No. 9 - Kasey Kahne
By JIM UTTER
The Charlotte Observer
Kasey Kahne is certain his team won’t quit even if a championship looks bleak at the moment.

An early wreck with Tony Stewart ended both drivers’ chance at a good performance Sunday and Kahne never had a chance to see what his No. 9 Dodge could do.

“It’s going to be a tough hill to climb to get back to the front of the Chase. We can do a good job this year and win some more races, but the Nextel Cup is going to tough to find this year,” Kahne said.

Ironically, it was Kahne who knocked Stewart, the defending series champion, out of this year’s Chase at Richmond, Va., three weeks ago.

Noteboo: No. 2 blues for Kahne, Kyle
by Monte Dutton
Gazette Sports Writer

A big loser this week was Kasey Kahne, already eighth in the points standings when the race began. Kahne was the unwitting victim when his friend, Tony Stewart, spun between turns three and four on the 12th lap. Kahne tried to avoid Stewart’s car by skirting the outside wall, but that’s precisely where the spinning orange Chevrolet wound up.

“The car,” said Kahne, “was good to go. It was a matter of getting to the front. We never got there.

“I had nowhere to go. I wanted to go low. I wanted to go high. I couldn’t go anywhere. … That’s something you never see, Tony (Stewart) losing a car. He just lost it. Things happen, and I was the car that hit him.”

Kahne looked rather forlorn several laps later, when he climbed a top a rolling platform in the garage area, watching the race in solitude. Stewart somewhat fiercely declined comment about the crash, then climbed back in his car and returned to the race, 53 laps off the pace.

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Kahne, Busch have championship hopes end
9, 20 collision again raises question: Should Chase points differ?
By David Newton, NASCAR.COM
September 24, 2006
06:38 PM EDT (22:38 GMT)




DOVER, Del. -- The boyish look that is synonymous with Kasey Kahne was gone, replaced by wrinkled disappointment as the 26-year-old Nextel Cup driver leaned against a toolbox in front of his crumpled car.

Team owner Ray Evernham looked equally disgusted as he tried to console his driver.


Kasey Kahne eventually returned to the track, but didn't finish the race. Credit: Autostock

Chase for the Nextel Cup


All the hard work Kahne put into making the Chase for the Nextel Cup seemed meaningless at the moment.

"No more championship,'' he said.

Kahne's championship hope ended on Lap 11 of Sunday's race at Dover International Speedway when he collided with defending Cup champion Tony Stewart in Turn 3.

Stewart, who a week ago talked about the awkwardness of being a non-Chase driver competing against a Chase driver, spun out as he went into the corner. Kahne was an innocent bystander with no place to go, destroying the front end of his No. 9 Dodge.

He spent 140 laps in the garage on repairs, returning for a 38th-place finish that left him ninth in points, 182 behind leader Jeff Burton.

He would have been last had Kyle Busch not blown a valve on Lap 110 to finish 40th a week after his 38th showing at New Hampshire.

"We all thought we had a shot to win the Nextel Cup, but you can't have two rough weeks I don't think,'' said Kahne, who was 16th last week at New Hampshire.

What has happened to Kahne and Busch are arguments for putting Chase drivers on a different points system than non-Chase drivers. If they were graded solely against the other Chase competitors they would have a ray of hope during the next eight weeks.

Instead, Kahne is left with a series-high five wins and no chance at the title and Busch simply with the hope he can catch Kahne in wins.

"Wrecking is one thing, but when you take out somebody that's in the Chase, you've screwed up a whole team's year by one race,'' Stewart said. "And of all people, it's one of my good friends.


"I don't think this Chase thing was thought out well enough. [NASCAR chairman] Brian France is a smart guy. We'll see if he can make adjustments to make it right for these guys.''

Only one thing can make it right for Kahne.

"We'd have to win the final eight races to win the Cup,'' said Kahne, trying to force a smile.

That Stewart was Kahne's culprit is most surprising. Arguably the most-talented driver in the series, he seldom wrecks without help.

"That's something you never see, Tony losing a car,'' Kahne said. "He just lost it. Things happen, and I was the car that hit him.''

Stewart was more upset with himself for taking Kahne out than he was for taking himself out. He sped into the garage, slamming his helmet and gloves as he excited the car.

He had a dazed look as he disappeared into his hauler, not stopping to talk while repairs were made.

"This Chase thing needs a lot of work, and it's not a matter of how many cars make the Chase,'' Stewart said. "It goes a lot deeper than that.

