NASCAR issues warnings to 10 Sprint Cup teams for Michigan inspection issues

Ten NASCAR Sprint Cup teams received warnings for inspection issues last weekend at Michigan International Speedway.

Those that received warnings were:

Josh Wise’s team failed the Laser Inspection Station three times before qualifying for its first warning. The team also will be docked 15 minutes of practice time this weekend at Darlington Raceway.

Michael McDowell’s team failed the Laser Inspection Station three times before qualifying for its fourth warning and lost its pit stall pick for that race. The team also will lose 15 minutes of practice time at Darlington. McDowell’s team also failed the Laser Inspection Station twice before the race. That marks the team’s first warning toward the new set of four that determines when a team loses its pit stall pick.

Regan Smith’s team received its third warning after failing the template inspection before qualifying at Michigan. The team received its fourth warning after failing the Laser Inspection Station twice before the Michigan race. Smith’s team will lose its pick of pit stalls for this weekend’s Southern 500 at Darlington Raceway.

Brad Keselowski’s team received its third warning for failing the Laser Inspection Station twice before last weekend’s race at Michigan.

Ryan Newman’s team received its third warning for failing the Laser Inspection Station twice before last weekend’s race at Michigan.

Chase Elliott’s team received its third warning after failing the Laser Inspection Station twice before qualifying.

Michael Annett’s team received its third warning after failing the Laser Inspection Station twice before qualifying.

Kasey Kahne’s team received its second warning after failing the Laser Inspection Station twice before qualifying at Michigan.

Trevor Bayne’s team received its fourth warning after failing template inspection twice before qualifying at Michigan. The team lost its pit stall pick at Michigan.

Kyle Larson’s team received its second warning after failing template inspection twice before qualifying at Michigan.

Roush puts all three cars in top 10 for first time in 65 races

While it wasn’t a win, Trevor Bayne got the closest he’s been to victory lane in five years Saturday when he finished third in the Coke Zero 400 at Daytona International Speedway.

But Bayne’s second top five of 2016 also got Roush Fenway Racing the closest it’s been to a win in more than a year.

The team that hasn’t won since Sonoma Raceway in June 2014 put all three of its entries – Bayne, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. (fifth) and Greg Biffle (eighth) – in the top 10 for the first time in 65 races. That stretch started with the August night race at Bristol in 2014.

Daytona began with Biffle on the pole – Roush’s first since Carl Edwards had it at Texas in November 2013 – and ended with Bayne getting Roush its best result since Biffle finished second in the 2015 Coca-Cola-600.

“For our organization to be on the pole this weekend, to have three cars in the top eight, two in the top five, I think that’s kind of a landmark for us as an organization with the struggles we’ve had to get all three teams running strong on a weekend like this,” Bayne said. “It’s not a win that we need to get in the Chase, but it’s a great step in the right direction for making it in on points.”

Leaving Daytona, Bayne currently is the highest Roush driver in the points in 17th. He’s six points behind the cutoff of the 16 cars that will make the Chase for the Sprint Cup.

Biffle, who had a pole for the first time since October 2012 at Charlotte Motor Speedway, earned his first top 10 since the September race at New Hampshire Motor Speedway last year. That was after his No. 16 Ford received damage in the Lap 90 crash that involved 22 cars that required multiple pit stops to repair

“It was a rough night after we got in that wreck,” Biffle said in a news release. “We got pretty severe damage and were able to come back and finish eighth. We had a pretty fast car, and (Brad Keselowski) was unbelievably fast. We have some work to do still, but I am so proud of my guys.”

Stenhouse came home with his second top five of the year and the fifth of his career. His finished fifth at Auto Club Speedway in March.

Stenhouse had started fourth and was riding in the back when the “Big One” occurred, and he was able to brake his No. 17 Ford in time to avoid it. Stenhouse lined up eighth during the overtime restart before getting a push into the top five.

“Clint (Bowyer) was pushing me the whole last lap. I wasn’t sure that we would be able to be pushed all the way through the corners, but we were able to hold it in a straight line as best as we could,” Stenhouse said in a news release. “The Roush Fenway Racing guys worked really hard, and Jack (Roush) has put a lot of confidence in everyone to get our cars better each week.”

Next week, the series will head to the recently repaved and reconfigured Kentucky Speedway. A Roush car has not finished in the top 10 at the 1.5-mile track since Matt Kenseth finished seventh in 2012.

