With six races left in the season, Sorenson sits third in the standings, 49 points behind leader Ricky Stenhouse Jr. He should be gearing up to make a run at the championship with Turner Motorsports. Instead, Sorenson finds himself without a ride.

Sorenson was released from the No. 32 team effective immediately. Sorenson said, “”I’m not sure what happened. I got a phone call this morning, but they didn’t really say much. All they would say is that I’m out of the car. I haven’t gotten a reason; I’m just as confused as you are.” Sorenson has been working feverishly to find a Nationwide team that will allow him to complete the season.

Rumors started circulating late last week that sponsor Dollar General was leaving the No. 32 team and Sorenson at the end of the 2011 season to pursue other options. It didn’t take long for those rumors to become reality, as team owner Steve Turner had meetings with the majority of employees and handed out letters in accordance with North Carolina WARN Act regarding layoffs.

Turner announced that Brian Vickers, a former Nationwide Series champion, will assume driving duties of the No. 32 Chevy beginning this weekend at Kansas Speedway. Vickers drove the No. 32 car before, when it was owned by Braun Racing.

Turner said, “We are confident [Vickers] can help assess where we are, as a company currently, and the direction we are going as we build our programs for 2012 and beyond.”

A little over a month ago Sorenson had an on track incident at the Atlanta Motor Speedway with teammate Justin Allgaier which cost him more than 20 points. Sorenson was very outspoken about the incident with reporters and reportedly he had an intense meeting with Turner Motorsports after the incident.

It is not know whether this has anything to do with his release.

Busch, who chased Edwards to the checkered flag after passing Ricky Stenhouse Jr. for second place on Lap 186 of 195, was the runner-up, .697 seconds behind Edwards. Stenhouse, the series points leader, came home third, followed by Kevin Harvick and Kasey Kahne.

After regaining the lead from Harvick following a Lap 177 restart, Edwards stayed there and held a comfortable advantage until Busch cleared Stenhouse for second.

“That was the hardest we could race out there,” Edwards said. “Kyle and I, Kevin, I raced Kasey—it was a lot of fun. This track is as good as it gets. This was a blast.”

Edwards’ crew was fastest during pit stops under caution on Lap 165, and he led the field to a restart on Lap 169. Harvick, however, grabbed the top spot before the lap was over and stayed there until contact from Justin Allgaier sent Turner Motorsports teammate Reed Sorenson’s Chevrolet into the Ford of Trevor Bayne in Turn 2.

“I will tell you one thing: I’ll find him after the race, and it’ll be between me and him—I promise you,” said Sorenson, who took a huge hit in the Nationwide standings.

Allgaier, who finished sixth, said after the race he wanted to find Sorenson, too—to apologize. Sorenson finished 32nd and now trails Stenhouse by 40 points.

Edwards led from the outset, pacing the first 41 laps before Eric McClure smacked the Turn 2 wall to cause the first caution. During pit stops on Lap 43, Edwards dragged an air gun beyond the boundary of his stall and had to return to pit road to serve a penalty.

Busch led the field to a restart on Lap 47, with Harvick beside him and Edwards in 17th place, the last car on the lead lap thanks to the infraction. As Harvick battled Busch and Stenhouse for the top spot, Edwards began a methodical climb through the field, working his way to the sixth position within 15 laps.

Harvick swapped the lead with Stenhouse three times, and Harvick on his team radio acknowledged the broader implications of that battle. Harvick owns the No. 2 Chevrolet driven by Elliott Sadler, and entering Saturday’s event, Sadler trailed Stenhouse by five points in the race for the Nationwide championship.

“I’ll get rougher with him (Stenhouse) the later it goes, if I have to,” Harvick promised as the cars slowed under caution for Joe Nemechek’s spin in Turn 2 on Lap 68. “I feel like I’m racing for the 2’s life up here.”

Sadler finished 10th. He remains second in the standings but is now 13 points behind Stenhouse.

That caution and one that followed on Lap 76 for Michael Annett’s spin through the infield grass bunched the field and gave Edwards the opportunity he needed to regain the lead. After trading the top spot with Busch following a restart on Lap 82, Edwards moved to the front decisively on Lap 102 and began to pull away.

By Lap 110, he had a lead of 1.394 seconds over Busch.

Danica Wows at Daytona

Danica Patrick raced her tail off and tried her best to get the win Friday night in the Subway Jalapeño 250.  Though she didn’t win the race, she proved that she belongs in the Nationwide series.

She started her GoDaddy.com Chevy in seventh place and finished in 10th place.  Patrick led many laps and worked well drafting with Tony Stewart and Aric Almirola.  However, on the last lap Mike Wallace attempted to block her and caused a multi-car pile up that resulted her 10th place finish.  Leave it to a veteran to cause “the big one” at Daytona.