"The guys that have an opportunity to win the Chase are guys that just don't have bad luck. That's all there is to it. It's not about anything else. Kasey can go out and win the rest of the races and not win the championship still.''

Had Kahne gotten past this race he surely would have been a factor in the remainder of the Chase. Five of the final eight races are on mile-and-a-half tracks where all five of his wins have come.

Now he and Busch will compete like Stewart.

"Now we can go for wins,'' Busch said. "We're pretty much out of the championship hunt.''

Only Johnson, who rallied from 247 points out to within eight during the final six races of the 2004 Chase, has come close to overcoming such a deficit.

And Johnson had to win four of five races to get in that position.

"Maybe we'll dominate the last eight races,'' said Kahne, who was making his 100th Cup start. "We can do a good job and win some more races, but the Nextel Cup is going to be tough to find.''

Evernham not throwing in towel just yet

Here is a great story from Ray. Now he needs to sit Kasey down and get him to believe it.



CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) - What a roller-coaster year its been for Ray Evernham, the car owner who hoped to use the Chase for the championship as a springboard to lift him from this season of strife, struggle and, yes, scandal.


Instead, he found himself in that same old rut Monday, a day after Kasey Kahne's 38th-place finish pretty much eliminated him from Nextel Cup contention. After a frantic push to even make the 10-race Chase, Evernham Motorsports never even got a clean shot to run for the title.

A ho-hum run in New Hampshire, followed by a classic case of wrong place, wrong time on Sunday in Dover, Del., has Kahne a distant eighth-place in the standings with eight races to go.

"No more championship," Kahne shrugged. "We all thought we had a shot to win the Nextel Cup, but you can't have two rough weeks."

Slow down, driver, your car owner isn't throwing in the towel just yet.

Especially not when these final eight weeks of the season provide an opportunity to erase a lot of what happened in the first 26.

"I've always said you control the part you can, and you can't worry about the rest," said Evernham, "and what happened Sunday we couldn't control. When does Tony Stewart ever spin out? The guy has the best car control in the business, and then the one-in-a million time he does spin, he wrecks my guy. All you can do there is laugh.

"But then you get back to business. It doesn't mean we are done. We've got a chance. It's not over until it's over."

Evernham makes a convincing argument, but few outside his camp will buy into it.

Kahne is in a tremendous hole and there's too many terrific points racers ahead of Kahne in the standings who will need to falter. Still, it could happen.

After all, Kahne needed just two races to erase a 90-point deficit to earn a berth in the Chase. But this hole is twice as deep, and the stakes are so much higher - for both the driver and the car owner.

Evernham fully expected 2006 to be his year. He expanded from two cars to three, a growth that required him to make tough personnel moves that were certain to leave someone unhappy.

That someone was Jeremy Mayfield, a two-time Chase qualifier who saw key team members taken away and given to Kahne and new teammate Scott Riggs. Mayfield didn't like it, and when his team began to stumble, he put the blame squarely on Evernham.

Their relationship steadily - and publicly - deteriorated until Mayfield was fired in August. But even that didn't end things.

In trying to work out a better settlement, Mayfield filed a court injunction to keep his job that alleged his team suffered because Evernham has a "close personal relationship" with female driver Erin Crocker that was distracting the car owner.

Evernham refuses to address Mayfield's allegations, other than to lump them together with everything else that has happened this season.

"The changes I made in the beginning of the season, I took a lot of criticism, I took a lot of heat. But I stand by them and feel it has shown its been better for the company," he said. "It's been a hard year sponsorshipwise. And lets face it, its been a pretty nasty year personally. I've taken a lot of abuse publicly for things that I feel are unfair.

"But I believe if I continue to work hard and do the things that I do, everything will be fine. And I've always believed that the greatest enemy of any lie is time."

So all Evernham can do is try to rally the troops and convince Kahne that this fight is not over. They've got eight races left, and five of them are on a 1.5-mile tracks - the exact circuit Kahne was unbeatable on earlier this year.

He's also got sponsorship woes with Crocker, who is losing General Mills as the primary source of financial support on her Truck Series ride. Either way, he plans to have her back for a full season in 2007.

And he's also moving forward with plans to expand to four Nextel Cup teams by 2008. But that takes sponsors, and sponsors want to sign with winners, and that puts the pressure back on Evernham to deliver a legitimate Chase contender.

Mayfield really wasn't in his two stints, making it in only to fizzle out as soon as the Chase began. Now Evernham wants to prevent Kahne from doing the same thing.

