Angelelli, Taylor win Grand-Am Race at Lime Rock
May 31, 2010
LAKEVILLE, Conn. (AP)—Max Angelelli and Ricky Taylor won the Memorial DayClassic on Monday at Lime Rock Park, a race highlighted by a first-lap accidentinvolving two of the Grand-Am Rolex Sports Car Series premier Daytona Prototypeentries.
Angelelli and Taylor, co-driving the No. 10 SunTrust Racing Ford/Dallara,finished 4.791 seconds ahead of Ran Dalziel and Mike Forest, driving the No. 8Corsa Car Care BMW/Riley.
The most compelling drama came at the beginning of the two-hour, 45-minuterace.
Just seconds after the green flag dropped, the No. 01 driven by Memo Rojashad hard contact in Turn 1 with the reigning champion entry, the No. 99 drivenby Jon Fogarty.
The No. 01, co-driven by Rojas and Scott Pruett, is owned by Chip Ganassi,who won the Indianapolis 500 on Sunday with Dario Franchitti and finished secondin the Coca-Cola 600 with Jamie McMurray. The first lap wreck ruined a potentialrecord-setting day for the No. 01.
The goal no longer was winning a record fourth consecutive Rolex Series raceand expanding the championship points lead. Instead, it became keeping the caron track long enough for Rojas and Pruett to earn valuable driver championshippoints.
Rolex Series rules mandate a driver must be in the car for at least 30minutes to earn points.
Rojas got his half-hour mostly by sitting in the pits after the crash, whichsheared the front end off the No. 01. Pruett pieced together his requirement viashort stints interspersed by repairs.
The incident resulted in a drive-through penalty for Fogarty, due to whatwas deemed “avoidable contact” by officials.
The No. 01 ended up last in the 26-car field, shaving the championshippoints lead for Rojas and Pruett from 21 to seven (155-148) over Dalziel andForest.
The production-based GT class was won by John Edwards and Adam Christodoulouin the No. 68 MazdaSpeed Motorsports Development Mazda RX-8.
Busch Brothers taking charge of NASCAR
May 31, 2010
CONCORD, N.C. (AP)—It’s not that common for siblings to reach the highest level of a professional sport, and when it happens, one of them typically toils in the shadow of the superstar.
That’s been the case the past five years in NASCAR, where the Busch Brothers were never in the same league.
Big brother Kurt hit his peak in 2004, when he won his only NASCAR championship, but his results were up-and-down after that banner season. Then along came Kyle, seven years his junior and a headline maker from the very beginning.
When Kyle raised his game in 2008 to become a title contender, Kurt was off the pace and searching for solutions. When Kurt turned it around and climbed back into the Chase for the Sprint Cup championship last year, Kyle was in a slump that led to the late-season firing of his crew chief.
After five years competing against each other in NASCAR’s elite division, the early hopes of a bitter championship battle between brothers had faded.
My, how things have changed.
The Busch Brothers are finally running at the same level, setting up a potential sizzling showdown over the upcoming long summer stretch of racing.
Kurt Busch completed a two-week sweep of Charlotte Motor Speedway on Sunday night, closing out the first win for team owner Roger Penske in the prestigious Coca-Cola 600 eight days after claiming the $1 million prize in the annual All-Star race.
Kyle Busch, meanwhile, won the Nationwide and Trucks Series races at CMS over the last two weeks, plus the Nationwide and Sprint Cup Series races at Dover earlier in May.
All told, the Busch Brothers have won the last six races spanning NASCAR’s top three series. The lone NASCAR celebration not by a Busch was Martin Truex Jr.’s victory in the Sprint Showdown, an All-Star race qualifier without either brother.
“That’s kind of cool,” Kyle Busch said of the family domination.
Indeed it is, particularly considering how combustible these two drivers are—particularly when racing each other.
Nobody has forgotten the 2007 All-Star race, when hard racing between the two led to an accident that knocked two of the strongest cars out of the event. They were furious with each other following that May accident, and it wasn’t until their grandmother insisted they make peace or risk ruining Thanksgiving dinner that the hardheaded racers resolved their dispute.
That’s right, brothers who passed each other every week in the garage, the motorhome lot and on the track went six months without speaking over an accident in a non-points event.
