The top 12 drivers in the point standings are now locked into the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup. Racing for the 2009 championship will be:

Tony Stewart, Jeff Gordon, Jimmie Johnson, Denny Hamlin, Kurt Busch, Mark Martin, Kasey Kahne, Carl Edwards, Ryan Newman, Juan Pablo Montoya, Greg Biffle and Brian Vickers

Photos by Rusty Jarrett/Getty Images for NASCAR

Points have been reset to 5000 with each win worth 10 bonus points. Here’s how the drivers have been seeded:

1.   Mark Martin (5040)
2.   Tony Stewart (5030)
3.   Jimmie Johnson (5030)
4.   Denny Hamlin (5020)
5.   Kasey Kahne (5020)
6.   Jeff Gordon  (5010)
7.   Kurt Busch (5010)
8.   Brian Vickers (5010)
9.   Carl Edwards (5000)
10.  Ryan Newman (5000)
11.  Juan Pablo Montoya (5000)
12.  Greg Biffle (5000)

Thoughts on making “The Chase”:

(1) Mark Martin: “Well, that’s certainly cool.  I’m certainly going to enjoy that for a week here.  I feel like a whole new person, huge weight off my shoulders.  It’s just like I said before, to make this thing is the icing and now we get to go race for the cake. Of course, I’m living in it now, but to me, this is certainly the best year of my career, the most fun, and since Chicago, some of that fun has been sort of smothered out by all of the pressure.  We are in, we are out, we are in, all that.  But the thing that I’m excited about is our race team has been so strong since Chicago.  The cars have gotten better and better on the racetrack, and Chicago, Indy, Bristol, Michigan, and here, I don’t think we ever ran outside the Top‑5, and those are the kind of race cars and the kind of effort that you have to give to be a championship contender.  So we’ll see how things fare here, but anybody in this Chase can win this Chase.  Every team that’s in it is capable of putting together a ten‑race row.  That’s all it takes is the magic ten races, and anybody can win it.”

Mark Martin finished 2nd in 1990, 1994, 1998 and 2002. There’s a saying, “always the bridesmaid, never the bride”. Is this Martin’s year?

(2) Tony Stewart: “I think we just answered that.  Anybody that’s in the Chase is a contender.  You know, we have seen so many things since the Chase has been here.  You know, you can go to Loudon next weekend and this thing can be totally upside down and you can have half the field of the Chase almost eliminated from it in one week.  We have seen weird things happen and it’s one of those deals that you can’t predict what’s going to happen in this Chase.  Every year, it’s been different for any other year. Would we have bet on this at Daytona?  No way.  To get one car in the Chase; but to have both cars, we are ecstatic.  I can’t wait to get to the shop on Monday and shake their hands and pat everybody on the back and say, thank you, to everybody.  That’s what I’m looking forward to the most.  I’m not looking forward to the day off tomorrow.  I want to get to the shop and thank these guys.  And Jeff knows this because he’s been a car owner, too. This is a tough series, and to get two cars in a Chase is unbelievable.  I mean, I’m very humbled by it.  But I’m very thankful that we have got the group of guys that we have.  And I’ve always been surrounded by good people at Gibbs but there’s something different when it’s your own deal.  There’s a greater sense of pride when you know you have had a hand in making it be successful and that’s why I can’t wait to get to the shop on Monday.”

Tony Stewart is a two time series champion having won in 2002 and 2005. It’s his first year as owner/driver having left Joe Gibbs Racing to form what is now Stewart-Haas Racing. Has he proved all critics and nay-sayers wrong by placing both his 2 cars into the Chase? His driver, Ryan Newman also has made the Chase and has been seeded 10th.

