NASCAR At New Hampshire Motor Speedway: Tony Stewart Wins Another Fuel-Mileage Race

Here’s what Dale Earnhardt Jr. had to say about his 17th-place finish at New Hampshire Motor Speedway on Sunday (after his televised comments to ESPN). Transcript courtesy of Chevrolet:

HOW FRUSTRATING IS THIS FOR YOU? “I had an awesome car all day. Just pretty frustrating. I want to win here. We’ve been so good here in a lot of races and would like to win. But, you’ve got to get up front and we really couldn’t accomplish that all day long.

When Brad Keselowski left New Hampshire Motor Speedway after a 35th-place finish in July, he was 23rd in points and outside the window to make the Chase

Leaving the track this weekend, Keselowski is not only in the Chase, but third in the standings, 11 points behind Tony Stewart.

Tony Stewart had just climbed from his car after winning Sunday’s NASCAR Chase race at New Hampshire Motor Speedway when, out of the blue, he made a cryptic comment to ESPN reporter Vince Welch.

“We got rid of some dead weight earlier this week, so it’s made it a lot easier,” Stewart said of his team’s sudden turnaround. “It’s been a big weight lifted off our shoulders. Sometimes you’ve got to make adjustments in your life, and we did that, and it’s definitely helped this weekend for sure.”

There is no doubt defending series champion Jimmie Johnson has been the class of the field over the last 10 races in each of the past five years. Despite the No. 48’s struggles throughout the regular season, Johnson and his Chad Knaus-led team have always been able to perform at their best in the Chase and emerge on top.

Yet this Chase has seen a different side of the No. 48 team in the first two races. After running out of fuel at the end the Chase opener at Chicagoland, Johnson sat eighth in points. Now, after a disappointing day at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, Johnson is 10th in points – the lowest he has ever been in the Chase.

No surprise here, but the guy who has won the first two Chase races is atop the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series point standings after Sunday’s race at New Hampshire Motor Speedway.

Tony Stewart took over the Chase points lead from Kevin Harvick and now leads Harvick by seven points.

In a reversal of last year’s Chase race at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, Tony Stewart was able to save enough fuel and capitalize as race leader Clint Bowyer ran out of gas with two laps to go.

“You can take a breath, I’ve got this,” Stewart said on the final lap coming to the win.

It’s NASCAR race day at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, and we’ve got the actual race start time, the starting lineup and some other facts about the Sylvania 300 for you below.

Start time: The command to start engines will be given by a representative from NAFTA at 2:10 p.m. Eastern time. After a few pace laps, the green flag will wave at 2:18 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 2:10.

I am cautiously optimistic about today. The forecast looks mostly dry – with even some sunshine in the afternoon – but it may not be totally rain-free. Don’t be surprised if the morning starts off gloomy, foggy and maybe with some drizzle. It’s expected to lift and partially clear to see some sunshine, but it will be unusually warm and muggy.

All that unseasonable moisture in the air will keep the atmosphere slightly unstable and a pop-up isolated storm can’t be ruled out during the afternoon hours. I am not saying a shower or storm will hit the race track – but it could, and will need to be monitored as the afternoon wears on.

The hot topic of the weekend at New Hampshire Motor Speedway has been fuel-mileage races and how NASCAR can move away from them in the future.

With nearly every driver availability dominated by questions about conservation techniques, whether they are good for NASCAR and what can be done to prevent them, veteran Jeff Gordon said there is no simple solution.

The upper level storm system mentioned in my previous forecast looks like it will remain far to the west over the Great Lakes near Chicago, keeping the bulk of the rain with it to the west. The forecast for the Truck race Saturday afternoon and the Sprint Cup race Sunday afternoon are looking better. Skies will remain mostly cloudy. The air very moist and humid but the showers look to be very limited.