"I really feel good about the potential, and I am pushing harder than ever," he said. "It is good to be this close, but it sucks to be this close and not be able to crest that hill. Sooner or later we're going to get there, though. I can promise you that."

:) thanks for the great articles! ive been arguing with people at work all day about kasey "being out of the chase" and now i know i am not alone in believing that it is still possible! even DW voiced his opinion that "when kasey gets on a roll, there is no stopping him"!!!!!!!!!

goooooooooo kkkkkaaaaaaaaassssssseeeeeeeeeeeyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy!

Kahne, Johnson shift into rally mode
Updated 9/25/2006 10:41 PM ET E-mail | Save | Print | Reprints & Permissions | Subscribe to stories like this


By Gary Graves, USA TODAY
DOVER, Del. — The only thing NASCAR's so-called "cookie-cutter" intermediate tracks really have in common is that Jimmie Johnson and Kasey Kahne have taken decent bites out of them lately.
And if either driver hopes to challenge in the Chase for the Nextel Cup, he'd better gorge on the five 1.5-mile layouts at the final eight venues. Sunday's Banquet 400 at Kansas Speedway begins a tour that will wind through Concord, N.C.; Hampton, Ga.; Fort Worth and Homestead, Fla.

Johnson, currently eighth, used this itinerary to win four of the final six races in the 2004 Chase. He finished eight points behind Kurt Busch. Now, he seeks similar magic in hopes of erasing a 136-point deficit to leader Jeff Burton.

Sunday's 38th-place finish in the Dover 400 seriously damaged Kahne's title chances, but he could make things interesting by following early-season wins at Lowe's, Atlanta and Texas motor speedways.

That both are still mathematically eligible for the championship leaves plenty of room for a miracle.

"We're going to come back at Kansas and do everything possible to win the race," said Kahne, who is in ninth place after his Dodge was collected in Tony Stewart's early spin and wreck. "I'd think we have to win the final eight to win the Cup. You never know what's going to happen. Maybe we'll dominate the last eight races, who knows?"

The first step is rebounding, and after a wreck at New Hampshire International Speedway left Johnson 39th, he took solace in finishing 13th at Dover International Speedway.

After a tire got away from his pit box during a stop under caution on lap 24, he restarted at the tail end and rallied to run second before pitting under green on lap 289 of 400. A caution 18 laps later left Johnson's Chevy on the back end of the lead lap, and he fell one behind leader Matt Kenseth on the restart.

"We just got out of sequence and it bit us," said Johnson, who still shaved 27 points from his prerace deficit. "It would have been a good day to capitalize on some things. We didn't lose a lot, but we missed a chance to gain some points."

Johnson faced the same hurdle in 2004 before going on that wicked tear that put him alongside Hendrick Motorsports teammate Jeff Gordon in intermediate-length supremacy. He already has claimed unofficial ownership of Lowe's with seven wins in his past 11 starts and just one finish worse than fifth. Johnson was second in May.

He has yet to win at Kansas but has three top-10s in four starts and won the pole in 2003. Though Johnson still needs those above him to falter just to climb into contention, a solid tuneup heading into Talladega Superspeedway — where he won this spring — makes anything possible.

Sad as Kahne looked Sunday while sitting on his pit box as his Dodge was repaired, he might have the most to look forward to. He won at Atlanta and Texas from the pole and led 158 laps at Lowe's in May to deny Johnson's bid for a four-peat.

"It's going to be a tough hill to climb to get back to the front of the Chase," said Kahne, who has finished 12th and 19th at Kansas. "We can do a good job this year and win some races, but the Nextel Cup is going to be tough to find."

Also:

NASCAR added three tracks to its Nextel Cup testing schedule for 2007 while removing sessions at Homestead-Miami Speedway and Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Bristol Motor Speedway (Feb. 28-March 1), Dover (May 14-15) and Talladega (Sept. 10-11) were added to a list that also includes 2006 holdovers Daytona International Speedway (Jan. 8-10, Jan. 15-17), Las Vegas Motor Speedway (Jan. 29-30), Richmond International Raceway (April 3-4) and Lowe's (May 7-8). ... Juan Pablo Montoya made his first test run as a stock car racer Monday at Talladega. Montoya ran the superspeedway in an ARCA car for Chip Ganassi Racing, with whom he won the 2000 Indianapolis 500 in his first try. Ganassi said he wants Montoya to run in ARCA, Busch and Nextel Cup races by the end of the season but said Monday he didn't know yet where the first race would be. The Talladega ARCA race is Oct. 6.