Early Rankings: Richmond I, 2014

Here are my early driver rankings for this week’s NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Richmond. I compiled them by crunching:

  • The loop data for the past 15 Sprint Cup races (excluding Daytona);
  • the loop data for the past four races;
  • the loop data for the past four races at Richmond;
  • the loop data for the past seven races at four other tracks in the Flats track group (i.e., MartinsvillePhoenixPocono and New Hampshire);
  • the practice and qualifying data for the past four races at Richmond; and
  • the practice and qualifying data for past seven races at the aforementioned Flats.

The results:

  1. Jeff Gordon
  2. Kyle Busch
  3. Jimmie Johnson
  4. Matt Kenseth
  5. Clint Bowyer
  6. Dale Earnhardt Jr.
  7. Kevin Harvick
  8. Brad Keselowski
  9. Joey Logano
  10. Denny Hamlin
  11. Kasey Kahne
  12. Carl Edwards
  13. Kurt Busch
  14. Ryan Newman
  15. Martin Truex Jr.
  16. Jamie McMurray
  17. Tony Stewart
  18. Brian Vickers
  19. Greg Biffle
  20. Paul Menard
  21. Marcos Ambrose
  22. Aric Almirola
  23. A J Allmendinger
  24. Kyle Larson
  25. Austin Dillon
  26. Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
  27. Casey Mears
  28. Justin Allgaier
  29. Danica Patrick
  30. David Ragan
  31. David Gilliland
  32. Landon Cassill
  33. David Reutimann
  34. Travis Kvapil
  35. Michael McDowell
  36. Dave Blaney
  37. Michael Annett
  38. Cole Whitt
  39. Josh Wise
  40. David Stremme
  41. Alex Bowman
  42. Parker Kligerman
  43. Joe Nemechek
  44. Reed Sorenson
  45. Ryan Truex