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Brad
Keselowski celebrates after winning the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series
auto race at Kentucky Speedway in Sparta, Ky., Saturday
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Nascar...
Yahoo Sports
Keselowski wins
third race of the season
SPARTA, Ky.- For a track already infamous for concrete-thick gridlock
outside the grandstands, Kentucky gave us a race on Saturday night as
wide open as rush hour on a holiday.
Brad Keselowski proved he’s not just a legit Chase contender but a
potential championship one, winning his third race of the year while
driving a backup car and manipulating his fuel situation. With big guns
like Kyle Busch, Jimmie Johnson and Denny Hamlin suffering setbacks
that kept them out of the lead, and with Kasey Kahne and Dale Earnhardt
Jr. unable to close the gap, Keselowski thoroughly dominated the final
third of the race.
Hamlin wasn’t able to build on what he’d hoped would be a marquee day,
the announcement of the extension of his contract with Joe Gibbs
Racing. “When you know you’re locked in and know you’re going to race
where you’re going to race for a really long time, and honest people at
Joe Gibbs Racing and FedEx have your back a long time, it’s a good
feeling,” he said. “We’re really blessed to have the partnership that
we have ... and a team that’s capable of winning a championship. That’s
all I can ask for. So it’s up to us to get that done from here on out.”
Hamlin now sits 5th in points, and appears a lock to make the Chase.
Kentucky spent untold amounts both in trying to rectify last year’s
disastrous parking nightmare and in trying to get out the word about
all the changes. And indeed, there were no reports of problems getting
into the track ... in part, at least, because attendance appeared to be
far short of last year’s total. Some of that dropoff is to be expected
when you go from an inaugural race to a second one, some is
attributable to the triple-degree heat, but some is certainly because
of the problems from last year. Post-race, Twitter had no reports of
drivers trapped in their vehicles or unable to leave the track.
The drivers didn’t have a whole lot of trouble getting around Kentucky
for the most part, either. Wide-open racing at the 1.5-mile track
didn’t produce a whole lot of drama; indeed, for much of the race it
felt like a Formula 1-style “who makes the errors in the pits?” kind of
race. Any driver able to find clean air could get distance on the
field, and the drivers, like Busch and Keselowski, who could restart
strong after one of the few cautions were able to grab and hold the
lead ... and he did so in a backup car courtesy of the, in his words,
“badasses” of his team.
“They put together a back‑up car from last year in 100° heat in an
hour’s time ‑‑ not even an hour,” Keselowski said. “It was like 40
minutes. I wish I had a stopwatch for that. Got it on the racetrack and
got to run our laps for practice to make the adjustments we needed to
be fast today. And that’s what badasses do, and that’s what got us to
victory lane today, and I’m proud of these guys for it. I’m proud of
them. Damn proud of them. I think that sums it up.”
This sets up an interesting final nine races of the regular season for
Keselowski. If he’s able to stay in the top 10, and he’s 34 points
ahead of 11th right now, he’d get bonus points for the three wins. That
at the moment would put him in the series lead. Fall out of the top 10,
and he’ll still surely make the Chase, but without the bonus points.
Either way, Keselowski showed he’s now legitimate championship
material. As Tony Stewart proved last year, a driver that can win at
any time is more valuable than a consistent finisher, if only barely.
And Keselowski now adds a 1.5-miler to his short track and his
superspeedway victories this year. That’s not a bad year’s work, and
we’re not even halfway.
Read this and other articles at Yahoo Sports
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