Chase Elliott will get extra track time and extra help at Sonoma

Chase Elliott will do double duty this weekend at Sonoma Raceway, competing in Sunday’s Sprint Cup race and Saturday’s K&N Pro Series West race.

This weekend marks Elliott’s first time at Sonoma Raceway, a 1.99-mile road course. It’s not uncommon for drivers competing there for the first time to run the companion K&N West race to gain more track time.

Trevor Bayne competed in the K&N West race last year, finishing 10th, a day before his first Cup start at Sonoma. Austin Dillonplaced sixth in last year’s K&N West race to gain extra experience on the road course a day before his second Cup start there. Kyle Larson won the 2014 K&N West race a day before his first Cup start at that track. Elliott is the only Sprint Cup driver on the preliminary entry list for this weekend’s K&N West race.

Elliott has competed in seven road course races in his NASCAR career, six in Xfinity and once in the Camping World Truck Series. He won the 2013 Camping World Truck race at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park after contact with leader Ty Dillon on the final corner of the last lap.  

Also this weekend, Hendrick Motorsports stated that Elliott’s father, NASCAR Hall of Famer Bill Elliott, will serve as a second spotter. It’s not uncommon for teams to use a second spotter on the road course to help with a portion of the track the main spotter might not have as good a view.

Elliott enters this Cup weekend having scored six consecutive top-10 finishes. Kurt Buschhas the series’ longest active streak of top-10 finishes with nine.

After a down 2015, Roush Fenway Racing drivers enjoying ‘new normal’

There’s a “new normal” at Roush Fenway Racing.

After a dismal 2015 there’s more structure, less finger-pointing and all three teams are competing toward the front.

To top it off, Trevor Bayne is getting some sleep.

“Last year I feel like I had to beat myself up a little bit,” Bayne recently told NBC Sports. “I’d be looking at data and having sleepless nights trying to figure how I could drive the car different, and now this year that we have faster cars, I feel like I can kinda do what I know how to do naturally.”

Bayne is 20th in the Sprint Cup standings after 14 races. At this point last year, his first full season with Roush, he was 30th. Heading to Michigan International Speedway, Bayne has one top five and two top-1o finishes.

The biggest sign of improved speed for Roush is in qualifying. Bayne has advanced to the second round of qualifying 10 times and the final round five times. Bayne has an average start of 16.8. His average last year was 27.9.

“Last season I feel like qualifying was one of the hardest parts of my weekend,” Bayne said. “We would be 30th, you know? Hardly making the second round at times, and this season we’ve made it to the final round almost every week, and I think (crew chief) Matt (Puccia) does a really good job.”

The improvements are even more significant for fourth-year driver Ricky Stenhouse Jr.

Stenhouse has started in the top 10 seven times. Last year, Stenhouse started in the top 10 just three times. For the Coca-Cola 600, all three of Roush’s car qualified in the top 10 for the first time since 2013 at Chicagoland Speedway.

“The new normal at Roush Fenway is everybody is working together,” Stenhouse told NBC Sports. “It’s not blaming this department or this department … I feel like everyone has been hands on, in the ditch with each other, you know digging and trying to claw our way out of this and I think it’s been showing.”

Greg Biffle‘s best finish through 14 races is 11th in the Coke 600, which he started a season-best sixth in.

“We’re definitely on an upswing, especially the 16 team,” Biffle told NBC Sports. “The problem is we don’t have any results to show for it. Meaning we’re not able to close right now. So, we’re getting to the three-quarter point in the race, things are happening, we’re getting involved in stuff. Or particularly Dover, the big wreck. Probably had one of the best cars we did all season.”

Biffle isn’t sitting by as the team tries to return to the level of competition it enjoyed when he started racing full-time for Roush in 2003.

That’s included Biffle coordinating pit stop practices among the teams and driving the pit stop car. It’s one way Biffle has committed to show he’s in “100 percent” to build Roush back up.

“I took charge and went down to pit stop practice and told the guys, ‘Hey, I’m going to be here every week for the next month, or one day a week, and I’m going to drive the pit stop car and we’re going to practice other things,’ ” Biffle said. “I recognized that they were kind of stuck in the same old routine and it needed to be changed up. And it brought so much energy and life back into my team that at Dover we had the best pit stops we’ve had in six months. And so then I went to Trevor and Ricky and asked them to do the same thing with their team.”

