Three-peat: Logano reigns at Kentucky

Autoracing Betting Lines

06/13/2010 - Sparta, KY (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Joey Logano outran Carl Edwards in the closing laps and beat the weather to win Saturday's Meijer 300 Nationwide Series race at Kentucky Speedway.

Logano passed Brendan Gaughan and took the lead for good with less than 25 laps remaining. Edwards then chased down Logano within the last 10 laps, but he held off Edwards by 0.67 seconds for his first victory of the season and the seventh of his Nationwide career.

His last win came in October 2009 at Fontana, CA.

Logano became the first driver in series history to win three consecutive races at the same track after starting on the pole for each one of those events. When Logano won his first Nationwide race at Kentucky in 2008, he became the youngest winner at age 18 years and 21 days.

"Oh man, I don't know what feels better, getting three-for-three here or finally getting a win this year," said Logano, who led a race-high 106 laps. "We've had quite a few stolen, and with Carl running right up there at the end, I was saying, 'I don't want to lose another one this way'."

The 300-mile race featured a track record-tying 10 cautions for 51 laps. Logano lost the lead after several late-race restarts, but managed to reclaim the top position shortly after.

"On my restarts, for at least on the first lap, I wasn't up to speed that good, and after that, I was able to make something of this car," he added.

Logano pulled into victory lane just before a severe thunderstorm moved over the 1.5-mile track. Teams were preparing pit strategies in the late-stages of the race in anticipation of the rain shortening the scheduled 200-lap distance.

Edwards finished in the runner-up spot for the second week in a row, while points leader Brad Keselowski overcame a 25th starting position to finish third.

"I'm sure Joey has had a long week, and he deserves that win," Edwards said. "I had him on that high line. I was up there, and I thought, 'Man, I hope they don't tell him what I am doing,' but I knew they were, and he got back up there."

Keselowski now holds a comfortable 272-point advantage over Edwards.

"It was one of those days, but we came away and brought home a solid finish for [this team]," Keselowski said.

Logano, Edwards and Keselowski are pulling the Kentucky-Michigan combo this weekend. The Sprint Cup Series will race at Michigan International Speedway on Sunday. Kyle Busch and Kevin Harvick missed out on the Nationwide race for the second week in a row to concentrate on their Sprint Cup efforts.

Gaughan, who was looking for his first Nationwide win, wound up finishing fourth, and Reed Sorenson took the fifth spot.

Steve Wallace, Scott Wimmer, Justin Allgaier, Scott Riggs and rookie Colin Braun completed the top-10.

Wwwscrapbook Autoracing Betting News

<< Reynolds and D'Backs down Cards
Phoenix, AZ (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Mark Reynolds finished a triple shy of the cycle and Dan Haren tossed eight solid innings, as the Arizona Diamondbacks handled the St. Louis Cardinals, 7-2, in the second test of a three-game series

<< Salazar and LeBlanc lead Padres past Mariners
San Diego, CA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Oscar Salazar hit a three-run home run to help the San Diego Padres dominate the Seattle Mariners, 7-1, in the second of a three-game interleague set. Adrian Gonzalez hit a two-run home run and scored

<< Guillen's 10th-inning homer lifts Tigers over Pirates
Detroit, MI (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Carlos Guillen's homer to start the bottom of the 10th inning gave the Detroit Tigers a 4-3 win over the Pittsburgh Pirates in the second of a three-game interleague set. With Brendan Donnelly (2-1) on the

<< Hamilton homers, Rangers hang on to beat Brewers
Milwaukee, WI (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Justin Smoak hit a two-run double and Josh Hamilton blasted a solo home run, as the Texas Rangers held on to beat the Milwaukee Brewers, 4-3, in the middle portion of a three-game interleague series

<< Hammel impressive on the mound as Rockies shut out Jays
Denver, CO (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Jason Hammel and Manuel Corpas combined on a four-hitter in Colorado's 1-0 victory over Toronto in the middle meeting of a three-game interleague set at Coors Field. Hammel (4-3) yielded only three hits,

