NASCAR At Charlotte Motor Speedway: Matt Kenseth Wins As Jimmie Johnson’s Chase Hopes Crash

NASCAR continues to get spoiled by another rain-free weekend, as we stay at Charlotte Motor Speedway for NASCAR’s longest race, the Coca-Cola 600.

Not only will it be mostly dry, but it will once again be hot. High pressure is going to dominate the eastern third of the United States this weekend. This will provide lots of sunshine, highs reaching the upper 80s to near 90, and it will be humid.

Wait a second. You’re telling me you missed the NASCAR race at Charlotte Motor Speedway because you had other things to do on a Saturday night?

The horror!

After a hard-fought battle for the runner-up spot on Saturday night at Charlotte Motor Speedway, Carl Edwards had some words for Kyle Busch on pit road. Edwards leaned into the cockpit of the No. 18 car and expressed his frustration at how Busch raced him late in the race.

Edwards said he was upset Busch came across his nose going into Turn 3 instead of leaving room and driving to the high side.

After two Chase races, Jimmie Johnson’s chances at a six-consecutive title were being questioned by some. After four races, he was right back in the thick of things, three points outside of the lead.

But following Saturday night’s hard hit and 34th-place finish, the five-time series champion is eighth in the Chase standings – 35 points out of the lead – and facing an uphill battle to defend his title.

Had his Hendrick Motorsports pit crew not made another mistake in the Chase, it still wasn’t going to be a great night for Dale Earnhardt Jr.

But instead of finishing 19th, as he did on Saturday night at Charlotte Motor Speedway, Earnhardt Jr. said he could have been 11th or 12th without a loose lugnut that forced him to hit pit road again under green.

Tony Stewart suffered costly right-rear damage after an incident with Greg Biffle on Saturday night at Charlotte Motor Speedway, and the two drivers couldn’t reach a consensus on who was to blame afterward.

With a huge run on Stewart with 33 laps to go, Biffle made a move to the outside exiting Turn 4 but caught the outside wall and made contact with the right side of Stewart’s car. The contact cut the left front tire and sent the No. 16 hard into the outside wall, ending any chance Biffle had at a solid finish.

Until Jimmie Johnson’s stunning crash late in Saturday night’s Bank of America 500, the most surprising development in the NASCAR’s Charlotte Motor Speedway race was Brad Keselowski’s off-night.

Keselowski spent much of the Charlotte race mired in the mid-20s before rallying for a 16th-place finish. Still, a result outside the top 15 is painful in the Chase, and it dropped Keselowski to sixth place in the Sprint Cup Series standings.

Matt Kenseth won Saturday night’s Bank of America 500 at Charlotte Motor Speedway, but it may not have been the story of the night.

With 18 laps to go, five-time defending NASCAR Sprint Cup Series champion Jimmie Johnson got loose after close racing with Ryan Newman and began to spin, then smashed his car head-first into the wall.

Prior to Saturday night’s Bank of America 500 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race, the wives and girlfriends of NASCAR hit the track in the ‘Better Half Dash’ charity event.

Jacquelyn Butler was able to use the coaching of her boyfriend – and former Bandolero champion – David Ragan to move under Ashley Allgaier with eight laps to go to take the victory in the inaugural event.

It’s NASCAR race night at Charlotte Motor Speedway, and we’ve got the actual race start time, the starting lineup and some other facts about the Bank of America 500 for you below.

Start time: The command to start engines will be given by a representative from Charlotte public schools at 7:39 p.m. Eastern time. After a few pace laps, the green flag will wave at 7:48 p.m. Eastern. So if you want to skip the pre-race show and just tune in for the race, flip on your TV set at 7:48.

Following Denny Hamlin’s 16th-place finish at Kansas last week, the Joe Gibbs Racing driver made some eyebrow-raising comments about the state of his team.

“I think we know what direction to go in; whether we can get there or not, got to have cooperation from everyone,” he said then. “People need to be open-minded to make changes.”

Jeff Gordon ended the regular season with three-consecutive top-three finishes, including a win at Atlanta. Going into the final 10 races of the Chase, Gordon was among the favorites to end Jimmie Johnson’s reign as NASCAR champion.

Four races into the Chase and Gordon is 47 points out of the lead and in danger of being eliminated from championship contention all together.

After Brad Keselowski won last week’s Nationwide Series race at Kansas Speedway, runner-up Carl Edwards told reporters about what he perceived to be a failed attempt by Keselowski to get Edwards penalized on a restart.

On the restart in question, Edwards had initially gone past race leader Keselowski, but the eventual race winner quickly zoomed back by in a faster car.

Mind games are a part of professional sports – especially when it comes to the championship battle.

When the 2011 Chase for the Sprint Cup got underway, Jimmie Johnson had two less-than-stellar performances and was thought by some to be down and out; his championship run of six consecutive titles a near impossibility.

With the exception of Thursday when a few rain drops fell, the rest of the Charlotte race weekend is dry. The cold front that brought the showers and storms to the southeastern part of the United States will move east out over the Atlantic as drier air moves in for Friday and Saturday.

Expect sunny days and clear nights with high temperatures Friday and Saturday in the mid 70s. It will be breezy Friday afternoon with possible wind gusts near 30 mph.

Qualifying Thursday night at Charlotte Motor Speedway was close, but Chase contender Tony Stewart was the fastest with a lap of 28.131 seconds at a speed of 191.959 mph.

Stewart, who was the 36th driver to make an attempt, knocked Matt Kenseth off the provisional pole by a mere 0.006 seconds.

After getting out of his car at Kansas Speedway last weekend, Dale Earnhardt Jr. told reporters he was more worried about his fantasy football team than the NASCAR point standings.

It seemed he was perhaps making a statement about the Chase and acknowledging he was basically out of it. But on Thursday at Charlotte Motor Speedway, Earnhardt Jr. said he “wasn’t expecting everybody to read between the lines too much there.”

In one of the most unusual announcements in memory, Joe Gibbs Racing said it made room for Dollar General’s 12 races on the No. 20 Sprint Cup Series car next season by asking current sponsor The Home Depot to cut back.

Say what?

In this year’s Chase for the Sprint Cup, one position could mean the difference between champion and also-ran. With so much on the line, it seems unlikely that a devious strategy such as team orders would play a role in determining the 2011 champion.

Or maybe not.

The NASCAR Sprint Cup Series heads home to Charlotte Motor Speedway this weekend for the fifth race of the 2011 Chase for the Sprint Cup.

Following last weekend’s race at Kansas Speedway, the top-eight Chase drivers are separated by only 20 points with Carl Edwards leading the way by only one point over Kevin Harvick.