{"id":19230,"date":"2018-06-09T12:50:19","date_gmt":"2018-06-09T17:50:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/?p=19230"},"modified":"2018-06-09T22:39:43","modified_gmt":"2018-06-10T03:39:43","slug":"nascar-saturday-michigan-notebook","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/2018\/06\/09\/nascar-saturday-michigan-notebook\/","title":{"rendered":"NASCAR: Saturday Michigan Notebook"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Erik Jones thinks victory is a distinct possibility this season<\/b><\/p>\n

BROOKLYN, Mich. \u2013 When will NASCAR\u2019s young guns start firing on all cylinders?<\/p>\n

There\u2019s little doubt that the critical mass of young talent in the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series is as potent as it\u2019s been since the turn of the century. Only one problem: the veterans in the series are decidedly reluctant to give up the spotlight.<\/p>\n

Three drivers in particularly have hogged the trophies and severely limited the winning chances available to the younger competitors. Between them, Kevin Harvick, Kyle Busch and Martin Truex Jr. have won 11 of 14 races this season, 19 of 24 events dating back to the start of last year\u2019s Playoff and 24 of 36 races over the past year.<\/p>\n

That doesn\u2019t mean, however, that the 20-somethings in the series have despaired of visiting Victory Lane. Far from it, says Joe Gibbs Racing driver and Cup series sophomore Erik Jones.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel like it\u2019ll come in time,\u201d said Jones, whose best result to date was a closely contested second to Busch at Bristol last year. \u201cThere\u2019s no reason to stress or worry about it. I just know that we\u2019re doing all we can to put ourselves in that position to do it and hoping that we do the right things to make it happen.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo do I think all the young guys will start to kind of roll in and start winning some races? It\u2019s definitely possible. We\u2019re all with very good teams. Ryan (Blaney) has been very fast this year, as well as Kyle (Larson) and Chase (Elliott) as well, so I could definitely see us all winning some races here in the coming months before the Playoffs or even in the Playoffs.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo it\u2019ll just be interesting to see what happens. There\u2019s a lot of teams that are working on stuff and getting cars better, and it\u2019s going to be interesting to see really who rises to the top here in the next couple months.\u201d<\/p>\n

KYLE BUSCH STILL LOOKING FOR SPEED AT MICHIGAN<\/b><\/p>\n

In the first round of Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series qualifying on Friday, Kyle Busch got a nasty surprise.<\/p>\n

His No. 18 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota, which had been second on the speed chart in opening Cup practice, was inexplicably slow in the opening round of time trials. Busch was 23rd fastest in the session, barely transferring to the second round.<\/p>\n

From that point on, the improvement was dramatic. Busch was second in Round 2 and third in the final round.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe first round was a bit of a scare,\u201d Busch acknowledged, \u201cBut the rest of it was OK. Just didn\u2019t quite get it, but we got everything out of it there the third round. That was all she had, so I wish that we were a little bit faster.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re certainly missing just a little bit. It seems like it\u2019s harder to hit it. Just looking at the 78 (Martin Truex Jr.) and the 11 (Denny Hamlin) and the 20 (Erik Jones) and those guys, we\u2019re not all as fast as we would like to be, so we\u2019ve got to keep working on it.\u201d<\/p>\n

That attitude extended to Saturday\u2019s rain-abbreviated practice session, in which Busch posted the seventh fastest speed (and second fastest 10-consecutive-lap average behind Kevin Harvick). But the 2015 series champion was looking for more.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe car will be good in race trim, and if we keep the downforce in it, hopefully that\u2019ll pay off better for us on race day\u2014hopefully hot and sunny,\u201d Busch said after rain ended the session.<\/p>\n

SHORT STROKES<\/b><\/p>\n

Kyle Larson struggled with a tight handling condition during Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series qualifying on Friday but appeared to have the issues resolved during Saturday morning\u2019s practice. Larson was second in the session at 200.083 mph, behind only Kevin Harvick (200.719 mph). \u201cThat last run on tires\u2014I thought we were as good as anybody except the 4 (Harvick),\u201d Larson radioed to crew chief Chad Johnston. Seeking his fourth straight Cup victory at Michigan International Speedway, Larson will have to overcome a 26th-place starting position to get the job done\u2026<\/p>\n

Rain played havoc with Saturday\u2019s track activity at Michigan. Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series practice, scheduled for 9:05 a.m. ET, started late and ended early, though Stewart-Haas Racing driver Aric Almirola managed to squeeze in a session-high 31 laps around the 2-mile track.<\/p>\n

NASCAR Xfinity Series qualifying was rained out\u2014forcing the field to be ordered by the rule book, with Kyle Busch on pole on the basis of owner points. Rain likewise wiped out final Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series practice.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service   Erik Jones thinks victory is a distinct possibility this season BROOKLYN, Mich. \u2013 When will NASCAR\u2019s young guns start firing on all cylinders? There\u2019s little doubt that the critical mass of young talent in the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series is as potent as it\u2019s been since the turn […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":19217,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[11],"tags":[613,614,219,16],"class_list":["post-19230","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nascar","tag-firekeepers-casino-400","tag-lti-printing-250","tag-michigan-international-speedway","tag-nascar"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/racedaysa.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/NXS_RaceStart_060918-e1528593533735.jpg?fit=640%2C427&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7hzTZ-50a","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19230","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19230"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19230\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19231,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19230\/revisions\/19231"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19217"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19230"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19230"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19230"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}