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At least Robby Gordon got to race in a resurrected Dakar Rally this past week. Made a hell of a showing too.

The rest of those of us with a racin’ jones - at least of the NASCAR variety - had to endure more Petty drama and Ganassi gnews. I’m tired of this stuff. We need to get back on the track, ya know?

Steve’s doing his best. Ferreting out stuff for him, me and hopefully some of you all to argue about. That’s what this Fast Lap thing is all about. NASCAR debate. It gets pretty lively ON PIT ROW sometimes. Try these four fast ones. Leave your comments here or call us for free on Tuesday at 5 PM ET for free at 877-502-8255.

1: Should NASCAR be okay with letting Robby Gordon run a Dodge in the Shootout?

2: Who will be the odd man out at Yates Racing now that Bobby Labonte is in the fold with the HOF Racing satellite ride?

3: Should NASCAR follow Michael Waltrip’s advice and ban on track testing permanently?

4: Two no-brainer selections for the first Hall of Fame class.

Personally, I think the “no brainer” question is unfair. Steve, after all, has an advantage on those. But what the hey. Give it a shot. It’s the Fast Lap at OnPitRow.com.

Photo credit: Icon Sports Media, Inc

I know, I know. Call me a slacker. I am what I am, and that’s all what I am, as Popeye the Sailor Man used to say. Better late than never, as my dad often said on those nights when he stopped for a cold one, or four. Never eat spinach with a stranger was another saying, that seems like it should fit here, but doesn’t.

The digital Fast Laps are back after a couple week hiatus. The respite wasn’t planned, exactly, but it was appreciated by the hack that writes this thing. ON PIT ROW hasn’t missed a beat - Fast Lap wise - and Steve-O and I have had some spirited debate these past two weeks. But it just isn’t the same without you. Damn, that sounds like a Barry Manilow song. Whatever, it’s open testing at OnPitRow.com. Try these three cookiecutter-ish quick ones.
1: Will the lack of testing by Cup teams cause fans to loose interest in NASCAR during the off season?

2: With just two, as of now, drivers slated to run for Rookie of the Year honors in the Cup Series, will that battle be better than the 2008 crop produced?

3: What was a bigger story in 2008; Junior finally winning a race after two years or Jeffy not winning for the first time in 14?

4: What is your wild-yet plausible-prediction for the 2009 season?

Take a shot. Let us know what you think about these four NASCAR related topics. Limit your answers to 100 words or less, but then come back to ridicule your fellow Fast Lappers and to defend your place on the track.

Up to now I have been able to ignore the fact that the weather around here has turned cold. A much longer, and warmer fall season and the fact that NASCAR was racing somewhere relatively semi-tropical helped. Now both are over for another year.

Unlike many of the regular NASCAR TV and radio shows that close it down for the winter months, ON PIT ROW and the blogs at OnPitRow.com are active all year long. Though this Fast Lap blog got a bit bogged down the last two weeks. My bad. If you missed the radio show last week, here are the Fast Lap questions that Steve and I chewed on during the week immediately following Jimmy Johnson’s historic three-peat. 

1: With all the pending layoffs forecast in NASCAR, should the drivers take a pay cut to help curb expenses?

2: With the close points races in the Truck and Nationwide Series’ should the Chase go the way of the spinner wrench?

3: Are you saddened by the end of Jeff Gordon’s 14 season win streak?

4: Should NASCAR be worried that only three drivers won 27 of the 36 races in 2008?

I think we may have laughed about these topics more than argue this time. That is not normal. Let us know what you think about ‘em.

Photo credit: Icon Sports Media, Inc.

Is it coincidence that the Sprint Cup Chase heads to the hottest place in NASCAR just when the suits in Daytona  would like you to think that the playoff pressure is heating up for Jimmy Johnson and Carl Edwards?  I think not.

You gotta give Edwards and crew chief Bob Osborne credit. They aren’t holding anything back in their attempt to make a game out of this Chase thing. Between banzai passes and high-stakes fuel strategies, the Office Depot Racing team is hangin’ it out.

The 2008 Chase has become - perhaps always was - a classic Chevy  vs Ford battle. Dodge never showed and Toyota, strangely, never contended.

Last night’s live radio version of the Fast Lap  was a classic battle too. Steve put up a good fight, only to be over-matched by his more experienced, and intelligent, opposition - me. At least that’s what I think. We’ll put our opinions up here later but in the meantime, we’d like to see yours. Here you go. Batter up! 

1: NASCAR is backing off its 24 practice dates in 2009 strategy. What is the right number?

2: What was Greg Biffle REALLY asking after the race by wondering how the #99 team got 8 more laps to a tank of fuel than his #16 team?

