Tony Stewart's Actions on Pit Road Dangerous, Further Damage His Reputation

Things got a little wild at the end of the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race at Charlotte Motor Speedway on Saturday night thanks to a little hard racing between Brad Keselowski, Denny Hamlin and Matt Kenseth and their tempers bubbling over afterward.

After Kevin Harvick had taken the checkered flag as the race winner Keselowski and Hamlin got into a little banging back and forth before heading into the pits. Upon heading into the pits Keselowski and Kenseth then showed their displeasure with each other after making contact on a restart earlier in the race.

Keselowski’s retaliation toward Kenseth on pit road got a little out of hand and led to the No. 2 driver accidentally slamming into the back of Tony Stewart’s Chevrolet. Stewart, taking umbrage to this, threw his car in reverse, gassed it and slammed into the front of Keselowski’s Ford causing significant damage.

Both Hamlin and Kenseth wanted a piece of Keselowski after the race ended with Hamlin being corralled and taken away by a crew member and Kenseth tackling Keselowski in between haulers in the garage area, before a small fight took place between crew members of each team.

While Keselowski, Hamlin and Kenseth engaged in the “fun stuff” after the race I believe that everything they did fits into what NASCAR likes to call “boys have at it.”

What Tony Stewart did on pit road was a little bit more than “boys have at it” and something that doesn’t help his “hothead” reputation within the sport, especially given the tragic circumstances between him and the late dirt track racer Kevin Ward Jr. in New York in August.

NASCAR likely won’t do anything to punish Stewart, because they are probably more concerned about the actions of Keselowski, Kenseth and Hamlin, as are the NASCAR media and fans. But, I believe what Stewart did during this post race incident was the most unacceptable moment of the whole melee.

Drivers throwing their vehicles into reverse and gassing them into parked cars behind them is incredibly dangerous and should not be accepted in the sport. Not only is it incredibly dangerous, but this action (whether rightfully provoked or not) shows that Stewart is quick to anger, which is the exact thing that he doesn’t need to be seen as at this moment, even if he wasn’t charged in the death of Ward.

Keselowski, Kenseth and Hamlin are going to get the headlines after tonight’s race, but it’s the momentary lack of judgment by Stewart that really should take some of the focus.

Nice to See Nice Guy Dale Jr. Win Again

One-hundred and forty-three races is an eternity to go without winning if you’re the biggest star and name in NASCAR. But that’s exactly what Dale Earnhardt Jr., the face of the sport, had gone through in the last four years. 

Luckily for Dale Jr., NASCAR and NASCAR fans that streak came to an end at Michigan Speedway on Sunday afternoon in dominating fashion as Dale Earnhardt Jr. just blew away his competition. When Junior crossed the finish line and received that checkered flag his next closest competition, Tony Stewart, was a whopping five-plus seconds behind him. 

I know that Dale Earnhardt Jr. may be the most overrated athlete in sports and I know that Dale Earnhardt Jr. is probably not one of the best 10 drivers in his sport. However, I’m thrilled for Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Junior Nation and really the entire sport of NASCAR in general. 

Why? 

Because Dale Earnhardt Jr. might be the nicest guy in NASCAR. 

Sure, guys like Kyle Busch, Kurt Busch, Tony Stewart, Kevin Harvick, Denny Hamlin and Carl Edwards have done a lot of winning over the last four years when Junior was struggling and not even close to Victory Lane, but if given the chance to spend an afternoon or have a beer with any of those guys I wouldn’t take it. I seriously wouldn’t. They all come off as jerks … which, unfortunately, means that many of NASCAR’s biggest names or stars are jerks. 

Dale Earnhardt Jr. has never once come off as a jerk, even amidst an epic losing streak that gave him every reason in the world to be one. He’s friendly. He’s humble. He’s down to Earth and fits a good ole boy mode that once was commonplace in the sport, but doesn’t seem to exist much anymore. Sure, Dale Earnhardt Jr. got a lot of his fans because of the family name. But, Dale Earnhardt Jr. is his own man, he’s not as arrogant or hard-headed as his father was, he’s more of the nice guy next door that you’d love for your daughter to date. Dale Jr. is good people and in a sport that seems to be lacking sometimes in good people it’s refreshing to see him succeed.

My 2011 NASCAR Recap: The Best & Worst of the Season

2011 was certainly one of the more interesting years in recent NASCAR history. Here is my little recap of the season with the best and worst moments and drivers of the year. 1) sorry that it’s over a week late 2) I would’ve loved to have gone more in-depth on it, but just don’t have the time.