That was three years ago, and while not much has changed with either Busch’s style—they are both still aggressive, highly focused and often hot-tempered in the race car—they have both gotten smarter.
Kurt, now 31, is showing the wisdom that compliments his talent level.
Although there were flashes of growth over the past few years, it was punctuated late last season when he hung strong in the Chase even after crew chief Pat Tryson announced he was leaving at the end of the season. He admitted after Sunday night’s win that his personal progress was made after realizing the mistakes of his youth.
“I’m not one to go out there with a big flash and a big flare,” he said. “I used to early on. I’d run my head up against the wall. I’d run my race car up against the wall. Reviews came in negative. For me, that’s not how I wanted to be remembered.”
And he didn’t hesitate in choosing Steve Addington, who was fired in October by Kyle Busch, as his new crew chief. Since taking over the No. 2 Dodge this season, Addington has guided Busch to two points wins, the All-Star race victory, and seven top-10s in 13 races.
“What I really enjoy about Steve is the confidence he gives me in the car and the adjustments that he makes,” Kurt Busch said. “I feel like he’s helped me pick up my game because I have to have a fresher outlook on different setups.”
Kyle, who just turned 25, is still a work in progress. His raw talent has never been questioned, but his decision-making isn’t always the best, particularly when he can smell victory. He wrecked out of last week’s All-Star race when he and teammate Denny Hamlin raced each other hard in the closing laps, and a furious Jeff Burton confronted him following the 600 to discuss how aggressive Kyle Busch had been on the final restart.
Hamlin chided his teammate last week as being too immature to win a Cup championship, and Kurt Busch seemed to agree when he wondered if his younger brother shouldn’t have backed down in the All-Star race.
“He’s been running these All-Star races for a few years now, running at a 1,000 percent pace every year,” Kurt said. “It doesn’t take a 1,000 percent pace to win it.”
Maybe Kyle Busch figured that out over the weekend, when he came from two laps down to win the Nationwide Series race and overcame a pit-road disaster while leading the 600 to rally for a third-place finish.
“These are the kind of races that make a championship,” he said after the 600.
If he’s right, and both Buschs are involved, it could be a very exciting time for NASCAR.
Ganassi just misses on Indy-Charlotte owner double
May 31, 2010
CONCORD, N.C. (AP)—About four hours after winning the Indianapolis 500 with driver Dario Franchitti, car owner Chip Ganassi arrived at Charlotte Motor Speedway, climbed Jamie McMurray’s pit stand and liked what he saw.
“I heard we had good cars down here, that’s why I came down,” he said.
Ganassi’s chances of sweeping the Indy 500 and Coca-Cola 600 came up just short, however. McMurray, who won the Daytona 500, led four times for 29 laps and was closing on Kurt Busch late, but couldn’t catch him and finished second.
“It was a great race. Jamie did a great job,” Ganassi said. “My old buddy Penske beat me tonight.”
Indeed, Roger Penske seemed to have the better chance of the two car owners of winning both races coming in, with 2009 Indy 500 winner Helio Castroneves on the pole there again, and All-Star race winner Busch starting second in Charlotte.
But Franchitti ended those hopes, then Busch had just enough to beat McMurray, who got his fourth top-five finish of the year.
“Every race that we’ve actually finished without an issue we’ve had a top-five car,” McMurray said. “We just run second one week and 30th the next. It’s just about being a little bit more consistent.”
BURTON BURSTS: A week later, Kyle Busch wasn’t angry and ready to confront a driver. Instead, a driver was angry and gesturing at him.
Jeff Burton was spotted shouting and pointing his finger at Busch immediately following the race, accusing him of a reckless move on the final restart that caused him to tumble to 25th place.
“Kyle just tried to make it three-wide and cut my left rear tire. It made me mad,” Burton said. “He’s very aggressive and I don’t care. He can get aggressive as he wants to be, but when I pay the price for his aggressiveness, I’m not going to tolerate it.”
A week after Busch accused teammate Denny Hamlin of causing him to hit the wall, Busch pinned the blame on Burton’s teammate, Clint Bowyer.
“I said, ‘Look, man, it’s the last restart of the race. You’ve got to go. You’ve got to make some bold moves. It wasn’t me that made it three-wide, it was your teammate. Why don’t you have a chat with him?”’ said Busch, who finished third.
