Here are my early driver rankings for this week’s NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Texas. I compiled them by crunching:
- The loop data for the past 15 Sprint Cup races (excluding Daytona, Talladega, Sonoma and Watkins Glen);
- the loop data for the past four races;
- the loop data for the past four races at Texas;
- the loop data for the past eight races at the other tracks in the Large Ovals track group (i.e., Fontana, Charlotte, Atlanta, Kansas, Chicago, Michigan and Kentucky);
- the practice and qualifying data for the past four races at Texas; and
- the practice and qualifying data for past eight races at the aforementioned Large Ovals.
The results:
- Matt Kenseth
- Jimmie Johnson
- Kyle Busch
- Carl Edwards
- Kasey Kahne
- Jeff Gordon
- Kevin Harvick
- Brad Keselowski
- Greg Biffle
- Dale Earnhardt Jr.
- Martin Truex Jr.
- Joey Logano
- Clint Bowyer
- Kurt Busch
- Denny Hamlin
- Juan Pablo Montoya
- Ryan Newman
- Marcos Ambrose
- Paul Menard
- Aric Almirola
- Jamie McMurray
- Jeff Burton
- Mark Martin
- Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
- Elliott Sadler
- Trevor Bayne
- Casey Mears
- David Ragan
- Kyle Larson
- Danica Patrick
- Austin Dillon
- Bobby Labonte
- David Gilliland
- David Reutimann
- Travis Kvapil
- Dave Blaney
- Parker Kligerman (i)
- Landon Cassill
- J.J. Yeley
- Michael McDowell
- Timmy Hill
- Josh Wise
- Joe Nemechek