No Championship Run For Stewart In Final Season
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| Three-time champion Tony Stewart was among four drivers eliminated on Sunday |
| Sarah Crabill/NASCAR via Getty Images |
Tony Stewart's final season in the Sprint Cup Series won't end with him riding off into the sunset with another title after the three-time series champion was eliminated from the Chase for the Sprint Cup following a 13th-place finish in Sunday's race at Dover.
Stewart was among four drivers who failed to advance to the second round, including first-time Chase contender Chris Buescher, and Ganassi Racing teammates Kyle Larson and Jamie McMurray. 12 drivers, including Sunday's race winner Martin Truex, Jr., advanced to the second round.
Sunday's race was the third of three races in the opening round, featuring 16 drivers who qualified for the championship battle, with Stewart, Larson and Buescher scoring victories during the 26-race "regular season" while McMurray qualified for his second Chase on points.
Stewart had hoped to replicate the success Jeff Gordon enjoyed in his final season last year. Gordon advanced all the way to the final four and nearly went out on top as the champion.
Coming into the Chase, Stewart had hoped his final year would play out the same, but finishes of 16th and 23rd in the first two Chase races dropped him to 15th in the Chase standings and needing nothing less than a win to advance.
It didn't happen.
Stewart ended the day 13th in the standings, 11 points behind Austin Dillon in the final cut-off spot.
"We gave it 110 percent today," said Stewart. "We've had a really good year, and we won't let this get us down. There's lots of racing left this season. Really proud of our team. We kept making it better all day. That is as good as we had."
Chip Ganassi's hopes of having at least one of his two cars advance into the next round went up in a cloud of smoke after McMurray's engine expired on lap 192, ending his day in the garage with a 40th-place finish.
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| Jamie McMurray's Chase bid ended with a blown engine on lap 192 |
| Chris Trotman/Getty Images |
McMurray was the last hope for Ganassi after teammate Kyle Larson had mechanical issues of his own early in the race, then lost more ground after a pit road penalty.
Already four laps down, Larson then slapped the wall on lap 182, finishing six laps down in 25th.
After putting both of their cars into the Chase for the first time, both drivers were out after just one round.
"Well, horrible day for our organization," said McMurray. "It's really hard when you run bad, but the fact that we have run so well the last two months and have been very consistent, both cars. You will have things like this happen. It's frustrating that it happens at this point when you can't really afford to have anything bad go wrong.
"Very unfortunate and disappointed, but very proud of our organization, where our cars started the year at to where we are right now we have made huge progress and we will just go race as hard as we can the next seven races."
It was a bitter pill to swallow for Larson, who qualified for the Chase for the first time by scoring his first-career Sprint Cup victory at Michigan four weeks ago, but entered Sunday's race barely holding onto the 12th and final transfer spot.
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| Kyle Larson finished 14th in the Chase standings following Sunday's race |
| Sarah Crabill/NASCAR via Getty Images |
He had high hopes after leading 85 laps at in the spring race at Dover, but finished out the race 14th in points, just ahead of McMurray.
"There wasn't much we could do," said Larson. "I cut the right front tire down and got in the wall and still had good speed in the race car after that but it just didn't work out.
"Our team has come a long way this season from where we started the year. We were pretty awful at the start of the season but then got a win at Michigan to lock ourselves in the Chase. That was good. I know we have the speed to have made it past a couple of rounds but it's my typical luck I guess, where it just doesn't work out."
Rookie Chris Buescher had also raced his way into the Chase with a victory in the rain at Pocono back in August, and then fought his way into the top-30 in points to become eligible, giving Front Row Motorsports their first shot at the title.
Despite being seeded 13th at the start of the Chase, Buescher was never in contention in any of the three races of the opening round – his best finish being 23rd on Sunday – and quickly dropped to dead-last in the standings which is where he finished.
Still, just making the Chase was a remarkable accomplishment for a team that had never finished better than 26th in points since their humble beginnings back in 2005.
"It was great to be in the Chase," said Buescher. "To even be in the running and be participating in it was a really special deal, especially for our first season, so that's pretty awesome. These three races never really rolled our way.
"Now we go back to racing the same way we did this weekend. Nothing really changes. To even be in the Chase was a really big deal for Front Row Motorsports and this 34 team. My hat's off to everybody who has worked so hard this season. It's unfortunate this is the end of our Chase, but it was a pretty good deal to make it in our first season."
The second round of the Chase starts next weekend with the Bank of America 500 at Charlotte Motor Speedway. Truex, Jr., will be seeded first with two wins, followed by last weekend's winner Kevin Harvick. Kyle Busch, Matt Kenseth, Joey Logano, Chase Elliott, Brad Keselowski, Kurt Busch, Denny Hamlin, Carl Edwards, Jimmie Johnson and Austin Dillon also advanced. All 12 drivers will have their points total reset to 3,000 points, with the top eight advancing to the third round.
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