Giants' Zito records first win against former team >>
San Francisco, CA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Juan Uribe drove in a pair of runs to help the San Francisco Giants take a 5-4 victory over the Oakland Athletics in the middle installment of a three-game interleague set at AT&T Park. Pablo San

Florida downs Miami, advances to CWS >>
Gainesville, FL (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Austin Maddox's RBI double in the top of the 10th inning lifted Florida over Miami-Florida, 4-3, sending the Gators to the College World Series. Florida, which won 7-2 in the opener of this best-of-t

UCLA coach Howland has surgery >>
Los Angeles, CA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - UCLA head men's basketball coach Ben Howland underwent successful surgery to repair a ruptured right Achilles tendon. The procedure was performed on Friday at the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medi

Rivera homers as Angels edge Dodgers >>
Los Angeles, CA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Juan Rivera clubbed a two-run homer to help the Angels defeat the Dodgers, 4-2, in the middle contest of a three-game interleague series at Chavez Ravine. Howie Kendrick and Torii Hunter each had an

Robben ruled out of Dutch opener >>
Johannesburg, South Africa (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Arjen Robben has been ruled out of the Netherlands' World Cup opener against Denmark on Monday due to a hamstring injury. Dutch manager Bert van Marwijk said that it was too risky to pl

FOOTBALL TRASH TALK

NFL Football Trash Talk

Trash talk has a place in every competitive endeavor (except baseball; those stirrup-wearers are too busy chewing on their sunflower seeds and their supplements to worry about what their opponents are doing).

Fantasy sports is no exception. Any intelligent discussion of the subject would probably start with a thesis statement or a definition of terms. Thankfully, this wont be an intelligent discussion.

Let me just say that I am happy to take a place in this space alongside my talented colleagues, even our commissioner. (You should see how she bleats like a demented paper boy about league fees on our fantasy site).

Trash talking, I would argue, is primarily about amusing your friends, their sheeplike demeanors and sloping foreheads notwithstanding. The best place I have found for football trash talking is at www.SportsAlarm.com.

Beyond the entertainment factor, though, I would recognize that the sophomoric ritual has one advantage, when properly applied. It magnifies your fantasy triumphs and mitigates your fantasy failures by transforming the eventual point total into an afterthought. Winning makes it seem like your opponent really is a truss-owning, lapel-pin-wearing nitwit. And in defeat, trash talk can be the air bag to break the fall from your hyperbolic heights. The plug-necked yahoos on your team, you can say, will be sacking groceries by the end of the season.

The best trash talk, in my view, is layered and nuanced. And it doesnt focus only on your opponents team. It picks apart your opponent. The idea is to create a shock-and-awe-scale blizzard of nonsense, and the goal is to make your opponent drop his hands from his keyboard in exasperation.

What team does your opponent root for? Accuse a Giants fan of having a Joe Namath pillowcase. Wheres your opponent from? Give a look of concern no matter his reply, then say, I'll try to type slower for you next time. Is your opponent into politics? Label everyone a tax-and-spend corporate shill.

Cap all that with a liberal application of irrelevance. For instance, dont just conclude by saying your opponent is a twerp who drafts like my grandmother. Say that your opponent is a sweater-wearing, eyebrow-plucking twerp who drafts his team about as well as Zsa Zsa Gabor gave acceptance speeches at the Oscars. By the time your foe makes sense of that, his starting running back will have had puppies.

But what about you? Hmm? Recall a memorable slam? Have a tried-and-true technique? Know someone who seems impervious to insult? Take a moment and tells us about it. Put together some (fit-for-publication) thoughts. You wont be too busy returning phone messages from your friends, Im sure, to reply.

In addition to the trash talking, the Sports Alarm has a huge gallery of high resolution pictures of beautiful women and models in bikinis. The most popular models are: Lindsay Lohan, Carrie Underwood, Alessandra Ambrosio, and Paris Hilton.