NASCAR Race Review - Lowe's

2007 Lowes - Race 31 of 36. Jimmie Johnson looked like the car to beat again, leading 95 laps prior to the caution on lap 208, but he came out 16th after the pit stop. Back in the pack on lap 231 he spun by himself and tapped the wall, dropping further back to 29th place. Clint Bowyer led most of the next 46 green flag laps until Jeff Gordon passed him with 62 laps left.

The lapped car of Juan Montoya had a tire go down six laps later sending him and 7th place runner Scott Riggs hard into the wall. Riggs finished 36th.

The race restarted with 51 to go and Gordon built as much as a 5-second lead over Bowyer. Kyle Busch eventually moved his Kellogg's Chevrolet into second place and cut Gordon's lead to 2.2 seconds with 13 laps remaining, just as Johnny Sauter spun after getting in oil from the Jeff Green machine. The race was red flagged and teams were worried about running out of gas.

Gordon sputtered on the restart with 5 to go, slowing down Busch while Ryan Newman shot his All-Tel Dodge from fourth to first in one lap. Newman had just layed down the fastest lap of the race, but he crashed the next lap and finished 28th after racing all but 50 laps in the top ten.

That set-up a two-lap shootout, but Gordon had no problem holding off Bowyer for his 2nd straight win of the season and 81st of his career. Bowyer had his #07 Jack Daniels car out front for 79 circuits and he spent a race-high 303 of 337 laps in the top ten. Gordon led 71 laps and is now two wins shy of tying Cale Yarborough for fifth on the all-time list. Gordon also snapped a five-race streak of DNFs at Lowe's.

Gordon was in the top ten for all but 42 laps and teammate Kyle Busch, who finished 3rd, was for all but 61 laps in the beginning of the race. Jeff Burton finished 4th, putting two Richard Childress drivers in the top four. Burton was in the top ten for only a third of the race and none of 5th thru 11th place finishers were in the top ten for more than 85 laps.

Johnson had the best car and was up to 7th place before the caution with 13 to go, but he needed to pit for gas and wound up in 14th. Perhaps the days next best driver was Newman's Penske Teammate Kurt Busch who had his #2 Miller Lite Dodge in the top three for 2/3 of the race. Busch was one of the first drivers to pit during green flag racing, on lap 276, but four laps later Montoya wrecked, leaving him a lap down and he finished in 26th.

Matt Kenseth led 32 laps early on and had led as late as lap 134, but he came out 12th after caution stops on lap 139 as most drivers took only two tires. He was now fighting a loose car which resulted in spins on lap 159 and 224. So, he took his #17 DeWalt Ford to the garage to fix the problem and finished 34th, 55 laps down. He is basically out of the Chase due to four straight bad finishes, his worst spell since 2001.

Jamie McMurray led 27 laps early in the race, but a loose lug nut during caution stops on lap 70 put him back to 10th place. The caution waved shortly afterwards and he pitted again, this time sending him back to 22nd place. Later, after a green flag run of 18 laps, the caution waved and he took on two-tires while the leaders took four, putting him up to fifth. He had fallen back to ninth on lap 275 and was the first driver to pit under green, but he also went a lap down after the caution waved with 55 laps left. He finished 24th.

Bobby Labonte was in 7th place in front of Johnson just prior to the caution with 13 to go, but he pitted about the same time as the caution waved and it put him back to 20th place during the red flag. He had run in the top ten for all but 93 laps, and made it to 12th by races end. Earlier he was blocked in, in the pits by Tony Stewart and was back in 25th place.

Carl Edwards finished 5th and Dave Blaney 6th in his #22 Bill Davis Toyota Caterpillar. Blaney finished 6th last weekend at Talladega. Tony Stewart started 29th and was up to fifth by lap 150. He was running around the same position before encountering problems in the pits during caution stops on lap 178. He had the second to last pit stall and had minor contact with Paul Menard when leaving his pit, then had contact with a pitting Kasey Kahne as he started to leave his pit again. He was back to 28th after the restart, but rebounded to finish 7th.

Kahne had run near 27th place for almost the first 200 laps, but somehow managed to finish in 8th. David Stremme and Michael Waltrip rounded out the top ten even though they only led a combined 14 laps in the top ten. Waltrip made it two Toyoatas in the top ten.

Dale Earnhardt Jr started 22nd and worked his way into the top five around lap 130, but faded from there eventually finishing 19th. His DEI teammate Martin Truex Jr. 17th.

Chase contenders Denny Hamlin and Kevin Harvick finished 20th and 33rd. Hamlin worked his way to fifth before the caution with 13 to go, but ran out of gas before during the red flag and had to be pushed into the pits. Harvick had tire problems early, going three laps down.

STANDINGS
Gordon opened up his lead to 68 points over Johnson, while Bowyer climbed to within 10 of Johnson. Stewart fell to 198 points behind in 4th place, close to being too far out of the Chase. Carl Edwards is 5th, 240 points off, an almost insurmountable deficit with only 5 laps remaining. Kyle Busch is 6th and Kurt Busch 7th, 315 points back.

This weeks trivia:
To get my first Grand National car in 1959, I waited until the bank closed on Friday and wrote a check for $2,000. Knowing the check was no good, I had to win the two races that weekend and I did with some relief help, Who am I?