Home Rod Mullins: NASCAR travels to California
Sports News

Rod Mullins: NASCAR travels to California

Contributors

nascarThis week, the NASCAR circuit travels to California for their first trip back to a “superspeedway” since Daytona and questions still abound about the success of the new aero package and setup on the Monster Cup Series cars.  There’s only been one definite answer delivered this season as to the cars; Ford’s Mustang has stolen some of the thunder away from Toyota this season but everyone is still scratching their heads as to the Chevrolet’s and the Camaro ZL1. Will the famed Chevy nameplate rise above the issues in 2018 to emerge as a stronger contender in 2019?

Auto Club Speedway in Fontana could be the needed boost for the Camaro and Chevrolet but the question is have the teams closed the learning gap in one year as they struggle to compete with Toyota and the surge of the Mustang.

As for last week, Kyle Busch picked up his 52nd Cup win and closed in on 200 race wins in the NASCAR Divisions overall last week at Phoenix and ISM Raceway.  In a race where Ryan Blaney was positioned to win his first race of 2019, his first short track and pick up his first win since the ROVAL at Charlotte, fuel mileage was the deciding factor in the Phoenix race as Blaney looked to save fuel before running out and Kyle Busch gaining on Blaney in the final laps.  Much has been made about Busch nearing the 200 win plateau with much discussion and comparison with The King, Richard Petty. Let’s set the record straight now: There is no comparison with 200 overall wins to Petty’s 200 Cup victories. Busch has been a dominating driver in two series with less than experienced drivers (at least compared to his resume) in the Truck Series and the Xfinity Series. That’s like putting the New England Patriots on the field against a pee wee or Pop Warner football team.  Busch should be judged on his real success in the Cup Series, which has been good but he’s no Richard Petty.

The last two weeks with races at Las Vegas and Phoenix saw some great drafting, gamesmanship and solid racing from my vantage point but the highlight of the past week was the Daniel Suarez-Michael McDowell fight card during qualifying at ISM Raceway. It led Suarez to issue an ultimatum to McDowell and the rest of the NASCAR field, “Keep being nice to me and I’ll be nice to you.” The fight stemmed from Suarez claiming he had been bumped and roughed up during qualifying preventing SUarez from a better qualifying performance.  To add insult to injury, Suarez and McDowell ended up starting 27th and 28th, side by side.  Talk about karma.

As for this week, Fontana will bring wide open racing for the Monster Cup Series and a chance to give teams time to work on the superspeedway car while taking notes for the upcoming Martinsville (VA) race and trips to Texas Motor Speedway before coming to Bristol on April 7th.

One dominate conversation this week at Fontana will be the crazy restarts. Usually, slow on coming up to speed and jumping out to a quick lead, the cars will bunch up and race in tight quarters before building up enough horsepower to get ahead. “It’ll be the Wild Wild West,” said Aric Almirola while Clint Bowyer said crew chiefs will be “covering their eyes” on restarts.  Fans could also see eight wide runs, with drivers using all the real estate they have in front of them to gain the upper advantage.

Needing a win and especially in front of the home crowd: Jimmie Johnson. Johnson continues to struggle this season as he did last season but he has shown improvement since the start of the 2019 season. Johnson will look to have a good performance and hopefully a win in front of many of his West Coast fans that remember his driving on the circuit in California so many years ago.

Also looking for a much needed win and breaking from a slump (in their eyes) is Martin Truex, Jr.  The Joe Gibbs Racing driver has been very outspoken since the start of this season and is out to prove that his team is of championship quality despite the move to JGR in the off season.

Next week on the podcast, we’ll discuss the Fontana results, preview Martinsville and discuss two important NASCAR figures who have been snubbed for major recognition in the sport with the recent nominations for the NASCAR Hall of Fame and the Landmark Award.  More on that next week.

Column by Rod Mullins

Contributors

Contributors

Have a guest column, letter to the editor, story idea or a news tip? Email editor Chris Graham at [email protected]. Subscribe to AFP podcasts on Apple PodcastsSpotifyPandora and YouTube.