Skinner, Speed to finish season for Red Bull

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) -- AJ Allmendinger will not finish the season with Red Bull Racing, giving up his seat to Mike Skinner and Scott Speed for the final seven races of the year.

Allmendinger is not returning to the No. 84 Toyota next year, and the team is letting him go early to pursue another job. He finished a career-high ninth in his Red Bull finale Sunday at Kansas Speedway.

Skinner, who drove the car for five races earlier this season, will drive the car the next two weeks at Talladega and Lowe's Motor Speedway.

Speed, who is making the transition from Formula One to NASCAR under Red Bull's guidance, will make his Sprint Cup Series debut at Lowe's in a third Red Bull entry. He'll then finish the year in the No. 84 by driving at Martinsville, Atlanta, Texas, Phoenix and Homestead.

"The schedule we put together is in the best interest of both Red Bull Racing Team and AJ's plans for the future," general manager Jay Frye said Tuesday. "Allowing Mike Skinner and Scott Speed to share the No. 84 for the balance of the season helps our team continue developing our program for the future."

Speed is believed to be in line to drive the No. 84 full time next season.


Allmendinger expects Sunday to be finale in 84
Player Ratings: Atlético 4-0 Schalke

Paul Menard to leave DEI for Yates Racing

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) -- Paul Menard will leave Dale Earnhardt Inc. at the end of the season to drive for Yates Racing, The Associated Press has learned.

Menard is expected to announce Tuesday that both he and his sponsorship will move to Yates, a person familiar with Menard's decision told The AP. The person requested anonymity because Menard had yet to make his announcement.

The loss could be devastating to DEI because Menard's sponsor is his father's midwest-based hardware chain. The loss of driver and sponsor leaves DEI with just one full-time sponsor, three drivers and horrendous economic conditions that combine to create a bleak outlook for the storied team founded by the late Dale Earnhardt.

DEI officials were not immediately available to comment Monday night.

Without Menard, DEI has just one full sponsor in Bass Pro Shops for Martin Truex Jr. He recently agreed to a one-year extension with DEI that takes him through 2009, but is winless this season and failed to make the Chase for the Sprint Cup championship one year after his breakthrough season.

Sponsorship from the U.S. Army is expected to leave DEI at the end of the year -- perhaps for Tony Stewart's new team -- and that leaves DEI without funding for the No. 8 Chevrolet that Aric Almirola will pilot.

Regan Smith, the fourth driver in DEI's current stable, has had very limited sponsorship all season.

Because of the economy, sponsorship has been incredibly difficult to find this year and very little new business is coming into NASCAR. Instead, longtime sponsors are simply moving to the best teams, and the smaller organizations are struggling for funding.

Chip Ganassi Racing closed one of its three teams in late June when the team couldn't find a sponsor for Dario Franchitti, and Texaco later said it will leave the sport at the end of the season. Texaco's departure leaves star Juan Pablo Montoya will only a half-season of sponsorship lined up for next year.

Yates, meanwhile, has been fielding two cars this year with no full-time sponsorship. Instead, it's pieced together several different limited programs for David Gilliland and Travis Kvapil while receiving support from Roush Fenway Racing.

Although Menard is 22nd in the points and has just one top-10 finish this season, his addition is a boost to Yates because of the Menards sponsorship he brings to a team that's trying to rebuild itself into one of NASCAR's top organizations. Yates struggled through several lean years, the defection of Dale Jarrett and Elliott Sadler, and finally team owner Robert Yates' retirement last season.

He turned the team over to his son, Doug, who has worked closely with Roush Fenway to rebound.


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Allmendinger, Gordon produce under pressure

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) -- It would have been so easy for an ailing Jeff Gordon or an unemployed AJ Allmendinger to take a leisurely Sunday drive around Kansas Speedway.

But Gordon is racing for a championship, Allmendinger is racing for a job and simply coasting to the checkered flag isn't an option for either.

With so much on the line, both delivered solid performances -- Gordon was fourth, Allmendinger was a career-best ninth -- that ultimately could define their seasons.

"I guess I need to be sick more often," Gordon quipped. "That was a good run and a good car. I know if I had been healthy, I would have gotten more out of it."

He could always use more. Gordon is winless this season, and his last victory was almost a year ago.

Gordon's most certainly not out of the title hunt. Should he charge to the front and end up contending, he'll likely look back at Kansas as the race that kept his chances alive. He left Kansas ranked sixth in the standings and trails leader Jimmie Johnson by 143 points.

He was under the weather all weekend and felt so ill on race day that Hendrick Motorsports asked Nationwide Series driver Brad Keselowski to be on standby in case the four-time series champion couldn't make it to the finish line.

But climbing out of the car isn't Gordon's style.

"When you've got a car and a team that's as good as this one, you can't let somebody else get in there and drive it," he said.

Keeping his No. 24 team focused is of utmost importance to Gordon, who has just seven races left to avoid his first winless season since his 1993 rookie campaign. He's coming off an intense work of week -- two days testing the car at Lowe's Motor Speedway and pit practice with the crew -- and heading into a stretch of schedule that suits him. Last season, Gordon won back-to-back races at Talladega and Charlotte, site of the next two events.

So powering through to his fourth-place finish was just what the entire team needed.

"I owe a lot to these guys. They stuck it out all weekend long when I was not feeling good and was pretty ill as far as my mood," he said. "That's the thing about a great team -- when one team member is down, other guys rally and pick up the pace, and that's what they did with me. I'm very thankful for that."

Allmendinger, meanwhile, went into the weekend believing it was his final race with Red Bull Racing. He's not returning to the team next year and had hoped to move into a new ride before this season ends.

But he's yet to put together a deal, and Red Bull officials have been in a bit of limbo as Allmendinger plans the last two months of his season. He made it clear Sunday that he'll race hard, even as a lame duck driver.

"You get a little chip on your shoulder when you're told you're not going to be back here next year," he said. "So I had to go out there and prove something to some team owners and hopefully they see what kind of character I have. I'm not going to give up. I'm going to keep fighting."

Finishes such as Sunday's -- the second top-10 in Allmendinger's 38 career Cup starts -- will be critical for Allmendinger to prove he deserves to be in the Cup Series. He left a successful career in the now-defunct Champ Car Series for NASCAR, a difficult switch for the 26-year-old.

Red Bull wasn't competitive last season, and Allmendinger and teammate Brian Vickers struggled to make races. Every start he missed cost Allmendinger seat time he needed to adapt, and Red Bull failed to find other opportunities that might have eased his transition.

Now Scott Speed, a longtime Red Bull athlete, is back in the United States on the fast-track for a Cup ride after a failed stint in Formula One.

Still, Allmendinger is trying to squeeze everything he can out of his final few days with Red Bull.

"When I kind of got let go from my Champ Car ride, I didn't want to be there anymore. I wanted to get a new start," he said. "Here, I wanted to stay. I love these guys. It's a great team. They're going to do a lot of great things.

"I've shown before I can go through some adversity, keep fighting and come out on the other side a lot better."


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Car troubles plague Kyle Busch -- again

KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) -- It's probably safe to say now: Kyle Busch isn't going to win NASCAR's Chase for the Sprint Cup championship.

The volatile driver proclaimed his Chase chances over after blowing an engine in Dover last week, a statement crew chief Steve Addington said was a bit premature. After suffering through mechanical problems for the third straight race, Busch's hopes might have been dashed for good.

The Chase leader after the regular season, Busch finished 28th at Kansas Speedway on Sunday and is 311 points behind leader Jimmie Johnson -- pretty much an insurmountable hole with seven races left.

"I think it's pretty self-explanatory to everyone out there," Busch said.

Busch started 31st and never really made up any ground because of car trouble. The crew couldn't figure out what was wrong, guessing it was a malfunctioning carburetor, so they told him to stay out until the next caution.

Busch kept racing and only took tires and gas on the next pit stop, saying on the radio he thought maybe the problem had burned off in the engine.

It didn't get any better.

Busch's crew never did figure out what was wrong, even after lifting the hood during a pit stop near the halfway point, and his car continued to sputter along the rest of the day.

"It was just like probably what it sounded like -- sputtering and not running clean," Busch said.

Busch wasn't the only Joe Gibbs Racing driver to have a tough day.

Tony Stewart had all kinds of problems, nearly hitting crewmembers from another team during a pit stop early, sliding across the infield after making contact with another car later in the race. He had to take a long pit stop near the 200-lap mark to fix the front spoiler, which was damaged from sliding across the grass, and finished 40th. Stewart is 11th in the Chase standings, 255 points from the lead.

Denny Hamlin also had a rough day, struggling with handling early, then some kind of engine problem over the final 30 laps to finish 11th. He's 10th in the standings -- 243 points behind Johnson -- leaving JGR in the final three spots in the Chase after three races.

"Those other guys in our group have had bad luck and I've had bad luck all year," Hamlin said. "I'm used to it. We have a situation where we are all trying new stuff and trying to get better. Right now, we've got to keep our stuff together.

------

PENALTY ENOUGH: Robin Pemberton, NASCAR's vice president of competition, said Sunday that Chip Ganassi Racing and Brian Pattie, crew chief for the No. 42 Dodge of Juan Pablo Montoya, are not likely to be hit with any further penalties for the technical violation that cost them the Kansas pole.

