While the Sprint Cup Series and the Camping World Truck Series are at Atlanta Motor Speedway this weekend, the Nationwide Series has the first of six open dates on its schedule.
Three races in may be the perfect time for a breather considering the exciting coast-to-coast action that's accompanied the start of the 2010 season -- one of the most anticipated on record.
Danica Patrick made her national-series debut while also bringing an incredible meter-moving presence to the Nationwide Series. She'll return to series competition June 26 at New Hampshire. In the meantime, she's back to her "regular" job in the IndyCar Series.
Said Patrick on her Twitter account earlier this week: "I am going to miss driving the stock car [and the people], but it is time to get the IndyCar season started."
Out of the gate, there have been three different winners -- Tony Stewart (Daytona), reigning series champion Kyle Busch (Fontana) and two-time series champion Kevin Harvick (Las Vegas). Busch, who started first at Daytona after the field was set via the rule book, Joey Logano (Fontana) and Brad Keselowski (Las Vegas) are the three different pole-sitters thus far in 2010.
Three series-only regulars are making noise in the top 10 in the standings: Justin Allgaier is fourth, Steve Wallace is sixth and Scott Riggs is 10th. An average of 3.3 "regular guys" have registered top-10 finishes in the first three events versus an average of 11.3 double-duty driver entrants.
Riggs' veteran savvy paces RAB Racing
After three races, Carl Edwards, the 2007 Nationwide Series champion, is the standings leader by 41 points over second place Brad Keselowski. The remainder of the top-10 drivers are well within striking distance of the lead -- 146 points separates first place from 10th, where Scott Riggs resides.
Riggs, 39, is in his first season with RAB Racing, an independent series team. The 2002 Raybestos Rookie of the Year spent two full seasons in the Nationwide Series from 2002-03, posting four wins. Until the season opener at Daytona, he hadn't competed in the series since 2007.
His time away from the series and his late addition to the organization -- he wasn't announced as the driver for the team's No. 09 Ford until late January -- hasn't impeded his results. In fact, in the short time Riggs has been with the team, his finishes have been team bests.
Riggs began with a 15th-place finish at Daytona, at the time the best for RAB. He was 16th at Fontana, then followed with a 14th-place finish at Las Vegas, the best ever for the organization since its inception in September 2008.
In addition to his 10th-place ranking in the drivers' standings, he's propelled RAB to 12th in the owners' standings, again an organization best.
These two open weeks will be critical for Riggs and RAB. The team was funded through the first three races and is in search of sponsorship to continue its surge on a full-time basis this year.
In the Loop: Strong starts, encouraging finish
There's no sophomore slump for Justin Allgaier. Besides sitting fourth in the standings, Allgaier also has racked up some of the top statistics in the Nationwide Series.
In the first three races, he has a Driver Rating of 96.0, an Average Running Position of 11.1, 16 Fastest Laps Run and a Laps in the Top 15 percentage of 79.4.
Perhaps most impressive: Allgaier has improved with each race. At Daytona, his Driver Rating was 89.5; at Fontana, 93.8; and at Las Vegas, he scored a season-best 104.7.
Another series-only regular who has been strong at the outset is Steve Wallace. In the first three races, the quickly progressing Wallace has a Driver Rating of 87.3, an Average Running Position of 13.4, six Fastest Laps Run and a Laps in the Top 15 percentage of 73.9.
Wallace, too, has improved with each race, scoring Driver Ratings of 83.5, 85.3 and 93.0 in the first three events, respectively.
Also improving is Danica Patrick, who will have to wait until June at New Hampshire for her next series race. No doubt, the stock-car learning curve has been a steep one for Patrick. In the three races, the open-wheel star posted a Driver Rating of 42.8, an Average Running Position of 31.7, and a Laps in the Top 15 percentage of just 3.6.
Still, she leaves on a relatively high note. Though her finish at Las Vegas was the worst of the three events (36th), Patrick had her best run at the high-banked 1.5-mile course. She had a Driver Rating of 54.4, an Average Running Position of 30.0, a Pass Differential (passes minus times passed) of plus-10 (her only positive race in that category) and 16 Quality Passes (passes of cars in the top 15 under green).
Wallace making a good progression
Looking for a good comparison for Steve Wallace's improvement? How about to that of the NFL?
Coaches talk about the development of young quarterbacks; that few can step in and master a complicated offensive system immediately. It's a maturation process on and off the field before they start showing progress, usually about their second or third year in the league.
The 2010 season is Wallace's fourth in a full-time capacity in the Nationwide Series. And has he ever begun to show progress.
