Tony Stewart has scored his first win of his season at the Chicagoland Speedway twice, once in 2004 and again in 2007. And on Monday, the Columbus, Indiana native scored his first win of the 2011 season at the Windy City racetrack. Suddenly the No. 14 team has gone from Chase pretender to title contender.
Mother Nature won the race on Sunday when rain postponed the Geico 400 to Monday morning, but when the first race in the 2011 Chase kicked off, it was anybodys to win. There were not very many cautions, but there were two strange instances early on. Defending Chicagoland winner David Reutimann felt the back of his car was bouncing around a lot after he pitted for a flat right rear tire. It was later discovered to be just what the Michael Waltrip Racing driver had feared: the rear shock of his Tums Toyota had broken a mount and come off the truck arm.
"Even with our issues we were fast, but just couldn't get in position to compete with the leaders" Reutimann said after the race. "It's very disappointing. We will regroup this week and work on our car for New Hampshire and get better next week." Reutimann was also spun out on pit road by Landon Cassil and, adding insult to injury, ran out of gas in the final laps. All these troubles relegated an otherwise competitive car and driver to a 32nd place finish.
The other mystery issue came when Greg Biffle, while racing for the lead, experienced a flat front tire. The Roush-Fenway driver suspected that the radiator pan was hitting something and that he had a shock problem because the front of his Filtrete/3M Ford was up in the air instead of down against the track. Biffle went from battling for the win to finishing 26th.
Up front, it looked as if it would come down to Jeff Gordon, Matt Kenseth or Kurt Busch. These three led early and often, but when that four letter f-word (not that f-word) was heard on all the team radios, the landscape of the race changed.
Fuel. Every driver was told to save every drop they could to make it to the finish. As the pay window began to open, Stewart also emerged as a contender. Martin Truex, Jr stayed out on the last round of pit stops in hopes of a caution, but the NAPA Toyota wheelman was forced to surrender his lead to pit for fuel. Meanwhile, Tony "Smoke" Stewart was clutching the engine in the corners to keep his rpms down and save precious gas.
But on the final lap, multiple cars ran out of fuel, including Chasers Jimmie Johnson and Matt Kenseth (who was denied a top ten finish because he was pushed to the finish on the final lap). This allowed Kevin Harvick to finish second and Dale Earnhardt, Jr, who was running sixth at the time, to score a third place finish. But it was Smoke who grabbed the victory and erased any doubt about his team's title chances.
The points were also shaken up this weekend as well. Kevin Harvick is now your points leader, followed by Stewart, Carl Edwards, Kurt Busch and Earnhardt, Jr goes from tenth to fifth. Meanwhile, Kyle Busch went from leading the points to eighth, Johnson to ninth and Kenseth to tenth. Gordon and Denny Hamlin round out the top twelve.
This week the Cup Series heads to New England and the New Hampshire Motor Speedway. "The Magic Mile" has kicked off the Chase since its inception in 2004, but this year it will be the second stop in the Nascar playoffs. With the points shaken up and Smoke on the rise (pun intended), this championship is anybody's to win. So watch out Jimmie!
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