"We'll continue to review it, but this is a lot like when we find a car is a little too high or too low in inspection," Pemberton said. "It's not a major offense and losing the pole is probably enough of a penalty."

Montoya beat out Jimmie Johnson for his first Cup pole on Friday, but the postqualifying inspection found the gas pressure in his rear shocks exceeded the allowable maximum. Johnson was moved up to the pole and Montoya had to start 42nd.

Montoya did the best he could with a tough situation, moving his way up to 16th in the first 100 laps and finishing 20th.

"To get a top-20 from starting dead last is a pretty good day here," Pattie said.

------

BIFFLE'S FINISH: Greg Biffle fell short in his bid to win three straight races, shot down by a car that mishandled all day.

It was still quite a performance.

Biffle started 18th and worked his way toward the front throughout the race, passing Jeff Gordon on the final turn to finish third. He held his spot at third in the Chase standings, still within reach at 30 points behind Jimmie Johnson.

"We were just off a little bit all day," he said. "We fought it tooth and nail. Man, we did everything we could to this race car. Toward the end, I was elbows up like I had been the last two races and that's I had, you know, third place."

------

GORDON AILING: Jeff Gordon has been feeling sick all week and wasn't sure if he'd be able to race Sunday -- to the point Hendrick Motorsports had Nationwide driver Brad Keselowski ready to take his place.

"I can't remember feeling this bad at the start of a race, ever," he said pre-race.

Still in the thick of the Chase, Gordon did climb into the car for the start and had a great race, moving from 13th at the start into the top 5. So what if he couldn't hold off Greg Biffle in the final turn? Finishing fourth the way he felt was impressive.

"I guess I need to get sick more often," Gordon joked. "That was a good run in a good car. I know if I had been healthy, I would have gotten more out of it."

------

TRUEX TROUBLES: After leading 27 laps early in the race, Martin Truex Jr. started complaining about how his car was handling around the 200-lap mark. Truex's long day finally ended on Lap 229, when a broken shifter sent him to the garage.

"It was a freak deal," Truex said of the shifter. "It's kind of the way our year has gone -- if it can go wrong, it will. It's disappointing."

------

PIT STOPS: Jeff Burton, fourth in the Chase standings before Sunday, had to move to the back of the pack at the start after replacing a tachometer on pit row. He was charged with a pit stop and dropped from 37th to 43rd. He rallied to finish seventh and is fourth in the Chase standings, 121 back of Johnson. ... Clint Bowyer, who grew up in nearby Emporia, was black-flagged to pit road after being charged with jumping the start. Bowyer, who started 24th, came back off pit road just ahead of the leaders to avoid falling a lap down and rallied to finish 12th. ... Kevin Harvick finished sixth, his ninth consecutive top-10 finish. ... Dodge's R6P8 engine made it debut in Kurt Busch's No. 2 Miller Lite Dodge Charger after the Penske team had done midweek testing on it for several months. "It was just a tough day all around -- loose, tight, loose, tight," said Busch, who finished 30th. "Our handling issue didn't give us a chance to evaluate the performance of the new engine."

------

AP Auto Racing Writer Mike Harris contributed to this report.


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Johnson holds off Edwards, takes points lead

KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) -- Well, it worked in the video game.

Carl Edwards did everything he could Sunday, including purposely bouncing off the concrete wall at Kansas Speedway, but it wasn't quite enough to beat two-time NASCAR Sprint Cup champion Jimmie Johnson.

"Where'd he come from?" Johnson asked after Edwards shot underneath him in the third turn of the final lap before banging hard off the wall, giving Johnson just enough room to drive back to the front and hold on for a win that vaulted him into the series points lead.

Edwards, who lost the lead to Johnson 47 laps from the end on the final pit stops by the leaders, said he knew what he was doing when he made his desperation move on the final trip around the 1.5-mile oval.

"I planned on hitting the wall, but I didn't plan on the wall slowing me down that much," Edwards said. "In video games, you can just run into the wall and run it wide open. That's what I did, but it didn't quite work out the same as the video game."

Johnson appeared to have the race well in hand after regaining the lead on lap 220 of the 267-lap event, consistently running 10 to 15 car-lengths ahead of Edwards until the last two laps when the runner-up closed in enough to make a run at him.

Edwards got the gap down to a few feet heading into the third turn on lap 266, but Johnson pulled away again as they reached the finish line.

"To be honest, I was cruising down the backstretch (on the last lap), had a decent lead and I knew he would go to the bottom," Johnson said. "My concern was just making sure I was at his quarterpanel coming off of turn two. So I was thinking through what I needed to do and, next thing you know, that car goes flying by.

"I knew inside there was no damn way he was making the turn and just stayed on the brake and tried to get it redirected and turned down. Then I was so in awe of how far he drove it in, I watched him pound the wall and get back in the gas and thought, "Man, he's serious about this win. I'd better get back in the gas myself.' "

Johnson, who said he saw plenty of so-called slide jobs when he was running off road and dirt track races early in his career, noted Edwards still caught him off guard on this one after the leader became a little too cautious in the final laps.

"At that time, I think Carl probably recognized what I was trying to do and took it in way beyond any sense of normal thinking and was committed to it," Johnson said. "I still can't explain to you how surprised I was and shocked. Still, it was pretty damn cool to see him bouncing around like that and skipping off the wall."

Edwards, who went from a 10-point lead over Johnson to a 10-point deficit with seven races left in the Chase for the championship, said, "I just really, really wanted to win this race. ... But Jimmie's a smart racer. I've done that to guys, too. When they slide jump you, you just lift, go right back by them and watch them. I didn't know what was going to happen and just had to give it a try."

Greg Biffle, who came into the third race of Chase with two straight victories, followed the leaders across the finish line to stay within 35 points of the lead.

"When we got here, we weren't very good," Biffle said. "We were 36th right off the truck. So we had big-time improving to do and we did that. We worked really hard and got our car good."

It was a very long race for Edwards, who started 34th in the 43-car field after a poor qualifying effort on Friday.

On his first pit stop, Brian Vickers veered into his pit as Edwards was coming out of his and the two made contact. On Edward's next pit stop, he got out cleanly but was hit in the side by Dave Blaney, who had ricocheted off Jeff Burton.

That second collision forced Edwards to make another stop to have sheet metal pulled away from the tire.

"Seemed like we were running into a lot of people and getting run into," Edwards said. "I don't know what was going on."

Missourian Edwards, who considers this his home track, was relentless as he drove through the field and took his first lead of the day on lap 176 of 267 and wound up leading 31 laps.

But Johnson, who started from the pole, led a race-high 124 laps as he turned in his fifth straight top-five finish, including three of his five season wins.

"Winning the race is a huge boost in confidence for the team and myself," Johnson said. "It's hard to get any points on anybody in the Chase. Five or 10 here and there is nothing."

Chad Knaus, his crew chief, said being in the points lead this early isn't very meaningful this early in the Chase.

"Doesn't mean anything right now," he said. "All we have to do is win races and finish in the top five, and the rest of it will take care of itself."

Jeff Gordon, battling an unspecified illness since Friday, finished fourth, followed by Matt Kenseth, Kevin Harvick, who got his ninth straight top-10, and Burton, all among the 12-man Chase field.

Burton remained fourth, 121 points behind Johnson, followed by Harvick, 136 behind, and four-time champion Gordon, who moved up from eighth and is 143 back.

The postseason nightmare continued for regular season points leader Kyle Busch, who had an early engine problem and struggled to a 28th-place finish. Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Tony Stewart, a two-time Cup champion, had an even worse day, finishing 40th after colliding with Brian Vickers and damaging his front splitter as he drove through the infield grass.

Heading into next week's race at Talladega, Gibbs teammates Denny Hamlin, who finished 11th Sunday, Stewart and Busch are 10th, 11th and 12th in the points and all but eliminated from title contention.


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Newman had a spark in his eye for racing

KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) -- Jimmie Johnson remembered Paul Newman as a great friend of the sport -- and a pretty fast driver.

"I have been out on numerous days where he has driven Cup cars," the two-time Cup champion said. "Normally, Rick (Hendrick) has a play day and puts a restrictor plate on the car and lets guys go out and drive around with half the horsepower. Numerous times, Paul has gone out on sticker tires, the plate off and run really quick laps. I was always so impressed with his driving ability and who he was as a person."

Newman, who died of cancer Friday at 83, did one of the voices for the 2006 film "CARS." Johnson had the opportunity to interview him as part of a TV project he was working on. Johnson also took part in a day at a race track as part of the festivities leading to the premier of the animated feature.

He said they put the body of a Hudson Hornet -- the car that Newman portrayed as "Doc Hudson" in the movie -- on a stock car frame and let him and others make laps in it.

"The only man on pit road with a stopwatch was Paul Newman," Johnson said. "He was timing the laps I was running, other guys were running. Then he got in that car that had no business, with that body especially, going around that track at speed, and he was trying to break the lap times that we were running out there with the school cars and stuff.

"You could see that spark in his eye. He had a true passion for motorsports in general. I would say more IndyCar and road racing, because that is what he came from. He was a great friend of Rick's and knew a lot more than people probably realize about NASCAR racing."

