The first off weekend for the Sprint Cup Series includes some down time for the Nationwide Series and Camping World Truck Series as well and offers a chance to look back on the top stories of the season so far.
Here are the fast five:
BOYS GONE WILD
NASCAR's decision to let drivers settle things on the track and not govern the sport with such a heavy hand was a major topic of conversation coming into the season. The policy was thrust into the spotlight in a major way after the Carl Edwards-Brad Keselowski incident at Atlanta Motor Speedway. By merely penalizing Edwards with a three-race probation for his retaliation on Keselowski, NASCAR sent the message that a driver would have to go pretty far to go outside the acceptable boundaries of the policy. Whether the two combatants from AMS will put this behind them remains to be seen, but NASCAR seems to want such rivalries and behavior to continue in hopes of generating additional interest in the sport.
DANICA MANIA PART ONE
Danica Patrick's foray into stock car racing turned the sports world's attention to NASCAR, and her participation in the Daytona ARCA race and three opening season Nationwide Series events drew larger television audiences and an uptick in ticket sales. But now Patrick returns to her full-time job with the Indy Racing League beginning on Sunday in Brazil and won't be back to NASCAR until mid-June. It will be interesting to see if the IRL experiences any added viewership or interest from NASCAR fans who follow Patrick to the open wheel world. And how will Patrick make the transition to Indy Cars and then back to stock cars later this summer?
RCR'S COMEBACK
Richard Childress Racing began its resurgence in the second half of last season and it has carried into 2010. All three of the team's drivers - Jeff Burton, Clint Bowyer and Kevin Harvick, who leads the point standings after four races - have run extremely well at the start of the campaign. It appears to be only a matter of time before one breaks into victory lane and all have a legitimate chance at making the Chase and ending RCR's nearly two-year drought.
EARNHARDT STILL STRUGGLING
He finished second in the Daytona 500 with a thrilling move to go from 10th to the runner-up spot on the last lap, but after that it's been more of the same old mediocre running for Dale Earnhardt Jr. As his Hendrick Motorsports teammates continue to excel, Junior lags behind suffering from mechanical issues like a broken axle or just plain ill-handling cars. Rick Hendrick vowed to improve the performance of the 88 team in the off-season and there does appear to be some benefits from aligning Earnhardt's squad with the No. 5 stable. But the pressure continues to mount for Earnhardt to live up to the lofty expectations he carried with him in his move to Hendrick.
JOHNSON'S DOMINANCE...AGAIN
Anyone who doubted whether Jimmie Johnson would contend for a fifth straight title was sadly mistaken. Two wins in the season's first four races is evidence there is no reason to believe the 48 team won't again contend for the championship. But the question remains whether that kind of domination is good or bad for the sport? The anti-Jimmie faction seems to grow louder every day and if there is indeed a "Drive for Five" in play come this fall, NASCAR executives have to hope more people will be interested to watch history being made rather than facing a tune-out factor from those bored with seeing the same driver winning again.
