Kevin Harvick once against returned to the winners circle as he drove the his No. 2 Chevrolet past Kyle Busch and into the front with 10 laps to the finish Monday and then held off his competitors to win the Kroger 250 at Martinsville Speedway, his fourth victory lap in the Truck Series in his 97th career start. Harvick was able to stay on Busch’s bumper, until he was able to get under him, and then ran the last 186 laps to victory.

Harcik does it again

Busch lost ground when he was penalized for a line violation because he ran against the inside backstretch wall when the race was under caution to try to straighten out a bent fender, but still managed to lead the race for 139 laps and finished a respectable 17th. Busch had company in this accident filled affair that saw a total of 13 cautions during the race, the first one slowing the race on the first lap.

Ron Hornaday finished second in his Chevrolet, Mike Skinner third in a Toyota that ran pretty well, Johnny Benson finished fourth on a day where his Toyota held together pretty good, while the race pole-sitter Rick Crawford managed to stay in the race and finished fifth to round out the top five. Stacy Compton ran sixth in his Toyota, Dennis Setzer came seventh in a Chevrolet, Brian Scott came eighth in a Toyota, Matt Crafton ninth, and Ken Schrader tenth on this day at Martinsville Speedway.

Kyle Busch stays on top of the series points race, despite his poor finish and a partial race schedule which will see him miss the next race at Kansas Speedway, over a Todd Bodine who had trouble with the track and drivers, finishing 18th because of two different accidents, the last of which happened with just two laps to the checkered flag, and put the race under a caution flag for the last few laps.

Images Newscom.com

Image details: Camping World RV Rental 250 served by picapp.com

It’s going to be a big weekend coming up for the Wallace’s as the NASCAR Nationwide Series makes a trip to St. Louis this weekend for the Missouri-Illinois Dodge Dealers 250 at Gateway International Raceway, hometown to brothers Mike and Kenny Wallace. Considered to be the home track for the Wallace family, the track has been kind enough to name the grandstands in Turns 1 and 2 after the Wallace’s, and even honored them by placing their name on the race itself during older brother, Rusty’s retirement year.

Despite all of the hometown recognition, though, a member of the Wallace family has never put a tally in the win column since the Nationwide Series began racing here back in 1997, but they’ll have a prime opportunity to change that this weekend. Mike Wallace is having one of his finer seasons as he currently sits 8th in points and would like nothing more than to notch one up here in front of his hometown fans. He nearly did just that back in 2005 when he finished 2nd here in an Evernham Motorsports car. Mike will also be an honorary guest at the St. Louis Cardinals game on Thursday where he will throw out the first pitch of the game.

Kenny Wallace will also attend the race, as will Steven Wallace, who will be driving for Rusty Wallace Inc, the team owned by his father, Rusty Wallace. That team is still looking for their first win of the season. Steven is currently 12th in the points standings, and Kenny is 18th. All three Wallace’s will also compete in a dirt track race at Tri-City Speedway on Friday in Pontoon Beach, IL.

Mike’s daughter, Chrissy Wallace, will be competing this weekend as well. Chrissy will make the third Craftsman Truck Series start of her career on Saturday in the Built Ford Tough 225 at Kentucky Speedway. To date, she’s finished 18th at Martinsville and 20th at the Milwuakee Mile.

With all of the controversy that Kyle Busch has managed to cause already this year due to his reckless on-track behavior, I thought it would only be fitting to compile a list of his most shining moments … or, rather, his top-ten wrecks. Enjoy!

10. Busch gets spun by Jeff Burton at the finish line as they race for the win at the Sam’s Town 300 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway in 2007.

9. Kyle Busch sets off “the big one” in the 2006 Aaron’s 499 at Talladega.

8. Richmond wasn’t the first time that Kyle Busch has been involved in an accident with Dale Earnhardt Jr. Here they make contact on pit road during the Ford 400 in 2007 at Homestead-Miami Speedway.

7. Kyle is involved in another “big one” at Talladega Superspeedway, this time during the 2007 UAW-Ford 500.

6. Kyle Busch and Mike Skinner get into it at the Craftsman Truck Series’ opening event in 2008, the Camping World 300, at Daytona International Speedway.

5. In the closing laps of the Craftsman Truck Series’ Kroger 250 at Martinsville Speedway, Kyle plows into Johnny Benson as they race for third place.

