Updated Sept. 8
In the coming days and weeks you'll hear plenty about the championship combatants, but today I'd like to note some of the drivers who missed the Chase.
The list includes two who made it a year ago -- Martin Truex Jr. and Kurt Busch.
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| David Ragan improved upon his rookie season, but it wasn't enough. (Getty Images) |
Former champions (who still race full-time) missing from title contention? Busch is on that list too, along with Bobby Labonte.
Busch, Newman, Kahne and Labonte have another thing in common. All four drive a Dodge, the only manufacturer without a driver in the Chase.
And the season started so well for the Dodge camp, which finished 1-2 in the Daytona 500.
Kahne still had a mathematical shot of making the Chase at Richmond, but was never able to mount a charge on Clint Bowyer for the 12th and final spot.
"I feel like I drove everything I could all day," said Kahne, whose hopes took a big hit with back-to-back 40th-place finishes in mid-August. "I tried to take chances. I tried to be smart at the same time to get what we could get.
"Track position hurt us all day. I was trapped in between a couple of Roush cars on pit road and it didn't matter where I came in (to the pits), I was trapped. It was a long day in the pits. I came out about last every single time it seemed like. That didn't help, but either way, we weren't going to beat Clint."
Roush-Fenway Racing's David Ragan was the only other driver outside the top 12 with hopes of racing his way into the Chase, but it wasn't meant to be for the second-year driver.
"It's very disappointing," said Ragan, who finished 32nd in large part because of a wreck on Lap 122. "We've got 10 more races to try and get a win and certainly to finish 13th in points is our goal now, but running back there 30th and 25th, you don't deserve to make the Chase running like that."
That Ragan was even in position to make the Chase was a testament as to how much he has matured and improved since finishing 23rd in points in his rookie season.
"Regardless of how we ended up today, I told everyone before the race that whether we made the Chase or not wasn't going to be solely be on the Richmond race," Ragain said. "I can look back at three or four races earlier in the year we didn't do a good job that resulted in the loss of a few points.
"Our speed has been in the race car, it's just a matter of making good decisions on Saturday or Sunday."
Power Rankings after Richmond:
| POWER RANKINGS | ||
| Current | Driver | Previous |
| 1 | Tony Stewart | 1 |
| It's only fitting that he won the race after hogging the lead most of the night. | ||
| 2 | Jeff Gordon | 2 |
| He was having issues with blistering tires before getting tangled up in the big mid-race wreck. | ||
| 3 | Jimmie Johnson | 3 |
| Earns his first top five and just his second top 10 in seven races at Daytona since winning the Daytona 500 in 2006. | ||
| 4 | Kurt Busch | 4 |
| Continues to knock on the door for a win at a restrictor-plate track. He has finished fourth or better in four of his past five trips to Daytona. | ||
| 5 | Carl Edwards | 6 |
| No doubt he was having flashbacks to Talladega. "It was a crazy, crazy finish," Edwards said. "I thought I wanted to be up there racing with those guys, then I saw that [Kyle Busch wrecking] and I was just fine with where I was at." | ||
| 6 | Juan Pablo Montoya | 7 |
| He now has eight top 10s on the season with five coming in the past seven races. | ||
| 7 | Denny Hamlin | 11 |
| He and Stewart were the class of the field. But with Stewart snagging the win, Hamlin had to settle for his third top-five finish in the past four races. | ||
| 8 | Mark Martin | 5 |
| Since picking up his third win of the year back at Michigan, Martin has followed with finishes of 35th, 14th and 38th. | ||
| 9 | Ryan Newman | 8 |
| He has hit a little bump in the road with four consecutive finishes of 17th or worse. | ||
| 10 | Kyle Busch | 10 |
| Wreck in the last lap left him with his fifth finish outside the top 10 in the past six races. | ||
| 11 | Greg Biffle | 9 |
| Never a factor at any point, spending just 14 laps in the top 15 all night. | ||
| 12 | Kasey Kahne | 12 |
| The sensational image of his collision with Kyle Busch notwithstanding, Kahne was able to leave Daytona with a 15th-place finish and move up one spot to 12th in the standings. | ||
| 13 | David Reutimann | 13 |
| After starting at the rear of the field because of an engine change, he had managed to work his way into the top 15 before being collected in the mid-race big one. | ||
| 14 | Matt Kenseth | 14 |
| Gets a much-needed top 10 after four consecutive finishes of 16th or worse had him tumbling down the standings. | ||
| 15 | Clint Bowyer | 15 |
| He had just joined the top 10 when he became a victim of the mid-race carnage. | ||
