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| Chase Elliott won at Dover last fall. |
Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series
Next Race: Gander RV 400
The Place: Dover International Speedway
The Date: Sunday, May 5
The Time: 2 p.m. ET
TV: FS1, 1:30 p.m. ET
Radio: MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio
Distance: 400 miles (400 Laps); Stage 1 (Ends on Lap 120),
Stage 2 (Ends on Lap 240), Final Stage (Ends on Lap 400)
2018 Winner: Kevin Harvick
Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series
Kyle Busch is at a record pace
Kyle Busch is not only pacing the 2019 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series in victories (three) this season, but his 10-consecutive top-10 finishes through the opening 10 races has only been accomplished by four other drivers – Lee Petty (1955), James Hylton (1972), Cale Yarborough (1974), Morgan Shepherd (1990) – and hasn’t been done in 29 years. The Joe Gibbs Racing driver, who celebrates his 34th birthday on Thursday, has 12 consecutive top-10 finishes going back to the end of the 2018 season.
And this week’s Gander RV 400 at Dover International Speedway (Sunday, 2 p.m. ET on FS1, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) may well be a place for Busch to further pad his numbers. He has 12 total NASCAR national series victories at the famed one-miler, including three in the Monster Energy Series, five in the NASCAR Xfinity Series and four in the NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series.
He has 17 top-10 finishes and 12 top-five showings in 28 series starts, including a series-best four more runner-up finishes in the past four seasons in addition to his three wins. Only the track’s all-time best Jimmie Johnson has more top-fives (17) or top-10s (24). Busch, who drives the No. 18 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota Camry, has led laps in six of the last eight races. He won the pole position in the Playoff race at Dover last Fall and won the 2017 Playoff race at the track, however he finished 35th after a drivetrain problem in this spring race at Dover last year.
An 11th consecutive top-10 finish this week would tie a mark set in 1990 by Morgan Shepherd who began the season with 11 top 10s. Busch continues to lead the Monster Energy Series championship driver standings. He’s now 15-points up on Joey Logano and boasts the most stage wins (five) of the series.
“I love that place,’’ Busch said of Dover’s Monster Mile. “It’s fun to race there and it’s a place I’m looking forward to going to with our Toyota Camry. I went there when I was 18 to race in the Xfinity Series for my first time. It will scare you the first time you race there. You carry so much speed at that racetrack and, for it to be a mile in length and for it to be concrete – concrete surfaces that we race on, anyway – are a little bit slick.
“It’s definitely a rollercoaster ride and you need to treat it like it’s fun and not to be scared of the place, I think, because you can get so much out of that place. There are two ways about it – you can probably be really, really good there, or really, really bad there. Some days are going to be better than others, obviously, with how you can get your car set up compared to the competition.”
Chasing Hendrick Motorsport’s Chase Elliott
Chase Elliott’s dramatic victory at Talladega Superspeedway last Sunday not only secured a Playoff berth for the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series’ reigning Most Popular Driver, but it was a huge boost of early season confidence for the 23-year old from Georgia.
Elliott returns to Dover International Speedway this week as the most recent winner at the Monster Mile. He scored a Playoff win here last October and has been nothing short of amazing in his young career at the track. He has five top-five finishes in six series races. His “worst” showing is 12th in this race last year. Watch for him to be upfront as his 4.3 average finish is best in the series as is his 8.24 average running position.
The victory last Sunday was the fourth of Elliott’s four-year Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series career. He’s. seventh in the championship standings, only four points behind 2017 series champ Martin Truex Jr.
“What kind of stands out to me, I just love Dover, because when you win Dover, you've done something,’’ Elliott’s crew chief Alan Gustafson said, looking ahead after the Talladega win.
“That's a tough, fast track. There's no place to hide. There's no way you can get away with not being on the edge all day.’’
Truex loves coming home to Dover
Martin Truex Jr. heads to Dover International Speedway feeling both comfortable and optimistic. The New Jersey native considers Dover as close to a “home track” as he has. And it has long been a sentimental favorite as well, considering it’s where Truex scored his first career Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series win in June of 2007. He added another trophy is 2016 and shows up this weekend already with a victory on the season – scoring his first career short track win at Richmond Raceway three weeks ago.
Since a disappointing 35th-place showing in the season-opening Daytona 500, Truex has steadily made his way up the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series standings. The new Joe Gibbs Racing team driver has a pair of runner-up showings (at Atlanta and Phoenix) in the No. 19 Toyota Camry and is currently sixth in the championship rankings, only nine points behind fifth place Brad Keselowski.
Truex has five top-10s and four top-fives in the last six Dover races, leading 387 laps in that time. He hasn’t started farther back than the fourth row in the last eight races. He’s won at the track in the Xfinity Series too – scoring two of his 13 career wins there (in 2004 and 2005).
He said he expects Sunday’s race to be more unpredictable than past versions.
“Dover is going to be a tough race, I think,’’ Truex said. “The speeds are going to be really high. I'm sure it will be the fastest we've ever been around Dover and 400 laps there is tough no matter what. I think it's going to be pretty crazy.
