Mid-Week Rankings: Watkins Glen, 2012

Here are my early driver rankings for this week’s NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Watkins Glen, N.Y. I compiled them by crunching:

  • The loop data for the past 15 Sprint Cup races (excluding Daytona and Talladega);
  • the loop data for the past four races at Sonoma;
  • the loop data for the past four races at Watkins Glen;
  • the practice and qualifying data for the past four races at Sonoma; and
  • the practice and qualifying data for past four races at Watkins Glen.

The results:

  1. Marcos Ambrose
  2. Jimmie Johnson
  3. Kyle Busch
  4. Juan Pablo Montoya
  5. Tony Stewart
  6. Martin Truex, Jr.
  7. Denny Hamlin
  8. Jeff Gordon
  9. Kurt Busch
  10. Carl Edwards
  11. Kevin Harvick
  12. Kasey Kahne
  13. Greg Biffle
  14. Ryan Newman
  15. Clint Bowyer
  16. Jamie McMurray
  17. Brian Vickers
  18. Brad Keselowski
  19. Matt Kenseth
  20. Joey Logano
  21. Jeff Burton
  22. Dale Earnhardt, Jr.
  23. Paul Menard
  24. Boris Said
  25. Sam Hornish, Jr.
  26. Aric Almirola
  27. Bobby Labonte
  28. Casey Mears
  29. David Gilliland
  30. Regan Smith
  31. David Ragan
  32. Jason Leffler (i)
  33. Patrick Long
  34. Scott Speed
  35. Dave Blaney
  36. Michael McDowell
  37. Joe Nemechek
  38. Travis Kvapil
  39. J.J. Yeley
  40. Landon Cassill
  41. Josh Wise
  42. Mike Bliss
  43. Stephen Leicht