Contender or Pretender: Infineon
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Juan Pablo Montoya (Contender) – Juan’s had his share of problems this year but he’s never had any difficulty getting around Infineon Raceway. In his three visits to this track he’s never finished worse than sixth. Infineon is also the site of Montoya’s lone win back in 2007. Only once in Montoya’s whole NASCAR career has he even finished outside the top six on a road course and that was because of a wreck.
Matt Kenseth (Pretender) – One basic fantasy racing rule of thumb about using Matt Kenseth is don’t use him on a road course. If you’re in an allocation league and you use Kenseth then you obviously don’t plan on winning. Matt Kenseth has openly said he hates these tracks and his numbers back it up. At Infineon Raceway Matt Kenseth has never cracked the top five and only once in his career has he finished in the top ten here.
Jeff Gordon (Contender) – Jeff Gordon’s been good all season long and at Infineon Raceway he has the longest active consecutive top ten streak in the series with four top tens in a row. His first top ten in this time period was a win for the 24 team. Jeff Gordon should be very confident this time around because he knows his car will have plenty of horse power under his hood from his seat time exchange with Marcos Ambrose recently.
Kasey Kahne (Pretender) – Last year’s Kasey Kahne win at Infineon was a complete surprise, probably even for Kahne. When you take away Kahne’s win last year he only has one finish that is better than 30th. Even with his win last year his average finish (26.7) is nearly the worst in the series. His average finish excluding his win is 31.8. Beyond a shadow of doubt I wouldn’t even consider Kasey Kahne this weekend.
Kurt Busch (Contender) – Kurt Busch is the best road course driver to never win a road course race. Last year he was very competitive running inside the top five until he had a run in with Jimmie Johnson. He rebounded from that and finished 15th. I expect Busch to be very competitive Sunday.
Jamie McMurray (Pretender) – Jamie McMurray is a good road course driver and has been in contention for the win on these tracks on multiple occasions. However at some point you need to check out the stats. In seven races he’s only finished in the top ten once. I’ll say it again that he’s a good road course driver but I don’t see him contending.
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