Kevin Harvick tops my early Phoenix II rankings. (photo courtesy nascar)

Here are my early driver rankings for this week’s NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Phoenix. 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 (excluding Talladega);
• the loop data for the past four races at Phoenix;
• the loop data for the past eight races at the other tracks in the Flats track group (i.e., Richmond, Martinsville, Indy, Pocono and New Hampshire);
• the practice and qualifying data for the past four races at Phoenix; and
• the practice and qualifying data for past eight races at the aforementioned Flats.

The results:

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