The more cohesive operation at Roush has the team the closest it’s been to consistently competing since Carl Edwards won at Sonoma Raceway in 2014. It’s seen Bayne, who hasn’t won since his 2011 Daytona 500 upset, lead a career-high 22 laps at Talladega Superspeedway to make his season total 34, also a career best.

After struggling in the back of the pack in 2015, Roush is showing signs it can turn its “new normal” into the kind of success Mark Martin helped create for the team during the height of his Hall of Fame career in the 1990s.

“It takes time to catch up and it’s hard to catch up,” Bayne said. “The guys that you’re trying to beat are also getting better. So you have to make huge gains to do what we’re doing this season.”

Upon Further Review: Sprint All-Star Race

The last couple of weeks have showcased some fascinating duels between young drivers in the Sprint Cup Series.

Kyle Larson has been involved in each.

Larson dueled with Chase Elliott for second place at Dover earlier this month. Larson eventually pulled away and challenged Matt Kenseth for the win before settling for second.

In Saturday’s Sprint Showdown, Larson battled Elliott for the win in the final segment to advance to the Sprint All-Star Race. Although their Dover battle was without contact, Larson squeezed Elliott into the wall off Turn 4 of the final lap of the Showdown, and they hit before Larson won.

“Kyle did what he had to do to beat us back to the end of the line, which is part of it,’’ said Elliott, who advanced to the All-Star Race via the fan vote.

Larson was aggressive on that final lap because he feared that if he finished second he wouldn’t advance to the All-Star Race via the fan vote.

“I had to use him up pretty good there,’’ Larson said of Elliott. “Feel bad about that. I feel like me and Chase race really well together. He’s always raced me clean, and I know I raced him dirty there, but I had to.’’

Saturday night saw Larson facing another nemesis in the Sprint All-Star Race.

Joey Logano.

Larson charged to the lead at the start of the final segment, but Logano stalked him. Logano passed Larson with two laps to go. Logano won $1 million. Larson bounced off the wall and finished 16th.

“I hate that I keep letting my team down,’’ Larson said. “I tried to hang on his quarter panel like I did with Chase earlier (in the Showdown). I got really loose as soon as I got in the corner. We were going so fast that I couldn’t correct it and ended up drilling the wall.

It’s not the first time that Logano has kept Larson from winning. In 2014, Larson finished runner-up three times. He finished second to Logano at New Hampshire and Kansas that year.

“He’s a heck of a racer,’’ Logano said about Larson. “He’s going to win a lot of races, that’s for sure, and it’s fun to race against him, and it’s fun to see the youth in this sport. For me, starting eight years ago now, to see guys that are close to my age now, and I get to race them for wins is a lot of fun.”

YOUTH MOVEMENT

The All-Star Race marked the eighth time in the last nine Sprint Cup races that at least one driver age 25 and younger has scored a top-five finish.

All-Star Race: Joey Logano (he turns 26 Tuesday) won.

Dover: Kyle Larson (age 23) finished second. Chase Elliott (20) placed third.

Kansas: Ryan Blaney (22) finished fifth.

Talladega: Elliott was fifth.

Richmond: No driver 25 and younger placed in the top five.

Bristol: Elliott was fourth. Trevor Bayne (25) placed fifth.

Texas: Logano placed third. Elliott was fifth.

Martinsville: Larson was third. Austin Dillon (was 25 at the time) placed fourth.

Auto Club: Logano was fourth.

STEP IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION

Days after a frank assessment of his team and season, Dale Earnhardt Jr. felt better after his third-place finish in the All-Star race.

Earnhardt is 11th in the points — the lowest he’s been in the points at this time of the season since 2010 — and said on his weekly podcast that “we’ve got to look ourselves in the mirror and really get to it here, figure out what’s going on and what we need to be doing, start really trying to find some speed and some answers.’’

Earnhardt noted on his podcast that the All-Star weekend wouldn’t solve all their issues but would be a start. After Saturday night’s race, Earnhardt was encouraged.

“For our team it’s a good step in the right direction to get more competitive,’’ he said. “A lot was made about the comments I made in the podcast on Monday. I just want the team to succeed and really like the crew and Greg (Ives, crew chief), and I think we can do it. We did it last year.

