With five races remaining this season in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series, the chase comes down to about five drivers going for the championship. At the start of the chase, NASCAR put Jeff Gordon into the playoffs after what happened at Richmond International Raceway with Michael Waltrip Racing. The final races this season could be very interesting with the drivers left to go out and win the title.

Matt Kenseth goes into the halfway point of the chase with only a four point lead over Jimmie Johnson. He started out the Chase winning the first two opening races at Chicagoland Speedway and Loudon. Kenseth is one of those drivers who wasn’t expected to run this good after changing teams. He goes into the remaining races with lots of momentum after his dominating year so far.

Jimmie Johnson goes into Talladega this weekend with five wins in the season. Two of those wins came at two of the three restrictor plate races so far this season at Daytona. He will definitely be one of the favorites going into these last few races. Johnson has one win in the chase at Dover earlier this year.

Kevin Harvick finds himself 29 points behind the points leader heading into this weekend. He could be one of the drivers to steal the win at the Talladega Superspeedway to climb higher into the points standings. Harvick has quietly captured three wins this season. One of those wins came at the Kansas Speedway about two weeks ago.

Jeff Gordon finds himself fourth in the standings and 36 points behind the leader. He hopes to capture a win this weekend to stay in the running for the championship. Gordon is the only driver sitting in the top-five without a win this season. His past success at the upcoming races could launch him up further in the standings.

Kyle Busch has not had a great Chase going for him after his past issues at the Kansas Speedway. He is no doubt still in the running, but finds himself fifth in the standings and 37 points behind the leader. Kyle hopes to make a great run in the remaining races to go after his first Sprint Cup championship.

The top-five drivers in the standings have five races left to go if they want to make a final shot for the championship. Of the next five races left, the top-five chase drivers has had lots of success previously at the next few remaining race tracks. See chart below for the next five race locations, and the current top-13 in the points standings.



Kyle Busch won the pole for tonight’s Dollar General 300 at the Charlotte Motor Speedway after running a fast time of 29.446 seconds, 183.387 mph. He earned his ninth NASCAR Nationwide Series pole this season. He goes into tonight’s race looking for his 11th career win.

Joey Logano will start in the second spot after qualifying just 0.004 seconds behind the pole winner. This will mark the ninth time this season where Logano has started a NNS race in the top-10. He will try for his fourth win tonight and hope to keep the No. 54 behind them in the owner points.

Sam Hornish, Jr. qualified in the third spot after running a fast time of 29.157 seconds, 182.945 mph. He will make his 23rd top-10 start this season tonight at the Charlotte Motor Speedway. He goes into tonight looking for a great run to get back around Austin Dillon in the points hunt.

Points leader Austin Dillon, will start in the fourth position with a fast lap of 29.556 seconds, 182.704 mph. Dillon hopes to capture his first win of the 2013 NASCAR Nationwide Series season tonight. He will need to put down a great run to stretch the points lead out from Sam Hornish, Jr.

Alex Bowman ran the fastest time yesterday during the first practice session to go out first in qualifying later this afternoon. Bowman posted a fast time of 29.594 seconds, 182.469 mph. He will try and go for his second Nationwide Series pole this season when he goes out last in qualifying.

Austin Dillon was the fastest during yesterday’s Nationwide Series final practice at the Charlotte Motor Speedway with a fast time of 29.606 seconds, 182.395 mph. Dillon led the session by just 0.011 over Sam Hornish, Jr. who sits second in points. He will try for his eighth pole this year and still looking for his first win of the season.

Sam Hornish, Jr. will go out third to last in the qualifying order after posting the second fastest lap in final practice yesterday. Hornish ran a fast time of 29.617 seconds, 182.328 mph. He hopes to get a great run this weekend to take back the points lead from Austin Dillon. Both drivers are currently separated by eight total points.

Six drivers will go home after qualifying as 46 showed up to race.

You can catch NASCAR Nationwide Series qualifying live at 4:00 P.M. Et. On Fox Sports 2. No radio coverage will be provided. You can follow live timing and scoring live here: http://www.nascar.com/en_us/nationwide-series/leaderboard/leaderboard-qualification.html

Jeff Gordon captured the pole for the 54th annual Bank of America 500 with a time and speed of 27.791 seconds, 194.308 mph. Gordon was the final car to go out in the session to steal the pole away from last week’s pole sitter at Kansas. He goes into this weekend looking to back up another solid run.

Kevin Harvick nearly won the pole, but was knocked off at the last second. Harvick ran a time of 27.806 seconds, 194.203 mph. He will start in the top-10 for his ninth time this season. He hopes to leave Charlotte with another victory as he did last weekend at Kansas.

