Points are at a premium

Kurt Busch should be the driver that everyone outside the top 12 is pursuing for the final spot in the Chase.

Instead, the former Nextel Cup champion is the one lagging behind.

When Busch was docked 100 points for reckless driving in early June at Dover, the penalty plummeted him six spots and out of a place for the 12-car, 10-race Chase for the Nextel Cup championship.

Those points could now deny him a chance to race for the title.

“Yeah, that’s what everybody will write about if we don’t make it,” Busch said. “There’s been times where we’ve let quite a few points get away from us. Hopefully the 100 from Dover won’t come into play.”

Busch is one of a handful of drivers vying to claim one of the few slots up for grabs in a six-race stretch that stars in today’s 500-mile race at Pocono Raceway and ends at Richmond. The final six races of the 26-race regular-season put the drivers, their fans and everyone in the sport on edge about how it will all end.

“It’s real nerve-racking,” said Clint Bowyer, who is in 10th. “It’s up to us to ensure that we’re in it.”

For drivers at the bottom of the top 12 like Martin Truex Jr. (11th) or Dale Earnhardt Jr. (12th), this stretch is like the college basketball conference tournaments: Win and you’re in. Lose and, well, you’ll need some help.

“I think everyone’s on the Chase bubble,” Truex said.

Had Busch not been docked those 100 points for reckless driving and endangering one of Tony Stewart’s crew members on pit road, he would have 2,304 points, enough to bump Earnhardt (2,217) outside the top 12.

Busch fell from 11th to 17th in the Chase standings after NASCAR penalized him, and has since worked his way back to 13th on the strength of five top-10 finishes in the seven races since Dover. Busch is followed by Ryan Newman (59 points out of the Chase), Jamie McMurray (113) and Greg Biffle (128), all legitimate contenders to catch Earnhardt, Truex and Bowyer.

Even Jimmie Johnson, once considered a lock for the Chase, has put himself in a vulnerable position by dropping from fourth to ninth in the past three races.

“There is a concern. We don’t want to be in this situation,” said Johnson, who swept Pocono in 2004.

Kevin Harvick held off hometown star Patrick Carpentier to win NASCAR’s inaugural Busch Series race in Canada, but disqualified driver Robby Gordon defiantly tried to claim the victory in a controversial finish that thrilled the crowd.

Gordon took the lead from Marcos Ambrose after a restart with four laps to go, but Ambrose quickly reclaimed it by bumping Gordon out of his way. Gordon went into a spin and the field raced by him as he idled on the course at the historic Circuit Gilles Villeneuve.

Because the caution flag was waving before Ambrose spun him, Gordon believed he was the leader on the restart, or at worst, in second position. But NASCAR ruled he was in 13th, a decision he vehemently disagreed with.

He refused to move out of second place on the restart, earning an automatic disqualification. When the field went green, he quickly pushed Ambrose out of the way and roared into the lead.

But NASCAR refused to acknowledge him, waving a black flag every time Gordon passed the flagstand for the final three laps. It put the real race to the finish far behind him, between Harvick and Carpentier.

Carpentier tried to pass Harvick, but when the move failed, he faded back and never mounted another challenge as Harvick rolled to the win. But Gordon was also celebrating, doing victory burnouts on the track at the same time as Harvick.

NASCAR officials exited the scoring tower and went straight to their office, where Gordon met them minutes after climbing from his car.