“We started this year off really awesome and hit a little rough patch, but this week was a great opportunity for us to learn, and I think we did. We had about 80 percent of the setup on the car was new stuff. So I hope Greg learned a lot. We didn’t get a lot of practice, so we had to learn as much as we could in the race, and I think we learned some stuff.’’

COVER BOY

By placing fourth and as the highest-finishing Toyota driver in the All-Star Race, Carl Edwards will be on the cover of the NASCAR Heat Evolution game for Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and PC. The game will debut Sept. 13.

Five Sprint Cup drivers taking part in tire test at Watkins Glen

Kevin Harvick, Joey Logano, Kasey Kahne, Carl Edwards and Trevor Bayne are taking part in a Goodyear tire test today and Wednesday at Watkins Glen International

The road course was repaved since the Cup series raced there last August.

Goodyear has two other tests in the coming weeks.

Richard Childress Racing, Chip Ganassi Racing, Richard Petty Motorsports and Furniture Row Racing each will have a team at Michigan International Speedway on May 17.

Hendrick Motorsports, Richard Petty Motorsports, Roush Fenway Racing and Joe Gibbs Racing each will have a team test May 31-June 1 at New Hampshire Motor Speedway.

Hendrick, Chevrolet most successful in first 15 years of racing at Kansas Speedway

The newest track on the Sprint Cup circuit is Kentucky Speedway, which has hosted five Cup races since 2011.

But 10 years before that, the new kid on the block was Kansas Speedway, the 1.5-mile track in Kansas City, Kansas, the series returns to for its 16th season this weekend for the GoBowling.com 400.

Saturday’s race marks the 21st race for the Cup series on the track. The very first one, held on Sept. 30, 2001, was won by Hendrick Motorsports’ Jeff Gordon in his No. 24 Chevrolet.

Over the following 14 seasons, that would be the scene that played out the most – a Chevrolet owned by Hendrick going to victory lane.

Six times in 20 races, a Hendrick car has won at Kansas Speedway. Gordon won the first two races and then claimed another in 2014 before retiring at the end of 2015.

Jimmie Johnson is the defending winner of Saturday’s race and has Hendrick’s other three wins, in 2008, 2011 and 2015.

“I really like the surface of the Kansas track and looking forward to a great race,” Johnson said in a press release. “Last year (Crew chief) Chad (Knaus) made a great call and we had a fast Lowe’s Chevy and the gamble paid off.”

Looking to bounce back from a dismal outing at Talladega is Dale Earnhardt Jr., whose best Kansas finish is second in 2011. He wound up third in last year’s spring race.

“That place has widened out pretty good and you can run against the fence there, which is a line that I like to run,” Earnhardt said in a press release. “It’s a very fast racetrack and very smooth – a lot of fun, so we should have a good time. We ran good there on the last several trips, so I anticipate us being very competitive.”

Chevrolet has won 10 of the 20 Kansas races, with Tony Stewart earning two (2006, 2009) with Joe Gibbs Racing and Stewart-Haas Racing. The remaining two victories were claimed by Joe Nemechek and Kevin Harvick while he was with Richard Childress Racing.

Ford has six wins and Toyota has two, but none since 2013.

The next most successful teams at Kansas are Roush Fenway Racing and Team Penske with four wins each. Penske has the most recent success, winning with Joey Logano in two of the last three races, both in the fall race held in the day.

Penske’s first Kansas win came with Ryan Newman in 2003 driving a Dodge. Now Newman is in a Chevrolet at RCR.

“It’s super-fast and it has a little bit of a goofy transition into Turn 1,” Newman said in a press release. “It just seems like it is a combination of downforce and horsepower to go fast. It’s super smooth so it doesn’t really matter so much how your car rides as much as how you have the tires loaded up in each corner and the overall grip you can get out of the car with the downforce.”

Roush’s last Kansas win came in 2012 with Matt Kenseth. The three-car team is looking for its first win since 2014 and has performed well on intermediate tracks so far in 2016, but Ricky Stenhouse Jr. has the only top-10 finish, placing 10th at Atlanta Motor Speedway. But he and teammate Trevor Bayne ran in the top 10 for much of the Texas race.

Stenhouse will be back with crew chief Nick Sandler this week after Sandler was suspended for the Talladega race for an unapproved steering wheel coupler.

“The tires usually don’t wear (at Kansas) so pit strategy becomes a factor because you want to minimize the amount of time you are on pit road,” Sandler said in a press release.

