Hornaday Jr. wins at Milwaukee Mile
Ron Hornaday Jr. won the Alan Kulwicki 250 Saturday night at the Milwaukee Mile in West Allis, Wis., taking the lead with seven laps to go after rallying from a lap down.
Hornaday passed Shane Hmiel on the inside, ending Hmiel’s chance for his first Busch Series victory.
Hornaday started in the 10th position, and dropped a lap behind when the first caution flag came out while he was in the pits.
The two-time Craftsman Truck Series champion worked his way through the field and managed to steal the race from Hmiel and David Stremme, who exchanged the lead several times. They led a total of 170 laps before fading at the end.
In all, eight racers led the 250-lap event — run under the lights for the first time — on the 1.032-mile track.
Stremme finished second, followed by Jason Keller and Hmiel.
Stremme was leading with 30 laps to go when he bobbled and slowed, allowing Hmiel to pass. Stremme won the pole position earlier in the day with a time of 29.375 seconds, which broke the track qualifying record of 29.394 set by Kevin Harvick in June 2001.
Wallace unhappy with proposed rule change
With four of the last seven Nextel Cup races having finished under a yellow caution flag, NASCAR is considering a rules change that would give the drivers an opportunity to finish under green.
The most likely scenario in the case of a caution in the last few laps of the race would be to restart the cars with both the white one-lap-to-go flag and green displayed simultaneously.
“We’re currently evaluating it,” NASCAR spokesman Mike Zizzo said Saturday. “It’s possible you could see it sometime later this year. But rumors it could happen as early as next week in Daytona aren’t true.”
Rusty Wallace hates the idea.
“They’re talking about making it mandatory that it’s green-white-checkered finishes so the fans don’t get upset,” the former series champion and longtime star said. “I don’t agree with that and I’ll be the first one politicking that you shouldn’t do that.
“All these race fans drinking beer and screaming and hollering have not been in a helicopter upside down with 30 tubes hanging out of you after going end-over-end 30 times like I’ve been before because of these green-white starts. I think it’s ridiculous and it’s unsafe.”
Kenseth pushed to back after car change
Defending series champion Matt Kenseth slid off course and wrecked his primary car during the first of two Saturday practice sessions for the Dodge/Save Mart 350 at Infineon Raceway.
The battered Roush Racing Ford had to be towed to the garage area on a flatbed truck and the No. 17 team immediately began preparing Kenseth’s backup car for today’s race. Kenseth qualified fifth for today’s race, but the rules require him to start from the rear of the 43-car field after switching cars.
Wheldon wins wild finish at RIR
Dan Wheldon came from the back of the pack and held off Helio Castroneves in a one-lap sprint to the finish to win the accident-plagued SunTrust Indy Challenge on Saturday night at Richmond, Va.
Wheldon, who started 20th, led Vitor Meira and Helio Castroneves coming out of a caution period with a lap remaining and managed to outsprint Castroneves in the final turn at Richmond International Raceway.