So last week wasn’t quite a bust for me, with my best bets (sure thing Greg Biffle, dark horse Jeff Gordon, and sleeper Clint Bowyer) finishing third, fourth, and 12th, respectively.
My lead picks (Tony Stewart at New Hampshire, and Biffle at both Dover and Kansas) have finished eighth and first, respectively, scoring 502 points between them. In other words, if I was in the Chase, I’d be fourth right now, 73 points behind Jimmie Johnson in first.
Talladega, however, offers the biggest challenge for any race forecaster in the entire Chase. A driver can go from third to 30th in half a lap, or the exact opposite.
Everyone knows about the Big One, a 20-plus car wreck that more often than not eliminates one of the sport’s top drivers from contention, especially late in the race. In other words, this weekend is a crapshoot.
Before picking anybody to win, have a look at the speed charts from every practice, go with a gut feeling, and wear your lucky underwear. You’ll need it. Just don’t drop a deuce and have to wash all the luck out of it.
Here’s what to expect from each of the 12 Chase drivers this week at Talladega:
1. Jimmie Johnson: Johnson’s got momentum on his side, the top cars in the garage, an average start of 8.2 (so you know he’s fast here), and only one start in which he hasn’t led a lap, when his engine blew up in fall 2002. He’s almost a lock, as much as any driver can be at Talladega. Any questions?
2. Carl Edwards: Come Chase time, Edwards does well at Talladega: the past three years, he’s finished fifth, ninth, and 14th in this race (although that 9th came in 2006, when he missed the 10-man cutoff). Despite two engine failures, Edwards has never retired from a race due to an accident. Given his recent momentum, with seven finishes of third or better from Indianapolis to now, don’t expect Cousin Carl to slow down any on Sunday.
3. Greg Biffle
comments (0) write a comment »
write a new comment
This article has no comments.