2018 NASCAR Pit Road Week 9: Richmond

Weekly Review and Power Rankings

Richmond Raceway

By Richard Tix

Saturday was a fun one. The weather in Minnesota finally heated up that I got to go outside and at least think about (dread) yard work. Cooper got to finally roam the yard without snow up to his belly.  Oh, and it was finally nice enough outside to open the windows inside and get some paint on the new nursery! Last but not least, a pretty entertaining race happened to be on Saturday night.

Richmond was a pretty good race start to finish that about had it all. The first half of the race included long green flag runs with some decent passing throughout the field. The end of the race had a dominate car that had to make it through plenty of restarts to stress even the most casual fan out. A few hot tempered run in's and a mix of cautions (still baffles me FOX didn't show the replay of the No. 17 hitting the wall bringing a caution I wasn't so sure should have been a caution). It basically had a mix of what almost every racing fan wants. I for one really enjoyed the race especially considering some Richmond races as of late have come up a bit short in the entertaining category.

Anyways, lets get right into the Power Rankings this week! Also, NBTW takes a fast look back at Team Power Rankings which hasn't been updated since week 3!

Pit Road Power Rankings: Week 9 (Week 8)

1. Kyle Busch (LW-1)- Yup, no one is touching him at the top right now.He has three straight wins and every finish except the Daytona 500 and Atlanta (7th) has been top 3 or better.
2. Joey Logano (LW-3)- JoLo led 92 laps on Saturday on the way to his fifth top ten in a row. Richmond was one of the first races that Joey looked to have winning speed after winning stage one and two.
3. Kevin Harvick (LW-2)- Harvick is just cruising along after his hot start. He now has four straight top tens after his 35th place finish at Fontana.
4. Clint Bowyer (LW-4)- Bowyer has a win, five playoff points, and is still third in the standings. After winning Martinsville he has three straight top tens.
5. Martin Truex Jr (LW-5)- Truex had a shot at beating Kyle Busch at Richmond, but a poor late pit stop cost him a chance and it also cost him the quality finish he should have had.
6. Kyle Larson (LW-6)- Larson followed up a strong Bristol with a quality Richmond (7th). Maybe he is starting to heat up?
7. Denny Hamlin (LW-9)- Denny had another good car this past weekend and this time didn't screw up late in the pits (him or team). It resulted in a nice 3rd place finish.
8. Brad Keselowski (LW-8)- BK is still 5th in the points, but he really has struggled lately to have a complete race. Saturday night he faded a bit late, but still finished 8th.
9. Jimmie Johnson (LW-NR)- It was nice to see JJ have another strong run on Saturday and it lead to back to back top tens for the No. 48 for the first time in 2018.
10. Ryan Blaney (LW-7)- Crashed at Bristol with a strong car. Caught up in another wreck at Richmond. It's been a rough patch for Blaney, but on the bright side he has still been fast.
11. Kurt Busch (LW-12)- 11th. Basically Kurt Busch has been an 11th place driver all season. Oh, and he finished 11th on Saturday.
12. Daniel Suarez (LW-NR)- Suarez started 26th on Saturday, finished 10th, and overall had a pretty nice race. Last week at Bristol was even better even though he finished one position worse (11th).

Dropped Out: Alex Bowman (LW-10) and Aric Almirola (LW-11)

Just Missed: Chase Elliott, William Byron, and Erik Jones

Team Power Rankings

1. Joe Gibbs Racing (LR-4)- Three straight JGR wins, all coming from Kyle Busch. Erik and Suarez do enough weekly to keep the floor high enough for JGR to be No. 1.
2. Stewart Haas Racing (LR-1)- SHR can easily make a case for No. 1, but my rankings not only are based off stats, but who is hotter at the moment. That title is held by Kyle Busch so JGR got the nod. Still, its impressive what SHR continues to do top to bottom with Harvick, Bowyer, Ku Busch, and Almirola.
3. Team Penske (LR-2)- Zero wins seems odd this far into the season, but JoLo is tied for most top 10's, BK is 5th in points, and Blaney has been fast most of the year.
4. Furniture Row Racing (LR-3)- The finishes have been rough, but the No. 78 is still strong enough to be a top team in NASCAR.
5. Chip Ganassi Racing (LR-6)- Larson has shown speed at more then just short tracks, so Ganassi gets the nod over HMS. That being said, JMac hasn;t shown much so they may start falling if Kyle doesn't keep them afloat.
6. Hendrick Motorsports (LR-8)- HMS is making moves, but its just shy of jumping Kyle Larson right now. JJ and Chase both ran strong at Richmond and Bowman shined at Bristol and Martinsville so things might be turning the corner. Then again, they haven't shown the speed at intermediates yet.
7. Richard Childress Racing (LR-7)- Meh, that's how I feel all around about RCR right now. They're around, but not factoring in a ton.
8. Wood Brothers Racing (LR-5)- Menard has been up and down lately, but does have two 13th place finishes in his last four. They have lost ground since their hot start.
9. Richard Petty Motorsports (LR-10)- Even if it was short lived, it was fun to see the No. 43 up front with Bubba making some aggressive moves at Bristol. Oh, and they had a top ten at Texas as well.
10. Roush Fenway Racing (LR-9)- We just went through the short track stretch where RFR rose up some in 2017, and instead Bayne became a punch line and Ricky only gathered one top 10. Pretty rough considering Ricky typically shines at some of the short tracks.
11. Go Fas Racing (LR-NR)- DiBenedetto has two 16th place finished in his last three races and the other one was a 21st place finish at Bristol.
12. Starcom Racing (LR-NR)- They get this spot solely because they put Landon Cassill in the car and in four races he gave them a top 20 and a 21st place finish while gather more points then Jeffery did in five races.

