With Tony Stewart’s victory Sunday in Sonoma, California, the list of Sprint Cup Series winners this season grows to eleven. If there are six more drivers who reach Victory Lane over the final ten regular-season races, then there’ll be one driver with a victory to his credit that will not get a spot on the 2016 Chase Grid – which will include only the sixteen top eligible drivers based primarily on race wins.
The lone remaining driver who won last year but is still without a victory in 2016 is Dale Earnhardt Junior … who will arrive at Daytona International Speedway later this week as defending winner of Saturday night’s Coke Zero 400 Powered by Coca-Cola.
Stewart’s the last driver to win back-to-back July races there, in 2005 and 2006.