“If I did anything wrong, I’d be more than happy to sit with Jeff Burton and talk with him and for him to point it out on replay.”
Burton wasn’t buying it, clearly frustrated at his finish after running in the top 10 much of the night.
“Not run into me,” Burton said. “That’s what he could have done differently.”
FRUSTRATED KENSETH: Matt Kenseth finished 10th and sits in third place in the points race, 117 behind leader Kevin Harvick.
But Kenseth, who hasn’t won since consecutive victories to open last season, was clearly frustrated.
“We didn’t pass everybody. We did it by pit strategy and pit stops and the way cautions fell,” Kenseth said on his top-10 finish. “It was good to get up front, but we don’t have anything that can run with those guys. Everybody is working on it as hard as they can, but we just have to keep working on it.
“We don’t have anything that can possibly win against those guys right now, but we will keep working on it.”
MONTOYA’S WOES: Juan Pablo Montoya, who had one of the fastest cars at Charlotte Motor Speedway the past two weeks, suffered a significant blow to his Chase for the Sprint Cup championship chances when he lost control of his loose car on the 63rd lap and brushed the wall.
After coming in initially to change tires, his crew told Montoya to go to the garage. He didn’t return to the track until he was 69 laps down and finished 38th.
It was a big hit in points for Montoya, who dropped a spot to 20th in the Sprint Cup standings.
BODINE’S BACK: Fit, trim and full of energy, Geoff Bodine is not only attempting a comeback at age 61, he’s set a high goal.
“I would like to be the oldest winner of a NASCAR race,” Bodine said. “I swear I feel good enough to do it.”
Bodine announced Sunday he’ll try to qualify for his first Cup race since 2004 next weekend at Pocono Raceway in the No. 36 Chevrolet for Tommy Baldwin Racing.
Bodine, who overcame a fiery crash in a Truck Series race in 2000, hasn’t run a full Cup schedule since 1999 and is mostly known these days for helping design the four-man bobsled that won a gold medal for the U.S. at the Vancouver Olympics.
The 1986 Daytona 500 winner failed to qualify in two races last year, but did finish 26th in a trucks race at Atlanta in March.
“I’ve really changed the way I eat the last 3 1/2 years of my life. I’ve changed my body and I feel better now at 61 than when I was 41,” Bodine said. “I think better than when I was 41. In racing, things come back to me so clear.”
Bodine might not get a chance next weekend to shatter Harry Gant’s record of the oldest winner at age 52. Bodine is in a one-race deal and acknowledged he likely won’t finish the race since the car is without a sponsorship and has been mostly a start-and-park operation.
Johnny Sauter drove the No. 36 car for 37 laps in Sunday’s Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway before retreating to the garage.
HALL ATTENDANCE: NASCAR Hall of Fame director Winston Kelley said it had its biggest crowds yet Friday and Saturday as fans in town for the race weekend flocked to the downtown Charlotte facility that opened May 11.
Kelley said attendance figures won’t be released until next month, but indicated tens of thousands have attended and there was a long line to enter the building Saturday morning.
“We are very pleased with the turnout and are particularly thrilled with the feedback,” Kelley said in an e-mail Sunday. “The comments have been overwhelmingly positive.”
LUG NUTS: U.S. Army Cpl. John Hyland, who lost his leg in an explosion in Iraq in 2007, sang the national anthem before the race. … While it may not be as prestigious as a grandfather clock, which the winning driver gets at Martinsville, Coca-Cola presented a 1956 Coke vending machine to Busch for his win. … Bradley Cooper, Jessica Biel and other cast members from “The A-Team” movie participated in pre-race activities. “I’m still surprised they don’t change direction,” said Biel, attending her first race.
Busch wins Coca-Cola 600 to sweep Charlotte races
May 31, 2010
CONCORD, N.C. (AP)—Kurt Busch has won the Coca-Cola 600 to sweep the two weeks of racing at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
Busch won last weekend’s $1 million All-Star race to roll into NASCAR’s longest race of the year with a ton of momentum. His Dodge was strong from start to finish in Sunday’s race, but he had to hold off a hard-charging Jamie McMurray over the final laps.
Related Martin on the rise
Daytona 500 winner McMurray came up just short and missed an opportunity to give team owner Chip Ganassi two wins in one day. Earlier Sunday, Dario Franchitti made Ganassi the first owner to win the Indianapolis 500 and Daytona 500 in the same season.