3: Dale Earnhardt Jr. said the season is too long. If it is, what is the right number?

4: Should there be any concern in the Joe Gibbs Racing organization over Joey Logano’s lack of performance in their cars?

Four Fast Laps but you only get a hundred words or less to respond to the questions. After that, the gloves are off and you can defend your position just like David Gilliland or Scott Speed. And nobody will sanction you even a little bit. Come on, we want to argue with you.

Photo credit: Icon Sports Media, Inc.

Let’s not kid each other, OK? Jimmy Johnson has this thing about as locked up as a chastity belt on prom night or the next Detroit Lions opponent. Johnson’s going to win the Sprint Cup - his third straight - unless aliens come down from the Planet Roush and take Jimmy and Chad Knaus away to some world that’s never heard of bump-stops, restrictor plates or the difference between loose and tight. 

But that doesn’t mean that there’s nothing to argue about. This here Fast Lap blog will never run out of topics that Steve can raise the idiot quotient on. Like the four fast, high-banked doozies that follow.

1: The truck series saw Ryan Newman pass teammate Ron Hornaday to win, but cost Hornaday 10 points in his championship battle. Should there have been team orders?

2: How can Carl Edwards be happy with the tire at Atlanta while most other drivers were complaining about no grip?

3: Does AJ Allmendinger being the best finishing Gillett-Evernham car again show that he’s better than the equipment he had been driving?

4: Because David Reuttiman could have won the Nationwide race if he had “moved” Carl Edwards out of the way on the final lap, but didn’t; is he a good sport or a fool?

Let fly with your opinions but be prepared to defend yourself.  Because there are no limits to Steve’s confidense in his positions. Or my disdain for the same. The Fast Lap is NASCAR debate. You can hear it live at OnPitRow.com every Tuesday at 5 PM ET or do the digital version right here any day of the week.

Photo credit: Icon Sports Media, Inc

For me, there has always been something special about Atlanta Motor Speedway. I think it goes back to the days when Bill Elliott was stomping everyone in that old Melling T-Bird. The track was - and still is - wicked fast and the Elliotts had it figured out. Or something figured out, anyway.

Now it seems that Chad Knaus, Jimmy Johnson and that no. 48 Chevey team are the ones with most of the answers, while many of their competitors are still trying to figure out what questions to ask. Johnson will be tough to catch if he doesn’t slip up some how. At this point in 2007, Jimmy was one race into a string of four straight wins that closed out his second straight Chase to the Cup championship. The hopes of fans who want to see “anyone but Johnson” at the head table in New York, rest on the likelyhood of J J running headlong into somebody else’s “racin’ deal”. Good luck with that.

And good luck with these four, highly banked, non-restrictor plated Fast Lap questions.

1: Should NASCAR start the Chase drivers in the front of the field every week of the Chase?

2: Has the time come for car owners to start releasing their lame-duck drivers to make room for the 2009 line up?

3: Is there any place with better racing than at Martinsville?

4: What is the most probable merger scenario?

 Remember, 100 words or less for your answers. But this is a debate blog, you know? Come on back and tell me what you think of my comments. Or Steve’s, or whomever’s. Stir the pot you know and we may use your insight on the next ON PIT ROW.

I love Martinsville. Or maybe it’s just a short track hang-over from the ARCA Championship weekend at the equally short, and fun as hell, Toledo Speedway. At least it was fun for Steve and me. Don’t know about Scott Speed and Ricky Stenhouse Jr or any of the others who got their rides short-tracked to greater and lesser extents. I can tell you it was a blast to watch.

Congrats to Justin Allgaier for keeping his head on and winning the race and the ARCA RE/MAX Series championship.  It’s on to the Nationwide Series in Penske Racing’s no. 12 and by the looks of Allgaier’s Friday showing at Lowes, he’ll do just fine.

Scott Speed had major short-track issues and may find a distinct lack of allies as he tries to make his Sprint Cup debut at Martinsville this weekend. Speed might want to tackles these four, tricky Fast Lap questions to work out some of his frustration, hmm?

1:  NASCAR threw up a trial balloon at Lowes this week seeking reaction to shrinking the field size at all three series races, How will that help NASCAR?

2:  While everyone else has moved up and down in the Chase standings, Johnson has held firm at the top. Can Burton or Biffle knock him out of the lead?

3:  If one of the NASCAR axioms is that crew chiefs and drivers must have “chemistry”, what are teams hoping for with their “driver de jour” programs?

4:  How might a GM-Chrysler merger affect NASCAR?

Go ahead. Show Speed how it’s done. Be assertive, but know your limits - 100 words or less - and don’t take any schtuff from your fellow Fast Lappers. We’re looking for the best for the new Fast Lap Show, coming to a blog near you.

