RowdySpeedway’s weekly power rankings are based on the past couple of races along with the driver’s past results at the upcoming race track.
1. Brad Keselowski – Brad did what he needed to do Sunday in Talladega, which was finish ahead of his closest title foes. Brad Keselowski ran in the front, the middle and the back of the pack Sunday in Alabama but more importantly kept the #2 Penske Racing Dodge chugging until the end, and came out of the 25-car pile-up better than Jimmie Johnson and Denny Hamlin, which extends his points lead as we head to the halfway point of the Chase for the Sprint Cup.
It must be a splendid feeling leaving a restrictor-plate track with a bigger points lead then what you woke up with Sunday morning.
2. Jimmie Johnson – Jimmie Johnson’s #48 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet was swept into the mess on the final lap — like most of the remaining field — but Johnson is still in striking distance, and we’re headed to Charlotte where the five-time champion has won six times.
It’s a bad sign for the competitors when the #48 team is still in striking distance.
3. Jeff Gordon – Gordon is quietly running better than anyone right now in the garage, but the four-time champion will need some luck, and some help to get back in title contention as he sits 42 markers back with six races remaining.
Gordon has finished in the top three six of the last seven races, but a hung throttle in week one of the Chase demolished his championship chances.
4. Denny Hamlin - Where was Denny Hamlin Sunday? Oh right, hanging in the back most of the day off of the lead pack. Hamlin decided to use the sit in the rear strategy Sunday at Talladega — a strategy I dislike — and even though he ran in the back trying to avoid wrecks, he still sort of fell victim to one at the end.
Hamlin powered through the carnage and wound up with a 14th-place finish, better than some but still lost championship points Sunday.
5. Clint Bowyer – Bowyer had won the last two fall races at the Talladega Superspeedway and found himself up towards the front near the end on Sunday, but it wouldn’t end well for the Michael Waltrip Racing driver as he would find himself with a 23rd-place finish instead, a big blow to the teams championship aspirations.
Bowyer dropped to fifth in the Chase standings, 40 out of first-place.
6. Kasey Kahne – It could have been a great deal worse for Kasey Kahne, and I mean a lot worse. On lap 99, Kahne’s #5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevy ran out of fuel as the pack stormed through turns one and two, Kahne would have lost a bundle of time if it wasn’t for Kurt Busch wrecking down the backstretch and bringing out a caution.
Kasey can thank Kurt for his twelve-place finish, which moves him to fourth in the Chase standings, 36 out of first-place.
Kasey Kahne won at the Charlotte Motor Speedway earlier this season.
7. Tony Stewart – Stewart went into turn one with the lead on the final lap, but found himself momentarily airborne and in the eye of a 25-car hurricane on the opposite side of the track after making contact with Michael Waltrip.
At least, Stewart admitted that the carnage at the end was basically his fault.
Stewart finished 22nd and has a new museum piece.
8. Matt Kenseth – Kenseth took the lead off of the final corner as a mess of cars wrecked behind him for his second restrictor-plate win this season. Kenseth has racked up two victories and two third-place finishes at the four restrictor-plate races this season, the new restrictor-plate king?
Despite winning on Sunday, Kenseth still finds himself in the basement of the Chase standings, one full race out of first place.
9. Dale Earnhardt Jr. - This had to be a winning week for Jr. if he wanted any remote chance of winning the 2012 championship. After leading 25 laps throughout the afternoon, Jr. got tangled in the final wreck which granted him a twentieth-place finish, and a trip to eleventh in the Chase standings.
10. Greg Biffle – Both the #16 and the #17 Roush Fenway Racing Fords have run well at the restrictor-plate tracks this season, and that trend continued on Sunday as both finished in the top-six, with Kenseth winning.
Both have had a horrid start to the Chase so Sunday gave them something to smile about, well, unless their luggage fell off of the Roush Fenway Racing team plane on the trip back to North Carolina.
11. Kevin Harvick – Going into the weekend, I thought this was Harvick’s last shot at a victory in the 2012 season, and looked as if he could pull it off for a little while, but he had to settle for his usual eleventh-place finish after the sheet metal and smoke settled.
12. Martin Truex Jr. – Truex has had the most consistent season of his Cup career, but he has vanished off of the face of the earth during the first four weeks of the Chase.
Truex finished 13th at Talladega and heads to a Charlotte track where he has led only one lap over the past five races.
13. Kyle Busch – After being forced to pit with ten laps remaining while leading last weekend in Dover — and then saying some very nonsensical things about TRD over the team radio on the cool down lap — rowdy bounced back with a third-place finish Sunday in Talladega despite serving a speeding penalty under green flag conditions in the first half of the race.
Kyle still grasps the thirteenth spot in the points standings.
14. Jamie McMurray – McMurray always seems to run well at these restrictor-plate tracks, and proved it to me Sunday yet again. McMurray looked like he was going to acquire a strong finish until Kevin Harvick wrecked him in the tri-oval with single digit laps remaining, which hampered his lovely afternoon.
15. Ryan Newman – Newman escaped the Talladega madness with a ninth-place finish and earlier in the week acquired more sponsorship for next season.