Patrick handled the incident well and kept her cool.  “It looked like Mike Wallace was like a fish out of water at the end,” Patrick said. “He was high, he was low and then he was high into me. It was just a cluster.”

Although the No. 7 JR Motorsports team did not get the finish they hoped for, the team was very excited about how well they ran and the progress they achieved.  “Hopefully I earned people’s respect out there some more,” said Patrick. “That’s what it’s going to take – whether you’re a girl or a boy, or young or new, you’ve got to earn the respect of your peers. That’s what I try to do every weekend.”

She seems to have the drafting aspect of it down.  Now she has to work on her intermediate and short-track skills.  When she came into the sport she had no idea how to communicate with crew chief Tony Eury Jr in NASCAR lingo.  She is quickly picking that up, helping Eury Jr get the car to her liking.  The cars are getting faster and the results are getting better for this JRM team.  She still has a lot of learning to do, but I am very excited to see how she does in the future.  I hope she will soon make the switch full-time to NASCAR so we can have a competitive female racer in our sport.

Turner Motorsports Success

Turner Motorsports is taking the Nationwide Series by storm.  Following the Subway Jalapeño 250, they now have all three drivers in the top 5 in points.  Reed Sorenson is the series point leader with one win under his belt.  Justin Allgaier and Mark Martin have also each gotten a win for the team this year.  Turner Motorsports is now the team to beat.  Reed Sorenson, Justin Allgaier, and Jason Leffler all have a legitament chance to win the Nationwide title.  Not to mention, all three drivers finished in the top 5 at Daytona this weekend and ranked fastest on the restarts.

Sorenson also won the Nationwide $100,000 ”Dash for cash” reward, given to the highest finishing young gun in the race.  Don’t underestimate this team; they only get better every week!

Joey Logano Finally the Bride

Joey Logano finally became the bride at Daytona. Logano held off hard-charging Jason Leffler to get his first win of the season for Joe Gibbs Racing.  He only led the last half mile of the last lap, but thankfully for him that’s all that counts.

Logano had help from his JGR teammate Kyle Busch to push him to the lead.  “Usually, I’m the guy that’s finished second – unfortunately — but this time I am the winner, so I’m pretty pumped up about that. This is a huge win for me for a lot of reasons,” Logano said.  I’m still not sure where Joey came from on that last restart, but congratulations to him on his long awaited win.

The scheduled 50-lap race on Road America’s 4.048-mile road course needed three green-white-checkered-flag attempts to determine a winner, and even on Lap 57, it was difficult to see that Reed Sorenson had won his first race since 2007.

For most of the afternoon, the race was relatively clean. Then came the final laps, and Road America morphed into something resembling a demolition derby, forcing the maximum overtime attempts allowed to determine the winner.

The race ended under caution, which was fitting considering all the pushing, grinding and shoving that sent countless cars into the road course’s expansive gravel traps.

It also ended under a cloud of uncertainty—and drama.

Justin Allgaier took the white flag and had the lead when the seventh and final caution was thrown because Aric Almirola’s No. 88 Chevrolet had stopped on the track in Turn 5. But Allgaier ran out of gas in Turn 6, and it wasn’t immediately clear whether Sorenson or Ron Fellows had inherited the lead—even though Sorenson was running second behind Allgaier and Fellows third.

Before declaring the winner, NASCAR officials took an extra look at the video feeds. They determined that Fellows had moved ahead of Sorenson after the yellow had been thrown, thus giving the win to Sorenson.

“This is not the place I thought I’d win a race,” Sorenson said. “I’d never been here before.”

The restarts produced by the green-white-checkers contributed to the late race mayhem, Sorenson said.

“It’s easy for the guys to get bundled up and have wrecks,” he said. “We were able to capitalize on that. When the last caution came out, Justin was first, and we were second. We were able to break away and stay in second place. Justin ran out of gas in Turn 6, and we were able to make it around and even have some gas left for some doughnuts.”

Fellows, who was scored second, was disappointed with his result.

“We got ourselves in a little bit of trouble, anyway,” he said. “For whatever reason, on the restarts toward the end, I just couldn’t get any forward traction.”

Jacques Villeneuve, who had an eventful afternoon, Elliott Sadler and Mike Wallace rounded out the top five.

Villeneuve was apologetic for a Turn 1 incident on the first GWC attempt. The incident put Max Papis and Brian Scott out of the race. On the restart, Villeneuve attempted to move to the inside of Scott only to run out of pavement where the Road America’s pit lane blends with the front straight. Villeneuve drifted back and bumped into the right rear fender of Scott, which sent Scott into Papis and both into the gravel on the outside of Turn 1.

“When I put two wheels on the grass, I really didn’t want to be there,” Villeneuve said.

