Kevin Harvick won the Coke Zero 400 Powered By Coca Cola at the Daytona International Speedway Saturday night. Really? Coke Zero 400 Powered by Coca Cola? As if we didn’t get that Coke Zero was a Coca Cola product?
Anyway – Harvick won for the second time this season, firming up his hold on first place in the Sprint Cup standings. Harvick, Jeff Gordon, Kurt Busch, and Dale Earnhardt Jr. all benefited from a combination of a high finish and a lack of competition (half the field did not finish the race). Busch and Earnhardt moved up two places each, and Gordon jumped three spots to claim the number two position behind Harvick.
The massive crash up that took out 19 drivers with mere laps to go was not the only explosive wreck of the day. AJ Allmendinger’s early exit prompted him to vent and pout at NASCAR legend and car owner Richard Petty in front of multiple cameras. Carl Edwards and Kurt Busch seemed none too happy with one another after the race. Then of course, there were the Gas Pedal Addict Fireworks sponsored by Gas Pedal Addict (not really; maybe next year).
Gas Pedal Addict’s favorite driver, the appropriately named Scott Speed, snuck in his second top ten finish of the season, jumping two places to 24th and moving to within a paltry 405 points of cracking into the big twelve Sprint Cup contenders.
With 18 races down and 18 to go, the contenders lineup is looking pretty well defined. There are only two or three spots that are realistically in play. Then again, a driver like Joey Logano, Kasey Kahne, or Jamie McMurray could go on a late season tear and shake things up a bit at the bottom end of the top 12.
It’s hard to believe that the 2010 NASCAR season is already half over. But if Daytona showed us anything, it’s that there’s still a lot of excitement left in this year.
