Early Rankings: Bristol I, 2015

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

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

Here are my early driver rankings for this week’s NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Bristol. 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;
  • the loop data for the past four races at Bristol;
  • the loop data for the past six races at the other tracks in the Steeps track group (i.e., DoverDarlingtonLas Vegas and Homestead);
  • the practice and qualifying data for the past four races at Bristol; and
  • the practice and qualifying data for past six races at the aforementioned Steeps.

The results:

  1. Kevin Harvick
  2. Brad Keselowski
  3. Matt Kenseth
  4. Jeff Gordon
  5. Joey Logano
  6. Denny Hamlin
  7. Jimmie Johnson
  8. Kasey Kahne
  9. Kurt Busch
  10. Dale Earnhardt Jr.
  11. Carl Edwards
  12. Ryan Newman
  13. Martin Truex Jr.
  14. Kyle Larson
  15. Jamie McMurray
  16. Clint Bowyer
  17. Paul Menard
  18. Greg Biffle
  19. Aric Almirola
  20. AJ Allmendinger
  21. Tony Stewart
  22. Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
  23. David Ragan
  24. Austin Dillon
  25. Sam Hornish Jr.
  26. Casey Mears
  27. Trevor Bayne
  28. Justin Allgaier
  29. Danica Patrick
  30. Chris Buescher(i)
  31. Brett Moffitt
  32. David Gilliland
  33. Cole Whitt
  34. Michael Annett
  35. Alex Bowman
  36. Landon Cassill
  37. Ron Hornaday
  38. Josh Wise
  39. Alex Kennedy
  40. Michael McDowell
  41. Jeb Burton
  42. J.J Yeley
  43. Mike Bliss
  44. Matt DiBenedetto
  45. Brendan Gaughan