Bowyer will try to keep spot in Chase group

By Jeff Hood

For the AJC

With two races remaining to set the field for this year’s 10-race Chase for the Sprint Cup, Clint Bowyer is the only driver who could fall out of the top 12 following Sunday night’s Emory Healthcare 500 at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

Bowyer holds a 100-point advantage over Daytona 500 and Brickyard 400 champion Jamie McMurray in the battle for the final spot in NASCAR’s version of the playoffs. Veteran driver Mark Martin is a point behind McMurray.

McMurray said Friday that he will need to run well Sunday evening and have some luck on his side to qualify for the Chase.

“It’s a big weekend for us, certainly, to run well and make up as many points as we can,” McMurray said. “But I don’t know that us making the Chase or us not making the Chase depends on us running well. I think it’s more on [Bowyer] having bad luck.

“We did the tire test here and felt like we learned some stuff. We have struggled at tracks that are slicker, though, and this is a slicker track. So hopefully we’ll be able to hit on some stuff that we feel good about.”

Won't go conservative

There was no on-track activity at AMS on Friday for the Cup and Nationwide Series teams, who spent the afternoon getting their cars through inspection.

While their crews turned wrenches in the garage, Bowyer, McMurray and 12 other NASCAR drivers spent time providing rides on the 1.54-mile oval to Coca-Cola grand-prize contest winners.

Bowyer’s crew chief, Shane Wilson, said his driver won’t be in conservative mode Sunday night.

“We’re definitely not going to be on the defensive,” Wilson said. “We still have to go out and race. We’ve had to race really hard to get that 100-point lead, so I don’t really to change anything up.

“When it comes to fuel and stuff like that, we’ll make sure we don’t run out or take some chances on stuff like that. No reckless abandonment. Just go out and run a good race. Maybe run a tick on the conservative side on pit strategy.

“But here at Atlanta you’re pretty much going to come in and put four [tires] on and make sure we have enough fuel to make it to the end. That’ll be the biggest thing. If there’s any kind of conservativeness, it won’t be until that point now.”

Ragan on AMS

Unadilla’s David Ragan is somewhat shocked that Atlanta will be relegated to one NASCAR weekend beginning in 2011.

“It’s hard to believe,” said Ragan, who also participated in Friday’s Coca-Cola ride-along program. “Obviously, I’m a Georgia racing fan, and I love to come back home and see family. I don’t think there’s anyone in the garage who doesn’t like Atlanta Motor Speedway. So we’ll just have to make this race bigger and better on Labor Day every year.”

Ragan, who is searching for his first Cup victory, hopes to give his home crowd something to cheer about this weekend.

“We’re bringing a car that we ran great with at Chicago,” he said. “We’ve tuned on it a little bit. We were pretty good here in the spring, but we ended up getting involved in a wreck, so we didn’t have a good finish. But I look forward to running good.”