“Pinch me. I am sure I’m sleeping. I am sure I am dreaming.” Pinch us too Old Man, we’re still not sure it’s real either.
And this is supposed to be one of his “bad tracks” in the ten race Chase for the Sprint Cup? “This is my hardest place, a tough place,” Martin added.
The 50-year old served notice to the rest of the Chase field on Sunday that even though he’s not won this many races in over ten years, he’s a serious title contender in 2009. Considered to be the best driver to have never raised a Cup trophy, Martin told the media all week that it was Juan Pablo Montoya who is the darkhorse to win this season’s title.
And this weekend Montoya showed why. He paced every practice session, sat on the pole and led a race high 134 laps. He also duked it out late with Martin on two restarts.
Martin prevailed, and in the process apparently made Montoya unhappy.
“What he did, not cool at all. I could have wrecked him,” Montoya commented post race. And even though he was unhappy with Martin, Montoya claimed Martin is the clear favorite to win this year’s title.
“He’s never won a championship, and he wants one, pretty bad.”
His performance today showed why he’s the favorite. He led the series with four wins and was the number one “seed” heading into the Chase.
Officially he led the points before the race. And after the race, he’s still officially the points leader.
The scary thing is he’s heading to two tracks where he’s traditionally done well at. But don’t tell the Batesville, Arkansas native that he’s on a roll. He still has his doubts about the title run.
“There’s always the lotto, Talladega,” he commented in Victory Lane. “I used to think that if the guys could figure out how to get me a fast race car, it would put me in a position to kind of be ahead of the trouble. That certainly isn't the case anymore. So from that standpoint it is kind of like a lotto. It's wild and crazy, and we're going to be there with bells on.”
He also mentioned that despite a decent sixth place finish at Martinsville in the spring, the track that shares his name is not his strongest track. Don’t tell his crew chief that though.
“In my opinion Mark is the best driver out there, and he proves that time and time again, no matter what situation it is,” Alan Gustafson said. “Not only does he restart well and race well, but he's obviously very smart and he knows what to do and when to go.”
And he picked a very good time to get going.
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