Best Driver:
Tony Stewart- It’s certainly debatable whether or not Tony Stewart actually had the best all around year in NASCAR, but what’s not debatable is that he showed he was the sport’s best driver during the 10-race playoff. That was simply put the greatest driving I’ve ever seen in 10 years as a NASCAR fan.


Best Achievement:
Tony Stewart winning career third championship after winning five of the 10 playoff races. Stewart didn’t win a single race during the NASCAR Sprint Cup regular season. His Chase performance will certainly go down as one of the greatest moments in NASCAR history.

Most Disappointing Driver:
Denny Hamlin- Denny Hamlin knocked on the door big time in 2010 and looked like he was primed to take the championship last year from Jimmie Johnson. He didn’t, but he certainly looked like he might be the biggest contender coming into the season. Despite making the Chase for the Championship he struggled for much of the season, winning only one race in the spring at Texas.

Best Crew Chief:
Bob Osborne- More often than not the best crew chief of the year will be the crew chief of the driver considered to have been the best driver, but not this year. Bob Osborne, the crew chief for Carl Edwards, was maybe the biggest reason why Edwards was the main contender from the start of the season to the finish. Edwards was the sport’s most consistent driver all year and the two have a great chemistry.

Best Season by a Non-Chase Driver:  
Kasey Kahne- This basically means you’re only the 13th best driver of the year, so congratulations to Kasey Kahne for being the best of the worst. If Kahne had been in the chase he would’ve scored very high as the last 10 races of the season were probably his best stretch that included a win at Phoenix to snap a long winless drought. Kahne likely won’t have any more droughts of that size again, as he goes to Hendrick Motorsports next season and will have the best equipment in the business.


Biggest Turnaround:
Brad Keselowski- I expected big things from Brad Keselowski in 2010 in his first full season in the Sprint Cup series. What we got from him in 2010 was a huge disappointment. In 2011, he was a different driver, winning three races at Pocono, Kansas and Bristol all after breaking his ankle in a horrific practice crash at Road Atlanta.

Worst Drop-off:
Denny Hamlin- See ‘biggest disappointment’

Worst Debut:
Andy Lally- This is really by default, just like the rookie of the year award he earned by being the only rookie of the year candidate. Lally is a very talented road course Gran-Am driver who had never had experience in NASCAR before. I’m pretty sure he just ran the full season this year as a favor to owner Kevin Buckland. Next year he returns to Grand-Am racing where he should once again be a star.

Driver to Watch for 2012:
Carl Edwards- This is basically my pick for who I think will win the championship in 2012. For the second year in a row I’m choosing Edwards. I was just off by a tiebreaker this year, so maybe next year will be the year.

Best Rising Star:
Ricky Stenhouse Jr. & Austin Dillon- this one is so close that I had to give it a tie between 2011 Nationwide Series champion Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and Camping World truck series champion Austin Dillon. I expect very big things out of these two going forward.

Best Race & Wildest Race:
Homestead- It looked all year like the best race of the season was going to be the first race of the season the Daytona 500, but it turned out to be the very last race of the season at Homestead thanks to the greatest championship fight in NASCAR history between eventual winner Tony Stewart and runner-up Carl Edwards.

Best Finish:
Daytona 500- It’s the biggest race of the season and it was the debut of the new tandem style racing at the restrictor plate tracks. On a final restart you basically had David Gilliland pushing Carl Edwards toward the win and Bobby Labonte pushing Trevor Bayne, in just his second career Sprint Cup race, toward the win. Bayne was the winner and many called it the biggest shock in NASCAR history. He was certainly the most improbable Daytona 500 winner in NASCAR history.

Best Fight:
Richard Childress vs. Kyle Busch- The best fight in NASCAR this year was actually one that wasn’t even captured on camera. Kyle Busch while driving in a truck series race got into a little bumping incident with Childress driver Joey Coulter, which in turned really pissed off owner Childress who reportedly took off his watch in the garage, handed it to his grandson/driver Austin Dillon and went to beating on Kyle Busch’s head with his fist. Everybody was pretty much in agreement that Busch deserved it.

Biggest Jerk:
Kyle Busch- Kyle Busch really should have a hold on this honor every year, but believe it or not Carl Edwards was my winner of this honor in 2010 and Kyle’s older brother Kurt could’ve easily won it or shared it with him this year. The incident in the second to last truck race of the season in which Kyle Busch intentionally wrecked Ron Hornaday under caution leading to his suspension from the fall Texas Nationwide and Sprint Cup races is the final straw that officially gave Kyle the honor.

Best NASCAR Decision:
Parking Kyle Busch at Texas for Nationwide & Sprint Cup races after intentionally wrecking Ron Hornaday in truck series. It was way past due for NASCAR to try to straighten this punk out.

