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| The Brickyard has four equally flat, tight turns. |
Next Race: Big Machine Vodka 400 at the Brickyard
The Place: Indianapolis Motor Speedway
The Date: Sunday, September 9
The Time: 2 p.m. ET
TV: NBCSN, 1 p.m. ET
Radio: IMS Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio
Distance: 400 miles (160 Laps); Stage 1 (Ends on Lap 50),
Stage 2 (Ends on Lap 100), Final Stage (Ends on Lap 160)
Team Penske Is Hitting On All Cylinders
Team Penske’s 1-2 finish Sunday night at Darlington (S.C.) Raceway was not only historic in the big picture, but course-corrective in the near future. The team shows up at Indianapolis Motor Speedway for Sunday’s Brickyard 400 (at 2 p.m. ET on NBCSN, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) feeling as confident as ever at team owner Roger Penske’s most decorated venue.
Penske has 17 Indianapolis 500 wins – including one this May - but is still looking for his first victory in the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series’ crown jewel event at the track – now the sport’s regular season finale.
Of the three Team Penske drivers, Joey Logano boasts the best Indianapolis record with six top-10 finishes in nine starts in the No. 22 Ford, including three top-five finishes in the last four years.
Sunday’s Darlington winner Brad Keselowski has four top-10 finishes in eight Indianapolis starts. The driver of the No. 2 Ford turned in his best Indianapolis Motor Speedway finish last year, finishing runner-up. His 99 laps led – over six races – is the most time out front for the Penske trio.
Ryan Blaney, driver of the No. 12 Team Penske Ford, has been the victim of some tough Indianapolis luck. He has DNFs in two of his three starts – including the past two years. However, Blaney led his first laps at the track last year and finished third in both the first and second stages before being eliminated in a crash in overtime.
Keselowski and Logano (Talladega) both have wins heading into the 10-race Playoffs, which begin next week in Las Vegas, while Blaney has secured his Playoff berth with a 12th-place season ranking.
7-Time Go-Time
Seven-time Monster Energy Series champion Jimmie Johnson heads into Indianapolis already in possession of four race-winning trophies (2006, 2008-09, 2012). But this season, he suits up at the historic track eager to snap a season-long winless streak at the venue where he’s won more than any of the other active competitors – and double that of any driver entered this weekend.
Johnson has six top-three finishes in 16 starts, including a runner-up in 2013 to add to his four-trophy haul. But the veteran is looking to lead his first lap at the track since that runner-up finish. He finished 27th in 2017 after being caught up in a crash while racing for the lead – part of a tough streak of three DNFs (at Kentucky, Indy and Pocono) in a span of four races.
But Johnson has proven himself to be a master of the “Big Races,” the “Crown Jewels” of the sport – winning the Daytona 500, Southern 500, Coca-Cola 600 and Brickyard 400 a combined total of 12 times. He is one of only four drivers to have won all four of those races.
The Big 3 In Indy
It’s a been two races since one of the Monster Energy Series’ “Big 3” last hoisted a trophy – the longest streak of the season between victories for championship leader and six-time winner Kyle Busch, seven-time winner Kevin Harvick and four-time winner Martin Truex Jr.
But the trio arrives in Indianapolis with plenty of reason to feel optimistic about righting their dominating ship. Busch has won two of the last three Brickyard 400s – sweeping the Xfinity Series and Monster Energy Series races in both 2015 and 2016. He has 10 top-10 finishes in 15 Indy starts. He won the first two stages last year but crashed with Truex late in the race.
Harvick won the 2003 Brickyard 400 from the pole position. He has 11 top-10 finishes in 17 starts including the past four years. His best finish in that span was a third place in 2015.
Truex is the only member of the “Big 3” still looking for that first Indianapolis Motor Speedway victory. In fact, the tough 2.5-oval has been a challenging venue for the reigning Monster Energy Series champion. He has three top-10 finishes in 13 starts and has led only 11 laps total. His only top five – a fourth-place in the No. 78 Furniture Row Racing Toyota – came in 2015. He and Busch crashed out together last year.
Don’t Count Out Menard, Newman and Kahne
Three times since 2010, the Brickyard 400 winner hoisted his only trophy of the season at Indianapolis. And for those three drivers – Paul Menard, Ryan Newman and Kasey Kahne – a win Sunday would be a game-changer, vaulting them into the Playoffs after a sub-16th place ranking for the regular season.
Menard won his first – and, so far, only – Monster Energy Series race at Indianapolis in 2011. It is the only top-five in the race for the driver of the No. 21 Wood Brothers Ford. He has two career top 10s, a 10th-place in 2016 in addition to his stunning victory.
Newman’s 2013 triumph – from the pole position – was a day of much glory for the Indiana native. It was his only win of the season and qualified him for the Playoffs in his last season driving for Stewart-Haas Racing.
And Kahne’s win last year in his final season with the Hendrick Motorsports team was as dramatic and heartfelt as they come. Only 19 of the 40 cars were running at the end of the race, which concluded in near-darkness. It was a trophy with great meaning for Kahne, who won two Night Before the 500 USAC races coming up the ranks and was runner-up in the 2005 Brickyard race.
Larson Is So Close
At only 26-years old and a strong weekly contender, Kyle Larson has proven himself full of talent and this season…also full of resiliency. The popular Chip Ganassi Racing driver led a dominating 284 of Sunday’s 367 laps at Darlington only to finish third behind Team Penske teammates Keselowski and Logano.
It’s the third time this season the Californian has led at least 100 laps in a race and not won. In fact, for all his effort – 14 top-10s and eight top-fives in 25 starts – Larson is still looking for his first trophy of 2018. For one of the sport’s most diverse racers, Indianapolis certainly would be a prime place to score that first win of the year.
Larson has three top-10s in four starts at IMS. He leads all drivers in percentage of laps run among the top-15 (88.9 percent) and boasts the best average running position (9.8) among those drivers with more than one start.
His team owner Chip Ganassi has five Indianapolis 500 wins and won the 2010 Brickyard 400 with Larson’s teammate Jamie McMurray.
Sunoco Rookie Promise
Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Sunoco rookie William Byron is the only driver entered in the Brickyard 400 that can boast a perfect record at the notoriously tough Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Byron won the NASCAR Xfinity Series race at the track last year in his only start at the famed facility. He led the last 16 laps and took a .108-second victory over former Brickyard 400 winner Paul Menard and perennial Cup championship favorite Joey Logano.
Byron could use a little of that positive juju. He finished 35th last week at Darlington Raceway, retiring his No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet with engine problems. After back-to-back top-10 finishes at Watkins Glen, N.Y. (sixth) and Pocono, Pa. (eighth) a month ago, he has three finishes of 23rd or worse since; two of them 30th or worse. He’s still 22nd in the points standings, despite the recent troubles and leads the Sunoco Rookie of the Year race over Bubba Wallace.
Wallace, meanwhile, has also suffered through a tough summer stretch. He is looking for his first top-20 since a 14th-place finish at Daytona in July. He’s crashed out in two of the last five races and is coming off a 26th-place finish at Darlington last week. He has finishes of 23rd (2015) and 14th (2016) in two Xfinity starts at Indy.
RACE REWIND
Last year’s Brickyard 400 was the second-longest one in the event’s 24-year history – going 418 miles instead of the scheduled 400. Kasey Kahne won under caution, beating Brad Keselowski, Ryan Newman, Joey Logano and Matt Kenseth. Sixteen cars were on the lead lap.
Kahne’s win in the No. 5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet came from the 19th starting position and was the farthest back a winner has come since Tony Stewart won the race in 2005 after starting 22nd.
It was the first win for Chevrolet since Jeff Gordon’s victory for the same Hendrick Motorsports organization in 2014. Chevrolet is the all-time winning make in the race with 17 wins in 24 races, including 12 consecutive victories between 2003-2014.
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