Trevor Bayne basks in the glory of being ‘in the game’ again at Talladega

TALLADEGA, Ala. – As NASCAR officials scurried between cars checking every wheel for five lug nuts, dozens of team members, reporters and driver’s family members waited on the pit wall at Talladega Superspeedway.

The delay took several moments after Sunday’s Geico 500, and it allowed for an unusual scene as the top finishers moved unencumbered between their cars to swap post-race tales of their good fortune over the course of a wild 500 miles on the 2.66-mile oval.

No one seemed to be having a better time than Trevor Bayne.

He debriefed at length about the closing laps with Ryan Blaney. He shared a laugh with Jamie McMurray and Austin Dillon. He entered a long conversation with past NASCAR champions Kurt Busch and Bobby Labonte, who offered an encouraging pat on the shoulder.

After finishing 10th and leading a career-best 22 laps – seven fewer than he led over 93 starts from 2011-15 – Bayne looked like he belonged Sunday.

More importantly, the 2011 Daytona 500 winner felt as if he did, too.

“We’re in the game,” Bayne said. “We’re not just out here taking up a spot. I feel like we’re in the race. We pushed Kurt to the lead there. It’s just fun to be in the game here.”

PODCAST: Hear Trevor Bayne candidly discussing his career and the 2016 season on the NASCAR on NBC podcast.

His No. 6 Ford was in the game at Talladega until the final restart with three laps to go. Bayne was third and on the inside line, delivering a massive push that briefly shot Kurt Busch into the lead past winner Brad Keselowski.

But as the action moved up the banking, Bayne was left on the bottom without any help. Blaney, his reliable drafting partner all day, had a badly damaged rear bumper that precluded him from riding shotgun.

“I NEED HELP!” Bayne screamed with two to go on the team radio as he nearly slipped from the lead draft. He recovered to salvage 10th with nary a drafting partner – a testament to the strength of his car.

“We probably had the fastest car here,” crew chief Matt Puccia said. “We knew we did on Friday in practice. We just played it safe and were just riding there. Got shuffled out at the end but great effort by this team, they’ve done a great job all year long.
“We came up short, but that’s Talladega. You have to be in the right lane at the right time. Really proud of these guys. They’re working hard week in and week out. We got one coming.”

It’s easy to shoulder the disappointment when everything seems to be trending in the correct direction.

Bayne’s second top 10 in 10 races of 2016 – tying his season-best total in Cup – moved him up two spots to 16th in points. The Roush Fenway Racing driver won’t need a miracle win to make the NASCAR playoffs for the first time at this rate.

But he will head to the July 2 race at Daytona International Speedway with the knowledge that he will bring a proven Ford that was among the only cars to emerge unscathed in a Talladega wreckfest.

“These races are gut wrenching from Lap 1 on, so I felt like that was the most calm race I’ve ever had,” he said. “I don’t have any damage on the Adovcare Ford. We’ll take it.”

Bayne took the lead for the last time on Lap 156 – six laps before the 21-car crash that wiped out much of his competition. He wisely had heeded the advice on his team radio to restrain himself – as difficult as it was for a 25-year-old who is 102 races removed from his last win (which came in only his second start).

“The car was really strong, but this place is all about patience,” Puccia said. “Even though you have a fast car, you can’t do it by yourself. You step out of line and get yourself in trouble real fast. He did a really good job staying patient, staying in line. It just didn’t work out for us

“But people have been talking about us all year long. We’ve had speed everywhere we’ve gone. That’s what we’ve got to carry on. We’ve got to keep progressing and moving the needle. That’s what we’re doing every week, and it’s starting to show. It’s a morale booster seeing how we ran today.”

And no one’s confidence seemed higher than Bayne, who seemed one of the guys inside and outside the car.

“It is so refreshing to come to the race track and have a chance,” he said. “I feel really good about the pieces they are giving me. It is all about the race cars. I’m surely proud of this team.”

Landon Cassill calls Harvick ’emotional,’ ‘thin skinned’ after comments about last-lap crash

Landon Cassill calls Harvick ’emotional,’ ‘thin skinned’ after comments about last-lap crash

After the conclusion of the GEICO 500 at Talladega Superspeedway, Kevin Harvick put the blame on a seven-car crash coming to the checkered flag on Landon Cassill of Front Row Motorsports.

Cassill made contact with Cole Whitt in the No. 98, starting an incident that included Harvick, AJ Allmendinger, Ricky Stenhouse Jr and Martin Truex Jr.

