Hendrick Motorsports Tag

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 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 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 Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service AVONDALE, Ariz. – Jimmie Johnson played spoiler last Sunday at Texas, stealing a win from Brad Keselowski in the closing laps. On Friday afternoon at Phoenix International Raceway – though “spoiler” is not a role he relishes – the six-time NASCAR Sprint Cup Series champion was at it again, winning the pole for Sunday’s Quicken Loans Race for Heroes 500 (2:30 p.m. ET on NBC) with a track-record lap at 143.158 mph (25.147 seconds). Johnson, who was bounced from the Chase for the NASCARRead More

MARTINSVILLE, Va. – Yes, Jeff Gordon celebrated his 93rd career victory in the Goody’s Headache Relief Shot 500 at Martinsville Speedway. Yes, Gordon will compete for the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series championship in the season finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway. Yes, there were tears of joy in Victory Lane for Gordon, who’s at the tail end of his final season in the No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet. But Sunday’s race at Martinsville had so much more — most notably, “Matt Kenseth’s Revenge.” Long before Gordon held off Jamie McMurray in aRead More

Four-time Sprint Cup Series champion Jeff Gordon is enjoying the race package at Darlington ahead of the Bojangles’ Southern 500. On a weekend when NASCAR is celebrating the days of old with retro-themed throwbacks to the 1970’s, Gordon is more focused on breaking into Victory Lane for his first win of the year and securing a spot in the Chase for the Championship. Gordon has seven wins at the historic ‘Lady in Black’ with the last one coming in 2007. Through much of the season (or the last several) GordonRead More

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – Dale Earnhardt Jr. endured a weekend of rain, a three-hour-plus pre-race delay, and nine caution flags to win the Coke-Zero 400 at Daytona International Speedway early Monday morning. The race ended at 2:41 a.m. and concluded with a large crash featuring Austin Dillon’s No. 3 Chevrolet going airborne and smashing into the catch-fence near Turn 1 after he crossed the start-finish line. Dillon walked away from the wreck, the fourth major crash of the night. After being released from the infield care center, Dillon said heRead More

BROOKLYN, Mich. – Kevin Harvick had his sights set on a clean sweep of knockout qualifying at Michigan International Speedway—until Kasey Kahne had other ideas late in Friday’s final round. Kahne sped around the two-mile track in 35.645 seconds (201.992 mph) to knock Harvick off the pole for Sunday’s Quicken Loans 400 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race (1 p.m. ET on FOX Sports 1). Harvick, who posted a 201.613 mph lap in the final session, had topped the charts in the first two rounds, matching Kahne’s pole-winning time in theRead More

DOVER, Del.—Jimmie Johnson, welcome to the club. With his overtime victory in Sunday’s FedEx 400 benefiting Autism Speaks at Dover International Speedway, Johnson became the fifth driver to win 10 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series races at a single track, joining Richard Petty, David Pearson, Darrell Waltrip and Dale Earnhardt Sr. in sharing that distinction. Johnson’s triumph was his series-best fourth of the season and the 74th of his career, eighth most all-time and two behind NASCAR Hall of Famer Earnhardt in seventh place. Unlike many of the six-time champion’s pastRead More

After powering to his second pole of the season on Thursday night, Matt Kenseth will start NASCAR’s longer race from the most advantageous position—with his No. 20 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota getting serviced in the most advantageous pit stall. Kenseth ran his fastest lap of the night (194.252 mph) in the third and final round of knockout qualifying at Charlotte Motor Speedway and secured the top spot on the grid for Sunday’s Coca-Cola 600 (6 p.m. ET on FOX), the 12th NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race of the season. TheRead More