NASCAR loves hitting the bricks

INDIANAPOLIS -- Rowdy, Smoke, Junior and 40 other NASCAR drivers are back at work in hope of kissing the bricks.

The Sprint Cup Series, rested from its final weekend off this season, returns to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway for the Allstate 400 at the Brickyard on Sunday.

The race has become the sport’s midsummer classic only 14 years after being added to NASCAR’s schedule, drawing more than 200,000 spectators around the 2.5-mile rectangular track.

Indy’s rich history in open-wheel racing provides an illustrious backdrop that makes the venue appealing to NASCAR drivers, so much so they have developed their own tradition in Victory Lane. The winner and his crew turn their caps backward, kneel and kiss the strip of bricks at the start/finish line that remains from the 99-year-old speedway’s early surface.

“The Brickyard is a special race,” said Dale Earnhardt Jr., whose late father, seven-time Cup champion Dale Earnhardt, won here in 1995. “There’s a ton of history. It’s a top-five track as far as places I want to win over the course of my career.”

But the Brickyard 400 represents more than one prestigious race. It also starts the final swing toward the series’ Chase for the Cup championship playoff. Only seven races remain to set the Chase field; the last two are the Aug. 31 race at Auto Club Speedway in Fontana and the Sept. 6 event at Richmond, Va.

After Richmond, the top 12 drivers in points vie for the title over the season’s last 10 races.

Comfortably atop the points is “Rowdy” Kyle Busch, 23, whose breakout season has included a stunning seven wins through 19 races. But he has yet to win at Indianapolis. “It would mean a lot to kiss the bricks,” Busch said.

The defending Brickyard 400 winner is two-time Cup champion Tony Stewart, an Indiana native known as “Smoke” who considers Indy sacred ground. Stewart, a former open-wheel racer with five Indy 500 appearances, won his second Brickyard 400 last year for Joe Gibbs Racing after casually sipping water at 200 mph on the final lap.

Stewart, currently 10th in points, recently announced plans to leave Gibbs after this season to become a co-owner/driver of his own two-car team, Stewart-Haas Racing, in 2009. There is also speculation that today he will announce plans to drive a No. 14 Chevrolet next year -- the number used by his racing hero A.J. Foyt -- with primary sponsorship from Old Spice and Office Depot.

The second driver for Stewart’s team hasn’t been announced, although Ryan Newman -- who plans to leave Penske Racing after this season -- is considered a top candidate.

Newman also is trying to become the third NASCAR driver -- along with Jimmie Johnson and Dale Jarrett -- to win the Daytona 500 and the Brickyard 400 in the same year. But Newman has struggled at Indy with one top-10 finish in seven starts.

Another driver switching teams after this season is veteran Mark Martin, who will leave Dale Earnhardt Inc. to join Hendrick Motorsports in 2009. Martin said last month that he expected to win the Brickyard 400 this year in his No. 8 Chevy. “Indy is one of the crown jewels of racing and we have the team that can get it done,” he said.

Sunday’s race also will mark the first appearance of NASCAR’s Car of Tomorrow at Indy. Phased in last year and now the sole vehicle used in the Cup series, the COT was designed mainly to increase driver safety.

But drivers have complained that the car makes it difficult to race side-by-side, a problem that could be compounded here because passing already has been a challenge at the flat, sprawling Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

Qualifying to set the race’s 43-car field is Saturday.

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james.peltz@latimes.com

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RACE FACTS

What: Allstate 400 at the Brickyard, Indianapolis

When: Saturday, qualifying (ESPN2, 7 a.m. PDT); Sunday, race (ESPN, 11 a.m.).