Some forecasts, like the National Weather Service, have Sunday completely dry. I am not too that point, yet, maybe that’s because I was burned last weekend by my forecast for Chicago. My forecast for Saturday and Sunday afternoon is mostly dry but I am not ruling out the possibility of an isolated shower or some spotty annoying drizzle.

Ryan Newman won the pole for Sunday’s NASCAR Chase race at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, but did so in one of the most unusual Sprint Cup Series qualifying sessions in memory.

“It was a little dramatic,” Newman said with a chuckle. “It’s a tough situation, it’s a tough call.”

Denny Hamlin suffered through what he called a “nightmare-type race” on Monday at Chicagoland Speedway and is 12th in points after the first week of the Chase.

Are his championship hopes on life support already?

Tony Stewart said his NASCAR team’s winning performance at Chicagoland Speedway last week proves “they don’t give up.”

“We never have,” he said Friday in New Hampshire. “We’ve got a group of guys that no matter how bad it’s been this year and how low I’ve got with it, they’ve never given up. They’ve never quit. It defines our organization as far as what our group of people are capable of and they fight to the end.”

In an effort to break up the two-car tandems at Talladega Superspeedway, NASCAR announced a rule change this week that has been welcomed by drivers throughout the garage.

The new rule will implement a larger restrictor plate and limit the pressure relief valve for the cooling system. The hope is to break up the two-car tandem drafting that has become the norm at Talladega and Daytona as of late.

Matt Kenseth said his penalty for being pushed to the Chicagoland Speedway finish line by JJ Yeley last week was unfortunate, but not unexpected.

NASCAR dropped Kenseth to 21st place (the first car one lap down) because it is against the rules to be pushed by another car on the last lap – even though Kenseth didn’t ask to be pushed.

Five-time defending NASCAR Sprint Cup series champion Jimmie Johnson thought he was good to go to the end of Monday’s race at Chicagoland Speedway. Told he would be one lap short of the finish, Johnson was confident he had saved enough gas to make it to the checkered flag.

That did not happen, however, as Johnson ran out on the final lap and coasted to a disappointing 10th-place finish.

Before he qualified for last week’s NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race at Chicagoland, Dale Earnhardt Jr. pulled out a piece of paper and a pen.

He looked up each of his qualifying results for the 2011 season, and wrote them down all on one sheet. And it was ugly.

Team owner Kevin Harvick indicated a few weeks ago his Nationwide and Camping World Truck Series teams at Kevin Harvick Inc. would look dramatically different in the future.

Those promised changes have quickly progressed, as a deal was announced prior to Richmond that the Nationwide program would merge with Richard Childress Racing, and on Friday it was announced Eddie Sharp Racing would take control of two KHI trucks.

Kyle Busch ran out of fuel at Chicagoland and finished 22nd, which was only his third finish outside the top 15 since the Coca-Cola 600.

For a driver who had come into the Chase as the No. 1 seed and one of the favorites to win the title, it was clearly a “disappointing finish,” as Busch called it Friday at New Hampshire Motor Speedway.

This is a very difficult forecast. A cut-off upper level low is positioned over the Great Lakes. This system continues to pump and funnel Gulf moisture from the southern United States into the northeast. Skies will remain cloudy with off-and-on waves of showers throughout the weekend. The wettest times appear to be Friday afternoon and evening and most of the day Saturday for New Hampshire Motor Speedway.

Sunday is the most challenging forecast. Different models have different ideas on what to do with the cut-off upper level low in the Great Lakes. A few forecast models keep the system stalled back over Chicago for the weekend, minimizing the disturbances that could impact the Northeast over the weekend, especially Sunday and Monday. That is why the National Weather Service is keeping Sunday day. From my experiences, you can never trust these systems to do what you think they will do.

The first of 10 Chase races is in the books and the series returns to New Hampshire Motor Speedway this weekend for the Sylvania 300.

While the Sprint Cup Series race will be the main event, the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series will also be hitting the track, while the NASCAR Nationwide Series enjoys a weekend off.