Ford 400
The Ford 400 was held on November 21 at Homestead-Miami Speedway. Kurt Busch won the pole. This race was known as the deciding race of the 2004 Nextel Cup champion, in which five driver are still mathematically alive for the championship including the points leader, Kurt Busch with 18 points margin ahead of Jimmie Johnson, who earned the most wins in 2004, Jeff Gordon, Dale Earnhardt Jr. and veteran Mark Martin. Those five chasers are 82 points margin for the final race. At the start of the lap 1, Hermie Sadler got turned sideways while Mike Bliss gets spun around but Johnson survived the wreck in the following caution. On Lap 93, championship leader Kurt Busch lost a tire when he enters the pit road, he lost the championship lead to Jeff Gordon and Busch took back the points leader. With 3 laps to go, race leader Ryan Newman makes some contact and lost the right side of the tire, the caution is out and set a Green-white-checker finish at Homestead. It was the 2nd most caution in any NASCAR races (The 2005 Coca-Cola 600 had 22 cautions, which set the most cautions). At the restart, Greg Biffle holds off Tony Stewart for the race leader and took the checkered flag to win the Ford 400, while Johnson and Gordon finished 2nd and 3rd. Kurt Busch wins the 2004 NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Championship with 8 points ahead of Johnson, the closest margin in the NASCAR history (until the 2011 Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup, won by Tony Stewart. Tony Stewart and Carl Edwards were tied following the season's last race, the Cup going to Stewart by virtue of more wins on the season, 5 to 1 respectively.)
- Complete Results
Top Ten Results
- Greg Biffle
- Jimmie Johnson
- Jeff Gordon
- Tony Stewart
- Kurt Busch
- Brendan Gaughan
- Jamie McMurray
- Rusty Wallace
- Ricky Rudd
- Kevin Harvick
Failed to qualify: Kyle Petty (#45), Johnny Sauter (#09), Mike Garvey (#75), Tony Raines (#51), Kevin Lepage (#37), Todd Bodine (#50), Larry Foyt (#70), J. J. Yeley (#11), Randy LaJoie (#98), Morgan Shepherd (#89), Kirk Shelmerdine (#72), Carl Long (#80), Geoffrey Bodine (#93)
Read more about this topic: 2004 NASCAR Nextel Cup Series
Famous quotes containing the word ford:
“We bring [to government] no hereditary status or gift of infallibility and none follows us from this place.”
—Gerald R. Ford (b. 1913)