Homestead notebook no. 1: The championships are all cut and dried
Friday, November 20th, 2009
Jimmie Johnson (left) is the only driver with any competition for a NASCAR series championship in this weekend’s trio of races at Homestead. Also pictured: Kurt Busch, who only has to start Saturday’s race in order to win the Nationwide Series title, and Ron Hornaday, who has already clinched the Camping World Truck Series title.
HOMESTEAD, Fla. - There may not be much of a race for the Sprint Cup championship, but it’s the only one left as NASCAR closes its season at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
Jimmie Johnson’s comfortable margin the Sprint Cup Series is the only one left to defend on what is, optimistically as it turns out, billed as Ford Championship Weekend.
Ron Hornaday’s fourth championship has already been clinched in the Camping World Truck Series, and all Kyle Busch has to do is start (which, of course, he will) in the Nationwide Series. The former completes its season with Friday’s Ford 200, and the latter closes down after Saturday’s Ford 300.
Mark Martin will have to gain 109 points on Johnson to win the Cup championship in the (predictably) Ford 400, and that’s about as likely as the Buffalo Bills coming back to make the NFL playoffs.
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MEANS SOMETHING HERE–No Ford driver has won the championship since Kurt Busch in 2004, and it won’t happen this year either, but Roush Fenway Racing has claimed the last five Ford 400s.
Greg Biffle won the season finale in 2004, ‘05 and ‘06. Matt Kenseth won in ‘07 and Carl Edwards in ‘08. Jack Roush has been the owner of six Homestead winners overall.
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TRACK HISTORY— Homestead-Miami Speedway hosted its first race in what is now the Nationwide Series in 1995. The now-Sprint Cup Series made its first visit in 1999, and the track began hosting the final races in all three touring series in 2002.
The track has always been 1.5 miles, but it opened as a track with four distinct turns, similar to Indianapolis Motor Speedway but shorter. Those four turns, laid out in a smaller space, created turning angles deemed dangerous, and the turns were rounded when the track was reconfigured for the first time prior to inclusion on the Cup schedule.
The banking of the turns was changed - tapered from 18 degrees on the bottom to 20 at the top - in 2003.
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ROOM AT THE TOP–Hendrick Motorsports drivers Johnson, Martin and Jeff Gordon have combined to win 13 races. Tony Stewart, whose team derives its chassis and engines from Hendrick, has won five more.
Combined, that’s 51.4 percent of the races to date.
The biggest casualty of Hendrick-Chevy domination has been Roush Fenway Racing, whose victory total has plummeted from 11 in 2008 to three so far this year.