FanHouse JasonLeffler

DAYTONA BEACH, FLA. -- After the dust settled in Daytona from Tony Stewart's verbal lashing of Goodyear and later his win in the Nationwide Series race, there were a few other things that are worth noting from the garage area:

Bowyer, Edwards get in some good-natured ribbing

Towards the end of the post-race press conference for second-place and Missouri-native Carl Edwards and third-place Clint Bowyer after Saturday's Nationwide Series race, the two drivers got on the topic of Daytona's plan to resurface the 2.5-mile superspeedway.

"I like the fact that his track gets rougher and slicker and there's different grip levels all over it. I was kind of sad to hear they were going to repave it," said Edwards. "I wish they'd just kind of patch it up or do whatever they do."

Kyle Busch will start on the pole for Sunday's Lifelock 400 at Michigan International Speedway, but he certainly won't be dissing NASCAR's newest car this weekend.

NASCAR held an unusual meeting with drivers and car owners one half hour prior to the morning's first practice Friday to lay down the law on what drivers need to be saying about the Car of Tomorrow project.

That's Racin's David Poole called it a "Come to Jesus"-style meeting.

Many drivers wouldn't even discuss it.

But what we do know is that NASCAR made it clear that its simply tired of hearing the constant negativity about the performance of the car being used for the first time on full time in 2008.

A key message of the meeting apparently was that NASCAR fans are being let down by the constant bashing, and that they shouldn't be subject to that for coming to a spectator event for enjoyment. There must have been enforcement policies laid down because hardly a soul was giving deep info about the get-together.

To me, telling the teams they should handle a problematic situation by putting on the rose-colored glasses doesn't seem like an effective way to solve problems. Doubly, as a NASCAR fan, it shows me that NASCAR truly has reached a point where it cannot make any legitimate changes in the near future to increase the quality of Sprint Cup racing on the new vehicle.

At least I've never heard of censorship helping a cars downforce in a pack of traffic.

The rains came after 11 drivers got on track during the qualifying session, leaving the rulebook to decide where teams would start Sunday's race. That leaves Jeff Burton on the outside pole with Jason Leffler and Tony Raines heading home.

If you were able to make it through Saturday's rain-delayed coverage of the Nationwide Series Heluva Good! 200 at Dover International Raceway, I commend you.

More importantly, if you made it you were treated to another episode of "Reasons Why Fans Hate Kyle Busch".

Busch, as is usual these days in any of NASCAR's divisions, found himself out front for 68 laps of the event, and with 31 laps to go, was battling back through the pack to get back to the lead. With 30 laps to go, he was no longer battling.

Heading in to turns 1 & 2 on a restart, Busch got spun and slammed into the wall by fellow Braun Racing driver Jason Leffler, who got loose underneath Busch. Busch's day was done, but his quote-giving abilities were not.

"I just have a teammate that can't stand to be No. 2," Busch said. "I don't know what Leffler was thinking there."

ESPN's Dave Burns then asked if Leffler "shouldn't have been racing as close" to Busch.

"Duhhh," said Busch. "You get air pulled off the side of you and you wreck. It's just not responsible driving."

There seems to be an oxymoron in there somewhere for Kyle Busch to be talking about "responsible driving." For the full effect of Busch's "Duh", check the video over on Youtube.

Leffler did apologize for the accident later, but I find it tough to really place blame on a guy who was on the inside of a someone passing him on the outside. Leffler got loose and lost it, plain and simple.

Denny Hamlin won the event that had a grand total of 5 lead changes, marking the 9th-straight victory in the Nationwide Series by somebody employed by Joe Gibbs Racing. One lap wasn't led by Hamlin or Busch in the race.

Yawn.

Kasey Kahne has had a pretty darn good Friday at Bristol Motor Speedway.

Friday afternoon, Kahne topped the Nextel Cup Series in qualifying and will start out front for Saturday night's Sharpie 500. Later Friday night, Kahne took home his first Busch Series short track victory with a win in the Food City 250.

And boy did the 250-lapper set a tone for the weekend.

Kahne won Friday night after battling three-wide with Ryan Newman and Jason Leffler with less than 15 laps to go, just before Newman blew a tire after contact and fell out. At the line, it was Kahne crossing first, Leffler spinning sideways, and David Reutimann third -- all of them close enough to fall under a blanket.

The finish, though, only tells half of the story.

Jason Leffler drove Toyota to victory lane for the first time in the NASCAR Busch Series after a nail-biting finish at O'Reilly Raceway Park. Fellow Toyota drivers David Reutimann and Mike Bliss gave the manufacturer a top 10 trifecta with their 3rd and 9th place finishes.

I've never been a huge fan of Leffler or the #38 team, but I was ecstatic about their win today, which makes for five top 5s and eight top 10s on the season. That team has struggled for the past several years--they lost Kasey Kahne to Evernham Motorsports, Shane Hmiel to drugs and several cars to the wall, many of them put there by Anthony Foyt IV. Speaking of Hmiel, he holds the record at ORP for most laps led by a non-winner (153).

What made Leffler's win even more exciting is that he is only the second non-Cup driver to win a Busch race this season (not counting Aric Almirola). But any race fan who skips Busch races thinking they aren't worth watching because of the Buschwhacking missed out on some fantastic racing today.