“Hopefully we'll be able to do some passing and hopefully the dirty air deal is not terrible. I think track position will be important, but the speeds are going to be tough. It's going to be demanding. Bristol was pretty crazy. I thought it was just because of how hard you had to drive the car every lap. As fast as Dover is, I think feel wise, it's probably the fastest place we go. So, it's going to be an eye opener for some guys.”
Harvick has some ground to make up
Kevin Harvick grimaced answering reporters’ questions last weekend following an early and unexpected exit from the Talladega Superspeedway race. The Stewart-Haas Racing driver and perennial championship contender was collected in a wreck only 11 laps into last Sunday’s event and suffered a season worse 38th-place finish.
But Harvick arrives at Dover International Speedway, the defending race winner of Sunday’s Gander RV 400 (2 p.m. ET on FS1, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) and more than ready to correct his season trajectory.
He led a series best 487 laps in the two 2018 races on the Monster Mile, winning in the spring and finishing sixth during the Fall Playoff race. He has six top-five and 17 top-10 finishes in 36 starts – earning five top-10s since joining SHR in 2014.
In 2015, Harvick led an amazing 355 of the 400 laps to earn his first victory at Dover. During a five race stretch from 2014-16, he led 810 laps at the track – 56% of his 1,442-career total.
Harvick crashed out in both of this season’s superspeedway races (in the season-opening Daytona 500 and at Talladega) but is still ranked fourth in the championship thanks to top-10 finishes in seven of the other eight races. The driver of the No. 4 Stewart-Haas Racing Ford Mustang has four finishes of fourth-place this season.
Dover is a vital venue for Jimmie Johnson
Seven-time Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series champion Jimmie Johnson returns to the site of his most recent victory – Dover International Speedway, where he is the sport’s all-time winningest driver with 11 victories. It’s that last one, in the spring of 2017, that is most noteworthy as the series returns to the tough one-mile concrete track this week. That was his last series win and marks the first time in his illustrious 83-victory, Hall of Fame-bound career that he has gone an entire season (2018) without a trophy.
Technically, the 43-year old Californian hoisted one already this year as winner of the exhibition “The Clash” race at Daytona International Speedway to kick off Daytona Speedweeks. But Johnson is eager to return to his historic winning ways and with his history at Dover, this week may present an ideal opportunity.
Johnson leads the competition with 24 top-10 and 17 top-five finishes in 34 starts at Dover. He has 11 wins, including this very first two visits to the track in 2002. He swept the 2009 season as well and won back-to-back in 2013-14 too – the only driver in the field to win back-to-back races at Dover. He boasts the series-best driver rating (114.4) heading into the weekend and the top average running position (8.835) among those with more than six starts at the track.
The driver of the No. 48 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 has a pair of top 10s in the three races since his win, including a ninth place in this race last year a third place in the 2017 Fall race.
He’s led a series best 3,105 laps total at Dover but is looking to lead his first since the 2017 season.
Johnson is coming off a tough Talladega Superspeedway race, finishing 33rd, which dropped him from 13th to 16th in the series championship driver standings.
Change of Pace: Bowyer, Hamlin looking for first Dover win
Stewart-Haas Racing driver Clint Bowyer and Joe Gibbs Racing driver Denny Hamlin arrive in Dover, Delaware with a statistic they’d like to quickly alter. The two perennial championship contenders have made the most Dover starts (26) in this weekend’s field without a win.
Half the current members of the Championship Top 16 are still looking for their victory at the Monster Mile, but none of the other active competitors have gone this long without a trophy. Bowyer, the driver of the No. 14 Stewart-Haas Racing Ford Mustang, has 14 top-10 finishes at Dover, but only three top-five showings – his best finish, however, came in this race last year - runner-up to SHR teammate Kevin Harvick. Bowyer’s 13.3 average finish is fourth best among the top-16 ranked drivers and his 89.8 driver rating is eighth best. Bowyer has a pair of Xfinity Series wins at the track as well.
Hamlin, driver of the No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota Camry, has won three poles at the track (second-most among active drivers), but his average finish of 17.385 is only 13th best in the field. His best showing (runner-up) came in last season’s Dover Playoff race. He has five top-10 finishes in the last six Dover races. Plus, he owns a pair of Xfinity trophies at Dover, winning back-to-back races in 2007-08.
“Ever since I’ve been at SHR, we’ve seemed to have some really good cars at Dover,” Bowyer said. “We’ve been so close to taking home that Miles The Monster (a replica of the track’s 46-foot mascot) trophy. I hope we are just as good this weekend. If we are, then we have as good of a chance as anyone. You’ve got to fight this ‘monster’ every lap. I won a couple of Xfinity races there — haven’t won a Cup race — but love this racetrack.”
Sunoco Rookie Optimism
After enduring an expected learning curve in recent weeks two of the Sunoco Rookie of the Year candidates scored big time at Talladega Superspeedway last week. Both Ryan Preece and Daniel Hemric left Alabama with career best showings in the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series.
