NASCAR Category

By Seth Livingstone, NASCAR Wire Service HOMESTEAD, Fla.—As strong as he was in winning Friday night’s Ford EcoBoost 200, Matt Crafton was already looking ahead to 2016. Crafton, whose hopes for a third consecutive NASCAR Camping World Truck Series championship were dashed by a crash at Phoenix last week, won his sixth race of the season, holding off John Hunter Nemechek and Tyler Reddick in the season finale. Although Crafton’s No. 88 Toyota Tundra finished 2.9 seconds ahead of Nemechek and more than six seconds ahead of Reddick, the 39-year-oldRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service HOMESTEAD, Fla.—Denny Hamlin stole the thunder from the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series’ four Championship Round drivers, winning the pole for Sunday’s Ford EcoBoost 400 at Homestead-Miami Speedway (3 p.m. ET on NBC). Outrunning Joey Logano and championship-eligible teammate Kyle Busch for the top starting spot, Hamlin toured the 1.5-mile speedway in 30.568 seconds (176.655 mph) in the third and final round of Friday’s knockout time trials. Logano (176.263 mph) will start beside Hamlin in the season finale, followed by Busch, the highest qualifier amongRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service HOMESTEAD, Fla. – Though the line that separates acceptable racing practices from on-track over-the-line aggression may not be defined in bold paint like the line that marks the start and finish of a race, NASCAR Chairman & CEO Brian France contends that drivers know exactly where it is. “Do you know how many drivers have come to see (NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Director) Richard Buck in the last two weeks, three weeks, four weeks?,” France asked rhetorically during his annual “State of the Sport”Read More

By Joey Barnes, Editor-in-Chief The Wood Brothers have fielded entries in the NASCAR’s top series since 1950 and after a decade of competing part-time, the oldest team in the garage will compete for all 36 races in 2016 Ryan Blaney behind the wheel. The last time Wood Brothers Racing fielded a full-time entry was 2006. “We are beyond excited to make this announcement about going back to full time competition,” said Eddie Wood, team co-owner, at a press conference at Homestead-Miami Speedway during Ford Championship Weekend. “It has been somethingRead More

By Seth Livingstone, NASCAR Wire Service Homestead, Fla. – When you’re a single-car team, competing for NASCAR’s biggest prize, you have to work smart and do things a bit differently. That’s where Furniture Row’s Cole Pearn comes in. The first Canadian NASCAR Sprint Cup Series crew chief graduated with a mechanical engineering degree from the University of Waterloo (Ontario). A former late model driver and three-time Canadian go-kart champion, his preferred participation sport is beer league hockey. It meshes perfectly with the Rocky Mountain lifestyle of his Denver-based race team.Read More

By Seth Livingstone, NASCAR Wire Service HOLLYWOOD, Fla. – There’s no telling where a younger, less mature Kyle Busch might have been this week. For all his talent, he probably wouldn’t have been at Thursday’s Championship 4 Media Day session in preparation for Sunday’s Ford EcoBoost 400 (3 p.m. ET on NBC) and his shot at a NASCAR Sprint Cup Series championship. Team owner Joe Gibbs sees the difference in his driver, who has overcome extreme adversity to put himself in position to battle defending champion Kevin Harvick, four-time champRead More

By Seth Livingstone, NASCAR Wire Service HOLLYWOOD, Fla. – Experience tells Kevin Harvick that there’s only one sure way to lock up his second consecutive NASCAR Sprint Series title. That’s to win Sunday’s Ford EcoBoost 400 at Homestead-Miami Speedway (3 p.m. ET on NBC). Experience is also why his team owner, Tony Stewart, thinks Harvick is the favorite to do just that. “I do (think he’s the favorite), mainly from the standpoint that he’d been through this scenario and through this week last year,” said Stewart at Thursday’s Championship 4Read More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service HOLLYWOOD, Fla.—Does Martin Truex Jr. have a decent chance to win the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series championship? There aren’t many who think so. In a recent poll of 50 full-time media members and 50 denizens of the Sprint Cup garage, all asked to predict the winner of the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup, Jeff Gordon got 40 votes, defending champion Kevin Harvick 37 and Kyle Busch 20. That left three votes for Truex, who earned his title eligibility for Sunday’s Ford EcoBoost 400Read More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service HOLLYWOOD, Fla.—If the four men on the dais at the Diplomat Resort & Spa had been a vocal group, rather than the four Championship Round drivers in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series, Jeff Gordon provided a ready name for the ensemble. “He’s the favorite,” Gordon said, pointing at reigning series champion Kevin Harvick. “We’re the sentimentals. That’s all there is.” The “we” in this case referred to Gordon, Kyle Busch and Martin Truex Jr., all of whom will be attempting to dethrone the championRead More

By Jeff Olson, NASCAR Wire Service Chris Buescher isn’t fond of points racing or being cautious. But when it comes to Saturday’s NASCAR XFINITY Series Ford EcoBoost 300 season finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway (2:45 p.m. ET on NBC), he might have to do a little of both. Buescher leads Chase Elliott by 18 points, Ty Dillon by 22 and Regan Smith by 24 going into the race. With such narrow margins, Buescher will try to balance caution with aggression. “You’ve got to be a little bit more careful, but atRead More