Worst NASCAR Decision:
NASCAR not finding a way to do away with the tandem racing at Daytona & Talladega which effectively turned four of the most exciting races of the year into less exciting races … but they were still pretty exciting.

Worst Wreck:
David Reutimann at Watkins Glen- still hoping that someday NASCARs will stay on all four wheels during every wreck. Reutimann is very lucky to have walked away from this one. David Ragan also had an extremely hard hit during the wreck.

Best Rivalry:
Tony Stewart vs. Carl Edwards- For most of the season the best rivalry was Kevin Harvick vs. Kyle Busch, but that all changed during the final 10 races of the season.

Best Moment:
Trevor Bayne winning the Daytona 500- If you want a storybook ending to the biggest event in the sport, this was it. Couldn’t have happened to a nicer kid.

Biggest Bonehead Moment:
David Ragan switching lanes on final restart of Daytona 500- We won’t ever know if Ragan would’ve won the Daytona 500 for sure and he did sort of redeem himself by winning his first career race at the Daytona July race, but that was the moment that could forever have us remembering David Ragan as a driver who didn’t win the sport’s biggest race.

Worst Performance:
Jeff Gordon during the Chase- Jeff Gordon had a great regular season winning three races at Phoenix, Pocono and Atlanta and looked like he was maybe the guy to beat going into the Chase … just one problem, he forgot to show up in the Chase. A potential fifth championship quickly turned into an eighth place finish on the season.

Most Embarrassing Moment/Most Unsportsmanlike Moment:
Paul Menard’s intentional wreck at Richmond to help teammate Kevin Harvick win … I lost all respect for Paul Menard at Richmond win he did that to help Kevin Harvick gain insurmountable lead on race leader and probable winner Jeff Gordon leading to Harvick’s win.

Best Silly Season Move:
Clint Bowyer to Michael Waltrip Racing- This was the biggest NASCAR move going into next season. Clint Bowyer is a huge pickup for Michael Waltrip Racing as he instantly becomes the face of that team. However, while it’s a huge move for Waltrip, I’m not sure it is for Bowyer who probably would’ve been better off staying with Richard Childress Racing.

Best Soundbite:
Boris Said at Watkins Glen about Greg Biffle – This is an honor that didn’t appear on my 2010 NASCAR recap last year, but just had to add it this year thanks to Boris Said. It’s the funniest driver postrace interview I’ve ever heard, bar none.

Biggest Surprise:
Regan Smith winning at Darlington – This might be the most arguable one of my entire recap, because most would say it’s Trevor Bayne winning the Daytona 500, but it’s not. You could teach a monkey to drive a car to victory at Daytona because the style of racing. But, Regan Smith had to earn his first career victory at Darlington with some hard driving to hold off Carl Edwards and a great call by his crew chief on pit road to put him out front on a late race caution.

Best Resurgence:
Jeff Gordon- Jeff Gordon’s 2011 season was probably the biggest up and down season of the year (note that I said up and down, if I had said down and up that’d be Tony Stewart). Fantastic regular season, atrocious playoffs. However, his three wins at Phoenix, Pocono and Atlanta were among the most dominant and best driven races of the year, especially the final laps at Atlanta where he held off teammate Jimmie Johnson ... those laps were the best of the season as far as sheer driving talent goes.

Worst Moment: 

This was not a NASCAR moment, but a motorsports moment and it's the day we lost the great Dan Wheldon at Las Vegas in the IndyCar season finale.

NASCAR Still Has Ways to Go on Safety

When Dale Earnhardt died on the last lap of the 2001 Daytona 500 it essentially set off a race to make the sport as safe as it possibly could be as quickly as possible. NASCAR has come an incredibly long way since that tragic day with the mandating of the HANS device for all drivers, SAFER barriers and a much safer car. You could say that Earnhardt’s death set off a safety initiative that essentially makes the result of his death just as important as his legendary Hall of Fame career.

Yet, as safe as NASCAR has become … I’ve said myself on multiple occasions that the days of NASCAR drivers dying from wrecks may be a thing of the past … there are still moments that pop up every now and then that remind me that NASCAR shouldn’t stop efforts to make the tracks and racing safer.

Last season proved that Pocono had severe safety issues in each of the tracks two races. In the spring race at the track close quarters racing on the final lap saw Kasey Kahne’s #9 Richard Petty Motorsports Ford dart to the infield grass in a boneheaded attempt to pass his blocking teammate A.J. Allmendinger in the #43 Ford. The grass, as it so often does with cars, sent Kahne out of control and in front of oncoming traffic that included the #16 Roush-Fenway Racing Ford of Greg Biffle, #5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet of Mark Martin and the #56 Michael Waltrip Racing Toyota of Martin Truex Jr. Upon hitting the nose of Martin’s #5 car Kahne’s car was sent airborne and almost cleared the short outside wall that would have sent him tumbling into the trees that line the outside of Pocono Raceway.

