No more excuses, 48 crew. (Getty Images)

Rounding up the best links from the week that was in NASCAR. Get up to speed without having to worry about getting run over.

• Good news ahead for the 48 team? Jimmie Johnson's pit crew won the Pit Crew Challenge, thus giving themselves another few hours of blessed employment. [AP/Yahoo! Sports]

• Are you betting on this weekend's All-Star Race? If so, you're a lunatic and need help, but here's some odds to get you started. [All Left Turns]

• Check this: the five greatest finishes in All-Star Race history. From Kyle Busch to Rusty Wallace to the Earnhardts, here are some good memories here; let's hope this weekend matches up to the past. [Sports Illustrated]

• Ryan Newman remains pretty darn ticked off at Kurt Busch. No love lost here, without a doubt. [Sporting News]

• Dale Earnhardt Jr. does shop at Wal-Mart, of course. But he usually does so around 1 in the morning. [USA Today]

• No more government spending on NASCAR, as a House Appropriations Committee voted to stop Pentagon

Confused by the format of the All-Star Race? It's easy. You simply race a number of laps equal to your car number multiplied by the number of wins you have in the last ten years, divided by the number of Martinsville hot dogs you can eat at a single sitting, and then do it all in reverse. Even the hot dogs. Simple, right? Here, let Yahoo! Sports' Jay Hart explain it all to you. Pencils at the ready, folks.

Kurt Busch and the ME car at Talladega. (Getty Images)

Welcome to the latest Happy Hour mailbag! You know how these work: You write us with your best rant/ joke/one-liner at happyhournascar@yahoogroups.com or on Twitter at @jaybusbee, we respond to your messages, everyone goes away with a smile on their face.

So I was running low on gas the other day and I tried the Jimmie Johnson solution: turn off the engine and coast, then turn it back on again. FYI: It doesn't work so well in traffic. Now, your letters, starting with the topic du jour:

Urt, Urt, Urt. A lot of us try, and I mean really try, to give you a chance to redeem yourself but it's getting about time to kick you to the curb. This latest deal, roaring through the 39 pits because you were angry, shows me the new attitude is superficial. Like a potential sponsor, I'm going to have to put my money somewhere else. You're an extremely talented driver; just look at how you mowed down the field at last week's Southern 500 with an underfunded team, but you are too much of a liability. I was really hoping to see some real change. How cool would it be to see some great storylines like Phoenix Racing getting a Chase berth? I'm sure writers like Busbee had the whole "phoenix-rising-from-the ashes" story ready in the back of their minds (sorry JayB, no Pulitzer there). What great stuff this would have been. Sorry, Urt, you're fired!

—Thomas

The Kurt Busch saga fascinates me for so many reasons. Have we ever had an athlete in the prime of his career detonating like this? I can't think of anyone; help me out. What Busch's increasingly unhinged rants have shown is that you just cannot trust the guy. He absolutely has a world of talent, but he needed to look at this year as a flat-out internship where anything above finishing half the races constituted a success. Instead, he probably scared away any sponsors or potential new owners with this rant; can you hear it and think there's any chance he changed? At some point, you run out of second chances.

Why talk when you can throw a fist or two? (Getty Images)

Catching up with our year-long Fireball Cup competition, recognizing excellence in the field of NASCAR brawling. And check this out: our new leader has come from nowhere to take charge of the competition in just one race!

Recall our rules, which can and do change on a whim:

• Verbal/Twitter exchange; slightly aggressive driving leading to issues: 1 point
• Bumping cars in an aggressive, making-a-point fashion: 2 points
• Spin, non-critical: 3 points
• Spin, critical: 4 points
• Out of car, punches thrown: 5 points

Fireball Cup stats, Talladega and Darlington:

• Ryan Newman's crew going after Kurt Busch: 2 points
• Kurt Busch, screaming his head off over the radio: 1 point
• Busch, aggressively burning out through the 39 pit stall: 2 points
• Busch, ramming his car into Newman's on pit road: 2 points
• Busch, shouting at the 39 crew himself: 1 point
• Danica Patrick, spinning out Sam Hornish Jr.: 3 points
• Tony Stewart, aggressively mouthing off toward Talladega: 1 point

Which gives us current standings of:

This is lovely: Kurt Busch's radio from Saturday night's race in Darlington. Really, I have nothing to add. This is a [expletive]ing masterpiece. Much more on Kurt this week, trust us. This story ain't getting old any time soon.

[Via Jeff Gluck]

Kurt Busch just wants to talk. Really. (Getty Images)

Saturday night's Darlington pit road altercation between Kurt Busch's boys and Ryan Newman's crew has resulted in fines and penalties for both sides. Here's how it shakes out, per a Tuesday ruling by NASCAR:

• Kurt Busch was fined $50,000 and put on probation until July 25 for "actions detrimental to stock car racing," including "reckless driving on pit road."

• Craig Strickler, one of Busch's crew, was fined $5,000 and put on probation through the end of the year.

• Tony Gibson, Newman's crew chief, is on probation until June 27 because of the actions of his crew.

• Andrew Rueger, one of Newman's crew members, was fined $5,000 and put on probation until June 27.

All of the penalties stem from the late-race incident in which Busch ran a burnout through Newman's pit stall, close to the #39 crew members, and subsequent postrace confrontations between both crews.

Busch wasn't docked any points, but it probably wouldn't have made much difference in his season anyway. After keeping himself

All right, this is cute: a roundup of all the stripes the Lady in Black dished out this weekend. Check it out as many of NASCAR's best drivers (yes, and Danica Patrick, you frothing Danica-is-horrible types) run up against the walls. And the walls maintain their undefeated record!

"The brakes went out, guys, I swear!" (Getty Images)Well, at least he didn't roll through the pit. Jimmie Johnson celebrates after winning at Darlington. But that's the boring real-life explanation. Have a little fun with this one, won't you? Best comment gets you a cupful of 48 smoke.