. Michael Waltrip -- #15 Chevy -- finished 6th
5. Jamie McMurray -- #42 Dodge -- finished 7th
6. Kasey Kahne* -- #9 Dodge – finished 8th
7. Jeremy Mayfield -- #19 Dodge – finished 10th
8. Rusty Wallace -- #2 Dodge – finished 30th
9. Tony Stewart -- #20 Chevy – finished 5th
10. Ricky Craven -- #32 Chevy – finished 38th

Jimmy Johnson is still leading the driver's points, and actually enhanced his lead over second place Dale Earnhardt Jr. to a total of 165 points. Earnhardt's bad luck practicing for the Sonoma sports car event kind of sidelined the young star at New Hampshire. Of course, we all know that with his second place standing this late in the game, junior could have sit this race out entirely and still would have been in the championship hunt in the last ten races of the season.

With the first five positions in the driver's standings remaining the same, Jeff Gordon in third is now listed with a -202, followed by Tony Stewart in fourth listed with a -302. Matt Kenseth is still listed in fifth, now with -369 points. Kurt Busch's win moved him up three positions to sixth, listing him now with a -454. Bobby Labonte dropped down one spot to seventh listed with a -460, followed by Elliott Sadler listed with a -480. Kevin Harvick dropped down one spot to ninth listed with a -497, with Ryan Newman remaining in tenth listed with a -502.

Next week The Cup series moves to the Pocono Mts. in eastern Pennsylvania for the Pennsylvania 500. The event is scheduled to be aired by the TNT channel on Sunday, August 1st at 1 pm eastern. Qualifying for the event is scheduled to be aired by the TNT channel at 3 pm eastern on Friday, July 30th.

Last season's winner of the second Pocono event was Ryan Newman. He was followed across the finish line by this week's winner Kurt Busch, Dale Jr., Michael Waltrip, Terry Labonte, Jeff Burton, Joe Nemechek, Todd Bodine, Dave Blaney, and Sterling Marlin.