2017 NASCAR Pit Road Week 26: Richmond

Weekly Review and Power Rankings

Federated Auto Parts 400

By Richard Tix

Hey! The regular season is done and y'all are still here? NASCAR heads into the final ten races which now has a new name. The Playoffs Chased away the old name - see what I did there? - and with that it brought in some new wrinkles. We now have playoff points included that roll over round to round up until Homestead.

So, now that we're heading to the "post season" Behind the Wall is going to do a complete reset of the Power Rankings. Just like last year, we're opening it back up to 16 spots in the rankings. However, those 16 spots are only going to be made up of the current playoff drivers. After three races the field gets cut to 12 and so will the Behind the Wall power rankings. Again, only playoff drivers will be of those 12 spots. Once we get to the third round (eight drivers left), the power rankings will still be 12 spots, but the top 8 spot will be the remaining divers and the last four can be made up of ANY driver, regardless of if they made the playoffs. Same will happen at Homestead, 12 spots in the rankings, the top four will be the remaining drivers, and the rest of the spots will be made up of anyone else. Just keep that in mind when your favorite driver who is on a hot streak sits in 9th because 8 other playoff drivers are ahead of him/her.

So, lets get it started!

Pit Road Power Rankings: Week 26 (Week 25)

1. Martin Truex Jr (LW-2)- Truex is already up 20 points on Larson (second) and has 38 playoff points after the reset. He can book it to the second round right now.
2. Kyle Busch (LW-1)- Rowdy finished strong with six straight top tens including two wins to finish the regular season. He also has 21 playoff points (third most) to help him move along in the final ten races.
3. Kyle Larson (LW-4)- Well, thats a nice way to finish off the regular season. Larson's win gave him four in 2017 and really helped by giving him an extra 5 playoff points.
4. Denny Hamlin (LW-3)- Hamlin has come on strong late in the regular season (even with an encumbered win). With Toyota still rolling, I expect Hamlin to be strong these final ten races.
5. Kevin Harvick (LW-7)- Harvick is my top Ford going into the playoffs and most of that is because he has been so consistent. 
6. Matt Kenseth (LW-5)- Kenseth was the one of the last one's into the playoffs, but don't let that fool you, he has been running very well as of late. He has some ground to make up, but should advance a round or two and then all it takes is a win.
7. Brad Keselowski (LW-11)- BK is not entering the playoffs like he would want to I am guessing. Sputtering in, BK really has run into a ton of poor luck. He still has two wins and 11 top fives this year, so they could get it together.
8. Jimmie Johnson (LW-NR)- Last year I had JJ ranked 9th going into the Playoffs..... Just keep that in mind if he starts advancing this year again.
9. Chase Elliott (LW-8)- Consistent? Yup. Championship contender? Probably not. Lets be honest, barring some crazy story-lines most these guys aren't in line for the Championship this year. However, Chase has had a great year that just needed a bit of late race closing. Maybe he gets Stage Three figured out and makes a run to Miami?
10. Kurt Busch (LW-10)- Kurt has been running strong late in the season. Maybe they have found something? But, is it enough to make a long run?
11. Ryan Newman (LW-9)- Winning speed? Nope. But the No. 31 team has been putting a bunch of quality runs together and not many have noticed.
12. Ryan Blaney (LW-NR)- Winning speed? Yup. But this team can not find any consistency which will burn then in the playoffs.
13. Jamie McMurray (LW-12)- His teammate is going off, meanwhile JMac has been riding steady. Making the playoffs on points is not easy and Jamie just keeps doing it year after year.
14. Kasey Kahne (LW-NR)- One last run with HMS. Let it sink in for awhile and enjoy it while you can.
15. Ricky Stenhouse Jr (LW-NR)- Hey, at least Ricky gets Talladega in the playoffs. However, it's in the second round and he will most likely already be kicked out.
16. Austin Dillon (LW-NR)- I had AD pegged for a much better season, boy was I wrong. However, he is here and gave himself a chance.