The win pushed Sorenson up two spots and into first in the standings by five points over Sadler. Ricky Stenhouse Jr. finished eighth and dropped from first to third. Allgaier finished 19th and remained fourth in the standings but is now 34 points behind the leader.

On a restart on lap 199 of 200, Keselowski bumped Edwards in an attempt to get the lead in Turn 1. The two raced door-to-door for the lead for most of the final lap.

As the two raced to the finish line, it appeared Keselowski had the edge and would take the win when Edwards turned Keselowski. Keselowski hit the outside wall hard, then slid into the inside wall before Shelby Howard hit him again before he reached the finish line.

Edwards took the checkered flag two car lengths in front of runner-up Reed Sorenson.

Afterwards, Edwards said:

I just couldn’t let him take the win from me. My guys work way too hard for that. We had a great restart. My guys built me a great car. We came to the checkered flag, and I hate to see stuff tore up, but we came here to win and he took it from us there in Turn 1. Just an awesome race. … I’m sure some of them don’t like that win—Brad Keselowski fans and stuff—but, man, I just couldn’t let him take it from me. I had to do what I had to do.

Keselowski said:

He turned left into me and wrecked me on purpose. I gave him the lane, and he still wrecked me. … I figured out a way to beat him. He wasn’t happy with me, so he wrecked me. Wrecking down the straightaway is never cool, whether it’s at 200 mph or 120. I’m sorry that’s the way it had to end.

After the race, Edwards met with NASCAR officials to discuss the incident. It appears, however, that no penalties are coming as Nationwide Series Director Joe Balash chalked the incident up to hard racing. He said:

I think at the last lap there was a lot of hard racing going on. There was some movement on the racetrack. It was a tough finish for a really great race.

Top 5: Edwards, Sorenson, Trevor Bayne, Paul Menard, and Steve Wallace.

Brian Scott, Colin Braun, Josh Wise, Ricky Stenhouse Jr, and Tony Raines finished sixth through 10th, respectively.

Notables: Michael Annett (11th), Steve Arpin (13), Brad Keselowski (14th), Kevin Harvick (16th), Brendan Gaughan (17th), Kenny Wallace (20th), Justin Allgaier (25th), Jason Keller (34th), and Johnny Sauter (41st).

The incident:

Top 5: Harvick, Kahne, Gordon, Dale Earnhardt Jr, and Jeff Burton.

Carl Edwards, Kurt Busch, Reed Sorenson, Mike Bliss, and Scott Speed rounded out the top 10.

Notables: David Reutimann (11th), Robby Gordon (12th), Steve Park (13th), Kevin Conway (14th), Matt Kenseth (15th), Bobby Labonte (16th), Clint Bowyer (17th), Greg Biffle (20th), Denny Hamlin (24th), Tony Stewart (25th), Ryan Newman (26th), Juan Montoya (27th), Mark Martin (28th), Joey Logano (29th), Jimmie Johnson (31st), Marcos Ambrose (32nd), Martin Truex Jr (35th), Jamie McMurray (39th), and Kyle Busch (40th).

Early in the race, Kyle Busch and AJ Allmendinger made contact, sending Allmendinger sliding towards the inside wall. He spun and hit the wall with his rear. Allemdinger finished 36th. Busch continued on. Afterwards, he had a heated exchange with team owner Richard Petty, an incident that was downplayed later.

About 60 laps later, Busch was racing past Juan Montoya, who was going a lap down due to pitting under green. As Busch passed him, Montoya came down while Busch moved up the track. The two made contact, and Busch was hooked into the wall. He suffered heavy damage and finished 40th.

Afterwards, Busch gave a sarcastic interview taking blame for the incident. He explained side-drafting and how Montoya hooked him before making contact due to the air.

On lap 116, David Ragan got loose and spun. He overcorrected and hit the wall. He then slid down the into Jamie McMurray and Martin Truex Jr. McMurray and Ragan could not continue, but Truex was able to continued on. They finished 39th, 38th, and 35th respectively.

On lap 148, Kurt Busch bumped Jeff Burton, loosening him up and sending him into Sam Hornish Jr on the outside. Burton bounced off of Hornish and slid back into Busch. Busch slid across the grass.

The cars started checking up. Juan Montoya got into the back of Brad Keselowski turning him into the wall. Keselowki got into Reed Sorenson spinning him into Jimmie Johnson, who turned into the wall.

Keselowski and Sorenson blocked the track, collecting several cars who had nowhere to go. About 12 cars were involved, including Sorenson, Montoya, Ryan Newman, Johnson, Elliott Sadler, Greg Biffle, Bobby Labonte, Joey Logano, Mark Martin, Regan Smith, Marcos Ambrose, and Travis Kvapil .

The race was red flagged for 20 minutes.

