Updated June 2
We have reached the halfway point of the Sprint Cup "regular season" and while Kyle Busch has asserted himself as the driver to beat, intrigue remains throughout much of the standings.
Dover, in fact, showed how quickly a driver (or drivers) can freefall with one bad race.
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| Stewart blames himself '100 percent' for the crash: 'It's my fault for being even anywhere close to Elliott (Sadler).' (AP) |
Despite finishing 35th, just his fourth finish outside the top 10 in 13 races, Dale Earnhardt Jr. was able to retain his third-place spot in the standings.
Most of the others in the wreck weren't as lucky.
Denny Hamlin dropped five spots to ninth after steam-rolling into the carnage and finishing 43rd.
"I came piling in there way late," Hamlin said. "I had the 43 (Bobby Labonte) right on my bumper trying not to get hit from him. When I heard wreck off Turn 2, I immediately was on the brakes. It's just these cars don't stop as well as they had in the past.
"Luckily, I wasn't the last one. It looked like guys even behind me piled in there. It's just part of the race track."
Richard Childress Racing teammates Kevin Harvick and Clint Bowyer also got dinged up. Bowyer's car escaped in relatively good shape but was later done in by a broken shock mount resulting in a 36th-place finish. He fell three spots to eighth in the standings.
Harvick's mangled car spent many laps in the garage. He eventually returned to the track but made up little ground, finishing 38th. He sank from seventh to 10th in the standings.
Stewart, too, fell three spots, from eighth to 11th. He, somewhat sarcastically, blamed himself.
"I take 100 percent responsibility," Stewart said. "It's my fault for being even anywhere close to Elliott. If I'm within a half a lap of him, I expect that to happen.
"Unfortunately, adversity is our motto here at Joe Gibbs Racing."
With 13 more races to go until the Chase field is set, 276 points separate sixth-place Jeff Gordon from 18th-ranked Travis Kvapil, which is a lot of drivers within a tiny window considering only two drivers (Earnhardt and Jeff Burton) can lay claim to being that close to first-place Kyle Busch in the standings.
Kasey Kahne finished 31st after also receiving damage in the early wreck but hung on to the 12th spot in the standings, just a mere eight points ahead of David Ragan and 154 in front of Kvapil.
Power Rankings after Dover:
| POWER RANKINGS | ||
| Current | Driver | Previous |
| 1 | Jimmie Johnson | 1 |
| Next to Martinsville, there probably isn't a better track for Johnson and his 48 team to try to rebound than Phoenix, where he has three wins, seven top fives, 10 top 10s and an average finish of fifth in 12 starts. | ||
| 2 | Mark Martin | 2 |
| Martin was OK in the first half of Sunday's race but really came on in the second half to snag a top five. That allowed him to close the gap on Johnson from 184 to 73 points. And there's even more good news for the 5 team as the series shifts Phoenix: Martin won at the track in April. | ||
| 3 | Jeff Gordon | 3 |
| Troubles at Talladega and Texas left him outside the top 10 in back-to-back races for the first time since May. | ||
| 4 | Tony Stewart | 5 |
| A good, solid effort from the 14 team throughout at Texas, just didn't have enough to challenge the Busch brothers for supremacy. | ||
| 5 | Juan Pablo Montoya | 4 |
| He started 20th and had made gains into the top 10 until he got loose running next to Carl Edwards, taking them both out. | ||
| 6 | Denny Hamlin | 6 |
| He was stout early, racing from 25th into the top five, but poor pit stops and contact with the wall had the 11 car reeling in the second half of the race. So his team gambled and won on fuel mileage to pull out second. | ||
| 7 | Kurt Busch | 7 |
| Not only did he have a great car, but great fuel mileage as well. He was always one of the last to pit after every long green-flag run at Texas. | ||
| 8 | Kyle Busch | 10 |
| On the verge of an historical triple victory weekend at Texas, he runs out of fuel just a couple laps from the finish. Tough way to end Dave Rogers' first race as crew chief of the 18 car. | ||
| 9 | Ryan Newman | 9 |
| Struggled with a loose car at Texas, running just 61 laps in the top 15. | ||
| 10 | Matt Kenseth | 12 |
| His 17 team continues to show late-season improvement. He had the best finish (third) of those who pitted for gas instead of gambling. | ||
| 11 | Clint Bowyer | 14 |
| A steady run for Bowyer, who finishes in the top 10 at Texas for the third time in his past four visits. | ||
| 12 | Greg Biffle | 13 |
| Notched his second consecutive top 10 and third of the Chase. | ||
| 13 | Kasey Kahne | 8 |
| After starting second, he dropped like a rock. Ran in the teens most of the day until his engine went sour in the waning laps, leading to a 33rd-place finish. | ||
| 14 | Carl Edwards | 11 |
| Four consecutive finishes outside the top 10 including two finishes of 39th. There wasn't a whole lot he could do to avoid Montoya getting up into him Sunday at Texas. | ||
| 15 | Kevin Harvick | 15 |
| Earns his fourth top five of the season at Texas, his first since a second-place run at Atlanta in early September. | ||