Greg Biffle also had a good day when qualifying ended after posting a lap of 27.841 seconds, 193.959 mph. Saturday will be his 12th time in 31 races this year, where he has started a race from the top-10.

Three drivers will make their NASCAR Sprint Cup debuts this weekend. Brian Scott will start 19th, Kyle Larson 21st, and Blake Koch 43rd.

Points leader Matt Kenseth will start in the 20th spot on Saturday.

Kasey Kahne found himself on the top of the board when the one and only practice session today scheduled before qualifying with a fast time of 28.863 seconds, 193.805 mph. He was just 1.259 seconds off of the track qualifying record set back in May by Denny Hamlin. He will be the second car to go out in today’s qualifying session.

Kyle Busch was second on the speed chart with a lap of 27.885 seconds, 193.653 mph. Busch will go out towards the middle of the group after drawing the 27th position for qualifying. He hopes he can get a great run to get back into the championship hunt. Kyle was just 0.022 seconds behind practice leader Kasey Kahne.

Last weeks winner and pole sitter Kevin Harvick, paced third on the sheet with a 27.900 seconds, 193.548 mph. Harvick will go out later today in qualifying in the 42nd position. He was 0.037 seconds off of the leader in practice.

Points leader Matt Kenseth, found himself eighth on the scoring sheet with a lap of 27.980 seconds, 192.995 mph. He will be the first driver to take time in qualifying later this afternoon.

Second in points, Jimmie Johnson, sat in the 17th spot when the session ended with a time of 28.077 seconds, 192.328 mph. Johnson will be the 41st driver to go out in qualifying later on today.

You can catch qualifying tonight live at 7:00 P.M. Et. On ESPN2. The Performance Racing Network will provide live radio coverage of the event. You can also follow live qualifying with Raceview quals on NASCAR.com.

This weekend, the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series will head into Charlotte Motor Speedway for the 54th annual Bank of America 500. Currently, only 43 drivers are scheduled to race this weekend so no cars will go home. Clint Bowyer is the defending race winner.

Some of the fresh drivers on the entry list include, Cole Whitt, Timmy Hill, Brian Scott, Landon Cassill, Kyle Larson, and Reed Sorenson.

Storylines:

Matt Kenseth and Jimmie Johnson are head-to-head going into Charlotte Motor Speedway in the points battle. Kenseth currently has only a three point lead over five-time championship winner Jimmie Johnson. Kansas marked the first time that neither of both drivers finished in the top-five in the race.

Kurt and Kyle Busch are starting to fade away in the chase after the first five races. Kurt, however, went on to a second place finish at Kansas, and finds himself seventh and 47 points out of the lead. Kurt will have to hope for some bad races for the guys in front of him to claim the 3013 title. Kyle Busch had some bad luck at Kansas Speedway after being involved in several cautions. Busch went on to finish 34th and fell back to the fifth spot in the points. He currently sits 35 points behind Matt Kenseth.

Dale Earnhardt, Jr. will make his 500th career NASCAR Sprint Cup start this weekend at the Charlotte Motor Speedway. Dale will try and become the third driver to ever win on their 500th start. Matt Kenseth did it three weeks ago at the New Hampshire Motor Speedway to join Richard Petty on that list.

Kyle Larson and Brian Scott will both make their NASCAR Sprint Cup debuts this weekend. Larson will drive the No. 51 Phoenix Racing Chevrolet with sponsorship from Target. Larson will take over the No. 42 Chevrolet next season after Juan Montoya will move to INDYCAR next year. Brian Scott will drive the No. 33 Shore Lodge Chevrolet this weekend for Richard Childress/Joe Faulk. Scott made his 200th NASCAR start last weekend at Kansas, and will make his 202 start this Saturday.

You can catch the Bank of America 500 live at 7:30 P.M. Et. on ABC. The Performance Racing Network will provide the radio coverage of the event.

This weekend the NASCAR Nationwide Series will head off to the Charlotte Motor Speedway for the 32nd annual Dollar General 300. The entry list currently features a total of 46 unique drivers. Joey Logano goes into this weekend as the defending race winner for this race.

The entry list features several drivers including, Blake Koch, Ryan Reed, Tanner Berryhill, Joey Logano, Robert Richardson, Jr., Ken Butler, Kevin Harvick, James Buescher, T.J. Bell, Chad Hackenbract, Danny Efland, Jamie Dick, Derrike Cope, Kevin Lepage, Dexter Stacey, Reed Sorenson, and Kevin Swindell.