Upon coming back down from his short flight Kahne’s wrecked car sat in front of more oncoming traffic and took out more contenders like the #24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet of Jeff Gordon, the #6 Roush-Fenway Racing Ford of David Ragan, the #19 Richard Petty Motorsport Ford of Elliott Sadler and more.

Kahne’s ill-decision that led to him almost sailing out of Pocono proved that the track’s walls were far too low if a car could almost find its way out of the track. As a result of this accident and the backlash from the wall being too low, after all NASCAR only seems to fix things when they have been proven to be dangerous, Pocono installed a high catch fence around the track. You can see this new catch fence in the video below of Jeff Gordon’s 2011 spring win at Pocono, if you look really closely at the outside wall.

The late summer race last season at Pocono proved once again that the track had some serious safety issues that needed to be looked into when Elliott Sadler recorded the hardest hit in NASCAR history, since the sport started keeping impact record of hits. Sadler’s wreck was the result of either losing control or being tapped from behind and spun out (there’s really no good video footage of the start of his accident) behind a wreck involving the #2 Penske Racing Dodge of Kurt Busch and the #33 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet of Clint Bowyer ahead of him on the track after Jimmie Johnson in the #48 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet wrecked Busch. Sadler ended up hitting the wall at an uneven angle which caused the most severe impact recorded in NASCAR history and destroyed the car so badly that the entire engine came out of the car and sat on the track in close proximity to his mangled Ford. Footage of Sadler’s horrific wreck can be seen below, but is very brief as the camera was following the initial wreck involving Busch.

Uneven walls or openings in the walls at some tracks are responsible for many of the ugliest and scariest crashes in NASCAR. Sadler showed a second weakness in Pocono’s safety in 2010 and the track made $3 million worth of safety changes before the 2011 season that included a SAFER barrier where Sadler hit to lessen the impact in the event of future wrecks.

Pocono Raceway can still do more when it comes to safety though as you can see from this 2011 ARCA series wreck involving Buster Graham that happened less than two weeks ago.

Now this incident involving Graham’s #59 Dodge might not look serious, but it could have and honestly should have been much, much worse. You see, it had down poured the day before when this race was initially supposed to be held and the race was pushed back to the next morning. Because of all the rain the infield grass was still wet and enabled Graham’s car to pick up so much speed that it actually ramped or jumped over the wall and onto a little piece of the track inside the infield. Graham was incredibly lucky that his car did indeed jump over that wall, because not only is that not a SAFER barrier, but it also is directly in front of a piece of land that unevenly juts out into the infield grass. I shudder to think about what would have happened to Graham had he not gotten a little luck from the drenched grass. I have a terrible feeling that he’d at least have made a trip to the local hospital or even worse, as ARCA cars aren’t quite a safe as NASCAR cars.

Safety issues are something that shouldn’t come up very often at all in NASCAR, but here they have popped up again after Monday’s race (rain pushed the Sprint Cup race back a day) at the road course in Watkins Glen, N.Y.

There were two absolutely terrifying wrecks at Watkins Glen on Monday, a single car wreck involving the #11 Gibbs Racing Toyota of Denny Hamlin and a multiple car incident involving the #6 Ford of David Ragan and the #00 Michael Waltrip Racing Toyota of David Reutimann. The multiple car wreck involving Ragan and Reutimann on the final lap of the race will probably look worse to the casual fan, because it’s scarier looking, but Hamlin’s wreck was just as hard, if not harder.

With 25 laps remaining in the race on Monday Hamlin’s Toyota blew a tire that reportedly cut the brake line and sent Hamlin into a tire barrier at a much higher speed than it would have had Hamlin had brakes. Now these tire barriers are supposed to act similar in style to the SAFER barriers by deflecting some of the impact of the hit, but as you can see in the video below, Hamlin just so happened to hit the tire barrier right in a spot where it was held up by a concrete base. Therefore, Hamlin’s impact wasn’t really deflected that much, as I’m sure you can tell by the drastic shortening of his car’s nose.

Watkins Glen should probably look into adding a SAFER barrier to that section of the track, and around the entire track (only certain areas of the course have the SAFER barriers). They should also do away with the concrete base behind the tire barrier and guardrail as that essentially did the majority of the damage in Hamlin’s accident.

