NASCAR has suspended Matt Kenseth, driver of the Number-20 Joe Gibbs Racing Sprint Cup Series Toyota, for two races after he intentionally wrecked Joey Logano late in Sunday’s Goody’s Headache Relief Shot 500 at Martinsville Speedway. In addition, Kenseth has been placed on NASCAR probation for six months that’ll carry well into the first half of next season. He was nine laps down to race leader Logano less than fifty laps from the finish when he drove into the back of the Number-22 Team Penske Ford and sent it into the wall. In a statement released Tuesday evening, Joe Gibbs Racing said Kenseth would appeal the penalty.

He wasn’t the only driver slapped with sanctions for bad behavior at Martinsville. Stewart-Haas Racing’s Danica Patrick was fined fifty thousand dollars and docked twenty-five championship points after purposely crashing into David Gilliland in the closing laps of Sunday’s race.

Matt Kenseth made it look easy Sunday at Michigan International Speedway. Starting from the pole, leading 146 of the race’s two hundred laps, and marching to his third win of the season and second in the last three weeks. The margin of victory was one-point-seven seconds over Kevin Harvick. Martin Truex Junior finished third and Austin Dillon came home with a career-best fourth-place finish. Denny Hamlin, one of Kenseth’s teammates at Joe Gibbs Racing, completed the top five with another J-G-R entry.

Carl Edwards … finishing sixth, one day after celebrating his 36th birthday. Kenseth kept his Number-20 Toyota in front over the final twenty-five laps, holding the field at bay through the day’s final restart to notch his thirty-fourth career victory … The race featured NASCAR’s “high-drag” aerodynamic rules package that debuted last month at Indianapolis, with the higher downforce intended to create more competitive racing with increased lead changes.

Sunday’s Pure Michigan 400 was the second event for the new package and produced just sixteen lead changes, one fewer than the track’s June race had with standard 2015 rules … Kyle Busch, a four-time winner this year, solidified his eligibility for a post-season Chase berth with an eleventh-place finish that lifted him into twenty-ninth place in the standings.

Busch now enjoys a twenty-three point cushion over Cole Whitt in his bid to remain among the top thirty with just three races left in the regular season … Kurt Busch finished twentieth on Sunday afternoon in his bid for a season sweep on the Irish Hills oval.

Matt Kenseth played the fuel-mileage game to perfection Sunday at Pocono Raceway, outlasting Joey Logano and Kyle Busch to record his second victory of the season – snapping Busch’s three-race winning streak but at the same time, extending Joe Gibbs Racing’s run of summertime success. Dating back to NASCAR’s All-Star Race in mid-May, J-G-R has now won seven of the last eleven Sprint Cup Series races.

Kenseth led just two laps Sunday, one at mid-race and the other at the end of the day in notching career win Number-33. Logano led a race-high ninety-seven laps but his fuel tank ran dry less than three laps from the finish.

He yielded the lead to Busch, who took the white flag in first place but the checkered flag in twenty-first place after running out of gas on his final trip around “The Tricky Triangle” and coasting to a stop. Busch was attempting to become the first driver to win four straight Cup Series races since Jimmie Johnson in 2007 and carried a sixteen-second lead over Kenseth into Sunday’s final lap.

Jeff Gordon rode home in third place with Dale Earnhardt Junior and Greg Biffle completing the top five. Johnson’s sixth-place finish gave Hendrick Motorsports three of the top six spots. Busch started from the pole and led three times for nineteen laps.

Despite his late-race misfortune, he is now just thirteen points outside the top thirty – where Busch needs to be in order to become eligible for a berth in the post-season Chase. He remains in thirty-second place. Sunday’s race included eighteen lead changes, six more than in this year’s first stop at Pocono on June 7th.