15 drivers will have to qualify tomorrow in on speed. Those drivers include, Blake Koch, Ryan Reed, Tanner Berryhill, Matt Kenseth, James Buescher, Josh Wise, J.J. Yeley, Danny Efland, Joey Gase, Jamie Dick, Derrike Cope, Kevin Lepage, Dexter Stacey, Reed Sorenson, and Kevin Swindell.

Storylines:

Last weekend at the Kansas Speedway, Austin Dillon passed Sam Hornish, Jr. for the points lead with an eight point going into tomorrow night’s Dollar General 300. The last two races, Hornish has finished in the 17th position allowing Dillon to pass him in the standings. He is still looking for his first career win this season in the No. 3 Chevrolet.

With the points battle heating up, so is the points for the owners title. The Penske Racing No. 22 Ford leads the points standings by just five points over Joe Gibbs Racing’s No. 54 team. With the No. 22 failing post-race inspections after Dover and then the 28th place finish last week at the Kansas Speedway, the No. 54 has came within five points to winning the owners title.

Many teams will carry special paint schemes tomorrow night honoring Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Those drivers include, Brian Vickers, Kyle Busch, Nelson Piquet, Jr., and James Buescher.

You can catch tomorrow’s NASCAR Nationwide Series race live at 7:30 P.M. Et. on ESPN2. The Performance Racing Network will carry the live radio broadcast of the event.

Last weekend at the Kansas Speedway, we saw an interesting race with Goodyear’s new multi-zone tire 2.0. The tire company has used this technology on passenger cars for nearly a decade before bringing it into racing. This tire has two unique compounds to allow more traction and endurance.

The tire debated at the Atlanta Motor Speedway last month where it had a lot of success on the older surface. The tire used at the Atlanta Motor Speedway was partially made up of the same tire used at Michigan and outer half made up of the previous Atlanta compound.

Jeff Gordon said the newer repaves the last several years has been the cause of these changes and feels repaving tracks needs to be looked at differently because It‘s a race track and not a highway. He also said the teams had the same issues at Phoenix and Darlington since they did their repaves. Its possible that we could see changes coming to the tires next season at several tracks that’s hard on them.

“I applaud their effort for trying to do this duel tread zone whatever you want to call it,” said Jeff Gordon. "I mean, for me the issues weren’t as treacherous for me. The grip level wasn’t as good as I would like it to be, and the falloff wasn’t as much as I’d like it to be, but some guys seem to set their car up a little freer had bigger issues on the restarts than we did. My car was a little tighter so it would take off halfway decent on restarts. It didn’t get up to speed good but it was at least comfortable.”

Kansas race winner Kevin Harvick nearly said the same thing as Jeff Gordon. Harvick said he feels they keep repaving tracks with stuff that puts the tire company in a box going forward. Though, He likes what Goodyear has developed.

Goodyear has no plans yet to bring this tire to the NASCAR Nationwide and NASCAR Camping World Truck Series races yet. NASCAR and Goodyear will meet sometime today and discuss what they find when they download all of the information.

Today, Brian Scott will make his 200th career NASCAR start at Kansas Speedway. Brian has many starts across the NASCAR Camping World Truck and NASCAR Nationwide Series.

He has two wins in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series, including one win that came last year at Phoenix. In that win, he led a total of 48 laps that made up the distance. His other win came back in 2009 at Dover International Speedway where he led only 14 laps that day.

Since coming to the NASCAR Nationwide Series in 2008, Brian has made 137 starts, eight top-fives, 35 top-10s, and two total poles. He hopes to leave Kansas Speedway with his first win in the Nationwide Series.

“Its obviously been a fun ride. The one thing I have not done in my 200 starts is to win a Nationwide race, and that’s the top of my priority right now is to go out there and get a great qualifying run and win in my 200th start,” said Brian Scott.

Scott will start today’s NASCAR Nationwide Series race in the sixth position after running a time of 29.463 seconds, 183.281 mph. he was just 0.182 seconds off pole sitter Austin Dillon’s lap.

Kyle Busch has always had trouble at the Kansas Speedway in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series. In twelve total starts, he has finished in the top-10 only twice in his career.

Last April, he started the race from the fifth position, but was out of the race due to a crash towards the middle of the event. This weekend could be the race that could make him stumble down hill.

He qualified in the 18th spot yesterday afternoon with a lap of 29.252 seconds, 184.603 mph. Busch will have to go to a back up car after a nasty crash early on in the second practice. Therefore, he will have to move to the rear on Sunday.