Hamlin’s wreck was no doubt serious business, but it might pale in comparison to the biggest problem that Watkins Glen has right now and it is a problem that has seemingly popped up multiple times over the last few years.

The problem, once again, is the uneven wall angles. The uneven wall angles on the guardrails, coupled with the deflecting tire barriers, at Watkins Glen have led to so much carnage over the last few years that it can no longer be ignored, and frankly the fact that it’s been ignored this long is extremely disturbing.

In the 2008 Sprint Cup race at Watkins Glen, the #00 Michael Waltrip Racing Toyota of Michael McDowell and the #38 Robert Yates Racing Ford of David Gilliland were battling hard for ground when McDowell forced Gilliland into a tire barrier that sent him back onto the track in front of oncoming traffic that led to the horrific wreck, you can see below, that severely damaged not only Gilliland’s car but also those of Bobby Labonte (#43), Dave Blaney (#22), Sam Hornish Jr. (#77), Max Papis (#70), Joe Nemechek (#78), Ryan Newman (#12) and Reed Sorensen (#41). All of the drivers were unharmed, but Labonte had to be taken to a local hospital for further evaluation.

The very next year in 2009 the same exact thing happened when the #9 Kasey Kahne forced the #77 of Sam Hornish Jr. off the track and into a tire barrier, which sent Hornish out into the oncoming traffic of Jeff Gordon’s #24 and Jeff Burton’s #31 Richard Childress Chevrolet thoroughly destroying all three cars.

But, just in case that’s not enough to drive the point home it happened once again in the 2010 Nationwide Series race at the Glen when Jason Leffler’s #38 car gets out of control hits the bad wall angle and is basically thrown back out onto the track in front of almost the entire field, causing an 11 car pileup.

The worst of any of these bad angle wrecks at Watkins Glen, though, came on the final lap of Monday’s race when Boris Said in the Phoenix Racing #51 Chevrolet got into Ragan’s #6 Ford sending it into a bad angle on the left side of the track which shot it back in front of Reutimann’s #00 Toyota effectively sending it into a bad angle on the right side of the track. Reutimann’s impact with the wall was so horrendous that it lifted his Toyota airborne and he was simply along for the ride from there. Both Ragan and Reutimann’s cars were junked and both drivers were extremely lucky to walk away. In post race interviews both Ragan and Reutimann agreed that the track should have SAFER barriers in the locations where they each hit.

There is absolutely no reason at all for tracks like Pocono or Watkins Glen to really have these safety issues in the first place in 2010 and 2011. Every single track on the NASCAR circuit should be mandated to have SAFER barriers on every single wall whether it’s an outside wall or inside wall, no matter what. Driver safety should be the most important thing on NASCAR’s mind and Watkins Glen now is something that must be fixed before the series returns in 2012, above is four consecutive years of horrendous accidents for the same reason.

Jeff Burton said it best on Twitter following the race on Monday at his Twitter handle @RCR31JeffBurton: “We need 2 look at the wall angles, and make some changes. All tracks have spent a fortune on softer walls. We need to keep working.”

NASCAR always needs to keep working on safety, it’s come a long way since Earnhardt’s death, but recent events seem to suggest there is still a little ways to go.

2010 NASCAR Recap

2010 was certainly one of the more interesting years in recent NASCAR history. Here is my little recap of the season with the best and worst moments and drivers of the year.

Best Achievement: Jimmie Johnson wins 5th consecutive Sprint Cup championship

What? You didn’t think I’d give this to Kevin Conway for winning Sprint Cup Rookie of the Year did you? Jimmie Johnson winning his record fifth consecutive Sprint Cup championship is really the only thing that could take this award. Johnson constantly leaves NASCAR fans wondering: “When is anybody going to beat this guy?” Denny Hamlin and Kevin Harvick showed it could be next year, but then again Johnson showed it might be a while yet. The drive for six begins in February.

Best Driver: Denny Hamlin

Well, you’d think that winning a championship would mean that Jimmie Johnson was the best driver of the year wouldn’t you? Sometimes though the champion isn’t the best of the entire season … for instance the 2007-2008 New England Patriots were clearly better than the New York Giants. In a year that Johnson and his #48 Lowe’s Chevy team showed some weaknesses here and there, Hamlin looked like the truly dominant driver the entire season. Hamlin won more races than any driver during the season with eight; oftentimes number of wins is indicative of who really had the best season. Hamlin’s eight wins were two more than Johnson’s season total. Hamlin also finished two more races during the season than Johnson did.

Most Disappointing Driver: Dale Earnhardt Jr.