------

CREW CHIEF BLUES: The disappointment on crew chief Brian Pattie's face was clear nearly 24 hours later. Juan Pablo Montoya was removed from the pole position for Sunday's race at Kansas Speedway because of a technical violation.

"It was just being complacent and thinking it was right from the shop," Pattie said Saturday, standing in the shadow of the Chip Ganassi Racing team's hauler.

"It wasn't huge, it wasn't a benefit, it was just barely over. But, you know, over is over. It's like when you get pulled over for speeding. 'How fast was I going?' It doesn't matter, you're over the speed limit."

"NASCAR made the call," he added. "I'm sure it was the right call because I don't want somebody else getting away with something."

The penalty, which will undoubtedly result in at least a stiff fine for Pattie, cost former open-wheel star Montoya what would have been his first Sprint Cup pole. But Pattie said it also took some steam out of the No. 42 team.

"It's hard to build momentum in this garage and we have done so in the last four to six weeks, with really good cars and good runs," said Pattie, whose team has struggled through most of the season. "We were running inside the top 10 at Loudon, we were running inside the top 10 at Dover, we were running inside the top 10 at California. That's where we need to be."

Instead of starting first Sunday, Montoya will begin the race 42nd in the 43-car lineup. But Pattie hopes the team can salvage a good race and regain the lost momentum.

"We've got a good team," he said. "They work really hard together. We've got really good cars and got a good plan for the rest of the year."

------

STILL STRUGGLING: Kyle Busch has fallen from first to last after the first two races of the Chase. But the youngster still regards this as a great season, no matter where he finishes.

"We weren't supposed to be in the position we've been in to win the championship," said Busch, who has won eight Cup races, eight Nationwide events, heading into Saturday's race, and three truck races this season. "This was supposed to be a building year, the learning year."

Asked what he will look back on in 2008, Busch said: "The eight wins and the places that they came at -- being all ... different racetracks. The overall success of the year -- being able to win 19 races overall."

Busch's struggles continued in the first two days on the Kansas track, where he finished 41st last year with Hendrick Motorsports. He qualified 27th on Friday and fell to 31st in the second of two practices Saturday.


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Newman had a spark in his eye for racing

KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) -- Jimmie Johnson remembered Paul Newman as a great friend of the sport -- and a pretty fast driver.

"I have been out on numerous days where he has driven Cup cars," the two-time Cup champion said. "Normally, Rick (Hendrick) has a play day and puts a restrictor plate on the car and lets guys go out and drive around with half the horsepower. Numerous times, Paul has gone out on sticker tires, the plate off and run really quick laps. I was always so impressed with his driving ability and who he was as a person."

Newman, who died of cancer Friday at 83, did one of the voices for the 2006 film "CARS." Johnson had the opportunity to interview him as part of a TV project he was working on. Johnson also took part in a day at a race track as part of the festivities leading to the premier of the animated feature.

He said they put the body of a Hudson Hornet -- the car that Newman portrayed as "Doc Hudson" in the movie -- on a stock car frame and let him and others make laps in it.

"The only man on pit road with a stopwatch was Paul Newman," Johnson said. "He was timing the laps I was running, other guys were running. Then he got in that car that had no business, with that body especially, going around that track at speed, and he was trying to break the lap times that we were running out there with the school cars and stuff.

"You could see that spark in his eye. He had a true passion for motorsports in general. I would say more IndyCar and road racing, because that is what he came from. He was a great friend of Rick's and knew a lot more than people probably realize about NASCAR racing."

------

CREW CHIEF BLUES: The disappointment on crew chief Brian Pattie's face was clear nearly 24 hours later. Juan Pablo Montoya was removed from the pole position for Sunday's race at Kansas Speedway because of a technical violation.

"It was just being complacent and thinking it was right from the shop," Pattie said Saturday, standing in the shadow of the Chip Ganassi Racing team's hauler.

"It wasn't huge, it wasn't a benefit, it was just barely over. But, you know, over is over. It's like when you get pulled over for speeding. 'How fast was I going?' It doesn't matter, you're over the speed limit."

"NASCAR made the call," he added. "I'm sure it was the right call because I don't want somebody else getting away with something."

The penalty, which will undoubtedly result in at least a stiff fine for Pattie, cost former open-wheel star Montoya what would have been his first Sprint Cup pole. But Pattie said it also took some steam out of the No. 42 team.

"It's hard to build momentum in this garage and we have done so in the last four to six weeks, with really good cars and good runs," said Pattie, whose team has struggled through most of the season. "We were running inside the top 10 at Loudon, we were running inside the top 10 at Dover, we were running inside the top 10 at California. That's where we need to be."

Instead of starting first Sunday, Montoya will begin the race 42nd in the 43-car lineup. But Pattie hopes the team can salvage a good race and regain the lost momentum.

"We've got a good team," he said. "They work really hard together. We've got really good cars and got a good plan for the rest of the year."

------

STILL STRUGGLING: Kyle Busch has fallen from first to last after the first two races of the Chase. But the youngster still regards this as a great season, no matter where he finishes.

"We weren't supposed to be in the position we've been in to win the championship," said Busch, who has won eight Cup races, eight Nationwide events, heading into Saturday's race, and three truck races this season. "This was supposed to be a building year, the learning year."

Asked what he will look back on in 2008, Busch said: "The eight wins and the places that they came at -- being all ... different racetracks. The overall success of the year -- being able to win 19 races overall."

Busch's struggles continued in the first two days on the Kansas track, where he finished 41st last year with Hendrick Motorsports. He qualified 27th on Friday and fell to 31st in the second of two practices Saturday.

Biffle focused on winning, not history, at Kansas

KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) -- Greg Biffle is a firm believer in momentum. So the winner of two straight races is feeling pretty good heading into Sunday's NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Kansas Speedway.

"It's right in our wheelhouse," Biffle said. "We won here last year, we're good on mile-and-a-half tracks, and we had a great Charlotte test (earlier this week). Man, I feel good about it."

The Roush Fenway Racing driver, hoping to add a Cup title to the championships he won earlier in his career in the second-tier Nationwide -- then Busch -- series and the third-tier truck series, is the first driver to win the first two races of the 10-race Chase for the championship since NASCAR introduced the format in 2004.

"Anything that you do that nobody else has done is kind of cool," Biffle said.

But Biffle is more concerned with keeping his momentum than basking in his historic feat.

"I don't want to say I want to win more, but I'm more focused on how we can keep it going more than reflect back on what we've been able to do so far," he said. "I think maybe at the end of the season I could look back easier, and say, 'That was pretty neat to win the first two Chase races.'

"But other than focusing on that, I'm focusing on the first three. I don't want to sound arrogant, but that's really what I'm concentrating on -- is winning here versus we made history the first two weeks."

To get that third win, Biffle will have to make up some ground after qualifying 18th for Sunday's Camping World RV 400.

And he's not alone.

Ten of the 12 Chase drivers qualified outside the top 10, with six of them -- including points leader Carl Edwards -- starting in the back half of the 43-car field.

Jimmie Johnson, the Cup champion the past two years, had no such problem.

He qualified second to Juan Pablo Montoya on Friday, but was quickly elevated to the pole when Montoya's fast lap was disallowed because of a technical violation.

That gave Johnson, who goes into the race tied with Biffle for second 10 points behind Edwards, the first pick for pit position in the race, a definite edge.

"A lot of the Chasers seemed to have difficulty qualifying ... and, hopefully, we can take advantage of the good track position and get a good pit stall pick and turn that into getting some momentum going on Sunday," Johnson said.

"Every little bit helps,' he added. "The clean air that we will have starting up on the front row is something you can't emphasize enough as drivers know how important that is and how helpful that is. And if we can stay up there all day long and make the fine adjustments to the car to race for the win, we'll be in great shape."

With only 10th-place Matt Kenseth -- starting third -- up front to keep him company, Johnson sympathized a bit with the other Chase drivers.

"What's tough is when you start that deep in the pack, the balance of the car changes a lot and what you need as far as your setup," he said. "The closer you get to the front, the more it changes. And if you get to the front with 100 (laps) to go or 50 (laps) to go, I have found I'm usually two or three changes behind the fast guys. And it takes us a while to close that gap.

"So, if you can start up front and run there all day long, you're fine-tuning. If you start in the back, once you get up there you've got to readjust your car and find the balance and then close that gap."

Kenseth, Biffle and Edwards' Roush Fenway teammate, was the only other Chase driver to get through qualifying without a problem. The 2003 series champion will start third and felt lucky to be that high on the grid.

"It just feels so slow compared to what we usually have here," Kenseth said. "So, I think, overall, everybody's just low on grip, and our group at Roush Fenway seemed to be off since we got here, and (crew chief) Chip (Bolin) made some really good changes and that was, by far, the best we've been."

Biffle, Edwards and several other Chasers apparently found some answers in Saturday's two practices on the 1.5-mile oval, with Edwards topping the speed chart in the first session and Biffle on top in the second. Other Chase drivers who ran in the top 10 in one or both practices were Kenseth, Jeff Gordon, Kevin Harvick, Johnson, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Tony Stewart and Jeff Burton.

That left Denny Hamlin, Clint Bowyer and Kyle Busch all struggling to figure out the track heading into the 267-lap event.

