The Car of Tomorrow (COT) is now officially the Car As of Now, or CAN, and the first driver to win in a CAN is Kyle Busch, who promptly got out of his CAN to declare, “These things suck!”

To be honest, Busch should have been third at best at the Food City 500 at Bristol. Tony Stewart led 292 laps then lost a fuel pump cable. Stewart was dominant, but the broken cable put him 29 laps behind. Stewart's Joe Gibbs Racing Teammate, Denny Hamlin took over the point, and he probably should have won, but a late race caution hung him and eventual winner Busch out to dry as the lead lap cars from sixth on back pitted. Jeff Gordon was the best of those, winding up third.

The new cars were all the talk as they made their much anticipated debut – and they will be back next week at Martinsville. Between now and then, teams have a ton of data and accumulated knowledge to look over.

For starters, these cars

Danica Patrick's season didn't get off to a good start at Homestead. (Photo: Indy Racing League)

The new cars are centered, or squared, so they are pretty equal. Also, the bodies, and the development that goes into them is about to come to an end because NASCAR now has the 'claw'. The claw is an inspection template that basically comes down over the whole car, and so now the moving around of body parts will quickly become a thing of the past.
The main problem or bonus – depending on how

...so, explain to me again what you hit? Danica Patrick's car is wheeled away after she hit the pit wall. (Photo: Shawn Payne, IRL)

You see, for qualifying you count on a one lap wonder. In most cases you get the car as close to the ground as possible. This normally means running them on the bump stops, which allows the springs to compress and the car runs low, um, well, illegally low. This is fine for qualifying as it is two laps, but in race trim, when the tires get some laps on them, the cars are, well, junk – ask Kyle Busch.

They tend to hop around the track rather than using the suspension to load the car in

Dan "Well-done" smoked them in the opening round of the IRL at Homestead. (Photo: Chris James, IRL)

All in all, despite what Busch says, the new cars were a success, and NASCAR is on track to having a cookie cutter car – just like they envisioned a few years ago.

Bristol notes…

Oh how it pains me to tell you that… wait for

Milka Duno is leaving Daytona Prototypes for the IRL. (Photo: Grand Am)

The answer may well be the same number of UPS lawyers, as Jarrett is fast running out of champions provisionals… oh, and Jarrett was a stellar 42nd today after being dumped early on by Matt Kenseth. Jarrett also wins the soon to come trivia question: Who was the first to wreck a COT, uh sorry, CAN.

Burton shows class

In the final green, white, checker, Jeff Burton proved why he is a professional. He had at least three opportunities to 'dump' Busch and take the win, but he didn't. It was old school racing, but a true professional, and when asked why he didn't dump

Umm, trying to remember what I wanted to say about this Nissan crew... oh yeah... EYE CANDY! (Photo: Grand Am)

2007 Unofficial Race Results : Food City 500
Food City 500 | March 25, 2007 | Race 5 of 36
FIN ST CAR DRIVER MAKE SPONSOR PTS/BNS LAPS STATUS

1 20 5 Kyle Busch Chevrolet CARQUEST / Kellogg's 190/5 504 Running
2 29 31 Jeff Burton Chevrolet Cingular Wireless 170/0 504 Running
3 1 24 Jeff Gordon Chevrolet DuPont 170/5 504 Running
4 40 29 Kevin Harvick Chevrolet Shell / Pennzoil 165/5 504 Running
5 11 16 Greg Biffle Ford Jackson Hewitt 155/0 504 Running
6 9 66 Jeff Green Chevrolet Best Buy 150/0 504 Running

Carpentier and Duno were fourth at Homestead. (Photo: SAMAX Motorsport)

AJ Allmendinger made his first race of the year. (Photo: Chris Trotman, Getty Images for NASCAR)

Jeff Gordon was on the pole at Bristol, finished third and left with the point lead. (Photo: John Harrelson, Getty Images for NASCAR)

Bill Auberlen and Matthew Alhadeff  in Rolex at Homestead

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