We might as well rename the disappointing driver of the year honor the Dale Earnhardt Jr. Award. He seems to be earning this dubious honor year-in-and-year-out. Earnhardt Jr. isn’t even one of the 20 best drivers in the Sprint Cup anymore, he finished 21st in the season points standings this year and frankly seems like a lost driver who doesn't have his heart in it. He didn’t win a race this year for the second straight season in the Sprint Cup and only compiled three top five finishes and a horrible eight top 10s. It’s getting to the point where you really can’t even consider Earnhardt Jr. to be disappointing, but instead the norm for him. So, maybe this honor would be better suited for a guy like Earnhardt Jr.’s teammate Mark Martin who had the biggest downfall of any driver in the sport from 2009.

Best Crew Chief: Chad Knaus

We certainly should just rename this honor the Chad Knaus Award because there isn’t a crew chief in all of NASCAR that even comes close. In fact, Knaus might have passed longtime Richard Petty crew chief Dale Inman as the greatest crew chief that the sport has ever seen. Knaus is the man behind Jimmie Johnson’s greatness and frankly for the last few years people have wondered exactly how successful Johnson would be with a crew chief other than Knaus … we certainly won’t see that scenario anytime soon, as team owner Rick Hendrick won’t even think about breaking this great duo up. Late in the Chase for the Championship many, including me, questioned Knaus’ decision to switch pit crews with teammate Jeff Gordon, whose crew performed better throughout the season. I feared it would cause chemistry problems for the last two races of the season, but it didn’t … why? Because Knaus is a genius.

Best Season by a Non-Chase Driver: Jamie McMurray

Jamie McMurray had a career changing season in 2010 and there is no doubt about it. The only flaw in the season was that he didn’t make the Chase for the Championship. McMurray came into the 2010 Sprint Cup season with three career wins in a little over seven seasons. All he did in 2010 was double his career total with three wins at the sports’ two biggest races and three of the sports’ most iconic tracks. McMurray started the season with a new team in the #1 Bass Pro/McDonald’s Earnhardt-Ganassi Chevy and immediately got off on the right foot winning the season’s first and biggest race, the Daytona 500. In August, McMurray would win the sports’ second biggest race of the season, the Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. He’d also win a race at Charlotte Motor Speedway in the fall, one of the sports’ biggest and most storied tracks.

Biggest Turnaround: Jamie McMurray

When you enter a season only having won three career races in almost seven and a half seasons and then win three in one season that’s a pretty big turnaround. McMurray also made a big jump in the points standings gaining eight positions between 2009 when he finished 22nd to finishing 14th in 2010. McMurray is one of the nicest guys in NASCAR; I just hope that his career year in 2010 doesn’t turn out to be a fluke.

Worst Drop-off: Mark Martin

Mark Martin, the senior citizen of the Sprint Cup Series, clearly had the biggest drop-off from the 2009 season to the 2010. In 2009, Martin won five races and finished second in the points standings, which extended his record of second place championship finishes to five … Martin might be the biggest bridesmaid in sports history. In 2010, Martin didn’t win a single race and fell 11 spots in the points standings to 13th. Martin wasn’t the only driver though with a drastic drop-off. Both Kasey Kahne and Juan Pablo Montoya found themselves falling the wrong direction in 2010.

Worst Debut: Danica Patrick

Well, I can definitely say I saw this one coming. In 2010, Danica Patrick who has been a career failure in the IndyRacing League decided that she would try her hand at being a part-time failure in the NASCAR Nationwide Series as well. Patrick competed in 13 Nationwide races in 2010 and it seems like she must have wrecked in most of them. It took Patrick until her 13th and final race of the season at Homestead-Miami Speedway for her to finally finish a race on the lead lap. Patrick will run another part time Nationwide Series schedule in 2011.

Driver to Watch for 2011: Carl Edwards

Using the Denny Hamlin scale from the end of the 2009 season that led everybody to believe he’d be a huge threat in 2010 because of a hot finish to end the season, I conclude that Carl Edwards will be a force to be reckon with in 2011. Edwards nearly went two full Sprint Cup seasons without winning a race and then he went on hot tear winning the final two races of 2010 at Phoenix and Homestead. This is a hot streak that I definitely see him carrying into 2011. I also think that the upcoming rule that will keep Sprint Cup regulars from winning the Nationwide Series championship will help to keep Edwards’ mind where it belongs, in the Cup series.

Best Rising Star: Brad Keselowski

Brad Keselowski frankly had a pretty disappointing first full season in the Sprint Cup Series in 2010, but I think his mind, heart and soul were focused on capturing the 2010 Nationwide Series championship, which he did rather easily, I might say. Now that he’s accomplished that the only thing for him to set his mind toward is great success in the Sprint Cup. Keselowski is a tough, aggressive driver in the mold of a Kyle Busch and I think this will lead to many wins, but also a lot of enemies. I expect Keselowski to have a pretty nice sophomore season in the Sprint Cup in 2011.

