The Chase gets tighter, other notes

Mark Martin is still sitting atop the points standings three races into the Chase. Matthew Stockman/Getty Images

KANSAS CITY, Kansas -- Maybe drivers other than Mark Martin and Jimmie Johnson in NASCAR's "Chase for the Championship" should approach the rest of the season like a dieter trying to shed excess weight:

Take a little off here and a little off there and keep chipping away at it rather than expect a huge chunk to disappear all at once.

That's what happened in Sunday's Price Chopper 400 at Kansas Speedway as Martin and Johnson finished seventh and ninth respectively as nine of the top 10 finishers are all involved in "The Chase."

Granted, Martin still leads the standings by 18 points over Johnson, but it allowed other drivers to climb back into contention, including race-winner Tony Stewart, who entered the race 106 points out of the lead and is now 67 points back. Jeff Gordon went from 136 to 103.

There were only three drivers within 106 points of the lead after last week's race at Dover and now there are six.

"If we can just do it another seven weeks, man, I'll be happy with that," Gordon said. "Right now, we've got to focus on our team and our program and our finishes and we can't control what those guys do or Greg Biffle or Tony Stewart or any of them.

"We got a little bit behind at New Hampshire and we've got to make sure that is the worst finish we have in the Chase. That's the only chance we have and that's asking a lot, but that's now our goal. It's the position we put ourselves in."

So with three down and seven to go in the Chase; let's take a lot at how the 12 drivers fared on Sunday and what their prospects are heading to California.

• Martin began The Chase as the points leader by virtue of the bonus points he received by winning four races. He won the first Chase race at New Hampshire and has been the points leader in the first three races. It's off to California Speedway, where Martin has one victory, but that came in 1998. He has a chance to redeem himself after a 40th-place finish at Fontana in February.

"I extended on the 48 (Johnson) but I didn't on several guys," Martin said. "I don't think we should be getting all hyped up about the tally right now. We've got a lot of racing to go. We finished as high as we could. We raced our guts out and that's what you've got to do in all of them and see how they (points) tally up. We had a good race, a good result based off of being a whisker off."

• Johnson had a mediocre finish at Kansas, if a ninth-place finish can be considered mediocre. He actually lost ground in the standings although he didn't lose a position. He was 10 points behind Martin before the race and is now 18 points out. He is a three-time winner at California and has won the second race at Fontana the past two seasons.

"It is way too early to tell," Johnson said. "It is only three races in, the worst finish is ninth and we just don't know what is going to happen. I hate losing points. I felt like we had a shot to win the race and I don't know what went on about three stops from the end. We had a car that was so fast. We have to figure out what went on there and sort that out."

• Juan Pablo Montoya scored his third-straight top-five finish when he was fourth at Kansas. Montoya now has more top-fives in The Chase than he did in the first 26 races when he had just two. He was 65 points out of the lead and now trails by 51.

"It was frustrating," Montoya said. "I know I got another top five, but the previous set of tires the car got were pretty tight. But this car has run good every week and time to move on to the next one. We took some points away where we thought we were going to lose a ton, so it's positive. I'll feel good when I get to Homestead if I have a chance on winning this. Otherwise, I don't care."

The bad news for Montoya is he has never cracked the top-10 in a Sprint Cup car at California. His best finish was 11th this past February. But he did clinch the 1999 CART championship with a fourth-place finish at Fontana, for whatever that is worth.

• Stewart drove to victory at Kansas for the second time in nine starts. Unlike his victory in 2006, when he ran out of fuel on the final lap and coasted to the finish, Stewart was full-throttle when he took the checkered flag Sunday, defeating Jeff Gordon by 0.894-seconds.

He gained a position in the standings, moving from fifth to fourth.

"It depends on who you are talking to," Stewart said. "It's not important to me that there are that many guys there within 103 points of the lead. I want to be within 10 points of it (the lead). But it shows how competitive this Chase is. Guys that were up front there had average days and a lot of guys closed on them today. It just shows that you're going to have to be on for 10 weeks to win this thing and if you have a bad day, there are going to be guys that are going to capitalize on it."

• Kurt Busch finished 11th and dropped from fourth to fifth in the Chase. He also dropped from 75 points out of first to 91 back.

"We started in a hole by qualifying 39th, but we battled and got track position back midway through the race," Busch said. "We could never find the right balance between tight and loose. Our fuel mileage allowed us to stay out in green flag stops that allowed us to lead a lap and get those valuable bonus points."

• Denny Hamlin finished fifth and remains sixth in points, but cut his deficit from 108 to 99 heading to California, a track where he has just one top-five and three top-10s in seven starts. But Hamlin believes the upcoming races that include Charlotte in two weeks and Martinsville in three are tremendous opportunities to make up some ground.

"It's better than what we normally run here so we'll keep digging," Hamlin said. "Right now, we are doing damage control to keep from losing too much ground before we get to the last five tracks where we know we are good at."

• Gordon is a three-time winner at California with victories in 1997, 1999 and 2004 and sees next Sunday's race as a tremendous opportunity to continue his forward progress.

"I think today was huge for us to have a great run and finish second," Gordon said. "We really needed this and expected it. These are the types of tracks where we'll be able to get our results. We did today now it's off to California to get it there."

• Biffle believes he gave away a victory on Sunday when he wanted four tires on his final pit stop but crew chief Greg Erwin overruled him for two tires. After that his car was loose and he finished third. The good news is Biffle improved from 138 points out to 114.

"I was catching the 14 (Stewart) but I got so loose -- coulda, woulda, shoulda," Biffle said. "It felt good to run good and continue my record here at Kansas of running well. We gained points and that is good. We'll just keep cracking away at it."

Biffle drove to victory at Fontana in 2005 and believes he can make up some more ground next week.

• Ryan Newman finished 22nd at Kansas after starting 30th. He dropped from seventh in the standings, 122 out of the lad, to ninth, 164 points out.

• Carl Edwards finished 10th and improved one spot in the standings. But he lost more ground in the points, entering the race with a 153-point deficit and is now 165 out.

• Kasey Kahne finished sixth and went from 189 out to 190.

"We've always run pretty strong in all these Chase races and have pretty good cars this time of the year," Kahne said. "I think we should be good in the final seven races. We're definitely a ways back (in the Chase point standings)."

• Brian Vickers for all intents and purposes is out of serious consideration for "The Chase" after he finished 37th and was involved in a spin on lap 127. He dropped from 10th, 151 out of the lead, to 12th, 250 points back.

The driver to beat remains Johnson. After that, Martin remains the sentimental pick, Montoya the surprise pick and Stewart has regained the dominance he displayed throughout the summer months.