Despite the qualifying ills he and the other Chase drivers experienced, Biffle expects a wide-open race on Sunday. And he's not concerned if people still consider him a dark horse or have moved him into the role of favorite.

"Other than winning these couple of weeks, how they changed their mind or what they're kind of predicting now, I haven't really gotten caught up in that," Biffle said. "I'm still focused on how am I going to win here, right now? That's what I'm thinking about."


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Montoya disqualified after winning pole

KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) -- Less than an hour after Juan Pablo Montoya celebrated his first NASCAR Sprint Cup pole, it was taken away from him because of a technical violation.

NASCAR spokesman Ramsey Poston said Montoya's fast lap was disqualified because a postqualifying inspection discovered his rear shock absorbers exceeded the maximum gas pressure allowed.

That moved two-time reigning Cup champion Jimmie Johnson up to the pole, with Montoya's No. 42 Chip Ganassi Racing Dodge moved to 42nd in the 43-car field for Sunday's race at Kansas Speedway.

It was a blow to Montoya, 24th in the season points and struggling most of the year to be competitive.

A team spokesperson said Ganassi officials were "evaluating the situation" and would have no comment until Saturday.

Before NASCAR's announcement, a delighted Montoya said, "It's huge. There's times where it's getting darker and cooling down and you run at the end and all of a sudden you pick up a half a second and you're up there. But we were in the middle of the pack and the track didn't really change that much. We were genuinely fast."

But, with his lap of 172.150 mph disallowed, Johnson's 172.007 gave him his fifth pole of the season and 18th of his career.

Matt Kenseth, another of the Chasers, moved up to third, but none of the other 10 were able to break into the top 10 and six of the contenders wound up 27th or worse.

"It was a very, very good effort for us," Johnson said before finding out he was on the pole.

"Everybody knows how important track position is. I thought that the 18 (Kyle Busch), the 99 (Carl Edwards) and the 31 (Jeff Burton), I thought some of those guys were much stronger than they posted today in qualifying. I thought they were better than that in practice. I was shocked to see some of those guys on the right side of the (timing) screen and at the bottom of it.

"But this is just one day of three and the important day is Sunday. It doesn't mean it's a layup weekend where we pick up points on the other Chase competitors, but every little bit helps."

Among the Chase competitors, after Montoya's disqualification, Dale Earnhardt Jr. was 11th, an ailing Jeff Gordon qualified 13th, Greg Biffle, winner of the first two events of the 10-race Chase, was 18th and Clint Bowyer 24th.

The disappointments were Busch in 27th, Denny Hamlin 30th, Edwards 36th, Kevin Harvick 38th, Burton 39th and Tony Stewart 41st.

Biffle was just one of a number of unhappy drives after his qualifying run on the slick 1.5-mile oval.

"We were hoping for a little bit better that that," said Biffle, teammate of Kenseth, Edwards, 13th-place David Ragan and 17th-place Jamie McMurray at Roush Fenway Racing. "We've just got something wrong with our cars here, all of us do, the whole group. I guess we've got one more day to figure it out."

The disappointed Stewart, seventh in the standings and hoping push his way into contention with eight races left in the Chase, couldn't explain his poor qualifying effort.

"We've been decent here," he said. "We've been decent all the way up until that qualifying run right there. I don't know what happened there. Something must have happened. We were decent in practice this morning, for sure."


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Goodyear looking for answers at Indy

KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) -- The answers are yet to come, but Goodyear has begun the process of figuring out what caused the tire debacle in the NASCAR Sprint Cup race in July at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

The manufacturer, the sole supplier of tires for NASCAR's top three professional series, was criticized after tires it brought to the track in July wore out so quickly that NASCAR had to wave the caution flag every 10 to 12 laps for tire changes in the Allstate 400. The longest run under the green flag was 13 laps.

The first of two scheduled tests to address the problem took place Monday and Tuesday, with Kyle Petty's Dodge establishing a baseline for the tire maker's next test session Oct. 6-8.

"We had two very successful days of testing at Indy," Stu Grant, Goodyear's general manager of worldwide racing, said Friday. "We ran a wide variety of tread compounds in an effort to understand how each interacts with this car on this track. With NASCAR's involvement, we evaluated several different aerodynamic packages to quantify what impact downforce has on tire performance. And with the help of Goodyear's research scientists, we've begun processes to accurately characterize the track surface and monitor how it may change."

Grant said the first test was meant to lay groundwork for the October test, which will include 17 Cup cars.

"The information gathered at the first test will enable us to evaluate, in more detail, those types of combinations that have the greatest potential. The second test will involve many more cars in an effort to more closely simulate the track conditions of a race weekend."

The tire problem in July became apparent during a practice session the day before the Brickyard race, when some cars couldn't make it three laps without the tire wearing down to the cords. A second practice session was only slightly better, when the runs stretched to about 10 laps.

The 2009 Brickyard race is scheduled for July 26.


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Busch stands by statement that season is over

KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) -- Kyle Busch's crew chief doesn't believe the team's title hopes are dead despite mechanical failures during the first two races of NASCAR's Chase for the Sprint Cup championship.

Busch isn't buying it.

Standing by comments he made after blowing an engine at Dover last week, Busch said Friday that he still doesn't think there's much chance of making up the ground he'll need to win the title.

"Here's how I look at it: you can't count on anybody else having a bad race," Busch said outside his hauler at Kansas Speedway. "Realistically, we're out of it."

Busch won eight races to win the "regular-season" points title, then finished 34th in the first race of the Chase in New Hampshire because of a failed suspension part. He followed that with a 43rd finish last week in Dover after his engine blew up, leaving him 210 points behind Chase leader Carl Edwards.

Busch declared his title chances over after the second straight mechanical breakdown, though crew chief Steve Addington wasn't so quick to give up, saying Thursday that "We're down, but we're not dead yet."

Busch still wasn't as optimistic, saying the only chance they have is to win out and have leaders like Edwards and Greg Biffle finish poorly each week.

In other words, he doesn't think it's possible.

"It depends on who has a bad race, how bad the race was for us to get back in it," Busch said. "But realistically, if you're not counting on those guys having a bad race, we can't win eight races in a row and have Carl or Biffle finish fifth through 10th every single one of those and still win the deal. It ain't going to happen."

So does that mean Busch has given up? Not a chance. The guy hates to lose a lead much less a race, so he'll continue to push hard.

"I'm going to do the same thing I've done all year long -- that's not going to change," he said. "Everybody says I gave up. I haven't given up. I'm still going out there to run as hard as I have every single lap to try and win this thing, but realistically the chances aren't there."

------

ALLMENDINGER'S FAREWELL: AJ Allmendinger's two-year run with Red Bull Racing is over after this season, possibly after this weekend's race at Kansas Speedway.

So what's next?

Allmendinger could return to his roots, get back into an open-wheel car. He raced on the Champ Car circuit for three years and has gotten word of potential offers from IndyCar teams.

It's always an option, but that's not what Allmendinger wants.

"We all know what's out there right now for rides," he said. "I definitely want to stay in Cup. I've got offers to go back to IndyCar, possibly, but I've clawed and scratched way too long and felt like my life was ending so many times over the last year and half that to finally get this and running up front, I don't want to give up on that."

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HOMETOWN HEROES: Clint Bowyer says he feels pressure to do well in races at Kansas Speedway, which is less than two hours away from his hometown of Emporia, Kan.

Carl Edwards doesn't feel that same kind of pressure racing in front of family and friends. The driver from Columbia, Mo., relishes the chance to win with hometown fans looking on, counting his 2004 win in a Craftsman Truck Series race among his favorite memories.

"I wouldn't say I'm stressed out here -- I just look at it as a really good opportunity to run well in front of people I know and who have helped me," Edwards said. "The win here in the trucks was huge and I know when I go out there on Sunday there will be a lot of people out there I know, I grew up with or helped me up there in the grandstands. To win the Cup race here in Kansas, that would be the biggest win on the schedule."

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BARRETT MOVING: Former movie stuntman and current Nationwide driver Stanton Barrett is making the move to IndyCar, teaming up with Beck Motorsports to run a full schedule next year.

It's been a long road getting there.

The 36-year-old got his start in NASCAR in 1992 with the Busch series and has bounced around since, occasionally running his own team when sponsorships fell through. Barrett, son of a former Winston Cup driver, has competed in 22 Sprint Cup races in 16 years and 169 in the Nationwide Series, failing to win a race on either circuit.

"It's been very difficult, (running) your own team off and on, and just keeping inventive to be able to keep a race team on the track and be able to drive," Barrett said. "There's thousands of drivers out there and not a lot of opportunities, and I feel like those opportunities have happened through hard work and creativity. It's a continual struggle."


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Stewart within sight of Chase leaders

KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) -- So far, 2008 hasn't been Tony Stewart's year.

The two-time NASCAR Sprint Cup champion is winless this season and, although he did make the Chase for the championship, Stewart hasn't done much in the first two races of the stock car racing's postseason to make anybody's list of favorites to win the title.

Even so, heading into Sunday's Cup race at Kansas Speedway, Stewart is one win -- or at least a couple of top-fives -- from becoming a serious contender despite beginning the Chase in 10th place.