Best Race/Best Finish: Talladega- Spring Race

The spring Talladega race was the most competitive race in the long and great history of NASCAR. There was an incredible and record breaking 88 lead changes in the race among a record 29 different drivers in this 180-MPH chess match that is big time restrictor plate racing. This wonderful race led into what became the best finish of the 2010 season. Jamie McMurray led the race with two laps remaining with Kevin Harvick tucked in close on his bumper to draft. The two formed a team that drove off from the rest of the field, which is something that doesn’t happen often in plate racing. On the final lap it looked like Harvick would stay tucked up under McMurray until the end, but at the last possible second Harvick ducked to the inside and made the old school slingshot pass around McMurray in a photo finish. The finish was the eighth closest in NASCAR history, since electrical timing began in 1993. It was a classic duel between two masterful restrictor plate drivers. The win for Harvick also broke an amazing winless drought of 115 races.

Wildest Race: Texas- Chase Race
&
Best Fight: Jeff Gordon vs. Jeff Burton- Texas Chase Race

The race at Texas Motor Speedway in the Chase for the Championship wasn’t just the wildest race of 2010, but quite possibly the wildest one ever. To be honest the racing wasn’t even really anything that special, it’s just a bunch of circumstances that led to the wild event. Early on during the race Kyle Busch was involved in a spin and sped down pit road to beat the pace car back out on the track and thus avoid being lapped. Because of this infraction, Busch was held a lap in the pits. Busch, always the hothead that he is, flipped off the NASCAR official in his pit box and NASCAR assessed him another two-lap penalty for unsportsmanlike conduct. It wouldn’t be the last unsportsmanlike conduct that this race would see by any means. Later in the race under caution for a Martin Truex Jr. wreck another wreck would occur when normally low-key Jeff Burton took offense to the way Jeff Gordon was racing him and Burton put Gordon into the wall, effectively ending both of their days. Gordon took big time exception to the intentional wreck and met Burton on the track for some old time NASCAR fisticuffs. Following Gordon’s wreck came perhaps the most startling moment in the race when Jimmie Johnson’s crew chief Chad Knaus benched Johnson’s entire pit crew and replaced them with Gordon’s pit crew, because the #48 pit crew just wasn’t getting the job done. This was an unprecedented and controversial move at the time that would later prove crucial in Johnson winning his fifth consecutive championship. This was certainly the wildest NASCAR race I can ever remember seeing. Oh by the way, did I mention Denny Hamlin won the race with a late pass over Greg Biffle?

Biggest Jerk: Carl Edwards

Honestly this award could easily be named the Kyle Busch Award, but I’m actually going to give it to Carl Edwards for 2010. Don’t get me wrong, Kyle Busch is a huge jerk, but in my opinion Edwards essentially attempted to murder Brad Keselowski on two different occasions this year. Edwards feels that Keselowski is an aggressive driver and he is, but Keselowski has never taken a racing action as aggressive and dangerous as Edwards did this season against him. Edwards could’ve very easily killed or extremely injured Keselowski this year when he spun him out and sent him airborne at Atlanta Motor Speedway and then later in the season intentionally wrecked him in front of fast, oncoming traffic in a Nationwide Series race at Gateway.

Worst NASCAR Decision: NASCAR’s lack of punishment for Carl Edwards

This award could’ve easily gone to NASCAR’s overkill of a punishment to Clint Bowyer in the Chase, but NASCAR’s lack of punishment for Carl Edwards in the two times that he tried to kill Brad Keselowski was their most appalling decision of the 2010 season. The problem is that at the beginning of the 2010 season NASCAR painted themselves into a corner by announcing the new “Boys, Have At It” policy that let the drivers take policing races back into their own hands. It’s a good move on NASCAR’s part to let the drivers police themselves like in the glory days of the sport and for the most part it turned out great. However, Edwards went overkill on his policing and NASCAR should have called him on it and punished him severely by deducting points and/or suspending him for a race or so. NASCAR didn’t do either after Edwards’ dangerous dumping of Keselowski at Atlanta in the spring. They merely put him on probation for three races, which isn’t even a slap on the wrist. They even had the opportunity to correct themselves later in the season when Edwards dangerously dumped Keselowski again at Gateway, but they simply put him on probation again, this time until the end of the season.

