Power Rankings: Figuring out where to slot Tony Stewart
1. Kurt Busch (LW: 1): The Kurt Busch top-10 train is still on the tracks. Busch got his 14th top-10 finish in the first 16 races by finishing 10th. He qualified fourth, though quickly fell towards the back of the top 10 once the race got going. Busch said his struggles were because of a lack of rear grip; something that’s imperative at Sonoma.
2. Joey Logano (LW: 4): We don’t blame you if you looked up at the end of Sunday’s race and went “Wait, Joey Logano was third?” His drive to the front was overshadowed by the battle between Denny Hamlin and Tony Stewart. Logano now has top-seven finishes in his last five road course races. And he’s the defending champion at Watkins Glen, the only other road course race on the schedule.
3. Kevin Harvick (LW: 3): Much like his teammate Busch, Harvick not-so-stunningly got a top 10 on Sunday. But Harvick didn’t start near the front. After starting mid-pack, Harvick had to finish sixth with a combination of pit strategy and passing a bunch of cars.
4. Martin Truex Jr. (LW: 6): Truex looked like he was going to be Stewart’s biggest challenger over the race’s final 20 laps. But it quickly became apparent that he needed to play defense against Denny Hamlin and Kyle Busch instead of going after Stewart. After Hamlin got by, Truex lost spots to Carl Edwards and Logano over the race’s final 10 laps.
5. Brad Keselowski (LW: 5): Keselowski finished 15th on Sunday, his third-best finish in seven Sonoma starts. His best finish at the road course is 10th, and that happened in his second start. Since then, he’s gone 12th, 21st, 22nd, 19th and now 15th.
6. Chase Elliott (LW: 3): Elliott certainly had a weekend of learning at Sonoma. It was his first competitive trip to the road course so he spent the weekend doing double duty with the K&N Pro Series West race. He won that after starting on the pole and ended up 21st in the Cup Series race.
7. Carl Edwards (LW: 8): Edwards had the fastest car through Friday and Saturday but didn’t end up with enough long-run speed to claim the title on Sunday. He finished fourth after a flurry of late passes and led 24 of the race’s 110 laps. Four drivers led 20 or more laps while Danica Patrick was No. 5 on the laps led chart with three.
8. Tony Stewart (LW: NR): This seems about right for Stewart after a win, doesn’t it? As we said on Sunday night, he’d be 16th in the points standings if he had run all the races and he gets an immediate post-win boost. Stewart celebrated the win by shooting off a metric crap ton of fireworks on Monday night in Indiana. How do we know that? He put the festivities on Periscope. You know he’s happy when he’s utilizing Periscope.
9. Jimmie Johnson (LW: 9): Johnson finished 13th, but it certainly looked for a long while that Johnson and crew chief Chad Knaus had outsmarted the competition when it came to pit strategy. The No. 48 hit pit road on the first caution of the day for fresh tires. Hitting pit road on lap eight not only meant Johnson could charge through the field, it also meant he had offset his pit strategy enough to gain a bunch of track position via green flag pit stops. It ultimately didn’t work after there were just two more sets of green flag stops the rest of the race.
10. Kyle Larson (LW: 10): With the way Larson is running and qualifying, we’re at the stage in his career where virtually every week will have a “Is this the week Kyle Larson wins a race?” article from a media outlet. No, Sunday was obviously not that week, though Larson finished 12th after starting fifth. Daytona may not be the best place for a “Is this the week?” post, but expect more of them at Kentucky, especially if he qualifies well.
11. Matt Kenseth (LW: 7): Kenseth was the slowest of the four Joe Gibbs Racing Toyotas. Or of the five Toyotas if you want to count Martin Truex Jr. Kenseth ended up finishing 20th and is still looking for his second top-10 finish at Sonoma. In 17 career starts, Kenseth’s best finish is eighth, though he’s finished in the top 20 on 12 occasions.
12. Denny Hamlin (LW: NR): Hamlin has shown speed at Sonoma before, so it wasn’t an incredible shock to see him lead 33 laps on Sunday. And the more we think about Sunday’s race, the more we’re wondering just how much of a no-win situation Hamlin was in entering turn 11 on the last lap. Had he taken a defensive line on the inside he would have likely gotten punted out of the way by Stewart as he would have been forced to brake earlier to defend his position.
Likely recogonizing that, Hamllin went aggressively into the corner. But he drove in too aggressively and missed the corner altogether, opening the door for Stewart.
Lucky Dog: We almost had a three-way tie for 12th. Kyle Busch finished seventh after a porous stretch of races and Dale Earnhardt Jr. was the fastest he’s ever been throughout an entire weekend at Sonoma. His finish just didn’t reflect that speed after he got caught three-wide with Edwards and Logano and suffered significant left-front damage.
The DNF: Clint Bowyer is having a rough season.
Dropped Out: Austin Dillon
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Nick Bromberg is the editor of From The Marbles on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter!