After finishing eighth at New Hampshire and 11th last Sunday at Dover, Stewart is seventh in the standings, just 113 points behind series leader Carl Edwards with eight of the 10 Chase races remaining.

So, considering he hasn't yet had one of his typical streaks of top-five finishes this season, is Stewart going to be a factor over the next two months?

"It's strictly a week-to-week deal," Stewart said before heading to Kansas. "All of the questions the media ask are all theoretical questions. Well, I'm not a philosopher.

"None of us can predict this. If we could, we'd be bookies in Las Vegas making millions of dollars betting on these races instead of driving in them. And it's a heck of a lot safer sitting in a chair in that dark room letting cocktail waitresses bring you drinks. I don't have the answers."

But Stewart does have an interesting history on the 1.5-mile Kansas oval, where he has five top-10 finishes in seven starts, including a win two years ago when he was not part of the Chase and a tough loss a year ago, when he was a contender.

The victory came in a race where Stewart stretched his final load of gas to the limit, coasting across the finish line with a dry tank.

It appeared he would be the winner last year, too, when heavy rain, accompanied by lightning and thunder, stopped the race past the halfway point with Stewart leading. But NASCAR restarted the race after a 21/2-hour delay and Stewart wound up crashing out and finishing 39th.

Instead of coming away from Kansas leading the points, Stewart found himself fourth, 117 points behind eventual champion Jimmie Johnson. Stewart went on to finish fourth in the points. And his winless string now stands at 42 races, dating to Watkins Glen in August 2007.

So, does Kansas owe him a win?

"That was just circumstances," Stewart said. "We were able to win a fuel-mileage race where we really weren't in a position to win, but because of our situation in the point standings, we were able to gamble and go for it. Somebody else that day lost a race they should've won. And last year may have been one of those for us. But it all comes out in the wash and it all averages out eventually."

The way the 26-race regular season went, nobody could have predicted that Stewart would be in the best position of the three Joe Gibbs Racing entries after the first two Chase races.

Kyle Busch, who won eight races and built a big points lead, is last in the 12-man Chase after finishes of 34th and 43rd, while Denny Hamlin, who began the Chase in fourth, is 11th after a 38th-place finish at Dover.

Stewart feels bad for both of them, but particularly for the 23-year-old Busch, who said again Friday that he believes his disastrous start has knocked him out of contention.

"For those guys, they can just throw caution to the wind and go for wins now," Stewart said. "If I were Kyle, I'd go out there and just worry about winning races again. It's been a remarkable, record-setting year for that kid, and the best way to finish it off now is to go out there and win three or four races during the Chase.

"It's hard to tell him to keep his head up. I mean, there's nobody who's going to make him feel better right now, and rightfully so. The kid has worked hard all year. The team has worked hard all year. They've just had two bad races in a row, and that's what you hope doesn't happen, obviously. You feel for those guys."

Unlike his teammates, Stewart knows he has an opportunity to put himself squarely into the championship picture with a few good finishes. But he isn't making any predictions.

"All we can do is speculate on what's going to happen until each week actually happens," he said. "So, all we can do is guess on what's going to happen. If any of us can predict the top-10 positions in Sunday's race, you're a genius, let alone figuring out how the next eight weeks are going to be."


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Allmendinger expects Sunday to be finale in 84

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) -- AJ Allmendinger expects this weekend's race at Kansas Speedway to be his last with Red Bull Racing.

Allmendinger and Red Bull announced earlier this week they will part ways at the end of this season, and Allmendinger did not drive the No. 84 during the two-day test at Lowe's Motor Speedway.

"I'm racing this weekend at Kansas, but I'm almost 100 percent sure I won't be with Red Bull after this race," Allmendinger said in his biweekly diary for Yahoo. "Hopefully I'll have something and I'll be in a car next week. Whether it's the team I'm going to be with for next year, and we can start working on that, or what ... that's kind of where we stand."

Red Bull general manager Jay Frye said Thursday he expects to know at the start of next week what the No. 84 team will do for the remaining seven races this season.

Allmendinger said he expected to be released from Red Bull the past month, and even though he wanted to stay with the team, he passed on an opportunity to sign a one-year contract extension to stay with the team because it would have put him in the same position this time next year.

He also said he's talked with several team owners, including Chip Ganassi about the vacant No. 41 seat, as well as IndyCar teams.

"Personally, though, I want to stay in NASCAR. I've worked too hard to learn these cars," he said. "The hardest thing I've ever had to do in my career, personally and mentally, is to fight and claw my way into this sport and to go through all that and say, 'You know what, I had two years. I'm going to leave.'

"I'm not ready to do that. I've got too much to accomplish."

Allmendinger left the now-defunct Champ Car Series to move to NASCAR two years ago, and Red Bull gave him a Cup ride even though he had not yet mastered the heavier stock cars. He's had a rough two seasons, missing numerous races last year as both he and Red Bull figured out NASCAR, but has shown steady improvement the second half of this year.

He made no mention of former Formula One driver Scott Speed, who is expected to replace Allmendinger next season. Speed has been in the Red Bull program for years, and the Austria-based executives have spent considerable money developing his career.

"I had a lot of good things happen to me because of Red Bull," he said. "I'm where I'm at now because of Red Bull. Sure I'm disappointed, but I can also look at it and say if it weren't for some of the decisions they made, I wouldn't have anybody calling me looking for another ride."


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Kyle Busch's crew chief isn't giving up

CONCORD, N.C. (AP) -- Kyle Busch declared his title hopes over after his engine blew during Round 2 of the Chase for the Sprint Cup championship.

Not so fast, driver. Crew chief Steve Addington isn't ready to wave the checkered flag on a title just yet.

"We're down, but we're not dead yet," Addington insisted. "There's still a long ways to go and anything can happen."

After two bad races to start the Chase, the team that won the "regular-season" points title now finds itself dead last in the Chase standings. Busch is in 12th place and trails leader Carl Edwards by 210 points.

Addington admits its a huge hole to climb out of, and even if Busch is skeptical about a possible rebound, the crew chief plans to take the team to Kansas Speedway this weekend looking for the strong run that can jump-start a comeback.

"We've got to just go out and win races," he said. "We can't do anything other than that -- just try to make up as many points as we can. There's no other way to approach it. We don't have anything to lose. So lets keep the guys pumped up to go out and do what they've done all season."

The remaining schedule works to their advantage: NASCAR has visited six of the remaining eight tracks this season, and Busch notched a pair of wins, four top-5s and five top-10s in those events.

History shows that Busch can mathematically still win the title if he doesn't have another bad finish. In 2006, Jimmie Johnson rallied from 165 points down with seven races left to claim his first title. And, in Chase history, a driver has gained 100 points on the series leader in a single race four different times.

Addington doesn't want to worry about statistics. He instead wants to rally his crew and focus on the future. The first step is preventing mechanical failures like the two that ended Busch's runs at New Hampshire and Dover.

Addington said the Dover motor failure was peculiar -- it also plagued teammate Tony Stewart's engine, but his lasted the entire race -- but has been resolved.

At New Hampshire, Busch's car had been terrible all weekend and the team spent a hectic pre-race making numerous changes. Just minutes into the race, a bolt became loose on the sway bar that caused the suspension part to fail -- an error Addington is confident won't happen again.

"The guy who does all my front end stuff, I'd put him up against anybody in this Cup garage. He's thorough and pays attention to everything," Addington said. "What happened? Why did it come loose? We'll probably never know. But that guy right there... he promised me, he looked me dead in the eye and said he put a wrench on it and thought it was tight. I believe him."

He still has to convince Busch not to give up just yet, but when the field goes green on Sunday, Addington doesn't think it will be an issue.

"Right after stuff happens, you know how Kyle is, he's frustrated," Addington said. "When he has time to sit down and think about it, and calms down a little bit, he knows how bad we wanted it and how bad he wanted it. It takes a day or two, but then he's fine."

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Addington's Q&A with Auto Racing Writer Jenna Fryer:

Q: What has it been like to work with Kyle this year?

SA: Coming into it, I heard all the stuff about him. But he's a competitor. When he sits down and is with the guys, having a good time, it's been awesome. When he's pushing you at the race track to make his car better, that's something a guy dreams of -- to have a driver who wants to be better. People go "But he beats you up on the radio!' Well, I want to win this thing, too. So if you take that personally, you are in the wrong business. I love the kid and all my guys love him.

Q: So he's not the nightmare everyone thinks he is?

SA: I don't think so. He's been a breath of fresh air for this race team.

Q: What's Kyle like on a good day?

SA: Oh, laughing, cutting up, saying off the wall stuff on the radio, talking to (spotter, Jeff) Dickerson on the radio about getting In-N-Out burgers after the race. When he's in a good mood and having a good time, it don't get any better.

Q: What's he like on a bad day?

SA: You leave him alone, let him be by himself and try to work through it. You can try to pick him up a little bit, but he's one of those guys who, he has his personality and you have to take it with a grain of salt. He don't say much to people when he's not in a good mood. But he comes around.

Q: What's been the highlight of this season?

SA: There's been a lot. Winning the (July) Daytona race was cool. And the Chicago race, because he had given up and was on the radio saying "How many races does Jimmie Johnson give away? None. How many races does Kyle Busch give away? A lot.' And then he just got up on the steering wheel and wanted it, so from what Dickerson said on the radio to him and Kyle coming back to win that race, that was pretty awesome. But Daytona, speedway races, you put a car out there and it's driver and watching him work is just amazing. Plus, it was my birthday, so that was a cool race, too.

