NASCAR's Championship Weekend Is Here - Who will win it all?

by 4ever3 on Nov 22, 2009 8:30 AM EST in Hamilton Spectator Articles Comment 0 comments

Oops, this was supposed to be posted Friday. I must have did something wrong when I set the publish date. Sorry.

NASCAR’s Championship weekend is finally here. All three of NASCAR’s top series finish up this weekend.

The NASCAR Camping World Truck Series crowned Ron Hornaday as their Champ last week, but the 4-time Champ is still looking to sew-up the Owner’s Championship this weekend so if you think ol’ Ron will be strokin’ it out there Friday night you’ve got another thing coming.

As far as the NASCAR Nationwide Series goes all Kyle Busch has to do is essentially start the race and the Championship is his and don’t expect him to be strokin’ it either as that cat goes for the win all of the time. In fact he might even be more dangerous out there than usual as he’s got nothing to loose by giving it all or nothing for that final race and win of the season.

The bigger story on Saturday will be the Denny Hamlin vs. Brad Keselowski saga that reared its ugly head yet again last weekend. Hamlin bumped Keselowski to get by him and Keselowski returned the favour, but then he went and hit Hamlin a second time in the rear corner of the car instead of the middle of the bumper where it’s safer, and sent Hamlin spinning; Hamlin, who had a top 5 car all day long, finished outside the top 10 as a result.

After the race the war of words ensued with Hamlin promising that he would cash in the chips that he owes Keselowski next race, which is this Saturday.

But perhaps the biggest story this weekend will be whether Jimmie Johnson will win his record setting fourth consecutive Sprint Cup Championship. Certainly his odds are good but look at what happened to him at Texas just two weeks ago; he got taken out early in the race and eventually finished 38 th giving up a ton of points to teammate Mark Martin.

It is essentially a two man race for the Chase Championship right now as Jeff Gordon will be eliminated once the Green Flag flies. Martin needs to gain 108 points on Johnson to win his first ever Championship.

So what does Martin exactly have to do to win it?

Best case scenario is that he wins the race, leads the most laps to get the extra 5 points, and has Johnson finish 26th or worse without leading a lap.

I know sounds impossible right? Well not quite. According to NASCAR.com Martin has gained 108 points or more on Johnson 9 times in 266 races of head to head competition. Using that stat as a benchmark would mean that Martin has a 3.3% chance of winning the Championship. Slim, but still a chance. I’m sure Martin and his team will throw everything but the kitchen sink at Johnson and not give up the fight.

I guess the big picture here is not whether or not Martin or Johnson wins the Championship it is the fact that their car owner Rick Hendrick will have the top two cars in the Chase at the end it all and if Jeff Gordon holds off Tony Stewart Hendrick owned cars will sweep the top 3 spots of the Chase.

That’s impressive.

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