Kyle Busch rallied from a mid-race crash on pit road to finish third.
Kurt Busch keeps to his own lane (Yahoo! Sports)
May 31, 2010
It’s got to be frustrating when you’re the one with the championship, the one who has won more Cup races in your respective careers, the one who finished third in the standings last year, and still all anyone wants to talk about is your little brother.
This is Kurt Busch’s reality, and that he shows no animosity about all the attention showered on his brother Kyle is a sign of his maturity. No, Kurt Busch’s temper hasn’t vanished entirely, but it’s clear he finally is getting comfortable in his skin. He’s done trying to play the villain that comes naturally to his brother, and he has realized he’ll never be one of the cool kids, so why try. Now he’s just Kurt – a decent guy who’s kind of goofy and sometimes says the wrong thing, but at the end of the day he means well.
More From Jay Hart News from the track: Charlotte Motor Speedway May 27, 2010 Water cooler talk: All-Star race May 25, 2010 
Kurt Busch celebrated his second win of the season in his usual style – with a backwards victory lap.Getty
One thing, however, remains the same: He can still wheel a race car as well as anyone.
Lest we forget, in the last eight years, only Jimmie Johnson, Tony Stewart and Jeff Gordon have won more races than Busch, who collected career victory No. 22 in Sunday’s Coca-Cola 600. It was the second win of the season for Busch, third if you count last weekend’s All-Star race, and provided the following ramifications:
• It spoiled Chip Ganassi’s perfect day. Only a few hours earlier, Ganassi celebrated an Indianapolis 500 victory with Dario Franchitti, then flew to Charlotte. When he arrived at the track, his driver Jamie McMurray was leading the Coke 600, with no one outside of Busch posing any threat. McMurray led as late as Lap 377 of 400, but ultimately wound up second.
• It demonstrated once again that this year’s title race is as wide open as ever. Denny Hamlin and Kyle Busch already have proved themselves, as has Kevin Harvick – and of course there’s always Johnson and Gordon. If Busch weren’t already in that mix, he certainly is now.
• It showed that Johnson is beatable even on his best track. Even before Johnson wrecked on Lap 274, he wasn’t the car to beat. Busch was, which is becoming a trend on the all-important 1½-mile tracks that dominate the Chase.
• And it demonstrated just how far the older Busch brother has come from the bratty kid who was picking fights with everyone just a few years ago.
“I’m not one to go out there with a big flash and a big flair,” Kurt Busch said after the win – probably the biggest of his 10-year career. “I used to early on. I’d run my head up against the wall. I’d run my race car up against the wall. Reviews came in negative.
“For me, that’s not how I wanted to be remembered, how I wanted to be looked at, sitting there on the porch talking with my grandkids about things.”
He won’t be. He has turned that corner. He’s working on a different legacy now – a one-man-gang sort of thing. Last season, Busch was the only driver to hang remotely close to the Hendrick trio of Johnson, Mark Martin and Gordon, and while they had one another to work off of, Busch essentially was a single-car team. He has a little more help this season, but nothing close to what Johnson has in Gordon and vice versa. Plus, Busch drives for the only Dodge organization left in the sport.
That he won the season’s longest, most grueling race is a testament to the strength of Penske’s engine program – the resources of which pale in comparison to what Rick Hendrick can provide his drivers.
“You know, it’s a fight, don’t get me wrong. I feel like sometimes we’re out on an island,” Busch said of being the only Dodge team. “But we’re out there and it feels good to have those guys on our side.”
On Sunday, Busch led a race-high 252 laps. No one else led more than 36, which brother Kyle did en route to salvaging a third-place finish that could have been much worse after running into Brad Keselowski on pit road.
Afterwards, Kyle noted that between them, the Busch brothers have won the last six events, including the All-Star race, spread across the Sprint Cup, Nationwide and Camping World Truck Series.
“So that’s kind of cool,” Kyle said, showing a rare moment of family pride. When asked if Kurt is a legit championship contender, Kyle replied, “I don’t see why not. He’s been running well all year long.”
Good enough that he has reinserted himself as the topic of Busch conversation, not just a source. In Kurt’s post-race press conference, only one question posed to him was about Kyle – the last one, and even that was about his brother’s new crew chief.
