Atlanta Motor Speedway’s position in the Sprint Cup schedule is looking to be about as good as it gets these days.
The AdvoCare 500 falls one week before the regular season ends and the field is set for the 10-race Chase for the Sprint Cup.
But once the circuit left Atlanta Sunday night, there was relatively little to be settled as far as the Chase field is concerned.
The Atlanta finish locked in the top 10 drivers in the standings, leaving only the two wild-card slots to be decided and only two drivers with realistic chances to take one of the spots.
Atlanta winner Denny Hamlin, who capitalized on the quick work of his pit crew on a late-race pit stop to move from third-place to first for the final restart, now has four wins on the season and will at least be tied for the lead when the points are re-set to start the 10-race championship-deciding Chase.
He said his pit crew “nailed it” when it counted. “There is nothing else I can say about it,” he said. “They were just on it all day long.”
Hamlin also appears to be on a roll as the Chase begins. His win in the AdvoCare 500 was his second straight on the Cup circuit, and he’s headed to his home-track, Richmond International Raceway, where he’s one of the dominant drivers.
“That’s my track,” he said. “It’s my best track arguably, and I just think we have a lot of momentum now, and for what it’s worth, I will try to take advantage of it.”
At Atlanta he led seven times for a race-high 105 laps, but he appeared to be destined to lose to Martin Truex Jr., who had a big lead as the laps wound down. But Jamie McMurray’s crash on Lap 321 and the ensuing caution flag sent the leaders to pit road, where Hamlin’s crew essentially won the race for him.
Gordon, who passed Truex for second place and made a run at Hamlin, was second-guessing himself afterward for not being more aggressive with a race win and a Chase berth on the line.
He said he should have run into Hamlin and moved him out of the way.
“I guess I’m getting soft in my old age,” said Gordon, who made his first Cup start at AMS 20 years ago this fall.
Two Chase contenders likely saw their hopes for a title run go up in smoke at Atlanta.
Carl Edwards blew an engine on Lap 264, bringing out a caution flag and derailing his fading Chase hopes. On the restart following Edwards’ blown engine, Jimmie Johnson, Sam Hornish Jr. and Ryan Newman wrecked on the backstretch, effectively putting Newman out of the running.
Edwards, who tied eventual champion Tony Stewart in points last year but lost the title on the tie breaker of race wins, is experiencing the kind of slump that has become the norm for the driver who finishes second the year before.
“Somebody is trying to teach me something here,” Edwards said. “I’ve been trying to live right and do the right things, so I hope there’s a reason for all of this, but, man, it’s just so frustrating.”
The battle for the final two Chase berths appears to be between Gordon, who has one win and is 13th in the points standings, and Kyle Busch, who also has one win and is 12th in points, 12 markers ahead of Gordon.
Kasey Kahne is the current leader of the wild-card standings with two race victories and the 11th spot in the standings, but he had a disappointing 23rd-place run at Atlanta.
"I felt like I probably lost about 10 spots," he said. "But we're still in 11th and have two wins and I think we're sitting decent.
“I’d image Tony (Stewart) is just a touch better, so he could fall out [of the top 10]; so there are some things there that could still go on and we could probably miss the Chase pretty easily.
“Hopefully we won’t have another race like [Atlanta] and we’ll be all right.”
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