2017 NASCAR Week 26: Richmond

Federated Auto Parts 400

Richmond Raceway

By Richard Tix

What to Watch For?

Final Regular Season Race of 2017

• It's everyone's last chance to steal the show in the regular season. After Richmond NASCAR will basically reset the points (minus some playoff points and seeding). So, Richmond is now the last chance to help improve your playoff odds. So, the focus this weekend (other than the cut line) will be who can grab a few extra point for the playoffs and how will they effect each round going forward?

Matt Kenseth vs Jamie McMurray

• The cut line, or bubble line as some may say, will be all the talk this weekend at Richmond. This is the final race until the playoffs start and guys like Joey Logano, Erik Jones, Dale Earnhardt Jr, and Daniel Suarez all need wins to get into them. While those guys will be fighting for a win, Kenseth and McMurray will be doing the same, but with a twist. See, a win locks them in, but they're both currently in on points. The kicker here is, that if one of the other mentioned guys like JoLo gets a win, than Kenseth and McMurray would be fighting for the final spot and one would miss out on the playoffs. What's even better? Well, currently only one point separates the No. 20 and No. 1 in the standings so literally the most points at Richmond (almost straight up) would advance. Things could get dicey if the No. 77 finds himself leading late and Kenseth and McMurray are near each other in running order.

Richmond Raceway

• How many time will someone say RIR or Richmond International Raceway? If you want a drinking word that isn't elimination, bubble, or cut line so that you can still remember the race afterwords, it would be something to do with RIR. This is the drinking word to get a buzz, but not go overboard. All of this because the track is re-branding and renaming to Richmond Raceway and this will be the first race under its new name. So, get used to it because it isn't going away.

**This section is just a quick look at some of Cup drivers latest finishes. This is not a tool for fantasy purposes and NBTW only is looking at end results. No deep statistic's are involved, but rather it is just a quick way to get ready for the race and get caught up on who has finished well at each track**

The Good

• Kyle Busch- Four total wins here at Richmond for Rowdy, but none since 2012. He still has three top 10's (two seconds) in the last four trips here.
• Denny Hamlin- Fresh off a win at Darlington, Hamlin heads to another one of his best tracks (Martinsville and Darlington are also in his top 3). Last year he won from the pole at this race heading into the playoffs.
• Joey Logano- Boy, does Joey need this. Richmond is the spot of his all too famous encumbered win earlier this year. NASCAR may have taken his win from counting, but he still has seven straight top tens here (though he will need the win).

The Middle

• Kevin Harvick- This is more like the "Good" sections extra credit. "Happy" has three straight 5th place finishes here and five top fives in the last six.

The Bad

• Ryan Blaney- In three starts Richmond has not been Blaneys track. Although, he did start on the front row (second) earlier this year, so things could turn around.
• Paul Menard- 21 starts, 1 top ten. Worse yet? In his last seven he has one top 15 and only two top 20's.
• Austin Dillon- AD has a sole top 15 in his first seven Richmond starts, however he does have four top 20's.

About the Track: Richmond

Track Stats

• Richard Petty once won 7 RIR races in a row, 9 of 10, and 12 of 17. All were from 1967 to 1975
• In 2013 Kevin Harvick and Carl Edwards won from the 17th and 26th positions. Joey Logano won in 2014 (Spring) from the 17th position as well. 
• In 2009 and 2010 Kyle Busch won both early season races and Denny Hamlin won both late season. Kyle also won the early season RIR race in 2011 and 2012 making it 5 straight Toyota wins and 6 in 7 (actually 7 of 8 because Bowyer won late in 2012).
• Richard Petty has the most career RIR wins with 13.
• Of current drivers Kyle Busch has the most total wins with 4.
• Richard Petty also has the most career top 5's (34), top 10's (41), and Poles (tied with Bobby Allison with 8).

Track Info

• Surface - Asphalt
• Length - 0.75 miles
• Banking
• Turns: 14 degrees
• Frontstretch: 8 degrees
• Backstretch: 2 degrees