Arizona heat

All eyes will be on the Phoenix International Raceway's one-mile oval on Saturday as Martin Truex Jr. can clinch his second consecutive Busch Series championship.

Truex is 84 points ahead of second-place Clint Bowyer and can retain the title with one race to go if he gains 106 or more points on Bowyer in Saturday's Phoenix 200.

Truex would need to lead Bowyer by 190 or more points heading to the final race in Homestead, though a 156-point lead would be enough for Truex to clinch simply by starting next weekend's season finale, meaning he would only have to add 72 points to his lead this weekend.

Bowyer, who has been the series' hottest driver in the past six races, has seen the gap between himself and Truex fluctuate. The RCR driver has shown amazing resilience, bouncing back from two qualifying wrecks and racing with his backup car in the last two races at Memphis (where he won) and Texas (where he finished seventh).

Truex, meanwhile, has missed several opportunities to deliver the knockout punch, most recently with finishes of third at Memphis and 11th at Texas.

This weekend has to be near-perfect for Bowyer and he knows it.

"We have got to get another win or finish in the top three and hope we can put some space between ourselves and the No. 8," Bowyer said. "The last couple of weekends I have put us behind the 8-ball, wrecking in qualifying. But at this point in the season I can't afford to let that happen again."

The points leader with two races to go has won the Busch Series championship in 22 of the series' previous 23 seasons. The exception was 2003 when Scott Riggs led Ron Hornaday Jr. by 17 points with two races left. Third-place Brian Vickers claimed the championship, coming from 23 points behind at the final race at Homestead.

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