Auto Racing Watch
PENSKE PAIR: Penske Racing teammates Ryan Newman and Kurt Busch swept the front row for Sunday's Coca-Cola 600 in yesterday's qualifying.
Newman's top speed of 185.312 mph was good enough to claim his second pole of the season and 39th of his career. His two poles in the first 12 races equal his total from all of last season.
"I knew there was some tough competition coming up," Newman said. "I didn't feel we had secured the pole when we qualified. We didn't do a qualifying run in practice, and I think that hurt us confidence-wise, but having too much confidence can hurt you way more than having too little."
Busch was only .039 seconds behind his teammate and just .01 ahead of Emporia native Elliott Sadler.
Sadler was one of three Virginians who will start in the top seven Sunday. Former Chesterfield resident Denny Hamlin held the provisional pole for part of yesterday before the track cooled and later qualifiers passed him. He will start sixth, one spot ahead of Chesapeake native Ricky Rudd.
Newman and Busch are the first teammates to share the front row at the start of a race since Rudd and David Gilliland captured the front row for Robert Yates Racing at the Daytona 500.
Failing to make the race were South Boston native Ward Burton, Michael Waltrip (for the 11th consecutive race), David Reutimann, Paul Menard, Kevin Lepage and Mike Bliss.
A NEW BEGINNING: Greg Biffle will start Sunday with his third crew chief in the past 13 points races. Greg Erwin will take over on the pit box of the No. 16 Ford, replacing Pat Tryson. Tryson had joined the 16 after working with Mark Martin the previous three years but was fired by team co-owner Jack Roush earlier this week. Erwin previously worked as Robby Gordon's crew chief.
"You know when you take a crew chief job that the crew chiefs are the first to go," Tryson said yesterday. "That's part of the business, and that's the way it is. Everything revolves around being in those last 10 races to make that Chase, so the pressure is a lot earlier in the season.
"Whereas before, maybe you'd stick with a guy all year, they've still got time to get caught up in points. Nowadays, if things happen that get you behind, they don't necessarily look at the big picture, just where are you at and where do you have to get?"
Biffle said Roush had wanted to make a change earlier in the season, around the fourth or fifth race, but Biffle vetoed it.
"I wasn't real excited about changing. They know that," Biffle said. "Then [Roush] kept after it and after it and after it. Things didn't take the turn that Jack was looking for, I guess. But ultimately it's his decision, right?"
LOOKING TO THE FUTURE: Biffle, who is in the process of negotiating an extension with Roush Fenway Racing, was asked if he might consider postponing that to see how the chief change works out.
He didn't even pause.
"I never really thought about that because I know it's going to work," Biffle said. "Whether Greg's the right guy or not, on that we'll wait and see, but we're capable of building the equipment I think to compete. That's what it takes."
COMING OF AGE: Joey Logano turned 17 yesterday, four days after beating Nextel Cup star Kevin Harvick in a race at Iowa Speedway.
The Featherlite Coaches 200, the first NASCAR-sanctioned race at the track, became a two-man showdown between Harvick, who won the All-Star Challenge the previous night, and Logano, the Joe Gibbs Racing development driver.
Logano won by nearly 2½ seconds and he said the experience continued his learning curve.
"I've grown a lot," Logano said. "This last race, running behind Harvick, I was watching his line, watching how he gets into the first turn after a restart. I learned a lot there paying attention to that in the beginning of the race. I think that's what won me the race at the end of the race."
UNFAIR ADVANTAGE: David Stremme has missed races when team owner Chip Ganassi put road-racing expert Scott Pruett in the No. 40 Dodge at Watkins Glen and Sonoma.
Stremme, however, doesn't agree with the decision to put Bill Elliott in the No. 21 Ford of Wood Brothers/JTG Racing.
"I think it's all right to honor our past champions, yet you need to honor them to a point," Stremme said. "It shouldn't be where a guy is out for a while and then all of a sudden, because one driver who has a current championship [Dale Jarrett] is out of his championship provisionals, they go get another guy.
"It's not right for the teams that come every week with the same driver. Hopefully they tweak on that a little bit, but it's definitely hard when you're outside the top 35."
Stremme said using Elliott's six past-champion provisionals instead of having the team's driver, be it Ken Schrader or Jon Wood, qualify was unfair to the rest of the field.
"I don't think it's fair to the guys who are here every week, the [A.J.] Allmendingers and all them," Stremme said. "They have just as much of a right to race too. When you've got Bill, who's a past champion and he hasn't been racing . . . this year, it's not fair at all. But that's the rules." -- Jill Erwin