For the first time in a while, Kurt was the center of attention, and for all the right reasons. He’s a winner, he has become a leader on his team and, come September, he may just be the Busch most likely to win the Cup title.
Jay Hart is the NASCAR editor for Yahoo! Sports. Send Jay a question or comment for potential use in a future column or webcast.
Ganassi just misses out on the icing to go with his milk (NASCAR.com)
May 31, 2010
Chip Ganassi was all smiles with Dario Franchitti earlier Sunday at the Indianapolis 500, and just missed out on a double dip at the Coca-Cola 600.
He was still wearing a smile and a celebratory winner’s hat from the Indianapolis 500 earlier in the day when he lumbered down off his driver’s pit box following the end of the Coca-Cola 600 Sunday night at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
There was the slightest hint of disappointment in car owner Chip Ganassi’s voice, but only a whisper of it. One of his Sprint Cup drivers, Jamie McMurray, had just finished second in NASCAR’s longest race.
“[Winning the 600] would have been nice,” Ganassi said. “It was an awesome day anyway. After what happened earlier, it would have been icing on the cake to win here, too.”
Six hours earlier, Ganassi had been in Victory Lane at Indianapolis Motor Speedway—where another driver of his, Dario Franchitti, had won the Indy 500 to help Ganassi become the first owner in racing history to win both the Indy 500 and the Daytona 500 in the same year. It was McMurray who had given him the first leg of that racing exacta by winning the Daytona 500 in February.
And when McMurray kept battling with eventual Coke 600 winner Kurt Busch for the lead through much of Sunday night at CMS, it looked for awhile as if Ganassi was going to be able to pull off a rare motorsports double by winning America’s biggest open-wheel race and one of NASCAR’s most prestigious events in the same day.
McMurray was out front on Lap 377 when the final caution of the 400-lap event came out. Busch, who had been running second at the time, was able to come into the pits for crucial adjustments and got his No. 2 Dodge out ahead of McMurray’s No. 1 Chevrolet, sealing both of their fates on a day and night when they clearly were the class of the 43-car field with one caveat. Busch was better on the short runs; McMurray better on the longer ones.
“I knew whoever came out ahead on that last pit stop between Kurt and I, if somebody didn’t screw up, that would be the race winner,” McMurray said. “It would take me too many laps to run Kurt down. … I just didn’t have enough time in the end.”
Chasing history
When Sunday’s Coca-Cola 600 went green again with 21 laps remaining, Busch quickly passed three cars that had elected not to pit—and as he had envisioned, McMurray didn’t have enough time to get his car up to its previous speed after falling slightly off the pace. Thus, his chase to gain Ganassi a piece of Memorial Day weekend racing history fell just short.
“[Crew chief Kevin Manion] just did an awesome job adjusting on the car [Sunday]. I don’t really make suggestions to him. I wouldn’t know what to do anyway,” McMurray said. “But Kevin did a really good job. We probably had an 8th- or 10th-place car at the beginning, and as the race went on we just kept getting faster and faster. We had the best car, I thought, at the end. It just would take us 15 or 20 laps to really get going and catch Kurt.
“And then when you get within so many car lengths of him, it took a few laps to get by him. Kurt just really drove his tail off at the end and we couldn’t quite get there.”
Ganassi wasn’t able to get to the Charlotte track until roughly halfway through Sunday’s marathon. His other Sprint Cup driver, Juan Montoya, already was 69 laps down after wrecking early in the race.
So Ganassi headed to McMurray’s No. 1 pit box, where he scrambled up the ladder and started asking questions about what was going on in the 600 even as those around him were trying to greet and congratulate him on what had transpired at Indy.
“The box started shaking and I didn’t know what was going on,” Manion said. “But Chip had arrived.”
Shortly thereafter, Ganassi clicked in on McMurray’s radio and started chattering about how he heard “you’ve got a pretty good car.” McMurray didn’t know who it was.
“Honestly, I didn’t think much about winning [the 600] because of Chip winning the Indy 500,” McMurray admitted. “He did come on my radio about halfway through when he showed up—and I didn’t know who was trying to talk to me, so I yelled. Then they told me under caution that it was Chip who had cued the mic. That was a good moment to have with him, kind of funny.”
