Spin the Black Circle: Bank of America 500 preview
There are six races left in the Chase for the Championship, but Saturday night's race might well determine the 2007 champ. You see, Lowe's Motor Speedway in Charlotte is a high-banked, 1.5-mile cookie-cutter track that's well nigh indistinguishable from the tracks in Atlanta and Fort Worth, coming your way in two and three weeks, respectively. To run well at one is to run well at all. Provided you don't crash your car Saturday night, you'll use the exact same chassis on Oct. 28 and Nov. 4. So if you catch lightning in a bottle....
Take a look at 2006 champ Jimmie Johnson. Last season, he finished second at Charlotte, second at Atlanta and second at Texas. He ran the same chassis in each race (modified for the day's conditions, of course), used the same basic strategy, even qualified in the top 10 of each event, and wound up taking his first points title rather easily.
Of course, more often than not, circumstance takes you out of such game planning. Someone wrecks you, or your engine goes kablooey, and you never get the chance to be consistent and/or identical for the trio of 24-degree-banked tracks I call the "ACT triumvirate." But if you make hay Saturday night, stay clean and register a top five? You're way ahead for the Atlanta race, with a bite on Texas, too.
So while we don't have much more data than usual (i.e., historical data) for this week's race, we'll most definitely apply what we learn Saturday night to our fantasy teams for the Atlanta and Texas events.
"Given To Fly" (Featured Elite Drivers)
(Last week: Kurt Busch, seventh; Jeff Gordon, first)
If it's Charlotte, it's Jimmie Johnson. There's no more dominant driver/track combo in the sport. Johnson has run 11 races at Charlotte and never finished outside the top 10. The fuel-mileage shenanigans of this May's race cause J.J. to finish 10th, which broke his streak of finishing first, second or third for eight consecutive Charlotte races. He's won here five times. It's not an adventuresome choice, but you'd be crazy not to play him, no matter what the fantasy cost.
For my other elite driver, I'll look past Johnson's teammate Jeff Gordon (last week's winner), and instead take Carl Edwards. Edwards is also a stallion on this track configuration. He's won twice at Atlanta and once at Texas in his brief career, and has four top-10s in the five Cup races he's run at Charlotte (and the fifth race was this May, when he needed to pit late for gas). Add to the fact that Edwards won at Michigan earlier this year and finished second and seventh at Fontana and Michigan within the last six weeks, and you've got a guy who knows how to run the big, high-banked, super-fast tracks.
"Rearviewmirror" (Midrange Drivers of Note)
(Last week: Jamie McMurray, 37th; Ryan Newman fifth)
I'll take Casey Mears, and not just because he won his first career Cup race here back in May. As I've mentioned, that was a fuel-mileage affair, and while Mears had a strong car, even he'd admit he didn't have the day's best car. No, I also like the No. 25 because Mears has been good at Texas for several seasons, even when he drove Ganassi equipment. Frankly, I think part of the reason Mears has his job at Hendrick is because of how well he's done on this track style in the past (being Johnson's best friend doesn't hurt). In four of the last six Texas events, Mears has been seventh or better, and that should translate Saturday night.
You should also take a long look at Mark Martin, who qualified 12th for this race. Martin is the man when it comes to LMS history: He's raced here 45 times and has 21 top-10s, 17 top-5s and four wins. Granted, Martin hasn't run with the leaders much since Ginn Racing merged with DEI, and I don't think he'll have the horses to win this race outright. But Martin personifies the driver who excels at these really long, kind of monotonous cookie-cutter races. He's ultra-patient, very respectful of other drivers, and doesn't mind hanging around, adjusting on his car, and making a late run to the top 10. That's just the kind of guy we want on our fantasy teams.
"Not For You" (Beware of these Drivers)
(Last week: Kyle Busch, 36th)
This section of STBC is devoted to finding the guys who, statistically speaking, don't excel on the present week's track and/or track style. I'm not definitively predicting a guy will stink at this week's race; rather, I'm saying there are more consistent fantasy options elsewhere. I've also decided that for the rest of the season, I'm only going to pick from among the guys who made this year's Chase. That way, I can continue to look as foolish as humanly possible which is, let's face it, the primary fun you get out of this column. So this week, I'll stay away from Kevin Harvick. He was my driver to avoid here in May, and finished 21st, so I'll ride that particular wave. It's not that Harvick can't be good here; heck, he has a second place at LMS and two other top-10s in his 13 Cup events here. Still, over the past couple years, Happy has distinguished himself mostly as a flat-track driver, notching wins at Phoenix, Richmond, New Hampshire and Watkins Glen. He doesn't have a finish better than 21st on this track style in '07.
"Nothing As It Seems" (Weekly Sleepers)
(Last week: David Gilliland, 27th; David Ragan, 34th)
I'll give Juan Pablo Montoya a try, despite the fact that he qualified 36th for this race. Montoya looked like a full-fledged bust over the first month of his rookie season, until he pulled into Atlanta and stayed in the top-5 all day, finally finishing fifth. He repeated his good cookie-cutter performance at Texas later in the spring, finishing eighth there. Heck, that's two of his five top-10 finishes for the entire season right there. Montoya has been ice cold of late, allowing David Ragan back into the Rookie of the Year picture while notching just one top 10 in his last 10 Cup events, but I think we could see him submit a solid performance Saturday night.
Finally, I'll play Bobby Labonte. I admit, I'm a bit seduced by the great qualifying lap he turned in Thursday night: B-Lab will start third, right alongside points leader Jeff Gordon. Oh, sure, I expect to see the No. 43 head directly backward when the race begins (just as the guy in front of him, polesitter Ryan Newman, will probably slam it in reverse when the green flag flies), but Labonte's savvy enough to hang at least inside the top 20 if his car runs all night. He has two wins here, and 17 top-10s in 29 Cup races. Sure, like Martin, most of Labonte's good results here came when he drove superior equipment (in Labonte's case, it was Gibbs), but still, you can be pretty sure B-Lab won't beat himself. A top-20 is a real possibility.
Christopher Harris is a fantasy baseball, football and racing analyst for ESPN.com. You can e-mail him here.
