Directv 500

fullSPEED · 31 Mar 2006, 07:14 (Ref:1565824)

On Sunday, the NASCAR Nextel Cup moves to Martinsville Speedway for the DIRECTV 500. Jeff Gordon and Hendrick Motorsports have more success on any driver at the short track of Martinsville. Last year, he dominated the track’s .526 mile oval sweeping the spring and fall race. He has accumulated seven wins and twenty top-10 finish in 26 starts. He has won four of his seven starts on this track.

kingfloopy · 31 Mar 2006, 13:40 (Ref:1566112)

Gordon should have another good run, I bet that Jimmie Johnson will probably run good despite what happened at Bristol.

I'm hoping the Petty cars can get a good run too, I think Kyle had a top-10 here last year and Labonte is coming off of a fifth at Bristol. It'd be amazing if they both got top-10's at Martinsville.

Tony Raines is coming aboard the #96 this race too replacing Terry Labonte. Labonte will return for the road course races later in the season and will also run some races in the #44 Hendrick car. I think he is retiring completely after this season.

On another note Jimmy Spencer will be back racing in the #49 BAM Racing entry as regular driver Brent Sherman has never driven at Martinsville before and the team is out of the top-35 in points. Spencer will remain with the team as a coach for Sherman and may drive in some other races later in the season. For some reason I don't see Sherman lasting much longer in the car unless the sponsor who he is connected to insists that he stays.

Also David Stremme (not a surprise to me), Travis Kvapil (also not a surprise) and Sterling Marlin (sort of a surprise) will all need to qualify as they are not in the top-35. I really wonder how long Kvapil will last in the #32 car and how the long the team will last as a whole. I can't imagine Tide staying with the #32 PPI for another dismal season after this. Unless the team can really improve this year its light out. The team actually ran fairly decent a few years ago too, but they seem to have forgotten how to build a good running car. On the other end Robby Gordon's team is securly in the top-35 and is pulling off for good runs. I look for the team to win the road course races this season, which would be pretty neat since its an owner driver deal and a single car team.

J.D.

kingfloopy · 1 Apr 2006, 16:19 (Ref:1567006)

The starting lineup is:

1 48 Jimmie Johnson Chevy 96.736
2 26 Jamie McMurray Ford 96.696
3 20 Tony Stewart Chevy 96.632
4 12 Ryan Newman Dodge 96.563
5 9 Kasey Kahne Dodge 96.509
6 14 Sterling Marlin Chevy 96.484
7 38 Elliott Sadler Ford 96.445
8 24 Jeff Gordon Chevy 96.288
9 2 Kurt Busch Dodge 96.117
10 16 Greg Biffle Ford 95.976
11 10 Scott Riggs Dodge 95.864
12 96 Tony Raines Chevy 95.830
13 43 Bobby Labonte Dodge 95.786
14 22 Dave Blaney Dodge 95.752
15 99 Carl Edwards Ford 95.670
16 17 Matt Kenseth Ford 95.632
17 5 Kyle Busch Chevy 95.603
18 18 J.J. Yeley # Chevy 95.530
19 21 Ken Schrader Ford 95.487
20 31 Jeff Burton Chevy 95.444
21 1 Martin Truex Jr. # Chevy 95.357
22 01 Joe Nemechek Chevy 95.275
23 19 Jeremy Mayfield Dodge 95.271
24 25 Brian Vickers Chevy 95.218
25 41 Reed Sorenson # Dodge 95.146
26 29 Kevin Harvick Chevy 95.132
27 7 Robby Gordon Chevy 95.065
28 88 Dale Jarrett Ford 95.017
29 8 Dale Earnhardt Jr. Chevy 94.855
30 6 Mark Martin Ford 94.708
31 34 Chad Chaffin Chevy 94.543
32 42 Casey Mears Dodge 94.538
33 55 Michael Waltrip Dodge 94.505
34 66 Jeff Green Chevy 94.463
35 95 Stanton Barrett Chevy 94.458
36 4 Scott Wimmer Chevy 94.444
37 45 Kyle Petty Dodge 94.214
38 40 David Stremme # Dodge 94.200
39 51 Mike Garvey Chevy 94.106
40 32 Travis Kvapil Chevy 94.087
41-OP 11 Denny Hamlin # Chevy 93.915
42-OP 07 Clint Bowyer # Chevy 93.673
43 92 Chad Blount Dodge 94.017
DNQ 74 Derrike Cope Dodge 94.013
DNQ 61 Kevin Lepage Ford 93.854
DNQ 78 Kenny Wallace Chevy 93.627
DNQ 49 Jimmy Spencer Dodge 93.525
DNQ 89 Morgan Shepherd Dodge 93.460
DNQ 00 Hermie Sadler Ford 92.628