“Landon Cassill was trying to cause a wreck for the last 40 laps and he finally got it done there at the end,” Harvick told Fox after the race in which he finished 15th.

Cassill, who finished 11th, learned of the 2014 Sprint Cup champion’s comments on Twitter as he left the track, the driver told Jeremiah Davis of The Gazette in a phone interview.

Cassill told the paper the wreck incident was the result of the field not letting up coming to the checkered flag and said he “laughed off” the comments as an “emotional” reaction from Harvick, who he doesn’t take anything “personally” from.

“Because he’s got a reputation for being fairly emotional and can’t handle himself,” Cassill said. “He’ll get over it. Two of the last few superspeedway races ended under a huge wreck because of him. I find it kind of funny he’s mad at me. His reputation is pretty thin-skinned. That’s just who he is.”

Cassill mentioned the conclusions of both last year’s Coke Zero 400 at Daytona International Speedway and the fall race at Talladega, which saw Harvick at the epicenter of two wrecks that caused mayhem in the closing laps.

“You saw the 4 car, Kevin Harvick, wreck the whole field at Daytona last year in very similar fashion,” Cassill told The Gazette. “He drove right over the 11 car (Denny Hamlin) and that was the wreck that caused the 3 car (Austin Dillon) to go up in the grandstands. How are you supposed to say that’s anybody’s fault? It’s superspeedway racing, really.”

Then in the fall Talladega race, a wreck began on a restart attempt after Harvick made contact with Trevor Bayne right before the start-finish line. The resulting accident would pave the way for the new rules on Overtime finishes.

Cassill’s 11th-place finish is his best result this season.

NASCAR on NBC podcast, Episode XII: Trevor Bayne and Danica Patrick

Trevor Bayne’s undulating career path and Danica Patrick’s connection with kids are among the highlights of the latest NASCAR on NBC podcast.

Bayne joined the podcast before his Tuesday appearance on NASCAR America, discussing his wild ride after winning the 2011 Daytona 500. After winning NASCAR’s biggest race in one of the major upsets in history, Bayne suffered through health problems (eventually leading to a diagnosis of MS) and a lack of funding kept him from racing full time in 2012.

“I’ve got a very strange career so far,” he said. “Even just my first year, going from a victory to the hospital, I said, ‘We just went through 10 seasons worth of a drama in one year.’ ”

Bayne persevered and moved full time into NASCAR’s premier series last season with Advocare, a sponsorship that materialized after his chance meeting with the company’s president.

“It’s crazy how it worked out,” the No. 6 Ford driver. “Five months before, I didn’t know what Advocare was.

"I tell young drivers all the time how important relationships are, You never know who you’re talking to, and some of my biggest breaks in racing have come from talking to people who most of the time I didn’t know who they were and what they did.”

Bayne also discussed his renewed commitment to triathlon training, his throwback paint scheme tribute to Mark Martin for the Southern 500 and his improvement in the 2016 season. Some of his results can be credited to a working relationship with crew chief Matt Puccia, who has bonded with Bayne as the father of a newborn.

The second guest on the podcast is Danica Patrick, who joined by phone from Chicago where she was promoting a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles sponsorship. The Nickelodeon promotion, which is in conjunction with the Chase for the Sprint Cup opener at Chicagoland Speedway, is the latest chance for Patrick to connect with younger fans, who seem to be drawn to racing’s most successful female driver.

“I think it’s because I’m their size,” the 5-2 Patrick said with a laugh. “I actually do think it’s because I’m small, it helps.

“But I’m probably someone their parents have pointed out to tell them a good story that you can do whatever you want. Just because you’re a girl doesn’t mean you can’t do something that boys do.”

Patrick also discusses how it felt to have Tony Stewart back at the track, her 2016 season with new crew chief Billy Scott and the new NASCAR news on lug nuts (“I plead the fifth.”).

Finally, NASCAR Talk editor Dustin Long will join us after covering the past two races at Bristol Motor Speedway and Richmond International Raceway. Dustin provides insight on the repercussions of Carl Edwards’ winning bump on Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Kyle Busch and how Tony Stewart seemed in his return to racing after missing two months.

You can listen to the podcast by clicking below or download and subscribe to it on iTunes by clicking here. The free subscription will provide automatic downloads of new episodes to your smartphone. It also is available on Stitcher