Hendrick Motorsports has announced that team owner Rick Hendrick will not be trackside at the Homestead Miami Speedway for Sunday's Ford 400 NASCAR season finale but instead back in Charlotte, N.C. for a family emergency.
Hendrick's 29-year-old niece Alesha Gainey is in critical condition at a Charlotte hospital being prepared for a liver transplant, Hendrick Motorsports General Manager Marshall Carlson told reporters. Gainey is the daughter of Hendrick's brother John, who was killed in a plane accident in 2004 along with Hendrick's son Ricky and two other of John Hendrick's daughters.
"Rick's priority at this point is supporting his family,'' Carlson said. "He's so proud of his teams but needs to be with niece and her family.''
Hendrick Motorsports driver Jimmie Johnson holds a 108-point lead over teammate Mark Martin entering Sunday's final race insuring the team its ninth championship, which ties Hendrick with Petty Enterprises for the most in Cup Series history.
HOMESTEAD, Fla. -- Mark Martin winces, then breaks into a grin every time he hears the introduction.
"Ladies and gentlemen ... Mark Martin, who is attempting to become the oldest champion in NASCAR history."
The difference between this week and years ago is that Martin grinned. He's been doing that a lot lately.
Martin trails his Hendrick Motorsports teammate Jimmie Johnson by 108 points entering Sunday's Ford 400 NASCAR Sprint Cup season finale at Homestead Miami Speedway. Johnson, 34, only needs to finish 25th or better to clinch a historic fourth consecutive title.
HOMESTEAD, Fla. -- If pressed to find one thing Ryan Newman would change about his season, of course, he'd like to score a win in Sunday's NASCAR Sprint Cup season finale at Homestead Miami Speedway.
After being close to victory circle a half-dozen times this season, that's about the only thing he feels is missing from a stellar debut season with the essentially start-up Stewart-Haas Racing team. Newman won two pole positions in the No. 39 U.S. Army-sponsored Chevrolet and, after an ominous start at the season-opening Daytona 500, still qualified for the 12-driver Chase for the Championship.
In our last installment of Inside the Chase for the Championship with Ryan Newman, FanHouse looks at the evolution of the season and how Newman evaluates his fresh start.
HOMESTEAD, Fla. -- The hard-core conspirators will think NASCAR scripted it. The reality is Jimmie Johnson was the fastest driver of the day.
Johnson will start his No. 48 Lowe's Chevrolet from the pole position in Sunday's Ford 400 at Homestead Miami Speedway -- the ultimate beginning to the last chapter in his quest to become the first driver to win four consecutive championships.
Of all things Johnson knocked his Hendrick Motorsports teammate -- and only title challenger left -- Mark Martin off the top spot on the qualifying speed chart. Johnson leads Martin by 108 points and needs only to finish 25th or better to clinch his historic championship.
With Jimmie Johnson positioned to become the first racer in history to win four consecutive NASCAR Sprint Cup championships, FanHouse motorsports writer Holly Cain took a trip to his hometown outside San Diego last week. This is the second of a two-part series looking at the unlikely start for a stock car great.
With Jimmie Johnson positioned to become the first racer in history to win four consecutive NASCAR Sprint Cup championships, FanHouse motorsports writer Holly Cain took a trip to his hometown outside San Diego last week. This is the first of a two-part series looking at the unlikely start for a stock car great.
EL CAJON, Calif. -- The neighborhood sits just beyond a miniature horse farm, up Crest Mountain in unincorporated El Cajon, where dusty pick-up trucks buzz by impatiently, dirt bikes strapped in their truck beds.
For two mornings this week, Ryan Newman struggled just to lift his head off the pillow to get out of bed, his neck muscles still sore from a frightening airborne smash-and-roll wreck at Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway last Sunday.
Even as he suited up Friday to practice for Race 8 of NASCAR's 10-race Chase for the Championship at Texas Motor Speedway, he was still aching from the crash, and bristling that it even happened.
Newman had been outspoken about NASCAR's immediate need to keep the race cars from launching into the air during accidents -- only to take that scary ride himself Sunday afternoon.
INDIANAPOLIS -- The timing of the latest round of Danica Patrick-to-NASCAR reports isn't lost on those in the IndyCar world, where Thursday's major announcement that IZOD will be the IndyCar Series' first title sponsor in a decade has been forced to share headlines with its most famous driver's likely part-time foray into stock cars.
Recently crowned 2009 IndyCar Series champion Dario Franchitti -- a former Andretti Green Racing teammate of Patrick's -- said Thursday he's still confident she's staying in IndyCar next season.
"I believe she'll be back in IndyCar next year and that will help her with her goal of winning the Indianapolis 500,'' Franchitti told FanHouse. "If she does drive in NASCAR, I think it will be difficult to do both.''
To hear Jimmie Johnson describe it, the most challenging part of wrapping up a historic fourth consecutive NASCAR Sprint Cup Series championship is not getting wrapped up in winning it. No matter how hard everyone else tries to convince him the trophy's been engraved.
He holds a 184-point advantage -- nearly a full race lead -- on second place Mark Martin and only needs to finish 10th place or better in the remaining three Chase for the Championship races to secure the trophy. That's even if Martin wins all three races and leads the most laps in each.
But Johnson insists his approach in the No. 48 Lowe's Chevy will be the same as if he was trailing by 184 points and promised he wasn't about to start being conservative.
"We're showing up to win races,'' Johnson said. "Finishing 10th isn't as easy as it sounds. It is a tough field of cars out there and we need to be on our game. With three to go, we need to race these next two as if we're behind in the points and get every point we can.''
Is there another sport that turns on its winners so?
And cheering against the New York Yankees doesn't count.
Another superb run in NASCAR's Chase for the Championship has put Jimmie Johnson in position for a historic fourth consecutive Sprint Cup title. He's on the verge of accomplishing something Richard Petty, the late Dale Earnhardt, Cale Yarborough, Darrell Waltrip and Jeff Gordon never did.
And for all his hard work and performance under pressure here's the thanks he gets: people are accusing him of stinking up the show.
Hendrick Motorsports has announced that team owner Rick Hendrick will not be trackside at the Homestead Miami Speedway for Sunday's Ford 400 NASCAR season finale but instead back in Charlotte, N.C. for a family emergency.
HOMESTEAD, Fla. -- 
HOMESTEAD, Fla. -- If pressed to find one thing 
HOMESTEAD, Fla. -- The hard-core conspirators will think NASCAR scripted it. The reality is 
For two mornings this week, 
INDIANAPOLIS -- The timing of the latest round of 
To hear 
Is there another sport that turns on its winners so?
