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Updated Aug. 22
We haven't talked much about Toyota this season, and for good reason. They've been awful.
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| Dave Blaney was one of two Toyota drivers in the top 10 at Michigan. (Getty Images) |
That brings Toyota's grand total for the season to a whopping six top 10s.
"We've been improving -- all the Toyota teams have been improving this season," said Blaney, who picked up his second top 10 in the past four races. "Brian and I have had some great runs. He ran great the first half of the race and I ran great the second half of the race.
"We got a couple of top 10s out of it and that's making progress -- that's what we want to see."
Blaney said revisiting tracks has been helpful, though not the absolute reason for improvement.
"Everybody gets better the second time from what we learned the first time," Blaney said. "So, you just have to learn more or learn faster. We've been getting a lot better lately."
"The last month and a half or so we've been using different setups on the car and the car has been way more competitive. If we just have smooth days we are competitive."
With no provisionals to fall back on, Vickers has missed seven races, but he hasn't run badly in the events he has managed to make. Wrecks and mechanical failures have doomed several runs, but he still has come through with an average finish of 25.1 overall. He's also the lap leader for Toyota with 95, including 11 on Tuesday.
Even better news for Toyota is that Joe Gibbs Racing has been strongly rumored to be switching manufacturers from Chevrolet to Toyota starting in 2008. If that happens, things will be looking even rosier.
Power Rankings after Michigan:
| POWER RANKINGS | ||
| Current | Driver | Previous |
| 1 | Jimmie Johnson | 1 |
| As great as he has been at Lowe's over the years, he might be ever better at Martinsville, where he has four victories, including three of the past four races. | ||
| 2 | Greg Biffle | 3 |
| Finished right behind Johnson in seventh, losing only nine points in the standings. | ||
| 3 | Carl Edwards | 2 |
| He looked to have a car that could compete for the win at Lowe's until a bizarre electrical issue derailed his race and, likely, his championship hopes. | ||
| 4 | Jeff Burton | 5 |
| Always under the radar, he has run off nine consecutive Top 10 finishes in Chase races. | ||
| 5 | Kevin Harvick | 4 |
| Harvick and the 29 team have nobody but themselves to blame for their lack of a top 10 this week. | ||
| 6 | Kyle Busch | 6 |
| Finally stops the bleeding of his Chase swoon with his first top 10 in seven races. | ||
| 7 | Jeff Gordon | 7 |
| Nice recovery for the 24 team after his early brush with the wall but still remains winless. This weekend's race at Martinsville might offer his best chance to pull off a victory in the final five. | ||
| 8 | Tony Stewart | 10 |
| He had a one of the best cars over the first 100 laps, but he lost track position and then fell a lap down because of a pit-road speeding penalty. | ||
| 9 | Clint Bowyer | 12 |
| The 07 team has been steady over the past couple of months, but not quite strong enough to compete for wins. | ||
| 10 | David Ragan | 14 |
| He's rebounded with three consecutive top 10s after a rough five race stretch spanning the end of the "regular season" and beginning of the Chase. | ||
| 11 | Denny Hamlin | 8 |
| Following a 16th-place finish due in part to contact with Bowyer that knocked him into the wall, he said he wasn't feeling any ill effects from last week's hard crash at Talladega. | ||
| 12 | Dale Earnhardt Jr. | 9 |
| Sure he's had some bad luck, such as a blown tire for the second consecutive week, but luck isn't the sole reason he has just three top 10s in the past 16 races. | ||
| 13 | Mark Martin | 13 |
| Captures his 11th top 10 in 21 starts this season. | ||
| 14 | Matt Kenseth | 11 |
| His 41st-place finish Saturday marked his eight of 36th or worse this season. | ||
| 15 | Kasey Kahne | 15 |
| Picks up just his second top 10 in 10 races and his first top five since Michigan in June. | ||
| 16 | Martin Truex Jr. | 16 |
| He's consistently average, with 12 finishes between 13th and 19th this season. | ||
| 17 | Bobby Labonte | 18 |
| Followed his sixth-place run at Talladega with a 17th at Lowe's. He hasn't managed back-to-back top 10s since August of 2007. | ||
| 18 | David Reutimann | 17 |
| Just when it looked as if Reutimann had turned the Corner, he stumbles to back-to-back finishes of 37th and 32nd. | ||
| 19 | Brian Vickers | 19 |
| He dominated the middle portion of the race, but his hopes were dashed when he popped a tire. | ||
| 20 | Elliott Sadler | NR |
| Nothing special about his performance Saturday night, but it trumped Casey Mears' 29th-place effort. | ||