About 11 laps later, Hornish was running three-wide in the middle of Sadler and David Reutimann when he got loose. He hit teammate Kurt Busch, then bounced off of Sadler and slid back into Busch. Busch was turned to the inside and slid across the track while Hornish and Sadler turned to the outside and made contact with the wall.

With his fourth place finish, Dale Earnhardt Jr climbed back into the top 12 in the standings.

Around lap 112, Johnson came down pit road with the lead. But, there was a problem with the left rear. He left the pits in ninth place. He battled back all day and took the lead on lap 288 when he used his fresher tires to pass Jeff Burton who was on older tires.

The caution came out when Burton got into Kyle Busch and spun him. Burton simply lost grip due to his older tires.

On the restart, Kurt Busch orchestrated the bump-and-run on Johnson to perfection. He tapped Johnson’s left rear, sending him up the track. Busch took the lead on the inside with about six laps to go. Thousands of anti-Jimmie fans cheered, thining, “Anyone but Jimmie.”

But, over the next five laps, those fans watched as Johnson slowly reeled in Busch.

By lap 299, Johnson was on Busch’s bumper. He nudged Busch and was able to get along side him, but couldn’t complete the pass. After about a half of a lap of racing side-by-side, Johnson who was close to completing the pass, drifted up and nudged Busch again. Busch slid a little high and Johnson was able to pull away. Busch fell to third while Johnson won. 

Top 5: Johnson, Tony Stewart, Busch, Jeff Gordon, and Kevin Harvick.

Ryan Newman, Clint Bowyer, Dale Earnhardt Jr, Joey Logano, and AJ Allmendinger finished sixth through 10th, respectively.

Notables: Kyle Busch (11th), Jeff Burton (12th), Marcos Amborse (13th), Denny Hamlin (14th), David Reutimann (15th), Greg Biffle (16th), Matt Kenseth (17th), Jamie McMurray (18th), Mark Martin (21st), Martin Truex Jr (22nd), Carl Edwards (25th), Juan Montoya (34th), and Kasey Kahne (36th).  

Kasey Kahne had a good run going until around lap 205, when he began having engine problems. He tried nursing his slow car around the track, as other cars easily passed him. On lap 238, Kahne’s engine gave way. He finished 36th.

Most of the race was run under green. Kahne’s engine problem was the first non-debris caution. After that, Juan Montoya and Jeff Gordon were beating and banging for fourth place. Gordon knocked the letters off of Montoya’s left rear, but the tire still appeared to be inflated.

Montoya began losing positions. He dropped from seventh to 12th in 10 laps. On lap 282, Montoya and Reed Sorenson were running side by side. They were not on the same lap, and were not battling for position. Montoya and Sorenson made contact. They raced side-by-side for another five laps before Sorenson appeared to cut right and hit Montoya sending him hard into the wall. He finished 34th.

Under the caution, leader Jeff Burton stayed out while everyone else pitted. On old tires, Burton was unable to hold off the cars with fresher tires. As he lost positions, he got loose and slid up the track into Kyle Busch, spinning him out. Busch and Burton came to the pit under caution and both recovered to finish 11th and 12th, respectively.

Mattias Ekström will pilot the car at the Toyota Save/Mart 350 at Infineon Raceway. No decision has been made as to who will fill the seat for the remainder of the season.

Update: Red Bull Racing accnounced that Reed Sorenson will drive the No. 83, beginning at New Hampshire Motor Speedway.

RBR General Manager Jay Frye said:

Our unique situation has afforded us the opportunity to try some different things, and we’re continuing to do that with Reed. We appreciate Casey’s work and everything he’s done the past five weeks.

Mears is rumored to be taking over Tommy Baldwin Racing’s No. 36.

Mears took over for Brian Vickers earlier this season when Vickers was sidelined for the entire season by blood clots. Mears has had lackluster results, posting a best finish of 22nd, with a 27.5 average finish.

Last weekend, he had a run-in with RBR teammate Scott Speed that resulted in Speed having harsh words for Mears.

At the time, Speed said:

Both of us were struggling but [Mears] wrecking us like that — I mean is ridiculous. Whenever you’re at Hendrick [Motorsports] and Richard Childress Racing and then you still don’t have a ride and haven’t done anything there’s no real excuses after that, but whatever.

Mears has always been considered by many as an underachiever because of his results in relatively competitive rides. He posted only one win in seven seasons, despite being at powerhouse teams such as Chip Ganassi Racing, Hendrick Motorsports, and Richard Childress Racing.

In his defense, however, Mears never had stability at crew chief. He rarely worked with a crew chief for more than one season. Still, after his stint with his fourth competitive team, one has to wonder how many more chances he will get.

Red Bull Racing also recently announced that it is parting ways with its competition director, Elton Sawyer.