Ryan Newman locked into the Chase for the Championship

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Who can rejoice over a 20th place finish?

The answer is simple--I, and all the other fans of Ryan Newman who were thrilled to see Newman get locked into the 2011 Chase for the Championship. While his team's performance at Atlanta Motor Speedway was less-than-stellar, it was certainly all it needed to be. After all, making the chase this year was the team's goal. Mission accomplished! 

After numerous rain delays, courtesy of Tropical Storm Lee that reigned from Sunday to Tuesday in the Atlanta area, the second-to-last race of the 2011 regular NASCAR season is finally in the books, all 500 miles of it. 

Krissie Newman, who often tweets during the race, remarked about how long the race seemed to be. She was absolutely right. 

I can't imagine how grueling it is for drivers to race for 500 miles at such high speeds in traffic. I liken a 500-mile race to be about the same distance between where I live in the Ozarks to where I used to live in Illinois. That trip is nightmarish and takes approximately eight hours on a good day with no major traffic tieups and no pit stops, pottie breaks, or pauses for food along the way. In fact, though I've made the trip in eight hours, it is actually closer to a nine-hour drive. It is hard to imagine driving that distance every weekend.

Congratulations to Ryan Newman for making the chase this year. I have long thought him to be a champion already, so to me, all this is just formality. Next, it will be a pleasure to watch Tony follow in his drivers' footsteps. I have no doubt that Tony will secure his spot in the chase at Richmond. 

This will be a fun race to watch because I'm sure Newman will enjoy it. There will be no pressure for points--just the normal pressure to win, something he has already done. That has to be a burden lifted from his shoulders. In fact, Newman has one win, one pole, five top 5's, and 11 top 10's at Richmond, in his career.

Ryan Newman on the pole at Bristol

Image by Getty Images via @daylifeRyan Newman earns the pole position for the Sprint Cup race at Bristol Motor Speedway tomorrow night.


This is Newman's second pole this season. The last time he lead the field to the green for the start of the race, it was at New Hampshire, he led the final lap too.


Newman also won Wednesday's Whelen Modified Tour race at Bristol. This redeeming race followed his win at New Hampshire when he was stripped of the victory by NASCAR officials who also penalized car owner Kevin "Bono" Manion because of modifications on the race
car.


Newman has won four times in five starts. It would have been five out of five, had he not been disqualified last month.


Go Ryan!

Danica Patrick joins NASCAR

Gone are the days of "Gentlemen, start your engines." Those gentlemen will now include a lady, once Danica Patrick is on the scene. Patrick has announced that she will join NASCAR as a full time driver in 2012 in the Nationwide series. She will drive for JR Motorsports, owned by Dale Earnhardt, Jr.

Patrick will also spend nearly two dozen races behind the wheel of a Sprint Cup car, driving for Stewart-Haas Racing.

It was bound to happen to the male-dominated sport of stock car racing. It is not that there haven't been successful women participating in the sport in the past, because there have. Women have made their mark in race car driving.

In 1949, Sara Christian, the first woman race car driver, posted a fifth-place finish at Pittsburgh, the best finish by a woman in NASCAR history. Christian ran seven races, with her first competition at Charlotte.

But probably the best known woman race car driver was Janet Guthrie, who ran 33 races between 1976 and 1980. Like Patrick, Guthrie was probably better known for driving Indy cars, but she also made a name for herself at NASCAR. She started in the top ten and posted top-ten finishes in the NASCAR’s Winston Cup, which is now the Sprint Cup Series. She finished sixth at Bristol, Tennessee in ‘77, which remains the best by a woman in the recent NASCAR era.

Guthrie is the only woman to take the lead in a Cup race. She was the Top Rookie in five races in her day. She was inducted into the Motorsports Hall of Fame in 2006.

It will be exciting to watch Danica Patrick go the distance with these good ole boys. It might be more fun to watch how they react to it. I believe Patrick is here to stay. She is spunky. She is competitive. And she is qualified. Her presence will undoubtedly beef up the Nationwide Series, which is already, in my opinion, becoming a must watch program.

I’m even more excited to watch her career as a Sprint Cup driver in a Stewart-Haas car. Since I’m a woman, Ryan Newman is my favorite driver, and I happen to have a GoDaddy website (http://www.ozarkattitude.com) this is a tad personal for me. I am really going to enjoy racing in 2012, not that it hasn’t been stellar this year.

With Ryan Newman seventh in points, his racing prowess is becoming obvious to even his staunchest critics. I love saying I told you so to those hard-nose idiots that have long misjudged him. 

Ryan Newman recognized for top performance

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It is so refreshing to see Ryan Newman get the recognition he deserves. 

In a press release yesterday, NASCAR.com announced that Newman and the #39 team won two awards following the race at the Michigan International Speedway Sunday.

The DirectTV Crew Chief of the Race award went to Newman's Crew Chief Tony Gibson, for having the lowest average of qualifying result and race finish. Newman qualified fifth and crossed the checkers in fifth as well.

Newman won the Mobile1 Driver of the Race award, for having the best finish of eligible Mobile 1 drivers.

The release also quoted Newman's second engineer, Wes Gantt. 

Gantt remarked that Newman's engineering background helps the team because he is able to "look at data and interpret it."

In other news, just today, Speedtv.com noted that Ryan Newman has earned more points than any other Sprint Cup driver in the last five races. He has earned 187 points, just ahead of Jeff Gordon, with 186 and Jimmie Johnson with 184.

An article on their website calls Newman, the "hottest driver on the circuit at the moment." They say that fact might surprise a few people.

Consider me not among them. I am surprised when Newman has an off day. I have long considered him to be championship material. He is a hell of a driver, but has a bad relationship with Lady Luck. It is my opinion that once Newman learns to tame her, there will be no stopping the Rocketman.

Newman feels at home at Michigan

Image by Getty Images via @daylifeThe Michigan International Speedway is special to Ryan Newman, so it is especially good to see him run well there. He certainly did that—grabbing a fifth place starting spot and finishing fifth, with lots of good runs in between.


There is no doubt about it—when your favorite driver has a good day, and especially a good finish, it makes racing really fun to watch. Needless to say I enjoyed this week’s Michigan race. Newman climbed to seventh in points with only three races to go before the Chase for the Championship begins.


It is clear that Newman and his team are giving it everything they’ve got. I can’t quite put my finger on it, or can I recall just when it happened, but early in this season it seems as if something just began to click. The cars seemed to go faster, balance improved, pit stops became competitive again, and the entire team seemed to come together.


Newman has won and lost at Michigan, where he holds the track record. He made it around the two-mile oval in 194.232 seconds during a qualifying lap in 2005.


A respectable fifth place finish can certainly earn Newman bragging rights as well. That is just the way it should be too, since this track is one he considers his home track. His father Greg brought him to the races when he was growing up. It isn’t far from where they lived in South Bend, IN. No doubt Newman dreamed of wheeling his own race car around it.


An avid fisherman, Newman has donated to youth camps and provided scholarships for kids. He never forgot learning to fish there with his grandfather. He’d like other kids to grow up with the same experience.


Perhaps the biggest proof of Newman’s devotion to the Michigan International Speedway, in Brooklyn, MI, is that he and his wife Krissie named their daughter Brooklyn.