4. Kyle’s involved in a horrific accident in the 2007 Aaron’s 312 at Talladega Superspeedway, in which his Nationwide car performs several barrel rolls.

3. Kyle Busch was already quickly approaching notoriety status with the NASCAR fans, but here’s the one that pushed him over the top. Watch again, as Kyle battles Dale Earnhardt Jr. for the lead in the closing laps of the 2008 Dan Lowry 400 at Richmond International Raceway.

2. Kyle gets into his older brother, Kurt, while racing him for the lead at the 2007 All-Star Race. Neither of the brothers appeared to take it personally, and Kurt even makes some witty comments following the race to make light of the situation.

1. Saving the best for last … at the 2006 NASCAR Awards Banquet held in New York City, Kyle Busch was giving his “thank you” speech – and, actually called his girlfriend by the wrong name. You’ll love this!

Image details: Goody’s Cool Orange 500 Qualifying served by picapp.com

The Sprint Cup Series was off this past week while the Nationwide Series took to the streets of Mexico City for the Corona Mexico 200 as Kyle Busch cruised to his third consecutive Nationwide Series victory. That, however, was not the headline that the sports world took away from auto racing on that day because while Kyle Busch was debating whether or not to dump Scott Pruett, Danica Patrick was out in Japan making history en route to winning the first IRL race of her career, as well as becoming the first female driver to ever win a race in that series.

In a pure incident of coincidental timing, just days before Danica broke down the barriers for females in racing, Chrissy Wallace inked a deal with Germain Racing that will have her competing full-time in the Craftsman Truck Series in 2009.

Chrissy made her NASCAR debut just a few weeks ago at Martinsville Speedway in the Truck Series’ Kroger 250. Despite starting that race all the way back from the 35th position, she was able to find her way up to 18th by the final lap of the race. Her run was impressive enough to force the hands at Germain Racing to offer her up a contract, and they finalized the deal this past Wednesday. Chrissy will run another six races this year in the no. 03 Toyota Tundra – the first of which will be on June 20th in Milwuakee, and from there she will begin to prepare for her 2009 rookie campaign.

Regarding her signing with Germain, Chrissy stated, “I’m extremely excited. This is a big deal for us. When I saw my name on that contract, I almost couldn’t believe it. But, I’m thrilled about this opportunity.”

Chrissy comes from a long line of racers in her family, to include her father Mike Wallace, and uncles Rusty and Kenny. She has spent the majority of her amateur career racing late model stock cars, and became the first female driver to win at Hickory Motor Speedway in 57 years.  She has also earned herself the backing of the unofficial NASCAR spokesman himself, Tony Stewart, and that just simply can’t hurt matters.

The official signing of Chrissy Wallace is a huge step for NASCAR as they continue to work on building diversity within their garage areas. In recent years, the sport has added a number of drivers with foreign backgrounds, to include such names as Juan Pablo Montoya, Dario Franchitti, and Patrick Carpentier. They have also created and contributed to a multitude of diversity programs in an effort to help this cause. Although Chrissy certainly is not the first female to dawn a NASCAR firesuit, it certainly appears as though that she may potentially be the first to have the necessary combination of talent AND proper equipment afforded to her that it takes to win at NASCAR’s highest levels.

DYN Imposes:
This week, Do You Nascar also asks its readers …

1) Do you think that Chrissy Wallace will be successful in the Craftsman Truck Series in 2009, and will she win Rookie of the Year?

2) Are female drivers often given some of their driving opportunities simply because of their market value as women?

3) Have NASCAR’s diversity programs been successful, and is the diversity they’ve added been good for the sport?

4) What could NASCAR do to expand their diversity programs?

Technical difficulties prevented me from posting the entire schedule for this weekend but here is what’s on today.

NASCAR Raceday 11:30 SPEED

NASCAR Nextel Cup Race 1:30 Fox

Speed Report 7:00 SPEED

Victory Lane 8:00 SPEED

Wrap up  so far:

Mike Skinner started on the pole and won the Craftsman Truck race.

The Busch Series has the week off.

Denny Hamlin in the #11 will start on the pole today.  Next to Denny on the front row will be Jamie McMurray.  Michael Waltrip didn’t make the race again.  Dale Jarrett made it but thanks to Matt Kenseth last week at Bristol, Dale dropped out of the top 35 in owner points.