Looks like Spencer didn't make the race. The only full time team that didn't. Pretty impressive that Chad Blount made the race. I've been following him for a few years since he ran in ARCA and an abbreviated Busch career. I've always thought he had a lot of talent and has never gotten a good break.

J.D.

muggle not · 2 Apr 2006, 01:49 (Ref:1567367)

It would be nice to see Kyl petty and Bobby Labonte have good runs at martinsville, both are capable. Jeff Gordon will contend for the win IMHO.

i wonder who will get ticked off in this race.. seems that every race someone gets upset.

kingfloopy · 3 Apr 2006, 01:07 (Ref:1568639)

Good run by Tony Stewart to get the win. Good runs by Jeff Gordon and Jimmie Johnson too.

J.D.

StuiE · 4 Apr 2006, 12:59 (Ref:1570098)

Dale Jr did pretty well considering his car was torn up! even after he hit the inside wall.

Stewart had it pretty much the whole day...he was gooood.

Surprised there wasn't really any tempers flaring...

Quote:

Originally Posted by kingfloopy

I really wonder how long Kvapil will last in the #32 car and how the long the team will last as a whole. I can't imagine Tide staying with the #32 PPI for another dismal season after this. Unless the team can really improve this year its light out. The team actually ran fairly decent a few years ago too, but they seem to have forgotten how to build a good running car..

Is Kvapil actually any good? always seems to be driving crap cars...

I'm surprised Tide is still with them now, it was a front running car back in the Ricky Rudd days, something has got to change within that team.

kingfloopy · 4 Apr 2006, 14:35 (Ref:1570545)

Kvapil won the truck series title a few years ago so he has some ability. But the championship win itself was kind of a deal where he was 4th or 5th in points and everyone ahead of him had problems in the final race or two, but a championship is a championship. I think he has some ability to run well or at least mid-pack, but the teams he's driven for in Nextel Cup (the #77 and the #32) have been lousy. I think he's probably hurting his career by driving for such lousy teams when he could go back and get a better ride in the trucks or Busch.

As for the #32 team its hard to say what happened. They switched from Ford to Pontiac a few years back and also started building their own engines. They ran well with Fords and at first they did with Pontiac (winning a race at Darlington). But then the engines seemed to get worse and worse and Pontiac left so they had to switch to Chevy with a lower level of factory support. That seems to be the kicker where the team really went down hill. I predict Tide will leave at the end of this season for one of the new Toyota teams.

J.D.

StuiE · 5 Apr 2006, 14:53 (Ref:1571465)

Interesting stuff.

Any reason they didn't go back to Ford? 'cos if they were good at building Ford engines... Lost Ford support?

Thanks for you insight J.D, I quite like reading your posts

kingfloopy · 5 Apr 2006, 15:22 (Ref:1571479)

I don't think they ever built there own Ford engines, I think they used either Pro Motors or the Roush motors. I believe when they went to Pontiac they built their own non-restricted engines and used Richard Childress engines on the restrictor plate tracks. It seems like the switch went well at first, but then the engines seemed to loose power and reliability for some reason. I think they use Childress engines everywhere now.

I imagine they didn't return to Ford because they had made a long term commitment to Pontiac and when Pontiac left they couldn't get out of deal. So they got stuck with switching to Chevy and they lost a lot of the support they had as one of only a few Pontiac teams. I think that hurt them a lot. Cal Wells used to work with Toyota in off road racing and CART. I wonder if they tried to work out a deal with Toyota for NASCAR or not.

J.D.

StuiE · 9 Apr 2006, 11:17 (Ref:1574475)

Funny how the Arceiro/Wells/PPI CART team only started to run well when the NASCAR team was going downhill.

I get the Chevy thing now, wasn't really thinking about the GM link.

at least Kvapil qualified for todays race :P a spot behind Carl Edwards, 30 somethingth, the #49 car DNQ again..