Q: The lowlight of the season?

SA: Loudon. That's a place that we've struggled and we made some changes and I think we went in the right direction and never got a chance to see, and it was the start of the Chase. We had talked about having a good race to start it, so to have that happen 15 laps into the race, that was devastating.

Q: Kyle said a driver and crew chief are like a husband and wife. So, is Kyle like a spouse to you?

SA: I guess in the sense that he tells you what he wants, and then he's gone and you don't hear from him for a long time, that's pretty good. And then when you want to talk to him about something, he's busy. We text at night before the race a lot, because he won't talk on the phone, but he'll text you all night. You've got to have a good relationship, and I think we show each other a lot of respect.

Q: The 18 team struggled for several years before this season. What's it been like to watch your guys experience success?

SA: We knew we've got good equipment, we knew we we're putting a good product out there, and we knew we were missing one piece of the puzzle. But there were guys questioning it when he came in, wondering if our stuff was good enough because he'd been driving really good (Hendrick Motorsports) cars. Some guys were worried and really nervous about it. I told them "Don't worry about it, if they aren't good enough, we'll go to work.' The Atlanta test (last October) was the best thing that ever happened to this race team because he ran eight laps and said "Load it,' and that right there, it was like a ton of bricks off everyone's shoulders.

Q: Is this team ready to win a championship?

SA: I've asked myself that a lot, because they've never been in this position. So you ask yourself if you are really prepared for it. I think with what they proved they can do all year long, I think they are as ready as anybody. They never showed me anything any different. I don't know if there's pressure in the back of their minds, because they've never showed it. They are as ready as anybody.


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Letarte under fire as Gordon trudges along

AP Graphics CAMPING WORLD RV 400, CHASE FOR THE CUP

CONCORD, N.C. (AP) -- Jeff Gordon has just eight more races to make it to Victory Lane and avoid his first winless season since his 1993 rookie year.

For many, it's inconceivable that the four-time Cup champion is this far into a season without a win.

To some, crew chief Steve Letarte is squarely to blame.

Gordon won't stand for it.

"Steve is an amazing crew chief," he said. "Whenever we're not performing, my fans seem to stay loyal to me, and I appreciate that. But I'm as much a part of this team and its performance as anybody else out there.

"If there's going to be criticisms, you know, I want it to come across the board."

But Gordon has been spared much of the criticism in a season that can only be described as disappointing. He heads into Round 3 of the Chase for the Sprint Cup championship ranked eighth in the standings, 118 points behind leader Carl Edwards.

His winless streak has reached 33 straight races, dating back to an October win at Lowe's Motor Speedway, and he's led more than 10 laps in a race just six times this season.

Letarte, who started working at Hendrick in the parts department as a teenager and moved through the ranks to the top job with Hendrick's winningest team, admits this season has been underwhelming for the No. 24 crew.

"My goals coming into the year were much higher than this," he said. "This is a race team built on winning races and winning championships, so when you don't win races, of course that's an unsuccessful season."

But it's not exactly a bad season.

It's just not the follow-up anyone expected from last year's incredible run, when Gordon won six races and notched a NASCAR record 30 top-10 finishes in 36 events. He built a lead of more than 300 points in the regular season, and was brilliant during the Chase with two victories and an average finish of 5.1.

Problem was, teammate Jimmie Johnson was just a tick better -- tallying an average finish of 5.0 to steal the title from Gordon.

Johnson, a four-time winner this season, is back in the thick of the title hunt this year. But Gordon is a bit of an underdog based on his regular-season mediocrity.

That's led his legion of fans to question what's wrong and critique the job Letarte has done this season.

"It's no different than when you coach the Yankees and you miss the playoffs," said Letarte. "It's no surprise. To think you can take a position like this in this sport -- or with any sports team -- if you don't win, you are going to take the blame. I've got big shoulders. I can handle it.

"But all I can do is keep doing my daily chores: try to make the car better, try to make the team better and try to win races."

Gordon explained the criticism comes with the territory for the crew chief, who holds down a job akin to being a head coach in other sports.

"Unfortunately, we just haven't seen the results like we did last year," said Gordon, who has just 13 top-10s so far this season.

"It's really easy to put aside or forget what we did last year, which to me was one of the best seasons I ever had in the Cup series. Looking at this year, just things haven't gone our way for whatever reason. But I believe (Steve's) the guy for the job, and he's a confident guy that does the job well. I hate that he gets the criticism."

Letarte also has support from team owner Rick Hendrick, who finds it somewhat amusing that the crew chief is being scrutinized after such a successful 2007 season. Instead, Hendrick blames this season's struggles on a combination of bad luck, NASCAR's finicky new car, Gordon's difficulty adapting to driving it full time, and team-related miscues.

"I think Jeff Gordon would be the first guy to raise his hand and say 'Stevie is one of the best I've ever worked with,' " Hendrick said. "Steve Letarte works hard, he's smart, and he's the same guy who led the points by over 300 last year and got him to finish in second in the Chase with an average (finish of 5.1) and got beat.

"He didn't go brain dead this year. It's really easy, in this sport, if the guy wins, it's his talent. And if he doesn't, it's the crew chief's fault. The crew chief kind of walks a plank by himself."

Hendrick believes Gordon and Letarte can pull it together, be a factor in this championship hunt and win a race before the season is out. But Letarte doesn't want the remaining eight weeks to be focused on simply getting back to Victory Lane and avoiding a winless season.

"We don't worry about wins. We worry about running better," Letarte said. "If you lead laps, you're going to win races. If you run in the top five, you are going to win races. If you run in the top 10 or top 15, you know, the opportunity to win races gets smaller.

"So we need to have faster race cars, and lead more laps and run more competitively to expect a win. Winning is a result of having a good car and a good day. If all you do is try to win, you miss the whole point."


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Harvick on a late-season roll

AP Graphic CAMPING WORLD RV 400

Check out the favorites to win NASCAR's Chase for the Sprint Cup championship and you're not likely to find Kevin Harvick listed among them.

Before the postseason got going, most everyone was touting regular-season sensation Kyle Busch, who has gotten off to a devastating start in the 10-race Chase, finishing 34th and 43rd in the first two races, virtually eliminating the 23-year-old from contention.

Jimmie Johnson, who has won the past two titles, was another popular choice after winning the last two races before the Chase began. And he's off to another strong start in the playoffs, tied for second with Greg Biffle, who has thrust himself into a contending position with two straight wins.

And, of course, there's Carl Edwards, whose six victories this season are second only to Busch's eight. He is leading the points and has established himself as the guy to beat.

But Harvick, getting little attention so far, is on the best streak of them all with a career-best eight straight top-10 finishes.

After running sixth last Sunday at Dover -- and moving up five spots to fifth in the standings, 101 points behind Edwards -- Harvick said, "I am just really proud of all my guys and I really think we still have the momentum to win this thing."

He could be right.

With eight races to go, beginning with Sunday's Camping World RV 400 at Kansas Speedway, Harvick figures the championship remains wide open, giving him as good a chance to win it as any of the leaders.

"I think it is way too early to tell if anyone is out of championship contention," the Richard Childress Racing driver said. "In 2006, Jimmie (Johnson) struggled in the first couple of weeks and came back and won. I think you have to wait until you get about halfway through the Chase to count anyone out.

"Right now, Greg Biffle and Jimmie Johnson seem to be on a roll, but that could change next week. So, I think for us, we just have to go out and race as hard as we can, get the best finishes possible and see where we end up in (the finale at) Homestead."

Crew chief Todd Berrier likes the way the No. 29 Chevrolet team has started the Chase. But he acknowledged that just earning top-10s probably won't be enough.

"We need to win a race," Berrier said. "But, if you can run 10th or sixth or fifth, you can win a race. That's what you've got to do.

"You've got to crawl before you can walk. I think we are consistently a lot better and looking for a little something to take that next step."

It isn't going to be easy.

Harvick, who has 11 victories in eight seasons, has not won a Cup race since the 2007 season-opener at Daytona.

But it's the third straight year Harvick has made the Chase, and his career-best finish of fourth came in 2006.

Harvick, who replaced the legendary Dale Earnhardt at RCR after NASCAR's biggest star was killed in a crash at Daytona in February 2001, would love to give team owner Childress his first title since Earnhardt won in 1994. But he understands that it's just too early to build up anybody's expectations.

"I have been on both sides of it," Harvick said last week at Dover. "We have won the first race and run good and got halfway through the Chase and didn't make it happen. We've run bad and got to the halfway point of the Chase and ran good the rest of the year.

"I have been involved in Chases where guys have wrecked the first couple of weeks and Jimmie (Johnson) came back and won and then Tony (Stewart) went through the whole Chase and didn't win a race but won the championship. It all depends on the complexion of the Chase and how it all builds up, and you just race as hard as you can."


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Roush rolling toward possible Cup title

DOVER, Del. (AP) -- No matter how many of his Cup cars were in the race, owner Jack Roush was always on the winning pit box whenever one of his drivers took the checkered flag.

