"Wiiings Over The Irish Hills--Brian Vickers Wins The CARFAX 400"

Our winner's snapshot is of Brian Vickers' Red Bull Toyota Camry getting fueled after winning at Michigan International Speedway. This happens as part of the post race inspection. As you saw by our Tweets (you did sign up to follow us at http://twitter.com/MSRnet ,right?) Vickers won when then leader Jimmie Johnson's gamble on fuel came up a few laps short. Jeff Gordon and Dale Earnhardt, Jr finished 2nd and 3rd.

This is the first ever win for Red Bull Racing in NASCAR Sprint Cup competition. It's Vickers' 2nd career win in Cup racing, and more importantly, it brings Vickers to within 12 points of 12th place Mark Martin (finished 31st) for the post-season championship chase. It will likely help move Vickers' negotiations with Red Bull supremo Dieter Mateschitz along.

Other Notables: Pointleader Tony Stewart finished 17th...and has a 284 point lead over Jeff Gordon (3500 to 3216) who's now second. Jimmie Johnson (three time and defending Sprint Cup Champion) is third in points. Martin has four wins.

The Daly Planet (http://www.thedalyplanet.tv) had two interesting days of live blogging on the quality of ESPN's coverage of Nationwide and Sprint Cup racing. Those who watch that coverage are very vocal about their likes and dislikes. John Daly is a TV veteran who's been on our Race-Talk program before, and runs the blog, where strong feelings are expressed in a manner that's safe for the family--hard to do in the blogosphere. If you have ever been frustrated by the quality of the coverage (or perceived lack thereof), this is your blog.

We are back in the office on Tuesday evening and will be staying close to our base until the last race to the Chase, at Richmond's Action Track on September 12--three races away.

"Acid-Dipped Racecars? Too Much RedBull?"

Quick take from the NASCAR Justice department: The Red Bull #83 team got a major handslap because of some irregularities in the way the bodies were hung on the Car of Tomorrow. Driver Brian Vickers was whacked 150 driver points...crew chief Kevin Hamlin and car chief Craig Smokstad both were given a "time out" from NASCAR tracks (but not the shop...) and General Manager Jay Frye was doing the NASCAR version of the Mea Culpa, Mea Culpa, Mea Maxima Culpa ( Latin for My Fault, My Fault, My Most Grevious Fault) when the news broke. A major lash of NASCAR Justice, IMHO. Dieter Mateschitz was fined $150,000 (about an hours worth of US sales of the energy drink +/-).

The irregularities included thinner than 24 gauge sheet metal on the bodies. NASCAR did not confiscate the chassis, but sawed off the sheet metal and returned that chassis to Red Bull.

Hamlin will have a lot of time to figure out the chassis back at the shop while he is laboring in NASCAR Purgatory (a/k/a indefinite suspension).

JJ "Has Somethin' For 'em at the Tricky Trioval"

This result happened last weekend at Indianapolis...so for the second time in a week...Jimmie Johnson and Mark Martin will start first and second for this weekend's Pennsylvania 500 at Pocono Raceway--a/k/a the "Tricky Trioval". Maybe the race at Chicagoland Speedway (where Johnson was beaten by point leader Kyle Busch) served as a defining moment--where crewchief Chad Knaus and JJ said "enough". The Knaus crew had to replace some balky shifter mechanisms before Johnson went to qualify...Mark Martin was fast at 167.560 miles an hour. Johnson put his Lowe's Chevy Impala SS on the pole with a lap of 168.215 miles an hour. Johnson's key to this race is tire management--during qualifying, drivers want to beat the snot out of the tires, because this 2 1/2 mile trioval is very abrasive. During the race, drivers want to conserve tires, because the track is so abrasive. Kasey Kahne will start the race 7th in his Budmobile (Dodge Charger). The point leader, Kyle Busch, struggled in practice, and didn't find a lot more speed in qualifying, so he'll start 27th out of 43 cars.

ARCA Note: Scott Speed is making the transition to full fendered cars with style...he's on the pole for Saturday's ARCA race. I wonder what might have happened had he been allowed to get a couple of years testing for the main Red Bull team in F1--and then try his hand. Dieter Mateschitz is a good judge of talent, IMO.