Kansas Speedway Tag

By David Morgan, NASCAR Editor For Jimmie Johnson to be able to keep his hopes of an eighth Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series championship alive, he’ll have to make it through Sunday’s elimination race at Kansas to do so. One may think that shouldn’t be too tough a task for the No. 48 team, but with only seven points separating him from the cut-off line, anything could happen by the time the checkered flag falls on the Hollywood Casino 400. The Round of 12 got off to a decent startRead More

By David Morgan, NASCAR Editor The Round of 12 all comes down to this. After a wild weekend on the high banks of Talladega Superspeedway that saw the majority of the field suffer some kind of damage on the 2.66 mile behemoth in Alabama, the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series heads west to America’s Heartland to take on the fast 1.5-mile Kansas Speedway for Sunday’s running of the Hollywood Casino 400. First joining the circuit as a relatively tame 1.5 mile track with 15 degree banking in the turns, KansasRead More

By David Morgan, NASCAR Editor The 2001 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series season started off with profound loss, but also ushered in an era of unprecedented growth for the series as they made their way to new markets and new tracks later in the year. One of those new tracks/markets was Kansas Speedway, a 1.5-mile intermediate oval just outside of Kansas City that would make its debut in September 2001. Jason Leffler and points leader Jeff Gordon would start on the front row, but it wouldn’t take long for thingsRead More

It’s that time of the year again. After the 16 driver field for the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series playoffs was set last weekend at Richmond, the intensity of the season is about to ramp up over the final 10 weeks of the season as we’ll whittle the championship field down to four at Homestead to see which driver will walk away with the title at season’s end. As a refresher, there will be three rounds of eliminations before the Championship Four is set. The Round of 16 will includeRead More

By David Morgan, NASCAR Editor After eight weeks of recovery time, Aric Almirola will be returning to the cockpit of the No. 43 Ford this weekend at New Hampshire Motor Speedway. Almirola was injured at Kansas Speedway in early May, suffering an acute compression fracture to his T5 Vertebra in his back after a vicious multi-car crash with Joey Logano and Danica Patrick. Entering Turn 1 on lap 200, Logano appeared to have something break on the right-front of his car, which turned his Ford to the left, making contactRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service KANSAS CITY, Kan. – Martin Truex Jr. finally ended his Kansas hex. Truex streaked away on the final restart with two laps left in Saturday night’s Go Bowling 400 to win his first Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series race at Kansas Speedway. Truex led a race-high 104 of 267 laps to win for the ninth time in his career and for the second time this season. Three times in the past, Truex had led the most laps in a Kansas race—without winning. But onRead More

By David Morgan, NASCAR Editor After winning his first career pole on Friday, Ryan Blaney headed into Saturday night’s Go Bowling 400 at Kansas as one of the favorites to be able to contend for the win and after a strong run from the driver in his sophomore season, the No. 21 Wood Brothers Racing team would bring home a fourth-place finish when the checkered flag flew. Blaney would lead the first nine laps of the race before ceding the lead over to eventual race winner Martin Truex, Jr., butRead More

By David Morgan, NASCAR Editor Kansas Speedway is not normally a track known for its vicious crashes, but with 67 laps to go in Saturday night’s Go Bowling 400, a three-car crash involving Joey Logano, Danica Patrick, and Aric Almirola, would bring out the red flag as safety officials worked to extricate Almirola from his car. Entering Turn 1 on lap 200, Logano appeared to have something break on the right-front of his car, which turned his Ford to the left, making contact with the right-rear of Patrick’s car andRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service KANSAS CITY, Kan. – Kyle Busch didn’t do a celebratory burnout when he won Friday night’s Toyota Tundra 250 at Kansas Speedway. He didn’t do his customary bow after notching his 47th victory in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series. Heartbreak for Ben Rhodes, who was leading by more than a second when his engine expired with eight laps left, provided the stroke of serendipity that launched Busch into Victory Lane. And Busch knew it. “That’s one of the worst ones to swallow rightRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service KANSAS CITY, Kan. – Improving in each round of knockout qualifying in relation to other cars, Ryan Blaney won the pole for Saturday night’s Go Bowling 400 at Kansas Speedway (7:30 p.m. ET on FS1), claiming his first career pole by a mere .009 seconds over Joey Logano. During a Friday qualifying session in which 11 cars failed to make it to the grid because of inspection issues, Blaney toured the 1.5-mile speedway in 28.481 seconds (189.600 mph) in the final round to earnRead More