Chase for the NASCAR NEXTEL Cup – Week 1
THE RACE: Sylvania 300 at New Hampshire International Speedway
WHEN: Sunday, Sept. 16 @ 1 p.m. (ET)
TV: ABC
DRIVERS QUALIFIED FOR THE CHASE: Jimmie Johnson, Jeff Gordon, Tony Stewart, Carl Edwards, Kurt Busch, Denny Hamlin, Martin Truex Jr., Matt Kenseth, Kyle Busch, Jeff Burton, Kevin Harvick, Clint Bowyer.
DEFENDING SERIES CHAMPION: Jimmie Johnson
DEFENDING SYLVANIA 300 CHAMPION: Kevin Harvick
CHASE FACTS:
10 races
12 drivers.
Drivers qualifying for the Chase have their point totals reset at 5,000; they then get 10 bonus points for each race victory prior to the Chase. The bonus points create the Chase “seedings.”
THE STORIES:
Jimmie Johnson is top-seeded via his six wins pre-Chase. He starts the Chase with 5,060 points.
At New Hampshire, four-time NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series champion Jeff Gordon – the second Chase seed with 5,040 points – will begin his “Drive For 5” by making his 500th series start – his 500th consecutive start, no less. Gordon’s first start came in the 1992 series finale at Atlanta (the last race of seven-time champion Richard Petty’s career) and hasn’t missed a race since.
Kurt Busch won the Sylvania 300 in 2004 – and went on to win the series championship in the first year of the Chase format. Busch swept both of 2004’s races at New Hampshire, so he has to feel confident coming back to the “Magic Mile.”
Kevin Harvick got off to a good start in last year’s Chase by winning the Sylvania 300 – he went on to finish third in the final standings. He’s out for a repeat win at New Hampshire.
A Chase driver has won the September New Hampshire race the last three years -- Kurt Busch, Ryan Newman and Kevin Harvick, with Busch the only one to go on to win the series title. Tony Stewart, who has two wins there (2000, 2005), owns the top Driver Rating at NHIS: 116.9.
NASCAR’s safety-oriented “Car of Tomorrow”, which has provided extremely competitive racing this year during a partial-season “rollout,” will be run at New Hampshire for the second time.
The ABC Network is back televising NASCAR NEXTEL Cup races for the first the time since 2000. The broadcast team features former series champion Rusty Wallace as an analyst and veteran broadcaster Brent Musberger as the overall broadcast’s host.
THE CHASE SCHEDULE: (track sizes in parentheses)
Sept. 16—New Hampshire (1.058 miles); Sept. 23—Dover (1 mile); Sept. 30—Kansas (1.5 miles); Oct. 7—Talladega (2.66 miles); Oct. 13—Charlotte (1.5 miles); Oct. 21—Martinsville (.526 mile); Oct. 28—Atlanta (1.54 miles); Nov. 4—Texas (1.5 miles); Nov. 11—Phoenix (1 mile); Nov. 18—Homestead (1.5 miles).