(3) Jimmie Johnson: “Looking forward to it.  The Chase with Matt not making it will be the only one in the Chase, that’s a stat I’m proud of and the team is proud of.  The last two races have not gone as we had hoped and we have som, e good tracks coming up for us.  We’ll have to see. To start a Chase, this is probably one of most interesting starts we are going to have.  I think it’s anybody’s championship right now.  Guys that have been kind of locked in, including Stewart, myself, Jeff, we have been running decent, but maybe not scoring the most points and you look at the guys around the bubble Mark and they have probably been scoring the most points. So I think it’s really tough to really give this to anybody and really pick a favorite at this point.  So we just need to buckle down put in ten good ones and work really hard.”

Jimmie Johnson has won the Sprint Cup Championship over the past 3 consecutive years, 2006-2008. Is he primed to collect another Sprint Cup trophy?

(4) Denny Hamlin: “We go into each season hoping to win a championship, and I feel like we have been a Top‑5 car each and every year, whether the points showed that or not. We haven’t had championship‑caliber finishes except for our rookie year but I feel now our performance on the racetrack is better than it has ever been in my career.  We are bringing good cars to the track and being competitive and competing for race wins every week.  That’s something we didn’t have in our rookie year when we were racing for the championship.  We were racing for the championship on short tracks.  We would gain all of our points there and lose them all once we got to the bigger tracks.  Now I feel like our big track program, our mile‑and‑a‑half program is better than our short track program. I think with those six or seven races on big tracks, I’m looking forward to.  It I think it kind of sets up nicely for us.”

Denny Hamlin’s best season finish was 6th in 2006. Hamlin carries the banner this year for Joe Gibbs Racing after Kyle Busch came up 8 points short from making the Chase. Rookie Joey Logano is currently 20th in the point standings.

(5) Kasey Kahne: “We are looking at starting the Chase and hopefully being as competitive as we have ever been in the Chase. So I’m going to do the things that I’ve always done and that’s just work with the guys.  I mean, they have always taken care of me and given me great cars.  They have put out a huge effort.  Doesn’t matter if we haven’t made the Chase or made the Chase.  Those guys have worked really hard each year and we have a great group of guys.  So just stand behind them and they have stood behind me and hopefully it will take us through the end of the year and then we’ll go on from there.  But yeah there’s definitely some people that are probably wondering and hopefully we can make it through this whole situation.”

Kasey Kahne is back in the Chase for the first time since 2006 when he finished 8th overall, his best.

(6) Jeff Gordon: “I’m excited.  We had a great year.  We really had to rebound from last year’s effort.  We just were kind of a non‑factor.  And this year, I think has shown the effort ‑‑ the effort has really shown in the results.  I felt like the first ten races we are were on our game and were strong and had a shot to win some races, like at Texas which is something I never thought I would do and then lost a bit of momentum, and Tony came on strong and Mark and Jimmie.  It was a little bit disappointing. But I feel like the last five or six races we have really been able to get some things turned around and I feel like we are really well prepared for the next ten races and I feel like tonight was something that really proved to a lot of people, including ourselves, of what we are capable of doing.  We had a great, great run tonight and best car I’ve had here in a long time and as strong as Denny was for anybody to battle with him, I think was really saying something.  And we battled with him a good bit.  So it was a great night for us, and a little bit of momentum for us going into the Chase.”

Jeff Gordon is on “The Drive for 5″. The 4 time champion won in 1995, 1997, 1998 and 2001. He finished the season 4th in 2002 and 2003. He finished 3rd in 2004 and was runner-up in 2007. Is 2009 his year?

(7) Kurt Busch: “It’s a fantastic opportunity to be able to work yourself through the regular season and to get into the Chase.  It’s a sigh of relief, but at the same time, it’s an opportunity.  We now have that in front of us.  To have our cars run with the strength that we had in the beginning of the year, and then to plateau a little bit, it feels good to finish off strong, especially at the most recent short tracks like Bristol and Richmond.
So the confidence that it gives the crew and the team to know of all the changes that we have made this of off‑season and to put a car back in the Chase; it’s my second out of four years at Penske to do that, it’s huge.  Roger Penske is ecstatic, all of the top guys; it’s amazing, the feeling you get when you do something special.  We did that but we cannot stop at just making the Chase.  We have to continue to push forward and to attack at the tracks that we are going to be good on and continue to advance our program on tracks that we think we might struggle.  And so a great day for Miller Lite and Dodge and everyone associated at Penske Racing, feels like we are back in the game.”

