Some Racing Updates

Once again, it's been a while.  Been on vacation and in Red Sox playoff mode as well as football, I haven't kept on too much about racing, unless it's some of my thoughts I have on Twitter.  OK, here we go.

NASCAR SPRINT CUP
With 6 races down, 4 races to go in the 2013 Chase for the Championship, it will come down to 4 drivers who I think has the best chances to win a title: Matt Kenseth, Jimmie Johnson, Kevin Harvick and Kyle Busch.  3 of those 4 drivers have won 4 of the 6 Chase races and the gap to 1st to 4th in standings is 26 points.  Kyle Busch finished in the top 5 all the chase races except a disastrous weekend in Kansas in which he finished 35th.  Matt Kenseth won at Chicagoland & New Hampshire, 2nd in points, only 4 points behind Jimmie Johnson, who dominated in Dover and is a favorite next week in Martinsville.  Kevin Harvick dominated in Kansas, and has some top-10 finishes, but another win could really help his chances in his last year with Richard Childress Racing.  Jeff Gordon is 5th in standings, only 34 points back, but really needs a win.

Sunday's Talladega race is one race that anything can happen, and it did.  Unlike a 25-car pile up in last year's race, this one only featured 3 cautions, the last one happened on the last lap in which Austin Dillon got spun out and collected Casey Mears, which gave Jamie McMurray his first win in 3 years and Dale Earnhardt, Jr. finished 2nd, moving up 3 spots and now sits 6th in points. Like I said earlier, Sunday's race will be in Martinsville, a nice short-track where any crashes and spin outs can happen at any time.  There will be some more point shuffles and the chase will go all the way to Homestead.

INDYCAR SERIES
The 2013 IndyCar Series was definitely if not the most competitive in a long time.  Once again, the Championship battle will go all the way to the final race of the season, which took place last Saturday night at Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, CA.  The battle was between Scott Dixon (now 3-time series champion) and Helio Castroneves (no series championships).  From the start, it looked like it was gonna be a tight battle, but as the race went on, it was harder for Helio to gain ground.  A big wreck on lap 110 of 250, involving 6 cars including Justin Wilson, James Jakes & Tristan Vautier, set things in motion for the race of the race, whether it was mechanical issues (Takuma Sato, Charlie Kimball) to wrecks (Alex Tagliani who was filling in for Dario Franchitti, and Sebastian Bourdais) made it harder for Castroneves to win the title, needing a 1st or 2nd place finish.  In total, only 9 of 25 cars were running at the finish.  It was definitely a wild race, but we now have 5 months to wait until the start of next year's campaign.

FORMULA ONE
For the last 5 races, there has only been 1 winner of those races: Sebastian Vettel.   The 3-time reigning champion has cruised all season and can clinch his 4th straight title this Sunday in New Delhi, India with a win or a big points finish over 2nd place Fernando Alonso.  There are 4 races remaining, so baring any drama, there will be a repeat championship winner.