With about 20 laps to go at Dover, Roush wasn't sure where he should sit. Greg Biffle, Carl Edwards and Matt Kenseth were racing three wide, bumper-to-bumper and just every other exciting combination as they pushed hard on the concrete track for the coveted Chase victory.

Sure, the racing was thrilling for the fans. It was almost too much to take for Roush.

"I hyperventilated," he said. "It's hard not to lose your mind when you have as many opportunities as there are with the multiple cars to be involved in something that's just not going to break your heart."

No broken hearts this time. Just a 1-2-3 finish that kept Roush Fenway Racing in the thick of the Sprint Cup title hunt with eight races left in the Chase for the championship. Biffle won his second straight Chase race, Kenseth was second and Edwards third. Edwards has a 10-point lead over Jimmie Johnson and Biffle in the standings, putting Roush in prime position to win his first title since 2004.

"We've worked hard this season to get our cars and team where they need to be," Biffle said. "I guess you can use the term, 'peak at the right time."'

Biffle certainly is after making the Chase without a win in the first 26 regular-season races and going 33 straight overall without a trip to Victory Lane before winning the Chase opener at New Hampshire. His last victory before that came last season at Kansas -- the track on tap this weekend, when Biffle can go for a stunning three straight victories.

Still, no one at Roush Fenway is making room for that championship trophy quite yet.

Kenseth methodically won Roush a championship in 2003 in the last year of the old points system and Kurt Busch won the first Chase title for him in 2004.

But 2005 still stings Roush and his crew. The team placed five cars in the 10-driver field and a third straight championship seemed all but a lock. Instead, Biffle was second and Edwards third -- both 35 points behind Cup champion Tony Stewart.

"The thing I remember most about 2005 is how much trouble I got in for stinking up their show," Roush said. "The fact we weren't able to close the deal just added embarrassment to the problem we created."

Edwards thought he'd be able to easily duplicate his 2005 season.

"I thought that was pretty easy, we'll just win it next year," Edwards said. "I didn't realize what a great thing we had."

Biffle failed to build on the momentum of his six-win season in 2005 and didn't even qualify for the Chase the last two years. Now, he's emerged as a legitimate contender to add the Cup title to the championships he won in the Busch (now Nationwide) and Trucks series.

"I feel a lot better now about this championship than I did in 2005," he said.

Kenseth wrecked in New Hampshire in the first Chase race and is in 10th place in the 12-driver field.

They all promise this won't be a repeat of 2005.

"I think about it every once in a while," Edwards said. "I think of how ignorant I was back then. I didn't realize how good I had it."

Roush Fenway even got a boost at Dover International Speedway from non-Chase driver Jamie McMurray, who looked strong and led a bunch of laps early before he got tangled up in a wreck.

So with Edwards leading the points race and Biffle winning all the Chase races, just where will Roush sit Sunday at Kansas? Turns out, he sticks with Biffle's crew because he has seniority on the team.

"I'll move off the pit box when it's clear that one of the other cars is going to win just because I show the right amount of support for what they're doing," Roush said.

Roush Fenway Racing already had eight wins this season. Edwards would love to move his owner into the No. 99 pit this weekend for ninth win -- even if he has to knock off one of his teammates to get it.

"I don't think it really matters that we're teammates, I think it matters that we respect one another," Edwards said.


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Revamped driver lineup 'Down Under'

The driver lineup will have a different look when the IndyCar Series shows up for its nonpoints Nikon Indy 300 next month at Surfers Paradise in Queensland, Australia.

Dario Franchitti, coming off a partial season in NASCAR, will return to the open-wheel series as teammate to 2008 champion Scott Dixon. Dan Wheldon, who left the seat that 2007 series champion Franchitti takes over, will make his first start in his return to Panther Racing after a six-year absence.

Franchitti, who also won the 2007 Indianapolis 500, left the IndyCar Series for NASCAR at the end of last season to sign with Chip Ganassi Racing. But Ganassi never secured sponsorship for that team, and was forced to shutter it in July because of the weakening economy.

Franchitti lingered in NASCAR, running a handful of second-tier Nationwide Series races before Ganassi finally offered him the IndyCar ride.

"I'm really looking forward to getting into the Target IndyCar and to do so in Surfers Paradise, which is one of my favorite tracks, is a big bonus," Franchitti said. "I'm excited to start working with the team, and Scott as my new teammate. I think this will give us a good jump-start on the 2009 season."

Franchitti was the 1999 winner of the CART sanctioned event at Surfers Paradise.

That was one of 18 open-wheel victories for the driver from Scotland.

Wheldon, the 2005 Indy winner and series champion, last drove for Panther in September 2002, finishing 15th in a race at Texas Motor Speedway.

"It's a great opportunity for us to work together on a race weekend and determine what the team needs from me and what I need from them," Wheldon said. "The key to the 2009 championship is coming out strong in the first five races, and the work we do now will help us accomplish that."

------

FLAG WAVER: New folk hero Boo Weekley, who helped the United States team upset the Europeans last week in golf's Ryder Cup, has been picked as the honorary starter for the AMP Energy 500 NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Talladega Superspeedway on Oct. 5.

"I can't believe I'm actually going to wave the green flag at Talladega," Weekley said. "I have actually been to a race there before and it was so much fun to be in the middle of all those fans. It's going to be intense to see all those cars come roaring past at 200 mph, I can't wait."

Over the course of his first Ryder Cup event, Weekley went 2-0-1, with a team victory in Saturday fourballs competition with teammate JB Holmes and a singles victory over Oliver Wilson on Sunday.

Weekley also had one of the most best moments of the weekend when he hit a great drive off the first tee on Sunday then put his driver between his legs and galloped down the fairway as if it were a horse. He drew laughter for his antics and cheers for his five birdies and an eagle he holed from the bunker later that day.

He is currently ranked 17th on the PGA Tour Money list and owns two career PGA Tour victories.

------

WINNING BIG: Drag racing's Tony Schumacher led the third quarter Driver of the Year balloting after going undefeated through the voting period.

The NHRA Top Fuel star won seven straight POWERade Series events, culminating with his 53rd career victory. That broke a tie with Joe Amato for career Top Fuel wins.

"It's an honor to be singled out for this award," said Schumacher, known as "The Sarge." "Of course, I wouldn't be in the position that I'm in right now if I didn't have the best team that's ever been assembled in the history of the NHRA."

Schumacher took 10 of 17 first-place ballots and received votes from the entire panel, totaling 111 points. Second, with 74 points, was Jimmie Johnson, NASCAR's two-time reigning Sprint Cup champion and two-time Driver of the year.

Indy 500 winner and 2008 IndyCar Champion Scott Dixon received one first-place vote and had 67 points, while NASCAR's Carl Edwards was fourth in the voting with one first-place vote. Others receiving first-place votes were NASCAR star Kyle Busch, who won both the first- and second-quarter votes, and Helio Castroneves, the runner-up to Dixon in the IndyCar Series.


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Wheldon, Panther to test at Indy on Monday

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) -- Dan Wheldon will test at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway on Monday and mark his return to Panther Racing in a non-points race in Australia next month.

The 30-year-old Englishman, who first drove for Panther in two races six years ago, will also test at Sebring, Fla., before heading to Australia for the Oct. 26 IRL race at Surfers Paradise.

"It's a great opportunity for us to work together on a race weekend and determine what the team needs from me and what I need from them," Wheldon said Tuesday.

"The key to the 2009 championship is coming out strong in the first five races, and the work we do now will help us accomplish that. In just the first few days I've spent with the team I must say I'm impressed with how hard the guys at Panther work and the attention to detail I've seen with the race cars."

Wheldon joined the IRL as a test driver for Panther in 2002 and made his first start late that season at Chicagoland Speedway, where he finished 10th. He won the Indianapolis 500 and the IndyCar championship with Andretti Green Racing in 2005 and drove the past three years for Ganassi Racing.

His spot with Ganassi will be filled next season by the 2007 Indy 500 and IndyCar champion Dario Franchitti, who is returning to the IRL after struggling in his one season in NASCAR.

Ganassi's Scott Dixon won at Indianapolis this year, one of a record-tying six wins, and claimed the series championship by 17 points over Helio Castroneves, who beat him in the season finale at Chicagoland by one foot in a photo finish.

Wheldon will replace Brazil's Vitor Meira with Panther.

"We look at this as a great way for our team to get a jump on the 2009 season with Dan," team co-owner John Barnes said. "Our goals for next season are high, and the work we're putting in to meet our goals of winning races, the league championship and the Indy 500 have already begun."


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Allmendinger out at Red Bull for 2009

CONCORD, N.C. (AP) -- AJ Allmendinger lost his ride at Red Bull Racing on Tuesday, paving the way for former Formula One driver Scott Speed to replace him next season.

Allmendinger is in his second season driving the No. 84 Toyota, but Red Bull opted not to renew his contract for the 2009 season. The team also pulled him from the car for the two-day test session that began Tuesday at Lowe's Motor Speedway.

Speed, meanwhile, was testing a third Red Bull entry in the session and is scheduled to make his Sprint Cup Series debut next month at Lowe's. He said during the dinner break Tuesday night he's not sure if he'll fill Allmendinger's seat next season, but will do whatever Red Bull officials ask of him.

