I said before Sunday’s race that I felt we would see our fifth straight different winner in as many races this season, and Kevin Harvick proved it out. The other thing to make note of is we’ve also had five different points leaders so far.
From the points side, that really isn’t a surprise to me. I think we will continue to see that week after week deep into the season. The new points system keeps things tighter, so this is something we can expect.
Remember, there is only one point difference between finishing positions in a race. Overall, there are only 42 points separating second place from the guy who finishes dead last, so everyone better expect a tight points race this year.
As we saw again Sunday, the racing is good. I just love everything NASCAR and the tracks are doing. I thought it was a great move to reduce the length of this race. I don’t care if we race one time a year or four times a year at Fontana, but 500 miles was way too long. That was a perfect-length race we had Sunday for the competitors, the fans in the grandstands and the ones on their couches at home.
It really was a unique race Sunday in Fontana. We ended up having the most dominant car not win the race but finish third. We had what we all felt was the second-most dominant car struggle, barely coming home with a top-15 finish. What was wild there at the end was seven of the top eight finishers stayed out.
Harvick was fun to watch Sunday. He started 24th, and then the next thing you know he is in the top 15. The next thing you know he is in the top 10. You turn around again, and here is Kevin in the top five. Then with less than 10 laps to go, Kevin was running the top two cars down.
You have to feel for Kyle Busch. He won on Saturday and then led something like 151 of 200 laps Sunday but finished third. The one thing I liked was how on that last restart all the fans were on their feet screaming their heads off. Naturally, Mike Joy, Darrell Waltrip and myself were up in the television booth, but we all commented on it.
A lot of folks are asking who the best driver in NASCAR is right now. It doesn’t matter to me that he finished third, but I don’t know how you don’t put Busch at the top of that list. The guy is a contender to win in every series we run every week. I think what he did Sunday was pretty unbelievable. He smacked the wall off Turn 2 and had only two tires while everyone else is running him down with four.
We are starting to see our five-time champion, Jimmie Johnson, come to life. That is two top-three finishes now for him. He finished third last week at Bristol and then second Sunday in Fontana. Some folks have been wondering about the No. 48, but let’s face it: He came within about a third of a lap of getting his first win of 2011.
If you look at Carl Edwards, you’ll see he finished sixth. What’s interesting about that is with the exception of his wreck at Phoenix, which was out of his control, Sunday was the first time he had finished outside the top two since Texas of last year. That’s pretty amazing, so Carl is another one you better not overlook.
