But that leaves Yates with quite a quandary: Replace not one, but two drivers.
Given the demand for drivers like Brian Vickers and Casey Mears, two drivers with little success over their careers, Yates has a difficult task ahead of him. NASCAR.com speculates that 19-year old Stephen Leicht and Busch driver David Gilliland are among the candidates to jump into Cup rides next year. Neither has much Busch experience.
The dearth of drivers in the pipeline has been a problem for sometime now. Ask Chip Ganassi, who brought up David Stremme and Reed Sorenson to Cup this season. Stremme had two years of Busch experience, Sorenson had one and a quarter or so.
And with silly season starting unusually early this year, most of the top names out there (Vick-ers and Mears) have already been signed. Of course, Mayfield is suddenly looking for a ride now, too.
Yates’ position is unenviable. His teams are in a funk, and now he’s driverless for 2007. And if his choices are Leicht and Gilliland, expect his teams to stay there for some team, or at least until the drivers get themselves acclimated to Cup racing.
Yates fans will be left in a lurch too. My wife — a former fan of both Jarrett and Sadler — whose uncle owns a Ford dealership in Oregon, was shocked when I e-mailed her the NASCAR.com story.
“They are all leaving,” she wrote. “I don’t understand.”

Owner Robert Yates (left) and Elliott Sadler at Daytona in 2004. (Photo courtesy of NASCAR)

Over the course of a metasearch for Tony Stewart and “my fault”, there comes just one instance where Stewart admitted fault: His win at Chicagoland in 2004, where he punted Kasey Kahne to get the lead. Stewart admitted fault since he ultimately caused Kahne to wreck, but it was hardly a firm admission given what else he said. (The wreck sparked a confrontation between Tommy Baldwin, then Kahne’s crew chief, and Stewart’s boss, Greg Zippadelli.)
So we should hardly be surprised that when Stewart and Ryan Newman got together on Sunday, Stewart was all too quick to hand off the blame to Stewart.
“We’re starting to learn to race him like he races us and he doesn’t give anybody a break so I wasn’t about to give him a break,” Stewart said, according to the Associated Press. “So, he’ll just take me out then if you don’t let him by. It’s amazing how he expects you to let him by, but he does-n’t give anybody that same courtesy.”
Newman dished some of it back, as one could reasonably expect.
On Speed Channel’s Inside Nextel Cup last night, both Michael Waltrip and Ken Schrader agreed that the wreck was, in fact, Newman’s fault. I’ll trust them, since they’re both veteran NASCAR drivers.
But we’ve heard the same tune from Stewart for so long — all while participating in various feuds with many of his colleagues — it’s hard to believe him when he goes all-in during yet another blame game.
Wolf, wolf.

After getting together with polesitter Ryan Newman in New Hampshire’s slightly-banked turns, Stewart spun and tapped the wall — enough that he was forced to retreat to the garage to make the necessary repairs. He came out in 42nd place, 22 laps down.
He kept running to get as many points as possible, improving to a 37th-place finish. But the poor showing dropped him four spots in the standings and out of the top 10.
While he is only 11 points behind Greg Biffle, who is 10th, the precipitous drop in the points bat-tle is a cause for concern. Heading into Loudon, he had finished 25th or worse in five of the previ-ous seven races. The only bright spots over that span were a win at Daytona and a third at Pocono.
Stewart, of course, was none too pleased with Newman, even though the replays seemed to show that both had a hand in the spin.
“I got wrecked by Ryan Newman,” Stewart said, according to the Boston Globe. “Everybody races each other different. There’s guys that are really good at giving and taking. There’s guys that aren’t. Ryan’s one of those guys that’s not good at the giving part.
“At some point, you finally get tired of giving to everybody or to particular individuals when all they do is take, take, take and they don’t give back. So when you catch them 30 laps into it and you have to race your guts out to get by him, it doesn’t make you really want to pull over and just let the same guy go later on in the race.”
(For the record, Stewart angered drivers in Saturday’s New England 100 modified race, where he was a guest driver. There are more details in the Easton, Pa. Express-Times.)
Earnhardt also fell four spots in the standings, but he is still comfortably in the Chase — 97 points and three drivers ahead of Stewart.
But a dead-last finish is always disconcerting. Junior’s engine expired on Lap 134.
As consistently bad as Stewart’s finishes have been, Earnhardt’s have been good over an even longer span. Dating to a 31st finish at Talladega in early May, Earnhardt had just one finish below 14th — a 26th at Sonoma — entering Sunday’s race.
For Earnhardt, it’s easy to view Sunday as an anomaly.
Stewart, meanwhile, only wishes his results could be viewed so positively.

Hot and humid conditions are likely today with maximum temperatures forecasted to reach near 100 degrees in many locations. Combined with a humid airmass, the heat index will likely reach near 105 degrees.

Hot and humid conditions will be possible again on Tuesday as well.

How are you staying cool this summer? Send us a note below or e-mail your photos to Nicole McMullin at .

NASCAR seems poised to make a move into Canada with a Busch race at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in Montreal.
Steve Page, an original member of the band with Robertson, is from Scarborough, Ontario, a Toronto suburb. He said many of his friends are NASCAR fans and have driven south from Toronto to attend races.
He added that the current races in Canada — Champ Car and Formula One — have fueled the country’s interest in auto racing.
Click here to listen to his explanation.

(Photo courtesy of Chevy)