JTG-Daugherty Racing’s Ryan Preece answered a top-10 in the season-opening Daytona 500 with a third-place finish at Talladega just off the bumpers of fellow Chevrolets, race winner Chase Elliott and runner-up Alex Bowman. Richard Childress Racing driver Daniel Hemric finished a career best fifth for the first top-10 of his career. His previous best showing in 2019 was 18th at Phoenix.
Both Preece and Hemric have reason to be optimistic about Dover’s notoriously tough “Monster Mile.” Preece has a best showing of fourth-place in last year’s Fall Xfinity race. Hemric has three previous top-10s in the Xfinity Series there, including a career-best third-place finish in the spring race last year and a pole position for the Fall, 2018 race. He also scored a pair of top-10s competing in the NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series – fourth in 2015 and ninth in 2016.
Front Row Motorsports’ rookie Matt Tifft is still looking for his first series top 10, but like Preece and Hemric, he boasts a solid resume at Dover. He has four top-10 finishes in the Xfinity Series there, including a career-best of sixth in Fall, 2017.
Parade Laps: Insights ahead of this week’s driver media rotations
Six drivers from the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series – Germain Racing’s Ty Dillon, Hendrick Motorsport’s Alex Bowman, Stewart-Haas Racing’s Kevin Harvick, Richard Childress Racing’s Austin Dillon, Chip Ganassi Racing’s Kyle Larson and Front Row Motorsport’s Michael McDowell will be participating in this week’s media rotations at Dover International Speedway in advance of Sunday’s Gander RV 400 (2 p.m. ET on FS1, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
Ty Dillon, 27, of Lewisville, N.C., tallied the most laps (seven) out front this season last Sunday at Talladega Superspeedway en route to a 17th-place finish – his fifth top-20 effort in 2019. The grandson of NASCAR Hall of Famer Richard Childress, Dillon has one top-10 – a sixth-place finish in the Daytona 500 – for his No. 13 Germain Racing team. In five starts at the notoriously tough Dover International Speedway, he has a single top-15 finish – 14th in this race two years ago. He led 27 laps in the race – the only time he has paced the field at Dover.
Alex Bowman, 26, of Tucson, Ariz., shows up in Dover fresh off his best career finish – a runner-up showing to Hendrick Motorsports teammate Chase Elliott at Talladega last Sunday. It’s his only top-10 finish of the season. He started on the outside of the front row for the Daytona 500 and his 11th-place finish in the race was his previous best showing of 2019. Bowman has one previous top-20 finish at Dover – a 20th in the Spring, 2015 race when he was driving for Tommy Baldwin Racing. He finished 23rd and 28th in his Hendrick Motorsports full season debut at Dover last year.
Kevin Harvick, 43, of Bakersfield, Calif., is coming off his worst showing of 2019 – a 38th-place finish at Talladega after being collected in a crash only 11 laps into the race. An eight-time race winner in 2018, Harvick is still looking for his first victory this season. He has four top fives this season – all fourth-place showings for the driver of the No. 4 Stewart-Haas Racing Ford Mustang. He won the pole position at Las Vegas and two weeks ago at Richmond, where his fourth-place finish is his last top-10 in a three-race stretch. Dover’s “Monster Mile” may well prove a venue where Harvick returns to Victory Lane. He is the defending race winner, has two career wins there and three top-10 finishes in the last four races. He’s led 1,442 laps in his career at Dover, including a five-race streak between 2014-16 when he led 810 laps – or 56 percent of the five-race total. He led 487 laps in last year’s two races – winning in this race and finishing fourth in the Playoff race.
Austin Dillon, 29, of Lewisville, N.C., earned his third 14th-place finish of the season last Sunday at Talladega. He won the pole for the race – his second of the season (also at Fontana, Calif.) – and his best race finish this season was a sixth at Richmond two weeks ago. The driver of the famed No. 3 RCR Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 for his grandfather’s Richard Childress Racing team has never led a lap at Dover in 11 starts but is coming off his best career finish at Dover – seventh last Fall.
Kyle Larson, 26, Elk Grove, Calif. is coming off a dramatic finish at Talladega, crashing on the white flag lap and having to settle for a 24th-place finish after a strong run all afternoon in the No. 42 Chip Ganassi Racing Chevrolet Camaro ZL1. Larson has been caught up in crashes in three of the last four races coming to Dover. More typically considered a legitimate championship contender, he has had only two top-10 finishes in 2019 – a seventh in the season-opening Daytona 500 and a sixth at Phoenix two weeks later. Dover has been a good venue for Larson, however. He has two runner-up finishes – in the spring 2016 and 2017 races. He has also led a combined 378 laps in the two 2017 season races – finishing second and fifth. In this race last year, he won the pole position and finished 10th.
Michael McDowell, 34, of Phoenix, Arizona started the season with a headline-making fifth place showing in the Daytona 500, but has six finishes since of 30th-place or worse. He’s crashed out of the last two races and finished last in the 40-car field at Talladega last Sunday. While he is still looking for his first top 10 on Dover’s “Monster Mile” he turned in his best showing (19th) at the track in the 2017 spring race.
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