Race: Subway Fresh Fit 600
Date: Saturday April 10th, 2010
Track: Phoenix International Raceway
Time: 7:30 pm ET
Tv: FOX
by Virginia Vroom of Predictem.com
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This weekend’s race is going to be at the blue walls of Phoenix International. I love this race. It’s a Saturday night race and something about those blue walls is just awesome. Saturday night races are just pretty awesome themselves anyway. Phoenix tends to be a track that Jimmie Johnson dominates, though, so for a lot of fans, that’s a drawback having to watch him win every year.
Phoenix is a 1-mile tri-oval that has a few different angles on it. Turns 1 and 2 boast 11 degree banking with turns 3 and 4 at 9 degrees along with the backstretch. The frontstretch is a nominal 3 degrees. At 1179 feet, the frontstretch is a little shorter than the backstretch, which stands at 1551 feet.
This is one of those tracks where several drivers run strong, but one driver will tend to dominate. Unfortunately for a lot of folks, that driver is often Jimmie Johnson, who has 4 wins here since 2007. With 2 races run here each year, Mark Martin is the defending winner of this particular track.
With this race, we see a lot of tire and fuel issues. Oftentimes, we will have 2-3 different pit strategies with the different teams throughout the race, which makes for different fuel runs and different tire runs. That’s what makes this such a great place to watch. There are a lot of different stories going on all at once throughout the night, and there’s rarely a dull moment.
Based on performance so far this season and track history, this one is going to be a toss up between Kevin Harvick and Jimmie Johnson. Harvick has dominated in the truck and Nationwide series but has failed to get the wins in the Cup. Johnson has run strong for the majority of the year, but has lacked the consistency that we’re used to seeing in him. Based on this info, I am going to pick 2-time winner Kevin Harvick for this weekend. I think that it’s going to be a hard matchup between these guys, but I think that Harvick is going to show that he can run strong in the Cup series as well as the other two. Johnson will most definitely be up front, but he’s going to have to work on his cars and communication to get that win.
Here is a recap of your current top 12 in the points:
1. Jimmie Johnson
2. Greg Biffle
3. Matt Kenseth
4. Kevin Harvick
5. Jeff Burton
6. Kurt Busch
7. Jeff Gordon
8. Tony Stewart
9. Clint Bowyer
10. Dale Earnhardt Jr.
11. Paul Menard
12. Brian Vickers
Another few to watch out for include all of the Hendrick boys this weekend, including Dale Jr., who is standing in 10th in the points right now coming off a couple of strong runs. Joey Logano is another to keep your eyes on. He’s had good cars and a lot of strong showings here lately, and if his talent from the Nationwide Series can carry over, we are bound to see a lot more victories from this one.
Stay tuned as we head for a great night race with the blue walls at Phoenix International this weekend!