This season’s championship owner standings contenders are starting to find themselves in a tight battle for the title. The top-five owners are only separated by 38 points and the top 10 only by 89 points. Joe Gibbs Racing’s Nos. 20 and 18 teams hold the first and second positions in the owner standings respectively, but with Carl Edwards’ second-place finish last weekend at Charlotte Motor Speedway, Roush Fenway Racing’s No. 60 team is just one point behind second and 16 points behind first.
Even more of an opportunity presents itself for the No. 60 team to close on the owner’s standings leaders this weekend with Kelly Bires driving the No. 18 Toyota this weekend instead of Kyle Busch. Edwards has made six starts at Chicagoland posting two top fives, four top 10s and two poles; while Bires has made three starts with a best finish of 12th.
Turner Motorsports No. 32 team is fourth in the standings nine points behind third-place and 25 points behind the owner standings leader. Brad Sweet is scheduled to pilot the No. 32 this weekend at Chicago.
Finishing out the top five is Kevin Harvick Inc.’s No. 33 team; which is 13 points behind fourth-place and 38 points behind the owner standings leader Joe Gibbs. Harvick will drive his No. 33 KHI Chevrolet at Chicago Saturday, a track where he has won twice in both NASCAR Nationwide Series and NASCAR Sprint Cup competition. If Harvick notches a top 10 this weekend, he’ll tie Tommy Houston for most on the all-time series top 10 list, at 198. He’s one of four double-duty drivers expected to run at Chicagoland and Kansas this weekend joining 2010 NNS champion Brad Keselowski and 2007 series champion Carl Edwards and Joey Logano.
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