Worst Wreck: Elliott Sadler at Pocono

Some NASCAR fans love bad wrecks. Those fans disgust me. Wrecks are a part of the sport and always will be, but the fact is that they are always dangerous and until that driver exits the car they are something that should be feared. There were a lot of bad wrecks this year as in every year … these included Brad Keselowski’s airborne wreck after Carl Edwards dumped him at Atlanta, Keselowski’s hard wreck after Edwards dumped him in the Nationwide Series at Gateway, Dennis Setzer getting airborne and into the catchfence in a Nationwide Series wreck at Talladega, Ron Hornaday’s airborne wreck at Talladega in the Camping World Truck Series, A.J. Allmendinger’s wild ride at Talladega in the Chase and Kasey Kahne almost leaving the track in the first Pocono track. However, there is no question in my mind that Elliott Sadler’s wreck in the second Pocono race of the summer was the worst wreck of the season and one of the worst I’ve ever seen. A few years ago NASCAR started keeping track of how hard the crashes are and said that Sadler’s Pocono wreck was the hardest wreck ever recorded. There’s no doubt in my mind that Sadler would have lost his life in that wreck had NASCAR not improved in safety in the last decade.

Best Moment: Dale Earnhardt Jr. Winning at Daytona in #3

This was a moment so good that it almost seemed scripted. Some fans even believed that it had to have been “fixed.” But, let me tell you that restrictor plate racing most certainly can’t be “fixed.” Dale Earnhardt Jr. announced that he would run his father’s old #3 Wrangler blue and yellow paint scheme at the Daytona Nationwide Series race in July. In the one and only race that he would ever run in this scheme he dominated and won. This didn’t surprise me at all for two reasons 1) It’s Dale Earnhardt Jr. in a restrictor plate race 2) I believe that Earnhardt Jr. can be a big time driver when he puts his mind to it (which doesn’t appear to happen often) and that he did so on this night in tribute to his father.

Biggest Bonehead Moment: Marcos Ambrose at Infineon

Marcos Ambrose had his first ever NASCAR Sprint Cup Series win in his grasp at the Infineon road course in Sonoma, California during the summer … and then he made one of the dumbest mistakes a driver could ever make. Under a late caution while attempting to conserve fuel Ambrose cut his engine off while going up a hill on the track. The car was unable to start initially after Ambrose shut it off and thus didn’t maintain the pace speed; This allowed second place driver Jimmie Johnson and three or four others to move in front of Ambrose. Johnson went on to win the race that felt as if Ambrose had it in his pocket.

Worst Performance: Denny Hamlin’s qualifying run at Homestead-Miami

Denny Hamlin entered the final race of the Sprint Cup season at Homestead-Miami Speedway 15 points ahead of Jimmie Johnson in the points standings. We all know that Johnson would go on to win his fifth consecutive championship, but I actually don’t think Hamlin lost the championship in the final race. Instead Hamlin lost the championship on Friday when a poor qualifying effort forced him to start 32 spots behind Johnson on the starting grid. It was a move that essentially gave Johnson a big lead from the beginning and he never looked back.

Most Embarrassing Moment: Kasey Kahne quits on Richard Petty

It had been determined earlier in the season that 2010 would be Kasey Kahne’s last season with Richard Petty Motorsports and that he would drive next season for Red Bull Racing while waiting for a spot to open up at Hendrick Motorsports for 2012. Kahne had struggled all season long at RPM and when his brakes failed at Charlotte in the Chase Kahne finally decided that he had enough. When the team fixed the car enough for it to return to the track to gain as many points as possible Kahne faked illness and the team was forced to put JJ Yeley in the car to finish the race. I’d known for some time that Kahne was one of the most overrated drivers in NASCAR, but he proved that night that he was also a quitter. That would turn out to be his final race for RPM. He went to Red Bull racing for the remainder of the 2010 season was replaced in the #9 Budweiser car by Aric Almirola.

Best Silly Season Move: Elliott Sadler to run full time 2011 Nationwide Series

For those who aren’t big NASCAR buffs, silly season is basically NASCAR’s equivalent of free agency with drivers switching teams. Most would say that the biggest move of silly season is Kasey Kahne going to Red Bull Racing for a year; but, as previously mentioned Kahne is overrated. Personally I think the biggest silly season move is Elliott Sadler’s decision to run for the Nationwide Series championship for car owner Kevin Harvick. Sadler is one of the nicest guys in NASCAR and one of my personal favorites. I know that he’s making the right decision to run full time in the Nationwide Series, because his Sprint Cup career has gone under. Sadler will be a big time threat for the Nationwide championship next season, especially with the upcoming rule that will state that Sprint Cup regulars won’t be eligible to win the Nationwide championship in 2011.