Ganassi’s day, Penske’s night
In the end, it was Ganassi’s long-time rival on both the NASCAR and open-wheel circuits who trumped him at Charlotte. Busch drives for Penske Racing, whose owner, Roger, had high hopes dashed earlier in the day at Indy and wasn’t even able to pull off the dash via airplane and helicopter that Ganassi did to make the second end of the day’s racing double-header.
So it was Busch who made history for his boss, instead of McMurray making it for his. Busch’s victory was Penske’s first Coca-Cola 600 victory—an event the owner has been trying to win since 1972, six years before Kurt Busch was even born.
“I talked to him [Saturday] and wished him luck for this weekend,” Busch said of Penske. “I told him last Thursday that we missed the pole by four one-hundreths of a second but that I was going to try not to let him down in the big show. And he said he’d be watching on TV.
“I was a bit puzzled. I was just hoping that it would be because he was celebrating up in Indy because of a big win there. But Roger is an amazing individual. I’m happy to be able to race for him and bring home wins for him—especially on a day like [Sunday] when he didn’t get it in Indy and we beat a Ganassi car to win it. That’s pretty special.”
Busch professed great respect for both McMurray and Ganassi, even though he was glad to have beaten them. He and McMurray even had planned beforehand to spend Memorial Day together boating on Lake Norman just outside Charlotte.
“The two individuals and the two individuals owning the cars have a lot of respect for each other,” Busch said.
In the end, Ganassi, still smiling, pretty much shrugged it off.
“It was close, but no cigar,” said Ganassi, who did pull a daily double once previously—having cars that won on the same day on Aug. 19, 2001, when Sterling Marlin won a NASCAR race at Michigan and Bruno Junqueira won a IndyCar race at Road America in Elkhart Lake, Wis. “But it was a great points day for us [with the No. 1 car], and that’s what we needed.”
Manion had said as much as the race ended, telling McMurray over the radio: “We’re doing what we need to do for the future—and for the Chase.”
McMurray, who moved up two spots in the points standings to 15th, took solace in that as well. But man, this year’s Daytona 500 winner knew he had come very close to doing something much greater.
“It would have been unbelievable. We’ve talked about how we’re going to do some photos with the Borg-Warner Trophy and the [Harley J. Earl] Daytona 500 Trophy—with Dario and I able to win both in the same year,” McMurray said.
“Then if we would have been able to win both the Indy 500 and the Coca-Cola 600 for Chip on the same day, it just would have been huge, unbelievable. But I’m really happy with our finish. It’s disappointing not to win—but we have had winning cars every week and that’s really all you can ask for.”
Sprint Cup Series Standings Pos.+/-DriverPointsBehind 1.—Kevin Harvick1,898Leader2.—Kyle Busch1,869-293.—Matt Kenseth1,781-1174.+2Jeff Gordon1,760-1385.—Denny Hamlin1,732-166
Biffle’s crewman hit by Stewart, taken to hospital
May 30, 2010
CONCORD, N.C. (AP)—A crewman for Greg Biffle’s NASCAR team has been taken to a local hospital after getting hit by two-time NASCAR champion Tony Stewart on pit road.
Stewart ran into Kevin McDowell, the right rear tire changer on the No. 16 Ford, during a late pit stop. Television replays showed McDowell slump to the concrete in pain after Stewart hit him leaving his pit stall.
There was no immediate word on McDowell’s injuries or condition.
Biffle finished 32nd in the Coca-Cola 600 and dropped two spots, to ninth, in the points standings. Stewart was 15th and fell two positions to 16th in the points.
Kurt Busch wins Coca-Cola 600 to sweep Charlotte
May 30, 2010
CONCORD, N.C. (AP)—Kurt Busch used a lightning fast final pit stop to chase down the leaders and give team owner Roger Penske a coveted Memorial Day weekend victory.
That the win came in the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway, and not at his beloved Indianapolis Motor Speedway, probably didn’t matter to Penske.
After all, it came at the expense of Chip Ganassi, Penske’s top rival in open-wheel racing and the winning car owner of the Indianapolis 500 earlier Sunday.
Related Martin on the rise
“Roger, this one is for you,” Busch said.
Busch and Ganassi driver Jamie McMurray were the class of the field at the end of NASCAR’s longest race of the season, and McMurray was hoping to give Ganassi a sweep of the two prestigious Memorial Day weekend races. Earlier Sunday, Dario Franchitti won in Indianapolis and, after the celebration, Ganassi flew to North Carolina to catch the second half of the NASCAR race.
