HAMPTON, GA – The Daytona 500 was supposed to be a chance for the Team Penske cars to shine again. In the 2018 edition, they dominated. Ryan Blaney led a race high 118 laps that day in what showed to be that Penske had the top superspeedway cars in the game.

This past year’s Speedweeks was looking the same way. Paul Menard in a Wood Brothers car which is aligned with Penske dominated the Clash in leading 51 laps. Joey Logano won his Duel last Thursday night.

In the ‘500 itself, they didn’t show me much.

Brad Keselowski had a terrible Speedweeks where he crashed in the Clash and finished 18th, had early pit road problems in the Duels and finished 20th followed by never really flexing his muscle in the ‘500.

Blaney only led 13 laps in the race and was caught up in the Lap 190 “Big One.” Logano, led just 11 laps himself and while he was racy, he never had enough drafting help to stay up front.

Combined, 24 laps led and one top 10.

This weekend in Atlanta, the lack of speed is still there. Two of the three didn’t even make it out of the first round of knockout qualifying and the third barely cracked the top 20.

Keselowski, will start 19th in his No. 2 Ford. Blaney and Logano will roll off 26th and 27th respectively.

That’s shocking.

Keselowski, has four straight top 10 finishes at the Atlanta Motor Speedway including winning in 2017 and finishing runner-up last year. He started fifth in both races. This is his worst starting spot on the 1.54-mile track since a 23rd place start in 2013. He’d finish 35th that year.

For Logano, he has three top six finishes in his last four Atlanta starts. In fact, dating back to when he joined Penske (2013) he has four top six finishes in six tries. His worst finish is 14th. His worst start is 26th and that was in 2016 when he finished 12th.

Blaney, has never really had a ton of luck in Atlanta with zero top 10 finishes, so he has some work to go.

The thing with the Penske cars is that they were flat out. They just didn’t have the speed. That’s the thing about this new aero package, you can have better handling, but you give up speed in doing so. If you want more speed, the handling goes away.

Another surprise is Kevin Harvick. He won the race last year that Keselowski finished second in. Combined, they have won the last two Atlanta races.

Harvick, has led 101 or more laps in six of his last seven Atlanta starts. He led 181 laps in a win last year. He led 292 of the 325 in a near win in 2017. He led 131 in 2016 and 116 more in 2015. In 2014, he led 195 laps before a late race problem.

Unfortunately this weekend, Harvick has been battling a steering problem. It occurred in the first practice session and they didn’t get to turn many laps. In qualifying, despite changing everything in between practice and the three round session, it didn’t go away.

Harvick, said his car is dangerous to drive and if the race started right now, they’d have to load it up on the hauler and head home. He will start 18th.

The last time Harvick failed to start in the first three rows in Atlanta was in 2013 where he started 30th and finished ninth. It’s the only race since 2012 that he didn’t lead.