Wallace, 22, heads into this first open week on a career-best streak of five consecutive top-10 finishes dating to last season. He put up back-to-back results of 10th and eighth, respectively, at Phoenix and Homestead-Miami last year before starting 2010 in the same fashion.
He was 10th at Daytona, sixth at Fontana and 10th at Las Vegas. He's sixth in the standings, by far the best start of his series career. Wallace started his 125th career race this past week.
"Three top-10s is a great way for us to start the season," Wallace said. "It always seems like the guys who can have a good start to the year and build some momentum tend to stay toward the front of the point standings for most of the year.
"We'll build on this and head to Bristol in a few weeks -- it's one of my favorite tracks and our hot rods should really be strong there."
Wallace isn't taking the week off. Instead, he'll make his Camping World Truck Series debut in Atlanta for Billy Ballew.
"I've always enjoyed watching that series; those guys race really, really hard," he said. "Running one of those races is something that I've wanted to do for awhile, but the timing has never been right until now."
Tale of two cities for Allgaier
After going east and west during the first three weeks of the season, Justin Allgaier added north and south destinations this week.
Allgaier, the 2009 Raybestos Rookie of the Year in the series, traveled to Toledo, Ohio, on Tuesday for an ARCA season kickoff event. He spoke about his career in that series and how it served as a springboard to his NASCAR career.
Allgaier won the 2008 ARCA title in dramatic fashion, overcoming a 105-point deficit in the final race to claim the title. In the process, he broke Frank Kimmel's series record of eight consecutive championships.
After his stop in Toledo, Allgaier traveled to Talladega, where on Wednesday he was there to help "install" new grandstand seats and give pace-car rides to media members in attendance.
Allgaier is fourth in the standings, the highest-ranked series-only regular.
Rookies running the gamut
That there will be ups and downs throughout the season for the series' five rookies is an understatement.
The first two races produced surprising results for James Buescher and Brian Scott. Buescher was eighth at Daytona while Scott secured 10th place at Fontana after running in the top five for much of the event.
Ricky Stenhouse Jr. has had the worst luck of the three thus far, getting caught in accidents in each race. Parker Kligerman wasn't able to race at Daytona after his team withdrew, but came back with a decent 22nd-place finish in his season debut at Fontana. Colin Braun had mixed results -- an accident relegated him to 34th at Daytona -- but he rebounded for a 18th-place finish at Fontana.
Las Vegas is where all the rookies' luck ran out. Literally. Four of the five were knocked out of the race before it ended -- Braun, Buescher and Scott due to accidents and Kligerman because of a faulty transmission. Stenhouse managed to collect his first finish of the season despite going behind the wall for repairs after hitting the Turn 4 wall.
The rookies will have two weeks to collect themselves before racing on their fourth different track in their first four events -- at Bristol -- the first short track of the year.
Rookie Standings
| POS. | DRIVER | TEAM | MAKE | POINTS | BEHIND |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | James Buescher | Phoenix Racing | Chevrolet | 34 | -- |
| 2. | Brian Scott | Braun Racing | Toyota | 30 | -4 |
| 3. | Colin Braun | Roush Fenway Racing | Ford | 29 | -5 |
| 4. | Ricky Stenhouse Jr. | Roush Fenway Racing | Ford | 24 | -10 |
| 5. | Parker Kligerman | Smith-Penske Racing | Dodge | 15 | -19 |
Toyota starting to make a move
Toyota has made the biggest jump in the manufacturers' standings since the start of the season.
The winner of the past two Bill France Performance Cups has vaulted from last to second in the standings after the first three races.
Chevrolet has yet to surrender the lead it claimed after Tony Stewart's season-opening win at Daytona. Kevin Harvick added to the advantage with his victory at Las Vegas.
Ford and Dodge are in third and fourth, respectively. Ford finished second in the first two races and was third at Las Vegas while Dodge has finished in the top five in each race thus far.
Manufacturer Standings
| POS. | MAKE | WINS | POINTS | BEHIND |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | Chevrolet | 2 | 21 | -- |
| 2. | Toyota | 1 | 18 | -3 |
| 3. | Ford | 0 | 16 | -5 |
| 4. | Dodge | 0 | 11 | -10 |
Up next: Off, off, Bristol, off
The Nationwide Series actually is off for consecutive weeks before returning March 20 at Bristol. The series also is off during the final weekend of March, and resumes with the first of its nine stand-alone events on April 3 at Nashville. Following these open dates, the series isn't off again until May's NASCAR Sprint All-Star weekend.
Tickets:
• Scotts Turf Builder 300 at Bristol Motor Speedway