He arrived in time to see McMurray work his Chevrolet through the field and ultimately take over the lead from Busch.
But a late caution for a Marcos Ambrose crash with 24 laps to go took it out of McMurray’s hands. He led most of the leaders down pit road, but was beat back onto the track by Busch and Matt Kenseth. Jeff Gordon was the first of three cars not to pit, and restarted as the leader with 19 laps remaining.
Busch blew past the three lead cars and steadily pulled away from the pack. McMurray quickly moved into second, but ran out of time to run down Busch, who held on to sweep the May races at Charlotte. Busch won the $1 million All-Star race last weekend.
“I thought about the Ganassi car behind me,” Busch said in Victory Lane, “he wasn’t getting by us.”
Ganassi didn’t seem to mind the defeat.
“It was a great race, Jamie did a great job,” he smiled. “My old buddy Penske beat me tonight.”
Kyle Busch rallied from a mid-race crash on pit road to finish third in a Toyota for Joe Gibbs Racing. Mark Martin finished fourth—the highest finishing Hendrick Motorsports car—and defending race winner David Reutimann was fifth for Michael Waltrip Racing.
Gordon wound up sixth and was followed by Clint Bowyer and Paul Menard, who had the highest finishing Ford. Ryan Newman and Kenseth rounded out the top 10.
While Kurt Busch celebrated in Victory Lane, his younger brother was getting an earful on pit road from a furious Jeff Burton.
Burton was eighth on the final restart, running right next to Kyle Busch, when contact between the two cars ruined any chance for a solid finish for Burton. He faded to 25th and angrily confronted Busch after the race.
“Kyle made it three-wide on the restart, trying to make something happen, which I don’t have a problem with,” Burton said. “So he runs into me and cuts my left-rear tire, then I have a problem with it. He’s real aggressive. That’s cool. But when he starts affecting me with his aggressiveness, I just will not put up with it. I’ve been around here long enough. I just will not tolerate it.”
It soured yet another stellar comeback for Kyle Busch, who rallied from two laps down on Saturday to win the Nationwide Series race.
On Sunday, he was the leader when a bizarre sequence of events on Lap 167 changed the entire race.
Four-time defending series champion Jimmie Johnson was running fourth when he inexplicably hit the wall, and Denny Hamlin, running fifth, had to weave low through the grass to avoid hitting Johnson. Both cars suffered considerable damage and NASCAR called for a caution that sent everyone to pit road.
Kyle Busch, at the time the strongest car in the race, ran into Brad Keselowski on pit road to damage his car. Even worse, NASCAR flagged him for speeding and he was forced to also serve a penalty.
It dropped Kyle Busch all the way back to 26th in a race he maybe could have won.
Johnson wrecks twice at Charlotte, ends up 37th
May 30, 2010
CONCORD, N.C. (AP)—Four-time defending NASCAR champion Jimmie Johnson has been at his best at Charlotte Motor Speedway. He has six victories, 13 top-five finishes and has led laps in 17 consecutive Sprint Cup races at the storied track.
That’s what makes his performance Sunday night so surprising.
Johnson wrecked twice in the Coca-Cola 600, the sport’s longest race, and ended up well off the pace in the Memorial Day weekend event. Johnson finished 37th, 36 laps behind winner Kurt Busch. It dropped him from fourth in the points standings.
Ganassi arrives for NASCAR race after Indy victory
May 30, 2010
CONCORD, N.C. (AP)—About four hours after making history with Dario Franchitti’s Indianapolis 500 victory, car owner Chip Ganassi has arrived for the NASCAR race at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
Ganassi flew from Indianapolis to Charlotte on a private plane, then made his way to pit road. He climbed atop Jamie McMurray’s pit box, still beaming after becoming the first owner to win Indy and NASCAR’s Daytona 500 in the same year.
Ganassi says “it’s unbelievable.”
McMurray congratulated his boss over the radio, saying he’s glad Ganassi was able to get back to see part of NASCAR’s longest race Sunday.
McMurray was running near the front of the field when Ganassi arrived, but teammate Juan Pablo Montoya crashed early and was about 70 laps behind the leaders.
