NASCAR Power Rankings

By Adam Ruggiero
Love of Sports Correspondent

Leave it to China to plan their giant, decades in the making, Olympic coming-out party on the very weekend NASCAR goes to its second and final road course for the Cup boys.

Some may tell you the series should just drop the twists, loops and hills of Infineon and Watkins Glen, but real race fans appreciate the plethora of story lines these serpentine produce.

First, there’s the “ringers” – the hired goons, if you will - of Cup teams whose drivers aren’t in championship contention and can therefore sacrifice the points to let a road course specialist pilot their ride for a weekend.

Then there’s the strategy. On oval tracks, pit strategy is typically based on staying out as long as you can and waiting for the caution before coming in. On a road course, however, teams plan from the end of the race back to the beginning. For example, a crew chief will figure his car gets 30 laps worth of fuel; he’ll count back 30 laps from the end of the race and have his driver pit then, regardless of caution, to maximize the odds of winning.

Lastly, there’s the tempers. Most of the Cup guys have been groomed on ovals, and when they take on the S’s and non-stop shifts of the road tracks, frustrations mount and accidents are inevitable.

Quite simply, road racing’s where it’s at, and I guarantee excitement, anger, revenge, gambles and triumph. Here’s this weeks Rankings…

POWER RANKINGS
(Last week’s ranking in parentheses)

1. (Tie) Carl Edwards (3)

Edwards comes into Watkins Glen off a win last week at Pocono, a notoriously predictive test of driver skill, and a close runner-up finish the week prior at Indianapolis, the first track of the final stretch of the season. His success comes in streaks and is usually fueled by confidence. He’s up to third in points and technically within two races of catching boy-king, Kyle Busch.

1a. (Tie) Kyle Busch (1)

Busch’s tyrannical reign atop the Power Rankings has all but toppled. It goes to show how fickle a sport where 170 mph is usually too slow and one thousandth of a second often isn’t good enough can be. Busch has finished 15th and 36th the last two weeks, he’s coming into a race where his best finish is seventh and his average finish is outside the Top 15. He’s picked the wrong time to go cold. Fortunately, qualifying was rained out and he’ll start from the pole. That could be the jump start his engine needs.

3. Jimmie Johnson (2)

Winning for the second year in a row at the Brickyard showed me Johnson absolutely has not given up on his bid for a championship three-peat. Funky weather and a red-hot Edwards foiled his shot at the win last week in Pocono, but he still rolled home in third. He’s been sporadic at the Glen, but he managed his best career finish there last year when he grabbed third. Maybe he’s got it figured out.

4. Kasey Kahne (NR)

In the last two weeks, Kahne’s jumped from 11th in points, barely clinging to a Chase spot, to seventh, and a more comfortable 80 points off the bubble. His chances of winning at Pocono were even greater than Johnson’s, and if anyone had a gripe about bad luck with the weather, it was Kahne. He just missed his third win of the year, but he’s got three Top 10s in the last four races. It’ll be an uphill climb, both literally and figuratively, for him to win at the Glen, but stealing victory from a seventh-place starting spot, where he’ll be Sunday, has been done as recently as 2006.

5. Dale Earnhardt, Jr. (5)

Junior hasn’t done much to put the fear into his competition lately, but he’s managed to hover around the Top 12 for the last month. Basically, that means he’s been off, but not bad. Things don’t get easier this weekend at a track where he’s never won, but there’s a first time for everything. The biggest thing going for Little E is that all of Hendrick is getting stronger, just look at Johnson and Jeff Gordon. The cars are there, and Earnhardt’s the name you want behind the wheel.

6. Mark Martin (NR)

Nothing feels as good to a NASCAR analyst than bumping Mark Martin up in the Rankings. He’s a favorite in the garage, a favorite on the track and a heavy favorite in the stands. Martin, time and again, comes so close to making an award-winning movie script out of his racing life. Never won a championship, never won at Daytona, never this, never that, always a bride’s maid – the list goes on and on. Yet he’s going to the NASCAR Hall of Fame, no question, and he’s somehow managing to give the big bucks teams and drivers a run for the considerable money every week he races. At the Glen, he has the fourth-best average finish (ninth), with his best being … you guessed it … runner up.

7. Jeff Gordon (8)

Gordon won’t win a race this year. I might, might, be a week or two late in being the first to say that, but any time before then such a statement would’ve been ludicrous. But for whatever reason, some of it no doubt having to do with the COT running full time this year, he’s lost that edge that pushed him to victory so many times in the past. This year, he’s managed some quality runs, 11th, fifth and 10th the last three weeks, but he hasn’t been able to close the deal. All you flaming rainbow maniacs can enjoy watching him make the Chase, but you won’t see him taking a Gatorade bath once this year.

8. Jeff Burton (10)

In the last seven weeks, Burton’s gone from racing like a young Richard Petty to an old Kyle Petty. He still knows which pedal does what, but he’s not nearly as good at using them as his younger competition. It’s starting to look like his run in the top two or three in points was a fluke. He’s managed, at best, a ninth-place finish in the last month-and-a-half. Since June 15th, he’s averaged an 18th-place. Prior to that, he averaged better than a Top 10. The question now is whether that was a fluke, or is this is.

9. Tony Stewart (7)

Hail the conquering hero! Stewart finally wins and begins his assault on the ’08 championship. Expect that to be my introduction to next week’s Power Rankings, because I’m picking Smoke to take the checkers on the winding rumble strips of Watkins Glen. He’s made steady gains in the points, now sitting ninth, and ever since his announcement that he’ll field his own Cup team next year, he seems to be driving more relaxed. I like him to win for the fifth, that’s right fifth, time at this track.

10. Greg Biffle (4)

Biffle has the same gusto under the hood Edwards does, and he’s almost the driver Edwards is, if not just as good. That’s why, despite two DNFs this year and no wins, Biffle’s still sitting eighth in points, ahead of Tony Stewart, Denny Hamlin, Kevin Harvick and Clint Bowyer. He has an outside shot to grab a win before the season is out, but if nothing else I think he’ll ruin other contenders’ shots at victory and finish consistently in the Top 5 and 10.

11. Kevin Harvick (6)

Harvick’s capitalizing on tracks where he perennially finishes well. This week is no different. Harvick has a win and an average finish in the Top 12 at the Glen, so expect him to put a little more cushion between himself and the bubble-sitter, Clint Bowyer.

12. David Ragan (NR)

The impressive young man has three Top 10s with two Top 5s in the last four races, and the scariest thing is it’s not that unusual. Ragan’s been overachieving all season to the point many forget he’s not a rookie, they’ve just never noticed him the last two years. Whatever he’s onto, he just better keep it away from Congress and the Mitchell Report, ’cause it’s that remarkable.

Watkins Glen, At A Glance

Centurion Boats at the Glen – 220.5 miles / 90 laps
Race Winner – Tony Stewart
Biggest Disappointment – Jeff Burton
Wrecked – Casey Mears
Most Impressive – Max Papis
Biggest Points Gainer – Tony Stewart