Not the Usual Suspects
Posted by Genna | Posted in Mark Martin , Matt Kenseth , NASCAR | Posted on 5/16/2009
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Is it just me or has anyone else noticed that our recent race winners aren’t the ones you’d normally expect to see running up front and winning? Sure, we expect to see Jimmie Johnson challenging for the lead at Darlington but did we really expect to see him challenging Mark Martin for the lead? I know I really didn’t expect that!
I think its pretty refreshing, actually, to see guys like Newman and Martin up there. Here are two guys that no one expected to be running so well in their first year at a new team. Then you have your surprising Daytona 500 champion, Matt Kenseth.
It’s also been fun to watch the rookies this year. Brad Keselowski won his first race in only five starts in Sprint Cup. That maybe be our biggest surprise yet but then again, maybe his talent was grossly underestimated. He had a fantastic 7th place finish at Darlington, a track not well known for being kind to rookies. Joey Logano finished 9th at both Talladega and Darlington.
How about Kurt Busch? I don’t think he’s run this well in years and now he’s sitting behind Tony Stewart and points leader Jeff Gordon in third place.
I honestly expected this to be another season where I’d sit back and expect one of three winners to be in Victory Lane but so far, Jimmie Johnson and Kyle Busch have only won a combined total of 4 races out of the 11 we’ve run this season.
This is how NASCAR should be! This is fun and exciting and its become less of the Kyle/Jimmie/Carl show this year. There are cars and drivers out there that a year ago weren’t competitive at all and you see them now running top ten, top five, and really contending for wins.
So here’s to an exciting 2009 season and hopefully victories for some other “little guys”.
I really think a lot of the fun and excitement you rightly mention is a direct result of the testing ban.
Not all though. Mark Martin has always had talent. He now also has a powerful organization to back that talent up.
Newman and Stewart are surprises to me this year even though Haas has been around for a while I expected it to take a couple of adjustment years for the team to contend as they are.
Brad Keselowski (Pronouned like: Kiss-a-louse-key) is a great Michigan surprise. His gangly stance belies his control of the vehicle. Often racing near the edge (sometimes over it) he manages to show up near the top or in the garage.
In my opinion Joey Logano has actually been slow at adapting to the COT and cup style racing. I think his past record of entering new series and dominating them thoroughly may have raised my expectations unrealistically. I don't count him out though. It's only May, by golly!
The only thing I adamantly dissagree with Genna on is that I think we need more of the Jimmie/Jimmie/Jimmie show this year.