--Fans seem to love plate races, especially the Daytona 500 and the sprint Talladega race…although that's most-likely because we don't have to deal with Michael Waltrip doing his "commentating".
--Marcos Ambrose and Casey Mears were each fined ($25k & $15k, respectively) for their post-race fight last week. In protest, Marcos will pay his fine in Australian dollars, while Casey will pay HIS fine in unsold Jack Daniel's Racing shirts.
--Nationwide Insurance will be sponsoring Dale Earnhardt Jr. for about a third of the schedule, starting next season. Since it's very VERY rare for two competing companies to sponsor cars on the same team at the same time, this likely means that Farmers Insurance (bum-ba-bum-ba-bum-bum-bum) is leaving Hendrick. While this leaves Kasey Kahne's status up in the air for 2015, it DOES guarantee about four months of "Will Chase Elliott move up to the 5 car with Napa sponsorship?" rumors.
--Nationwide's announcement also can't be good for Ricky Stenhouse Jr., who was already running "Ford EcoBoost" paint schemes this year. Personally, I wouldn't be surprised to see Chase in the 5 car, Kasey in the 17 car, and Ricky running in Whatever They're Going To Call The Nationwide Series next year.
--Eric McClure is back in the #35 car this week, continuing his Farewell Tour That Nobody Cares About tour.
--Even after the fireworks at Richmond last week, the sports world was instead focused elsewhere:
