That is how last year's Vegas Race ended for Jeff Gordon, arguably one of the hardest impact crashes you will see. This year Jeff Gordon is fully healthy and he is back at the track that almost ended his career.
Congrats first to Matt Kenseth for winning two straight races to start the season, no driver has ever won the first three though. If you look at that video you will notice that with five laps to go, Kenseth was in position to possibly claim victory before Gordon tapped him. He wound up finishing 20th after leading 70 laps.
So could this be history this weekend? Kenseth is a two-time winner at this track, winning in 03 & 04. In nine races at this track, Kenseth has four top 5 finishes and has led more laps than any other driver. Who is going to stop him, assuming he can get out of his own way first, starting 40th this week.
Well for beginners, there is Jeff Gordon again. Gordon almost caught Kenseth in the last few laps last weekend, but wound up finishing second. Gordon is looking like the driver from 2001, the last time he won in Vegas and also went on to claim the Championship. An average qualifying spot might be too much for him to overcome though this week.
Let's take a look at how the I see the top 5 finishing.
1- Jeff Burton: Burton already has two wins at this track in its 11 year history, but that hasn't been since 2000. Burton starts 14th on Sunday and only four times has the race winner started in the top ten. Burton is struggling to start this season but can quickly turn things around. Burton finished 5th last year and has the most points at this track over the past ten years.
2- Mark Martin: The fan favorite won the inaugural race here in Vegas and hasn't won a race since Kansas in 2005. The guy has nine top 10 finishes in 11 races at this track and it helps that he is starting 8th. Better to be ahead early and often.
3- Denny Hamlin: You have to expect one of Joe Gibbs guys to be up at the front at the end. Kyle Busch is going to the back of the pack after changing he engine although he got the pole so Gibbs second best driver, Hamlin will have to carry the workload for this team. Fortunately Hamlin has the second best average finish out of all drivers in the circuit, only behind Mark Martin.
4- Greg Biffle: My reasoning on this one is that he is quietly near the front in every race. Last week he had the fastest car but his pitting blunder caused him the race most likely. Biffle finishes what he starts so you can expect him to be around at the end. I like a hot team and I like Biffle.
5- Tony Stewart: Stewart has never won in Vegas but has finished in the top 5 four times. More than half of Tony's 33 wins have come on 1.5 tracks. His race team seems to be leaps and bounds ahead of the rest of the start up teams. One thing is for sure is that Tony knows how to race a car and as long as the thing has four wheels on it, you can expect Tony to drive... the wheels off it.
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