Kurt Busch won the inaugural Chase championship while driving for Roush-Fenway Racing in 2004. This will mark his 3rd Chase for Penske Racing.

(8) Brian Vickers: “I guess the Chase is about who can be the best for ten races.  That’s the bottom line. And the past ten races, I don’t know the exact statistics, but several people have told me this, we were one of the best, if not the best teams, collected the most points, in essence, the past ten weeks; and it wasn’t the most, make it was second‑most or tide or something. Nevertheless, to me that proves to us and to everyone, what the team is capable of doing.  You know, we have done it for the past ten weeks.  There’s no reason we can’t do it for the next ten weeks.  It doesn’t mean we will.  That’s a big hill to climb.  There’s a lot of challenging ‑‑ there’s a lot of challenging teams in this Chase, very competitive teams, talented drivers, teams.  So we have got a big road ahead of us. But are we capable of it, absolutely.  I think we have proven that.  It doesn’t mean that we will.  We have still got a lot of work ahead of us.”

Brian Vickers will make his debut in the Chase for the Sprint Cup. His best season finish was 15th in 2006. Vickers gave Red Bull Racing their 1st win this season.

(9) Carl Edwards: “This season is so much different than last season.  We had six wins or something at this point last season. Right now, we have struggled a little bit as a group, Roush Fenway, so I feel like this is our opportunity to only be a few points behind the leader, kind of gather all of our energy and all of the things we have been working on and head into these last ten races full force.  So real excited about it and hopefully we can have some good runs and get back up there the way we know we can run.”

Carl Edwards seriously contended for the title last year against eventual champion, Jimmie Johnson. Edwards finished 2nd.

(10) Ryan Newman: “It’s a dream come true, to think back to Daytona going through basically three race cars and make it to Richmond here and be in this position, it says a lot about the hard work that Tony Gibson, Tony Stewart and everybody at Stewart Haas Racing has put into this effort. People say it looked like a risk to leave Penske Racing but to me it looked like an opportunity.  Yeah, there was risk associated with it but it was an opportunity.  I’m extremely gratified to be in this position.  Everybody is going to be working their hardest to do it and only one can win it.  We will do what we have to do and I’m so proud to represent U.S. Army and knowing that I’m driving for over a million solders fighting for our freedom and this is a win for them, too.”

Ryan Newman finished 6th in 2002, 2003 and 2005. This is his first Chase driving for Stewart-Haas Racing.

(11) Juan Pablo Montoya: “I think right now, it’s anybody’s game. I think you’ve got to finish every race.  I think a bad result is going to be a tenth place if you want to win the championship and a good result is going to be like the last couple of weeks for us that we’ve been fighting for wins.  That’s the only way to do it.”

While Montoya is a former 1998 Formula 300 Champion, 1999 CART Champion and 2000 Indy 500 winner, his best season finish in NASCAR’s top series was 20th in 2007.

(12) Greg Biffle: “Just keep figuring out how to make our cars faster and that’s what we have been doing the last ten weeks, all season.  We only have two wins as an organization this career and they both came from Matt, first and second race of the year. So we know that we are off a little bit, but you know, we are not going to give up.  We are just going to keep working as hard as we can, and we know we need to be a little bit better.  We thought this front suspension package we tried here was going to be the deal and it wasn’t.  You know, I don’t know if we ran any better or worse than we would have but we are going to continue to work on it.  That’s all I can say.”

Biffle’s best season finish was 2nd in 2005. He finished 3rd last year behind his Roush-Fenway Racing teammate, Carl Edwards.

Photo Credit: Jerry Markland/Getty Images for NASCAR