Two Toyota Camrys started the Auto Club 500 in the top-15, with Dave Blaney qualifying 14th and Brian Vickers starting in the 15th position.
Vickers ran in the top-10 for the better part of the 500-mile, 250-lap race and finished 10th in his first race of the season.
This was the first top-10 finish for a Toyota [...]

KURT BUSCH (No. 2 Miller Lite Dodge Charger) — finished 7th, top Dodge
“We’re not concerned about the aerodynamics right now. We feel like we need to advance our front end geometry. We’ve done a lot over the off season. I’d say on a scale of 1-10 we chopped off five points and we need five [...]

Alltel Corp. could fetch a price tag of $25 billion to $31 billion from private equity firms or other U.S. mobile service providers looking to expand in rural markets, analysts said Tuesday [Feb 20th]. Alltel, the top rural U.S. wireless provider, fueled merger speculation when it said during an earnings conference call Tuesday that it [...]

JIMMIE JOHNSON, NO. 48 LOWE’S MONTE CARLO SS - finished 3rd:
“It wasn’t a bad day. A mysterious debris caution cost us and then we had some issues on pit road. But it was solid. We had the speed. We just had a stop at the end that kind of hurt us.
“It’s good to get some [...]

FIN, ST, CAR, DRIVER, MAKE, SPONSOR, PTS/BNS, LAPS, STATUS, WINNINGS
1 25 17 Matt Kenseth Ford Carhartt 195/10 250 Running 342,316
2 1 24 Jeff Gordon Chevrolet DuPont Cromax Pro 175/5 250 Running 249,011
3 23 48 Jimmie Johnson Chevrolet Lowe’s 170/5 250 Running 212,811
4 8 31 Jeff Burton Chevrolet Cingular Wireless 165/5 250 Running 173,441
5 3 01 Mark Martin Chevrolet U.S. Army 160/5 250 Running 171,708
6 6 07 Clint Bowyer [...]

Matt Kenseth put the disappointment of Daytona well behind him Sunday, driving away with his second victory of the weekend and second NASCAR Nextel Cup win at California Speedway.
Kenseth, who got caught up in the last-lap melee the previous week at the Daytona 500 and wound up 27th after starting that lap in third, stayed [...]

Editor’s note: Yet another L.A. ‘columnist’ that knows little more than to use cliches and put-downs and show his ignorance in bashing NASCAR. It’s emabarrasing that with all the great Southern California race fans that love NASCAR (including us!), we have to put up with these morons like T. J. Simers who’s ‘expertise’ is [...]

Will all the initiatives and improvements that track president Gillian Zucker has implemented in the last year, will Sunday’s Auto Club 500 finally be the success NASCAR has hoped for since it began to stage races at the two-mile facility 50 miles east of downtown Los Angeles?

ON THE DAYTONA 500 “We’re just trying to put that event behind us. It was a great race and we had a great race car. The Kellogg’s / Carquest Chevrolet was very strong throughout all of speedweeks and we still have our Busch car. So I’m very proud of all the guys at Hendrick Motorsports. [...]

ON BEING IN CALIFORNIA AND SPENDING TIME WITH FRIENDS & FAMILY “We’re testing in Bristol next week so we’ve got to go back home Monday after the race. But fortunately a lot of friends and family come here, so I get to spend time with them.”
HOW IS THE CAR OF TOMORROW GOING TO IMPACT THE [...]