Racin' With Russ
By Russell Schmidt

Stewart Takes Chicago Snoozer 400
Monday, July 16, 2007

After smack talking about his teammate last week, Tony Stewart turned things around the second half of Sunday’s NASCAR Cup race at Chicagoland Speedway by taking his first win of the season.

In a race dotted by an occasional tire failure and little side-by-side racing, the Home Depot driver held off strong advances by Roush-Fenway driver Matt Kenseth in earning his 30th career victory.

Jimmie Johnson’s day ended prematurely when a tire unexpectedly let go, sending the Lowe’s Chevy hard into the wall and out of the show. He took a three place hit in the overall standings.

Others in the ‘tough day’ department included Dave Blaney, Ward Burton, Jamie McMurray, Martin Truex Jr, David Stremme and Robby Gordon.

Carl Edwards made a late race charge to the front winding up third in between teammate Kenseth and Kevin Harvick.

Points leader Jeff Gordon hung around the top 15 most of day, making a charge to wind up ninth by days end. The latest result for the four-time champion leaves him with a little larger lead over Denny Hamlin, now 303 back.

The boys rest up this week, but the next series of races kicks off with the Brickyard 400, a very important event.

The Busch series took to the banks of Chicago on Saturday afternoon with Harvick barely holding off Matt Kenseth in the closing stages.

Others in the top five included Jeff Burton, Clint Bowyer and Kyle Busch. Points leader Carl Edwards had yet another bad pitstop, yet fought back to claim a 20th spot, still leading the pack by a comfortable 716 over Harvick.

Trucking in Kentucky saw Mike Skinner pick up his fifth win of the season in convincing fashion. The Toyota driver led most of the race en route to his latest win over Travis Kvapil, Ted Musgrave, Ryan Mathews and returnee David Green.

Skinner extends his lead over Ron Hornaday by 164 and 288 over Kvapil. He certainly is on one of the biggest winning streaks of his career, not to mention leading laps in every race this season.

Open Wheel News - Scott Dixon took his second win in as many weeks after leading the Indy Racing League pack across the finish line at Nashville Superspeedway. Points leader Dario Franchitti took second with teammate Danica Patrick third.

From Rumorville - For those die-hard Dale Earnhardt Jr fans proud to wear the Budweiser colors…your days are numbered. This past week, the beer giant basically announced they’ll be ending their longtime association with one of NASCAR’s fan favorites. Over the past few weeks, Dale Jr has signed with a few little companies such as Adidas sneakers and SONY. But, there are more wholesome family favorites about to adorn Jr’s cars, namely Pepsi products or? Seems that some of Jr’s new advisors are switching his followers from beer-drinking fans to family concerns. Remember that commercial where Dale announces changing his number to 6.7? Funny stuff.

Don’t be surprised if NASCAR changes some of its rules pertaining to the top-35 qualifier situation. I don’t see them doing anything this year, rather developing a plan and implementing it for 2008. Will it be the number of those locked in or simply a grouping together of those ‘go or go-homers’ during qualifying still remains to be seen. They need to do something as week after week, not all of the fastest cars are making the races.

On the local level, Robert Turner swept both Late Model races at Ace Speedway over the weekend, leaving Mebane driver Speedy Faucette on the sidelines after he blew a tire and smacked the fence in the first race. That left Dustin Rumley and Rodney Cook to fill out the top three in the opener, swapping spots in the second.

Other winners at the Altamahaw track included Randy Butner (Modifieds), Jay Dalton (Limited Sportsman) with Corey Agee and Daryl Gwynn splitting the Southern Ground Pounder Modified shows.

Next week’s RWR will review this week’s Busch action at Gateway while the Cup and truck teams have the week off. Other topics to be covered include open wheel news, some local notes and more racing news from around the globe.