Kahne tops the Cup contenders to watch on Sunday

	Points leader Matt Kenseth has little margin for error in the Chase's final four races. AP

It's been a bizarre first six weeks of the Chase, a stretch of racing that has had no rhythm. Just when you thought Kevin Harvick was going to emerge as the championship frontrunner, he skidded to a 32nd place finish at Dover. When it looked like Harvick's teammate, Jeff Burton, was going to pull away from the field, his engine died in Martinsville and he wound up 42nd.

So this hasn't exactly been a championship run to remember -- at least not yet. Every driver in the Chase has struggled at some point over the first six weeks of NASCAR's playoff, which means the last month of racing will be unlike the first two years of the Chase. In 2004, Kurt Busch never relinquished the points lead over the last four races of the season, and neither did Tony Stewart in '05.

This year? Well, there are four drivers within 48 points of leader Matt Kenseth. I still think Kenseth will be your 2006 champion, but any of those four -- Burton, Harvick, Jimmie Johnson or Denny Hamlin -- could easily overtake Kenseth if he even has a minor stumble.

Plus, there's the wild card of Kasey Kahne, which brings us to the five drivers to watch on Sunday afternoon at Atlanta Motor Speedway during the Bass Pro Shops MBNA 500.

1. Kasey Kahne

Kahne is my pick to win Sunday, and I'm hardly going out on a limb. After claiming the pole at the March race in Atlanta, Kahne led 85 laps  and took the checkered flag at the 1.5-mile track. He's been the series' top driver at the intermediate-length venues this season, and now he's in a position to steal the championship. Though he's eighth in the standings and 99 points behind Kenseth, Kahne knows that the schedule over the next month favors him more than any other driver. He has won six times this season on tracks that are 1.5-miles or longer, including Atlanta and Texas -- the next two in the Chase. The season-finale in Homestead, Fla., on Nov. 19 is also on a 1.5-miler.

Last offseason, Kahne's owner, Ray Evernham, devoted a great deal of time and money to try to give Kahne's Dodge Charger an aerodynamic advantage over the rest of the field on the 1.5-mile tracks. Clearly, that effort by Evernham paid off. On Sunday Kahne will be driving a car (chassis No. 128) that has won five times this season. If Kahne keeps up his stellar performance on the intermediate tracks -- and there is zero evidence to suggest he won't -- don't be surprised if he wins the title.

2. Matt Kenseth

On Sunday the points leader will be driving chassis number 267, which is the same car that Kenseth pushed to a third-place finish at Darlington in May and a fourth-place at Michigan in June. If you polled 100 crew guys in the garage on who's going to win the championship, probably 80 would name Kenseth. The No. 17 DeWalt team has been the most consistent in NASCAR over the last four months. Moreover, Kenseth has won a championship before (2003) and Robbie Reiser, Kenseth's crew chief, is as talented as anyone in the sport.

But there is one problem: In the last two races on 1.5-mile tracks, Kenseth finished 23rd at Kansas on Oct. 1 and 14th in Charlotte on Oct. 14.

"Usually, the mile-and-a-half tracks are good to us, but we've struggled in the last two," Kenseth says. We'll need to turn that around if we're going to get the job done down the stretch."