Photo credit: Icon Sports Media, Inc.

Ah, controversy. Where would NASCAR bloggers be without it? Thanks Tony. Muchos gracias Regan. And thank you so much NASCAR. The finish of the latest Talladega race wasn’t a finish at all - only a beginning.

Tony Stewart got the trophy. But as Luke told me in an email this morning, he has to know he didn’t really win the race.  Regan Smith  crossed the finish line first and ended up 18th.  I would be more supportive of his claims that he believed he had made a legal pass, if his story about how he came to that conclusion hadn’t changed. 

Mike Helton clarified the rules “moving forward”. But that didn’t un-muddy the race time perception that one of his officials had created earlier at Daytona. Maybe we need a do-over.

Onward to Charlotte and the autumn night race.  Back home again in Carolina and some of the best looking televised Fast Laps on the schedule.  Take your four warm up laps right here.

1:  Did Carl Edward’s ill-timed bump draft of Greg Biffledeal a death blow to the Roush-Fenway trio’s title hopes?

2:  Did Goodyear blow it again, or is there something else to blame for the tire problems at Dega?

3:  Does the exciting racing and multiple lead changes outweigh the inevitable the big ones?

4:  Did the inexperience of DEI drivers, Smith, Menard and Almirola lined up at the restart lead to Tony Stewart’s win?

 Here’s your chance to get those tires nice and warm, so they don’t go BOOM when you turn left on Saturday night. Give us you best shot and we may use you ON PIT  ROW as an example of what is good and intelligent in the NASCAR internet community. Or we might expose you as the…..

Photo credit: Icon Sports Media, Inc.

That three car battle for the Chase to the Cup that many - including me - were predicting seems to be shaping up.  Jimmy Johnson got his first 2008 Chase win.  Carl Edwards and Greg Biffle each grabbed another top three finish.  Throw a blanket on those three with the pack over ninety points back already.  

And the pack doesn’t include any Toyotas at all.  The Joe Gibbs Racing gang is falling farther behind with each poor showing.  Wait until next year coach. Oh, and Kyle, the pressure’s off now. Go ahead and win some races.

Kansas was a pretty predictably dull race other that Carl Edwards’ banzai pass attempt at the end and Juan Pablo Montoya’s cheating penalty in qualifying.  My guess is, that Talladega will be a different story.

Want to spice up the race interest at the office?  Start a big-one pool and try to pick what lap the semi-annual wreck will occur.  I say 155.  But there will be plenty of Fast Laps before that.  Try the next four, restrictor-plated, four-wide, warm-ups for the weekend.

1: Was the penalty to Juan Pablo Montoya for over-filled shocks during qualifying appropriate?

2: Should Kansas get a second Cup date, in part because a casino is being built next to the track?

3: Can Joe Gibbs Racing return to respectability during the Chase?

4: Paul Newman?

That’s it.  That’s the Talladega 2 edition of ON PIT ROW’s Fast Lap.  Steve and I will kick these things around on Tuesday’s show.  Listen live right here and call us between 5 and 7 PM EDT at 877-502-8255 and give us your take on any or all of the above.  And, of course, leave your thoughts here in the comment section.  Just be nice to your friends.

Photo credit: con Sports Media, Inc.

I think I may be convinced.  In 2007 Clint Bowyer parlayed a win in the first race of the Chase to the Sprint Cup playoffs -his first ever win as a matter of fact - into contention with Jeff Gordon and eventual champ, Jimmy Johnson.  Clint hung in without another win.

Greg Biffle has two.  In a row.  And he’s going back to Kansas, where he is the most recent winner as well.  And the once - and probably future - favorite driver to sweep the Cup up - Kyle Busch is limping with an average finish of a tic worse than 38th place in the first to Chase races.  Yikes!  Looks like Biffle may be for real and Rowdy is outta here.

And where did Matt Kenseth come from?  I mean lately you expect the Biff and Carl Edwards to be tough, but that no. 17 team has been as resilient as the Detroit Lions.  Good to see though.

Take a look at our little mid-week distraction we call the Fast Lap and tell us, in your own concise way,  what you think of the four topics that Steve-O has tossed up today. 

1: NASCAR’s new drug policy adds random testing, but why isn’t there a banned substance list?

2: This weeks Robby Gordon rumor has he and DEI joining forces. Will Robby ever get it right?

3: How can the new car provide such great racing on a one miler and not even come close when you add another half mile?

4: Is The Chase down to a three car battle?

This is a debate so bring your arguing shoes.  We’ll use the best, or maybe the worst, comments on a future episode of ON PIT ROW. 

Photo credit: Icon Sports Media, Inc.

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