NASCAR Sprint Cup Series News and Notes – Friday, June 17, 2016

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F4R-SCS-News-Notes

NASCAR Sprint Cup Series teams are on a well-deserved break this weekend and will return to action Sunday, June 26th at Sonoma Raceway for the Save Mart 350. Television coverage starts at 2 pm ET on FOX Sports 1 with the green flag waving at around 3 pm ET for 110 laps covering 218.9 miles on the California road course. Radio coverage is on PRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, channel 90.

Logano Captures First Win of Season; Becomes Tenth Different Race Winner

Joey Logano led 138-of-200 laps on his way to Victory Lane in Sunday’s FireKeepers Casino 400 at Michigan International Speedway for his first win of the 2016 season.
The No. 22 Team Penske Ford driver became the tenth different winner in 15 races this year and posted a near-perfect 149.2 driver rating. His triumph marked the 100th victory for Roush-Yates Engines. Continue reading

Logano is Two-for-Two with New Aero Package

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In the second race that featured NASCAR’s new lower-downforce package, Joey Logano lowered the boom—again. 

There was one major difference between Joey Logano’s victory in Sunday’s FireKeepers 400 at Michigan International Speedway and his win May 21 in the Sprint All-Star Race at Charlotte. This one counted in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series standings and punched Logano’s ticket into the Chase.

But it remained abundantly clear that Team Penske already has a handle on the aerodynamic configuration the sanctioning body is considering for 2017.
Continue reading

Dale Earnhardt Jr. Overachieves for Runner-Up Finish at Pocono

Photo - Matt Hazlett/Getty Images

Approximately halfway through the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series final green-flag run on Monday at Pocono Raceway, crew chief Greg Ives radioed to driver Dale Earnhardt Jr.

“The 41 (leader Kurt Busch) needs to save (fuel) to make it. We do not. Go get him!”

But over the closing laps, the handling of Earnhardt’s car tightened up, and he was unable to track down Busch, even though the eventual race winner was in fuel-conservation mode.

Earnhardt thought he could have been more effective in keeping Busch behind him after the final restart. Continue reading

Chase Elliott Strong at Pocono but Settles for Fourth

Photo - Sean Gardner/Getty Images

Photo – Sean Gardner/Getty Images

For a while during Monday’s NASCAR Sprint Cup Series, Axalta ‘We Paint Winners’ 400 at Pocono (Pa.) Raceway, it appeared that Chase Elliott would score his first career victory, but when the checkered flag waved, the Hendrick Motorsports rookie settled for fourth.

Elliott, the 2014 NASCAR XFINITY Series champion saw his winning chances disappear following a restart when he was battling teammate Dale Earnhardt Jr. for the race lead. An aggressive move in the tricky Tunnel Turn forced Elliott to burp the gas, which allowed Kurt Busch who was riding third to pass the Hendrick Motorsports duo and never look back. Continue reading

Saving Fuel Gets Kurt Busch a Sprint Cup Win at Pocono

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Working with a substitute crew chief, and saving enough fuel to get to the finish line and complete a celebratory burnout, Kurt Busch won Monday’s rain-delayed Axalta ‘We Paint Winners’ 400 at Pocono Raceway.

Busch won for the first time this year in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series and for the third time at Pocono, a 2.5-mile speedway featuring three widely different corners. And Busch claimed his 28th victory in NASCAR’s premier series with race engineer John Klausmeier leading the team in place of crew chief Tony Gibson, who was serving a one-race suspension for a lug nut violation last week at Charlotte.

Told he was two laps short at the start of the last 33-lap green-flag run, Busch saved enough fuel to get to the finish while keeping race runner-up Dale Earnhardt Jr. behind him. Continue reading