"Red Bull has made great decisions for me my whole career," Speed said. "I trust that when they think I'm ready, they'll make the right choice."

Speed is a favorite of Red Bull's Austria-based executives, who spent considerable money developing him for Formula One. When he washed out of that series, he was sent back to the U.S. to learn stock cars, and has been solid in the Truck Series and developmental ARCA Series.

It's believed Red Bull executives want Speed in one of their two Cup cars next season. Brian Vickers already drives the flagship No. 83, leaving no room for Allmendinger if Speed moves up to the next level.

"I have a lot of drive to do this because I think if you can be successful in Formula One and come over here and do this and be successful in Cup racing, that's another huge accomplishment," Speed said. "I think I've learned everything pretty quickly. But the thing I'm missing is experience. You can't learn experience."

Speed could conceivably replace Allmendinger before next year.

Allmendinger is listed on the entry sheet for this weekend's race at Kansas Speedway and is expected to fulfill that obligation. But Speed could replace him for the final seven races of the year and still retain his rookie status for next season.

Allmendinger, meanwhile, is now looking for a ride after what's been a tumultuous time with Red Bull.

He moved from the now-defunct Champ Car Series to NASCAR before last season, and struggled as he and Red Bull adapted to the Sprint Cup Series. He got off to a slow start again this year, and general manager Jay Frye temporarily pulled him from the car to give Skinner, a veteran, a chance to assess the program.

Since returning to the car in April, Allmendinger has shown steady improvement but has not been able to get the car off the top-35 bubble. The No. 84 is currently ranked 34th in car owner points, just barely inside the window that guarantees it a starting spot in the field each week.

"AJ is a talented driver and we really enjoyed working with him," Frye said in a statement. "He's come a long way in just two years and we wish him nothing but the best."

He's believed to be a candidate to replace Reed Sorenson in the No. 41 for Chip Ganassi Racing. Sorenson is moving on to Gillett Evernham Motorsports next year, and was replaced Tuesday at the test by Jeremy Mayfield, but the team said that was simply to obtain feedback from the veteran driver.


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NASCAR fires officials in harassment lawsuit

DOVER, Del. (AP) -- NASCAR has fired two officials who had been suspended during an internal investigation into claims made in a $225 million racial discrimination and sexual harassment lawsuit against stock car racing's sanctioning body.

Tim Knox and Bud Moore were fired last week, NASCAR spokesman Ramsey Potson said. He declined to discuss the reasons for their dismissal before Sunday's race at Dover International Speedway.

Knox and Moore are accused in Mauricia Grant's lawsuit of exposing themselves to her, and making graphic and lewd jokes. She worked as a technical inspector for NASCAR's second-tier Nationwide Series from January 2005 through her October 2007 firing.

NASCAR had placed Knox and Moore on indefinite paid administrative leave in June as it investigated her claims.

Grant, who is black, filed suit earlier that month alleging 23 specific incidents of sexual harassment and 34 specific incidents of racial and gender discrimination during the two-plus years she worked for NASCAR.

Her suit alleges she was fired as retaliation for complaining to her superiors about the way she was treated by co-workers.

Potson said NASCAR has concluded its internal investigation into the lawsuit. NASCAR has denied any wrongdoing.

"We've talked to dozens of officials and our personnel," he said. "That part of it is wrapped up."

The firings were first reported Saturday by NASCAR Scene.

Dean Duckett, another former technical inspector, filed a complaint this month against NASCAR with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, alleging racial discrimination, a hostile work environment and wrongful termination.

Duckett, who is black, said discrimination started in May 2001 and lasted until NASCAR fired him from his job in the Cup series on Nov. 14, 2007.

He told The Associated Press on Saturday that he would consider a lawsuit if NASCAR refused to offer him his old job back.

Duckett was named in Grant's lawsuit. Her lawsuit claimed he was reprimanded and then fired last November for using "aggressive language toward a white co-worker."

Duckett denied harassing Grant, though he acknowledged NASCAR suspended him with pay for two weeks. Duckett was accused by Grant of dumping water on another female official to simulate a wet T-shirt contest.


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Skinner races to first Trucks win of year

LAS VEGAS (AP) -- Mike Skinner raced to his first Craftsman Truck Series victory of the year and 25th overall Saturday night, beating Erik Darnell by two-hundredths of a second in the Qwik Liner Las Vegas 350.

The 51-year-old Skinner, the 1995 series champion and 2005 Las Vegas winner, took the lead from Darnell on a green-white-checker restart. Darnell reclaimed the top spot on the final lap, but Skinner's Toyota was back in front at the finish line.

"Erik's truck was awfully good," Skinner said. "I knew I wasn't going to wreck to win the race. I was going to push him, bounce off of him, do whatever I needed to do. But he's a friend. He's a class act and he has a great future in this business.

"I knew that we had the third best truck, but I knew that I had one shot and you have to make the best of these things. I tried him (Darnell) on the bottom and they lined up behind me, and I said, 'Well, I have to fake him to the bottom and try him on the top."'

Matt Crafton finished third, John Andretti was fourth and Ron Hornaday followed to move within a point of leader Johnny Benson in the season standings.

Benson cut a right front tire while leading and crashed into the outside wall on lap 64. He was declared out of the race on lap 72.

Hornaday had to finish in the top four in order to take over the points lead from Benson with six races left. Entering the race, Benson had a 74-point lead over Hornaday.

"One point behind. OK, that is fine, we will take it," Hornaday said. "It is better than 70 out. We were getting 20 at a time, and it looked like it was his (Benson's) job this week to get the points.

"I hate to see Johnny do that (crash), he was running very hard. I saw he didn't put tires on there at the beginning (first pit stop), and I blew a tire here last time."


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Wheels falling off JGR's season at wrong time

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) -- Joe Gibbs Racing used the first 26 races this season to establish itself as NASCAR's top organization.

It took just two races to undo all that work.

Two terrible showings to start the Chase for the championship led Kyle Busch to concede his title hopes Sunday after his engine failed at Dover International Speedway. Denny Hamlin didn't wave a white flag, but his 38th-place finish has him stuck at the bottom of the standings with his teammate.

Timing, it seems, is everything, and the wheels are most certainly falling off JGR's season at the worst possible part of the year.

"About what you would imagine," team president J.D. Gibbs said Monday when asked the mood at the race shop. "I'd say there's a good amount of frustration and disappointment. It's obviously very frustrating because you work so hard all year. So it's frustrating for the drivers, for the crews, for the 400-plus people at the shop -- everyone who puts everything they have into this -- and then the small things bite you.

"But stuff like that happens in life. We don't like it, we don't have to like it, but we have to work through it."

Problem is, there's not much time to work through this.

Busch started the Chase with an 80-point advantage over most of the competition. Two races in and he's plummeted to last, 210 points behind new leader Carl Edwards with just eight events to make up the difference. Hamlin sits in 11th and two-time Cup champion Tony Stewart is clinging to his title hopes in seventh.

"Look, all you want is a chance in the final race, and I haven't sat down and looked at all the points and all the scenarios," Gibbs said. "But we're not giving up on having a final chance in that last race."

He'll have trouble convincing Busch of that, though. The winner of the "regular season" declared his run at a first Cup championship over after his last-place finish in Dover. But his gloom and doom is based on experience: Busch started the 2006 Chase with a wreck in the opener and an engine failure in Round 2; he never recovered and finished last in the standings that season.

"We're out of the title hunt, that's for sure," Busch said as his crew diagnosed his ailing engine.

This isn't like February and March when bizarre mechanical failures hit all three JGR cars.

Hamlin's power steering failed in Atlanta, and he had a fuel pickup issue while leading on a restart in the closing laps at Bristol. Stewart had a similar pickup problem at Bristol, and his cost him the lead to Hamlin shortly before Hamlin suffered the same fate.

Busch lost his power steering in Bristol while leading, then broke a rear gear in Martinsville. A broken gasket also took him out of contention at his home track in Las Vegas.

It got to a point where the JGR tally showed more races lost than victories, and frustration was mounting among all three teams.

"All they know is they broke a part and it kept them from winning a race," Jimmy Makar, senior vice president of racing operations at JGR, said at the time. "There's nothing you can do but fix the problem and show them that it's fixed."

That they did, ironing out every little blip to string together a wildly successful regular season.

Busch won a series-high eight Cup victories, and Hamlin added one other win. And they were untouchable in the Nationwide Series, as Busch, Hamlin, Stewart and Logano combined to win 16 of 28 races.

So why now are these issues popping up? And why are they happening to Busch, who was seemingly flawless the past four months?

"That's the question we're all trying to figure out right now," Gibbs said. "There's nothing we're doing differently. If anything, now is the time to be more conservative. And our people are as good as anybody at testing products. We are very good at checking parts and qualifying parts and making sure we have everything in order."

It's easy to say that in this year of JGR dominance, not winning the championship would make the season a bust. But crew chief Steve Addington said Sunday the hole his team is in will allow Busch to get aggressive and race for wins from now on.

"We've had three very different things happen to three very good race cars at the wrong time," Gibbs said. "But there's not much we can change at this point. All we do is go as hard as we can. We had good cars that just didn't finish.

"We were pretty good before the Chase. We're still pretty good, and we'll just have to see where we are four or five races from now."


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