NASCAR: Charlotte shakes up playoff picture

Two of the top contenders in the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup will face some adversity over the next two races as both Joey Logano and Kevin Harvick dealt with problems on Sunday during the Bank of America 500 at Charlotte Motor Speedway.

Logano entered the weekend as the defending winner but was eliminated after hitting the wall twice during the first half of the race. The second incident occurred on Lap 156 during a round of green-flag stops but before the Team Penske youngster had hit pit road.

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The first instance occurred on Lap 118 when he blew a left front tire. The second issue was centered around the right front.

"I don't know; tires are popping," Logano said. "We're not the only car that had the issue, but we're the ones that hit the wall when it happened, so that's not the best place to have them go down. We had a fast car. Our car was capable of winning the race. We drove up from 10th and were up to third and running down the leaders, so I felt really good about what we had. I don't know. Things happen. It's part of racing, I guess."

Meanwhile, Harvick, who led 12 laps from the pole, developed a motor problem 30 laps after Logano tagged the wall for the first time. It was only the third time the 2014 champion failed to finish a race this season.

"I thought it was a power issue," Harvick said, "So I cycled through everything. By the time I figured out what happened it just shut off. It looks like low oil pressure. I just hate it for everybody ... they made some great adjustments today and got our car back where we needed to be to run up front and everything was going fine."

Logano and Harvick fell to 11th and 12th in the Chase standings, respectively. Only the top eight will advance to the next round. But Sunday saw several playoff contenders run into problems as Chase Elliott and Austin Dillon were involved in a big 12-car crash.

Here are the updated playoff standings with only two races remaining in this round at Kansas and Talladega.

Jimmie Johnson, 1 win, advanced

Matt Kenseth +31

Kyle Busch +27

Brad Keselowski +25

Kurt Busch +24

Carl Edwards +20

Martin Truex Jr. +19

Denny Hamlin +3

Austin Dillon -3

Chase Elliott -3

Joey Logano -6

Kevin Harvick -8